After driving the three week rebuild around with no rego or cert I decided to rebuild the pick up. I had been to the Hot Rod Blow Out, Beach Hop and a couple of Nostalgia Drags in it and I think it was after coming home from the drags one day on 2-3 cylinders I thought I had better do something about it, I also recall Tony Cassar, from Australia coming over with his mate who I took to Puke's Just-A-Cruise one time. He had this brilliant white hot rod show T shirt on and between the oil coming through the floor and the water coming through the the windscreen from the radiator his "new" white shirt looked like it had been dragged across the floor of a wrecking yard.
I blew the pick up apart at my parents ranch in Pukekohe and proceeded to get the car ready for cert. I had to add fishplates to the chassis joins, strengthen the centre cross member, fully seal the firewall and floor and use clips on the brake lines as per the Low Volume Vehicle Technical Association (LVVTA) regulations. I also fully wired the car - turned out that the electrictian that came round used to be a part owner in my Dad's Vanguard powered midget in the mid sixties and it was him that fitted the Vertex magneto.
I worked at Pioneer Auto Parts at the time and purchased a few boxes of VNT black engine enamel to paint the car in the yard! Together with the powder coated red 16" '35 wires it looked okay from a distance! I fitted twin Holden Stromberg carbs and an outside header too.
I thrashed like crazy to get it to the Rotorua Street Rod Nationals but a mixture of no sleep and teh fast approaching deadline led to a radiator cap problem. Once I came home and relooked at the car I realised how small the problem was. The car was certed, regoed and on the road, the T5 made open road driving a true breeze for the eighty year old banger! The car was featured in this new guise in the May 2005 issue of New Zealand Hot Rod Magazine - www.nz-hotrod.com
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