Featured Cars: Custom Street and Classic Rods, Build kits

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Though a common street rod practice is replace the fabric and wood roof opening with sheet metal Petty didn’t go that route. “The theme did not allow for it to be filled or chopped,” says Petty, who reasoned that a teenager back in the 1960s would likely not have attempted such a complex undertaking. Instead, Bogus Bob out of California supplied the wood kit and ribs. The original style vinyl roof insert was used from Snyder’s NY and held in place with the original tack strip. “I felt it made the car period correct and theme correct at the same time,” says Petty.

While the Lil’ Coffin was usually different shades of red Petty chose a more subtle but still stunning colour: Toyota’s Speedway Blue. “I felt it has a show car feel,” he says. “It is vibrant and in the right light looks like a special recipe made in the back room of a paint shop.” Sandy Morita, a lower mainland hot rod paint and body icon gets credit for the base/clear paint and finish. “He buffed it up to the endless shine it now sports,” says Petty. The frame was painted with a tougher PPG Concept Acrylic Urethane paint tinted to match the upper body color. The final touch on the body was a pinstripe job by Myc Roc. (See photos on page 48).

If the car was really built in the 1960s a junkyard 289 or 302 SBF might have been used and The Tiki Dream powerplant follows that theme...at least in spirit. The engine is accessorized with Edelbrock finned air cleaner and valve covers to mimic a 1960s era 302 but it is actually a 1994 Prototype Mustang Cobra engine Petty says was originally built to run in the Can-Am race circuits in the US.

“The motor was brand new, on its original shipping crate when I got it,” says Petty. “From what we can tell, it produces over 340hp. We searched through Ford and could not find build info on the motor other than the build sheet showing a $1 charge for the engine. Ford actually put it through on their invoice as $1 for the whole car as it was part of sponsorship for a race team in the US.”

Petty removed the fuel injection from the motor and replaced it with an Edelbrock Air gap manifold and a Holley 600cfm carburetor. He then used an MSD electronic distributor, MSD coil and plug wires, Ford SVO reverse flow water pump, Ford SVO ceramic coated headers and Ron Reader pulleys made in Michigan specifically for 5.0L conversions to old style water pumps.

The exhaust was built with galvanized 3" pipe , using a Ford style H pipe set-up, and flowing through Magna-flow stainless steel mufflers. The ends are capped off with 16" S/S tips. The wiring kit used was an American Auto Wire Highway 22 installed by Claire Henderson. An Odyssey gel battery is mounted under the cabin floor and between the crossmember.

When it was time to do the interior Petty contacted Davlin Upholstery in Victoria, BC to stitch Pearl White naugahyde with Caribbean Blue inserts on 1977 Mustang II bucket seats up front and on the stock rear seats which received new springs from Snyder’s Auto Seat Covers (Rochester, NY). The ’60s style tuck and roll job perfectly suits The Tiki Dream. “With over 240 hours in the interior, I really feel Dave at Davlin hit it out of the park,” says Petty. A set of airline style seat belts were used with a color matching seat belt material and the custom headliner and side panels were placed in the car in one piece to give the interior a seamless look. The interior door trim is from a 1959 Chrysler Saratoga 2-door sedan. “I used it to separate the colours on the panels and tie the colour flow together front to back,” says Petty. “I bought it off eBay as a gamble it might work and when we tried to install the stainless steel trim it didn’t really fit. But then we flipped it upside down and it fit like it was made for a Deuce door.”

Glass and window installation was done by B&N Hotrods. Windows use stock hardware front and rear as per the period theme. The dash is stock, with a So-Cal Auburn style dash insert. The dash panel was split horizontally and a 1.5” strip added to fit the insert and retain the look of a stock dash. The heater is a swap meet find from an early ’40s GM or aftermarket brand of that time period. The core was rebuilt, a new 2-speed motor sourced and the doors chromed. Petty took the cover to the Grand National Roadster Show and had California pinstriper Herb Martinez, a well known and respected striper from the ’60s and ’70s, lay down some lines.

Limeworks out of Whittier, CA supplied the 16" 1936 Ford Banjo-style steering wheel. The column is a 1940 Ford style stainless steel column. The tach cup for the 4” Classic Instruments tach is also stainless steel as are the turn signal switches. Classic Instruments also supplied the white-faced gauges from their White Hot series. There is fuel, voltage, temperature, speedometer and oil pressure gauges. The dome light is a Bob Drake unit used because of the Art Deco style ribs and petty used a Lokar Lakester gas pedal and throttle cable.

The stereo is a Secret Audio unit by Spectre. It hides under the rear seat and is controlled wirelessly. The Alpine speakers are hidden behind the rear side panels and in the front via the lower kick panels. Perforated holes were used instead of an ugly speaker grate or screen. The final touch was a carved Tiki statue drilled to use as a shift knob. The T-5 manual transmission was sourced from a Fox body Mustang and uses a B&M Short Shifter unit with a home made extension rod.

While The Tiki Dream, so named after the owner’s fondness for Tiki carvings and the ’60s-era surf culture they are often identified with, took 12 years to come true it was worth the wait. In its first show, the BC Classic and Custom car show held at the Tradex in Abbotsford in April The Tiki Dream took 1st place in the 1960s Retro Hot Rod Class. While it will never experience the type of use it did with its first owner up to 1953 the reborn ’32 already has 2,500 miles on the odometer. Petty doesn’t know where the car will be in 50 years but he knows it will have a lot more miles on it and that’s as it should be.

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