NZ Trip 2011....HR Blowout/shed visits/Nostalgia Drags...PICS GALORE!

I live here ( well other Island), Shed 5 , NEVER heard of it , looks like a bloody great place .My food would go cold.

 

N.Z. has been at the top of my places to go list for years. Looks like a magical place with great hot rods and left points!! Pics remind me a bit of central Cal. Thanks for sharing Kevin.

 

Prepare to have your mind blown! That is if you can wrap your mind around what you are about to see. These are completely scratch built models built by Graham Berry. When I say scratch built I mean he builds every single piece of every car from scratch and to scale. These are mostly built from brass. The bodies are fiberglass. Check out the detail of the brass work in the unfinished cars! Imagine the work in that quick change rearend and then imagine building a complete finished car with working suspension, steering, doors etc. He's like a crazy hot rodding jeweler on crack!

Graham Berry is a legend in New Zealand hot rodding. He's the top race car builder for many, many years building everything from front engine dragsters, funny cars, altereds etc to record breaking salt cars. He is a pioneer of early speed equipment manufacturing in NZ with partner Dave Chung in Berry & Chung speed equipment. He is a Hero of mine and I don't have many.



Hogan/Berry funny car under construction



Bill Ward 's Bonneville car under construction....





How about this one, everything to scale and working...



And the body for it, how would you make that grill?



Here is the engine in the red A coupe....



Here is the latest masterpiece, perfect miniature of the Orange Crate.I think there needs to be a 10 page article on the greatest hot rod modeler ever in the Rodders Journal. Fascinating stuff!











Graham Berry and Squeak Bell. 2 legendary Kiwis.

 

Here are some scans from the Feb 2011 New Zealand Hot Rod Magazine about the Orange Crate Model. Check out the NZHRM website ....New Zealand Hot Rod Magazine - HOME

 

kiwi you should put this in sundays models thread.if they don' mind .awesome work,thanks for posting

 

Great thread, makes me miss my homeland! Go New Zealand.

 

Great picture Kev, Thanks very much!

Nick.

 

a truely awesum thread Kev!

 

Awesome thread Kev..........talent does not describe it. "Gods gifted hands".

 

Don't want to hijack Kev's thread but heres a few more blowout pic's for folk to enjoy

 

DB gave this injected Hemi powered A to his son for his 21st a few weeks earlier!

 

And of course Kiwi Kev also had some serious judging duties too while he was there, i think he was looking foward to it?











Hijack over!

 

Kev, So glad for you. Thanks for sharing your trip. Slim

 

Shed 5 is the Deus Ex Machina Motorcycle Cafe in Auckland CBD that we have talked about on the NZHRM forum

 

Thanks for sharing these great pictures! Makes me want to go to NZ. Hopefully someday! Hope there are more pictures, I can't get enough of them. Thanks again for putting them on.

 

Great thread thanks for sharing I swear I could smell the vinegar on the fish n chips !

 

We dont usually have vinegar on f n c here. More of a Watties Tomato Sauce thing in NZ.

 

Awesome thread. Mike is a genius and one of the nicest guys you'll ever meet.

 

DAY THREE...Sunday...Hot Rod Blowout show...


Woke up and it wasn't raining so that was good! Headed for the show in Chris's roadster pickup. The show is held on the grounds of the Avondale go kart track. This is also the location of the Auckland speedway club's track for racing speedway bikes. The Blowout cars are parked in the go kart track pits (top right of pic). Preferred parking for street rods, 50's and 60's cars etc is around the karting track. Regular spectator cars park everywhere else. Numbers were down a little compared to previous years due to the wet weather leading up to the show but it was still a good turnout and the show was a success.



One of the first to roll in was Gary Rae in his channeled 32 roadster. He has recently rebuilt the car back to the way it was in the early 70's. It was almost destroyed in a fire. As a kid of about 11 I saw this car one day and it left a lasting impression. I was standing on the lawn outside my house on a quiet morning and just stared as this bright red roadster rumbled up to the stop sign, stopped and made a left turn and disappeared down the street. That vision is still etched in my mind.



After the fire....



Earlier days....



Both these cars were at the show 30 plus years after this pic was shot....



Mike Ujdar drove it in, a great moment!



4 Kiwi rods from the old days...









Pictures from the Blowout area...

 

A lot of cool engines to check out...

 

Graham Berry with a display of his incredible models. Graham is an honorary Scrounger.





John Reid has an incredible shop today and builds high end street rods. When he was a teenager in the early 70's he built this T bucket called Vandal. It was in a class by itself among the local cars of the day. The real car was recently restored and this is the model of it Graham built....



The real thing...



Later John rebuilt the car black with flames and re named it Black Sabbath...



Here is the model of the second version...



Earlier examples of Graham's work...

 

Some Kiwi club plaques....















I even saw one of these....

 

WOW!
I have enjoyed your shared trip so very much.

Simply: Beautiful !

 

I got to hang out and talk with HAMBer gasserkiwi and his cool son who is collecting parts for a 39 Willys sedan build. He needs a hood and front doors if anyone can help out.

 

Great stuff Kev! Thank's for taking the time to post it all.

 

And then managed to blow up Diff, Trans and crack the block the following week at the Nostalgia drags......Doing the burnout from HELL at the time! I couldn't think of a better way for it to happen!

(DB gave this injected Hemi powered A to his son for his 21st a few weeks earlier!)

 

Some pics from the preferred parking area....

 

Thanx for the super trip to New Zealand Kev, really a nice travel story for us to enjoy. Man those fish and chips look great. Thanx bro ~sololobo~

 

WOW!........some seriously fine cars and culture....and Graham Berry is way off the hook...those models are amazing! .........TRJ should definitely do a story on him and his work......