As tradition, I take my dad out to the LA Roadster show at the LA Fairgrounds in Pomona, CA When we got there this year, the parking staff made us go down the NHRA quarter-mile track from finishing point to starting line in order to get to the back of the parking lot.

Being that we are gearheads, we got the crazy idea of racing down the track when done at the show. Since the track was open, we headed to the starting line and laid down water for a burn out. Then a woman in Dodge Magnum asked if I wanted to race. Of course I said yes and we headed down the track. We were neck and neck halfway, but after that she got the lead. I didn’t expect to win, but it was fun racing down the same track the top fuel dragsters go down.

After driving my truck to Gator Drag I dropped it off at a shop in the Houston, Texas area.

This is a sneak peak photo of what I am doing to it.

I may be shooting myself in the foot right now but I have to say this Friday the 13th isn’t going too bad.

I got my rear bumper back from the chrome shop and it looks great. I’m converting the rear bumper on my S10 to a blazer style and I shaved the impact strip. There will be a tech story in the mag very soon showing the whole process so keep your eyes peeled.

I remember going every year to Greenville, MS for Showfest.

It was one of the best events where many wild trucks made their debut. Then at night they all lined up to cruise the nearby strip. The cops were cool and you could legally drag. It was great until the locals of the city got out of control with shootings. Of course the truck enthusiasts were blamed for the whole thing. It sucks that the show is gone, and it bums me out that there is no show like it to this day.

Though some people may think that everyday is a vacation by wearing flip-flops religiously, they should know better when it comes time to driving trucks.

Yeah it may feel nice to let it all hang out with open footwear, but the line has to be drawn there. When it comes time to drive, nothing is better than a snug fitting pair of shoes. I choose a good ol' pair of Converse Chuck Taylor All Stars because of their fit, and thin soles that let me get a good feel for the pedals. With flip-flops it's easy to loose grip in footing, which can lead to accidents. So my advice is to find a good pair of sneakers for everyday driving.

Mike needed help in hauling some large sheetmetal parts for his new truck.

The best solution was for me to lug it around in the gigantic longbed on my ’62 GMC. We figured this was the best way to transport the parts and drove the truck to the shop that had them. Once there, we loaded it up and took off. Even though my truck is old, it did what it needed to and now I know I can count on it for future uses.

When I got my GMC it came equipped with the original longbed.

I like the look of the shortbed version, but don’t want to heavily modify this gem of a truck. When I saw this truck on the street, it convinced me that I don’t need to cut it in order to make it clean. For now my plan is to lower it and keep it as original as I can.

While out in the Houston area of Texas, I noticed several fuel stations carried E85.

I was quite a bit curious what all the hype was about, and since my Chevy S-10 is flex fuel ready, I tried it out. One of the things that got me going was the price of $309.9 versus almost $4 for regular unleaded. After I filled up, I hit the road, and noticed the difference of the 105 octane of the fuel. My excitement soon ended when I started to get only 17mpg versus 26mpg on unleaded. These aren’t exact comparisons, but it is a noticeable difference. In my opinion it is not worth it.

I would just like to point out that Kevin Aguilar stole my blog post! Party foul numero uno! Like Kevin's S10, my not-so-cool S10 just hit the 100,000 miles mark on the way to the Havoc Havasu Show mid-April.

Like Kevin, I got a picture of the event. I don't know how his picture turned out so good, considering it appears as though he was piloting the truck while taking the picture, like me. I haven't mastered the drive'n'click-while-in-traffic yet. And like Kevin, I consistently get 26mpg. On the way to Havoc I got 30mpg, and the return trip home should come out even better. I really didn't think anyone else in the world waited for their truck to turn 100k, and then took a picture of the odometer while driving. I'm shocked. However, unlike Kevin, I got my baby when she was 26k years old. Cheers to a true 100k Kevin!

Glad you made it there safely.

When I started the trip to Conroe, Texas, I knew that my truck was going to hit the 100K mark.

