Chevy II Nova Gasser: Week to Wicked
If you've been paying attention to the goings-on around Speedway Motors over the past few years, you may remember a little yellow '52 Chevy truck. We partnered with Classic Trucks magazine to transform the ho-hum stocker into a lowered, LS-powered hot rod in one week. They call it Week to Wicked, and we had so much fun last time that we decided to do it again.
This time, we've teamed up with Car Craft magazine to do something truly unique. If we were worried about being trendy, you might expect to see a pro-touring build based on one of our G-Comp suspension systems. Instead, we chose to go back in time to the days when not all hot rods were inches off the ground on 18" wheels. This time we're building a gasser, or a street freak, or an A/FX-er, or whatever you want to call it. It will be tall, proud, loud, and above all fast. It will be the kind of car that would have lurked under the street lights at some long ago street race. Or played as an extra in Two Lane Blacktop, fighting it out at the drags against some brand-new muscle car.
So what car have we chosen to be our victim? It's a '67 Chevy II two door sedan with a fresh paint job, a straight six engine, and not much else. We bought the car from a local customer who also has a mean G-Comp equipped '67, so we were able to talk him out of this one. It's a very straight car, but most of the trim and interior are missing in action.
That's another way in which we're breaking with traditional Week to Wicked practice. It's typical to begin the transformation with a nicely restored stock vehicle. This makes it much easier to finish in a week. Our Nova, however, looks more like the cars that we're used to starting with. Mice have run away with most of the seat. The front fenders arrived separately after having hung in the barn for a few years. And those cool mag wheels? Don't get too attached, they weren't included in the deal, so we scrambled around the shop to find some suitable rollers.
To complete the project, we've gathered some restoration parts from our shelves to fill in the missing pieces. Once it starts looking more like a Nova, we'll start adding parts out of our catalog that are brand new but look like they belong on a late 60's/early 70's build. We're also well aware that when you bolt a straight axle under a car and drive it around with slicks that it better have some power to back up all that talk. To that end, we've teamed with Speedway Motors Racing Engines to build a stout 496 big block Chevy that's sure to annihilate our little slicks whenever the need arises.
We're pretty excited about this project, and we hope you'll tune in to watch it all come together. We officially start the transformation on Monday, August 12th, and by the end of the week we'll fire up our completed Nova gasser. You can see all the action on Hotrod.com