What I’m Watching: Z Dream

I’m not the biggest Fast & Furious franchise fan. I mean, I liked the first one when it came out, but I was already a car-obsessed teen at that point, so it’s not like it changed my life or started my obsession. I enjoyed the summer vibes of the second instalment, but by the time the third one came around it started to get lost on me, and I didn’t even bother with 4 onwards. But when I heard that Sung Kang had bought his own s30z project to build up, I thought “hey, this is kind of cool!”, a Hollywood actor buying a shitty old Datsun, not too dissimilar to mine, who’ll be building it up just as he wanted. When I noticed the build transformed from a “car guy passion project” into a “Workshop x Media Partner x SEMA” build, I went “okay, this is still kinda cool, but not as cool as it was before”. But I digress! I shouldn’t have let my narrow mind get the better of me before actually watching the start of the series. Once I sat down to view the first video, I realised there really is a hell of a lot of passion being poured into this, from everyone involved, including the owners, the builders, and the creatives putting this series together for us. I’ll be updating this post when each new video comes out, so keep checking back.

Click here for more videos.

RAMPAGE – 2nd Gen Camaro

Have you heard of the Rampage Camaro? Of course you have, it was arguably the biggest hit of SEMA 2014; a second generation Camaro with a full slathering of motorsport technology and fabrication bestowed onto it by the wizards at Roadster Shop. And what’s better than seeing pictures of a glossy finished car shining under stadium lights? Pictures of that same car in bare metal with little to no panels bolted to it! I actually found this build through another featured build. I was browsing for updates on the red MKII Supra (whose owner works at Roadster Shop), when I saw him post a link to this build within his own thread. See, it always pays to look through the archives, you never know what you’ll find! I honestly had a lot of trouble figuring out which pictures to use for this post, as I found myself wanting to save pretty much every damn image from the thread, so I hope you enjoy the visual banquet that is this build as much as I did. It might not be achievable for most of us, but it’s nice to dream and peek into the upper echelon of car building once in a while. Who knows, you might find an idea or two for your own build?

Click here for more Roadster Shop builds (there are four so far including this one).

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Mach 40 Mustang/GT

Buried inside one of the many great 2012 SEMA posts on Speedhunters was this highly customised Ford Mustang, a car that some might dismiss at first glance. Actually, calling it a Mustang is probably a bit of a stretch, because this extreme 1-off build is actually based on a rear-engined 2006 Ford GT, with the appearance of a lower and longer ’69 Mach 1. While there isn’t a build thread as such, you can still head to the bottom of the post to see hundreds of photos of the build process on the creator’s own website, Eckert’s Rod & Custom.

Click here for more Mustang builds.

Thanks to Geoff for submitting.

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RTR-X Mustang Speedhunters

If you’re a regular Speedhunters reader, then you would have already seen this monster being built over the last couple of months. For those of you who aren’t, here’s the lowdown…

Ford, Monster Energy Drink, and Team Need For Speed teamed up with Formula D driver Vaughn Gittin Jr. to build a street/drift styled ’69 Mustang to debut at SEMA 2010. Using a brand new Dynacorn body and an Art Morrison chassis as bases for the project, numerous sponsors came on board and threw their own catalogue of desirable parts at the build, culminating in one awesome ‘stang.

The best part is that Vaughn plans to hit the track in this beast in the future, so keep a close eye on Speedhunters because this ’69 won’t be confined to car shows. Find the links to the build after the jump.

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Mercedes Bent 600/190SL

A lot of attention at SEMA seems to be directed at this very interesting SL Merc, and rightly so. A modern SL600 mated with an oldschool 190SL, meticulously grafted together by Hot Rods & Custom Stuff. A quick Google search of their business name brought me to their website, and like most of the top builders in the US, they have dedicated galleries for each of their projects, so head on down to the bottom of the post to find the link.

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Twin Turbo ’70 Firebird

Well, it’s the silly season, aka SEMA season, so a bunch of huge builds have been wrapped up just in time to make it through the doors of the Las Vegas Convention Centre. One of those builds is this evil looking, black on black, twin turbo, 1970 Pontiac Firebird built by the team at All Speed Performance. I was lucky enough to catch the build thread a couple of weeks ago when the car was in the body shop, so I was excited to check up on it’s progress now that some SEMA coverage is starting to flow, and thankfully it was completed in time. Build thread link after the jump.

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