It had to happen some time, but I wasn’t expecting it to come so soon. That’s mostly because I can clearly remember it only having 6-miles on it when new. The rollover was overwhelming, but the truck is still running great and getting 26-miles a gallon. Now that I made it into town, I feel relieved that it continues to run like a champ.

so i finally got off my butt and started working on my '67 again.........

i literally haven't been driving the truck for two reasons; first is that the taillights don't work and i think the problem is the turn signal switch in the steering column. The column isn't easy to remove from my truck because of the way its mounted. Its mounted oddly because of the position of the hole in the firewall. I've been lagging on removing it because I was hoping to put a new, smooth firewall on the truck first. Well since that's not happening any time soon and i'd like to drive my truck, i decided to suck it up and get crackin' on fixing the wiring. There's not a lot to room to work in my garage so this has been no fun.

Sometimes its better to jump at the first sign of trouble.

Here is one of those photos from my archive, taken in 2002 at the SEMA show. One of the guys had a work truck that not only had a generator we were using to power a buffer, it also had a boom. Playing very coy we some how talked Marcel Venable into sitting in the strap. Before he knew it the boom was going higher and higher until it was topped out. After a few choice four letter words Marcel asked to be let down and we all responded by walking away leaving him there to blow in the wind. Needless to say he was finally let down but not after we let him sweat it out for a while.

Before heading out 1,500 miles to Conroe, Texas for the Gator Drag show, I am going through a weekend full of maintenance on my truck.

I started out with a serpentine belt replacement, and now I have moved on to placing a stock set of wheels on the front to minimize the wear on my 20’s. Next I will check all fluids and replace the oil, transmission fluid, and gear oil. Afterwards I will check my tire pressure and all suspension components. Once I pack a set of emergency tools, I should be all set to go on my journey.

get 'em while they last.....

There's a new DVD out that covers the world of custom trucks. Go behind the scenes of your favorite truck magazines with the Havoc movie. The DVD covers both the bowling green and lake havasu installments of our Havoc truck shows and you can see the staff at work. As a bonus, you'll get behind the scenes looks at some of ST's best model photo shoots. aww yeah!

For 2008, a third Havoc stop has been added to the calendar! Sandwiched between the Havoc Havasu Show (April 11-13, 2008) and the Havoc Kentucky Show (August 2-3, 2008), the Havoc Fresno Show (June 28-29, 2008) will be a great summertime event to add to your calendar!

Click on the images below for show information:

Ever since I was little, I have been into miniature metal cars.

I guess I’m addicted to them since I still collect them. Many of my friends are into them too. Just recently my friend Cory bought a brand new house and dedicated a whole room to display his collection. I am so jealous.

This is what happens when I get bored. I think I need help

Look at this. I got bored one day and decided to have a little fun with some hot dogs. I think I was inspired by the opening credits of Napoleon Dynamite. The fun part about this was when I was done farting around I got to eat the project. I think I will be working with food some more….

my new favorite camera is.....

the GoPro Motorsports Hero wireless camcorder. Its smaller than my Amex card and takes killer color video. Go buy one!

During my last plane flight to a show, I had a stop in Salt Lake City, Utah.

When I arrived it was 35-degreees and still snowy. Since I stayed in the airport, I wasn’t too cold in my T-shirt and short. Though I’m glad I live in SoCal.

Sitting in the passenger's seat of my brother's fresh-out-of-the-backyard (you know what I mean) 1993 Toyota, we watched the sun rise as we headed to Danger Zone in Visalia, CA, this past Saturday, April 5, 2008.

Since this was our first time attending this show, we didn't know quite what to expect. Although I hadn't been to Danger Zone before because it's nearly 200 miles away, it bugged me that there was a decent (so I had heard) CA show that I was missing out on.
On the road, we zoomed (our speedometer wasn't working, but we sure seemed to come up on cars quickly) past several vehicles that were obviously heading to the show, which has always been a big part of the show-day excitement to me. As we approached the park, we saw trucks lined up on the street, waiting to just get through the park's gates. At this point, we both realized it was going to be a huge show and a great day. While some may complain at having to wait in a big line at a show, I was excited, because it meant people had shown up! After hitting up the McDonald's drive through, we settled into the line of trucks.
As I've already mentioned, I was very pleasantly surprised by the show. It was HUGE and I felt the same excitement that I had felt my very first show. There's just something about going to a new show (new to you at least), when you've been in the scene for a long time. All day long I was completely stoked to be there.
Awesome venue, fun time; can't wait until next year!

