Shop Tour - Hardcore Drag Racing

  This cool looking Gasser is based on a 1962 Mercury Comet. The Ford-Lincoln-Mercury exec’s were looking for a catchy name and they found one ! The NASA space-race was on everyone's mind at the time, so they named it after NASA’s mission “Mercury”, added in Comet for an extra nod to the space-race and you have a winner. The body was painted a classic matte-black. Throw in some old-school lettering and some period looking decals and you have a classic race car for the street.     The body was customized with the typical racer tricks of the day, the front bumper was removed & the grill was worked over by removing the inner headlights.   Poking through the fiberglass hood sits a transplanted Chevrolet 454 big-block, topped off with a tunnel ram and dual quad Holley carburetors. The motor was hopped-up with a solid roller cam and roller rocker arms.  Backing up the big-block is the heavy duty TH-400 with a high stall converter and manual valve body, the transmission shifts at

    The Wicked 1 is a 1948 Anglia two-door sedan owned by Gerard Milidantri from Suffern, New York.  He’s a general manager of an aerospace company that overhauls turbine engines and on the weekends he runs the Anglia at South East Gasser events.   The club brings back  Drag Racing from the late sixties and the cars must have period correct parts that you could buy up until 1967 and no later . No modern electronics , no automatics, no electronic fuel injection . Only open headers & a 4-speed , perfect for wheels up launches. We caught up with The Wicked 1 & Gerard at Island Dragway in Great Meadows , New Jersey.   This Anglia was hand-built in Pennsylvania in the late sixties by a fellow named GK Bernard. It was later purchased by SEGA emcee Quain Stott .   At a SEGA event in 2019 it was the first time Gerard had seen the Anglia, and it made such an impression that he sold the his Corvette and decided to pursue SEGA racing. In 2021 they struck a deal and bought the Angl

  Robert George is from New Zealand and races this cool old school 1974 Camaro Z28. The original steel body was outfitted with fiberglass doors and front clip from Hairy Glass .  In race trim it only weighs 2350 pounds.   It features a full Chris Alston tube chassis with a Mustang II front end. Out back a set of ladder bars mount to a Dana 60 filled with 5:13 gears & a spool.  QA-1 shocks handle the bumps front and rear.   This is Robert's office. More high quality tin work is through out the interior. An old school cable drive Moroso Tach. sits on the dash , and only a trio of gauges is needed to keep an eye on things.       For power an LS7 454 fills the engine bay. It breaths through a big Holley Dominator carb. And it's filled with old school speed secrets. Dress up items include vintage Moroso valve covers.  The horsepower is sent to a TH-400 transmission with a trans-brake and a high-stall torque converter.     Here is a view with the front clip installed , we can s

  The room in this speed-shop is Heaven for me , because these are my favorite wheels of all time .  Ansen or E-T Slots look great on anything . Gasser's, Muscle Cars , Drag Cars and don't forget Custom-Van's. The Sprint style slot wheel came in sizes from 3 inches wide  to 14 inches wide . and you could get them in 13  to 15 inch diameters with the most rare being 16in. , those were mostly for Dragsters .   The street car wheels were made with cast aluminum , while the race versions were made in magnesium  . They were made with bolt on center caps or push in caps .    This example is a15x14  Ansen   Sprint slot wheel,with a 4- inch back space.                          Slot wheels give any street machine that racing look and just add to the cool factor !       It is very rare to find a set of 15x12 or 15x14's for sale , but about once a year I seem to find a set on Ebay .     I'm looking for a set of Ansen 15x10 or 15x12's in the Ford/Mopar Pattern of -5x 4

     * Street Freaks   * What is a Street Freak?  It's a street driven Drag Strip dropout, de-tuned for Sorta-Legal   on-road Cruising. Take a fugitive funny car with a dynamite engine and jacked up suspension, add mufflers (rarely), lights and the biggest street tires (most only had slicks) and drive it on the street ! I grew up in North Jersey in the early 80's , reading every car magazine I could get my hands on . Yes, you could still hold something in your hands and read it !  I had a subscription to Hot Rod at 9 years old and renewed for at least 10 years , until it got over run with ads . I would also purchase  Car Craft , & now defunct Popular Hot Rodding & Cars Illustrated at the news stand / magazine store . This was my only education about Hot Rods or any cars for that matter, as I was the only one in my family who was interested in cars. And as luck would have it , my house was the only one on my street with out a driveway or garage . So convincing my fat