Angela Crompton, Marlborough Express, April 2013
The ‘Peculiar Green’ truck built by Blenheim classic car restorer Mark Stead, second left, and the pink 1937 Ford Cabriolet, fourth from left, he restored for Kaikoura couple Stu and Glynis Windle line up with the other top vehicles at the New Zealand Street Rod Nationals in Taupo
Keep on truckin’
Success at two North Island car shows brings kudos to Mark Stead’s custom car-building skills and, he says, endless bragging rights.
The truck he drove to the shows took him two years and two months to build and is identified on its registration papers as a 2012 Big Shed Customs COE (cab over engine).
It was one of the top five “People’s Choice” vehicles among 1000 entries at the Whangamata Beach Hop in the Coromandel late last month.
“Voters” made their choices by dropping money into a bin beside the vehicle they liked the most.
“The car attracting the most cash was the overall winner and the money in all bins was donated to community causes in Whangamata.
Bragging rights: Blenheim car restorer Mark Stead stands beside the 2012 Big Shed Customs COE truck he built, identified among the top vehicles at two North Island car shows.
photo: Derek Flynn
Last year the beach hop car vote raised more than $30,000.
The following weekend was Easter and Mark lined his truck up with other contenders at the New Zealand Street Rod Nationals in Taupo.
There, it and a 1937 Ford Cabriolet Mark restored for Kaikoura couple Stu and Glynis Windle were among the top-10 vehicles.
The Windles took home the Taupo Rodders club trophy.
This week Mark’s truck is back home at his Big Shed Customs workshop, opened in Riverlands 12 years ago.
The qualified panelbeater builds custom cars and restores hot rods, street rods, muscle cars and classic vehicles.
The truck is the first Mark has built for himself and he worked on it after hours, most week nights and nearly every weekend.
A HiLux chassis was chosen for its strength and wheel base size, and the readily available suspension and steering parts.
He fitted the chassis with a 5-litre, 302 Ford fuel-injected engine with a 4-speed Falcon auto gear box and diff assembly.
The body was based on the style of a 1950s delivery truck.
Asked about the goods his 2012 vehicle will deliver, Mark said: “Mates say ‘a fat head and an ego.”
Hear how he created the cab and deck, though, and he has the right to feel a little proud.
“I can’t draw . . . I [just] knew what I wanted.”
He drew some cardboard templates then cut into 10 sheets of panel steel which were stretched and shrunk into shapes using a power hammer and an “English wheel”, a metal-making tool that forms compound curves from flat sheets of metal.
“Everything has a natural shape. My hands and my eyes tell me where it’s at.
“With my eyes I can see where I want to go next and by running my hands over it I can feel any imperfections.”
Finally, the truck was painted metallic green, specially mixed to resemble an empty Heineken bottle.
The truck’s official colouring is identified as “Peculiar Green,” inspired by a woman Mark overheard last year exclaiming: “That’s a peculiar truck and what a peculiar green.”
Peculiarity helped it stand out, he said, and people at the North Island shows had started referring to “that Blenheim truck”.
It is easy to handle on the road with power steering and a 5-litre engine but Mark doesn’t want to talk about fuel efficiency.
“I don’t know. I just put fuel in it.”
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http://www.stuff.co.nz/marlborough-express/news/8548743/Keep-on-truckin