Recently the 305cid V-6 in my “62 GMC started to run on the warm side. I could not figure out what was going on, since the truck ran fine before the water outlet blew a hole. I flushed the system and refilled the system with all new fluid. That didn’t work, so I fixed the next possible weak link. That happened to be the water pump, which was swapped out in a matter of 30-minutes.

The only thing left to do was to take it out and test it. To do so, I had to take the risk of driving it on the freeway and hope it didn’t overheat. So, to make things interesting I set a goal of making it to The Hat for lunch. That burger joint is about 8-miles of freeway driving from our office and that was a long enough distance to test it out. To my surprise it made it, and I had a kick-ass meal to boot. Now I know for a fact that the new water pump solved my problem.

So pops got his truck cab painted last week.

He called me on Friday to let me know his friend Slick Vic was putting down coats of the Grabber Orange color on the cab of his '53. Dad has been doing the body work on the truck for about a month so i was very excited to see it all shinny. After Vic was satisfied the cab was dry we strapped in on the trailer and brought it back to the shop and set the cab on the frame. I snapped the shot right after we got the doors on. What do you think of the color? and do you think it going to need any graphics?

For those of you who have remained bitter over never being elected class president or Homecoming Queen/King, fear not! April is your month to finally win a popularity contest. The best part is that all you have to do to enter is upload your vehicle to Readers' Rides. Many of you have already done this!

HERE'S THE DEAL: The ride with the most votes by 5PM PST Wednesday, April 30th, 2008, wins "stuff." "Stuff" means whatever the editors and staff decide to throw in to support the contest. Editors, let us know what you've got! Sounds easy enough, right? Well, some conditions apply. 1. Nine sites (Mini Truckin, Sport Truck, JP, Four Wheeler, Off-Road, Diesel Power, 4 Wheel Off-Road, 4WD & Sport Utility, Truckin') are involved in this contest; 9 sites, 1 winner, winner gets all the "stuff." 2. You can only vote once per ride. If you try to vote again, all you'll be able to do is modify your original vote. 3. You can't vote for yourself (and even if you could, it would only be once). Sorry, that's just how the system works!     

WHAT THIS MEANS: 1. You desperately and utterly need others to help you out by voting for you. We suggest you spread the word via Myspace, Facebook, text messages, emails, letters, and perhaps having an airplane depict it in the sky. This might force you to turn up the charm and manipulate others into voting for you, but in the end, you will be much more popular and have improved networking skills, all thanks to this contest. And, that is what it's going to take to win. 2. You will need to keep your eye on the competitors, both on your site and on the other sites. To the best of my knowledge, you can't easily cheat the system, so you'll have to win fair and square. Sorry. 3. You will need to work quickly. You only have one month, and some rides already have some votes stockpiled. 4. You will need to trust us, because this is NOT an April Fool's joke, even though it is being launched April 1st and would make the perfect joke. The ride with the most votes really will walk away with tons of "stuff."

HOW IT WORKS: The winner will be chosen purely on the number of votes. In the case of a tie, the ride with the higher overall rating wins. In the case of having the same overall rating, the ride with more page views wins. Once announced, the winner will have one week to reply to us, as it's possible the most popular ride could belong to someone who is uninvolved, which would be messed up. If we don't hear from the winner, we'll move to the next ride with the most votes, and so on.

Hope you all have a lot of friends. If not, start networking now! Let the games begin!     

While skimming through a recent celeb magazine, we spotted Cora in a candid photo.

It seems that she is now in a relationship with Brody Jenner of MTV’s hit show The Hills and getting some newfound press. Since, we have worked with her many times, we can say that it’s always a pleasure, and she deserves all this attention. Congrats Cora!

this could be my new truck if the price of gas keeps climbing....

i just paid 3.63 for a gallon of 87 octane gas in Anaheim, California. Ouch. I'll give it about two more months before i'm payin' four bucks a gallon. I don't know who's responsible for this but if it keeps up pretty soon i'll be taking a pack mule or my skateboard to work.