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Little ‘Pirate’ up for grabs

25 March, 2015

It was at the first New Zealand Drag Nationals at Kopuka on a dry summer’s day in 1967, where Bob Rossiter’s ‘Pirate’ dragster faced off against the team of Lucas and Saunders in their matching flathead-powered rail job called ‘77 Sunset Strip.’

The Pirate, running on an exotic homemade brew of sodium peroxide, nitromethane, and magnesium sulphide, sat on the start line spitting flames of multicoloured gas out of the weed burners. Neither pilot would inch forward to stage, with some saying it was the longest pre-stage driver psych-out in drag-racing history. But then, just before there was a full meltdown, they both pulled up to the start line and the starter excitedly leaped into the air and dropped his flag.

The cars left in a plume of tyre smoke, clutch dust, and black coal, and the capacity crowd all stood to see the two cars careen toward the finish in the midst of all the dust.

The Pirate won the day and Bob Rossiter was crowned New Zealand’s first National Top Eliminator. All these years later the Pirate (and Bob) still exist, and the rail is lovingly looked after by the good folk of the Southward Car Museum after it was purchased in 1968 by none other than Len Southward himself.

Fast forward a few decades or four and another famous drag racer/fabricator/hot-rod builder by the name of Graeme Berry steps in and does the impossible — he builds an exact model-car scale replica of the Pirate dragster, perfect in every single detail imaginable. This very model, donated to the Scroungers Car Club, will be going up for Auction at the 13th Annual Hot Rod Blowout on Sunday, March 29, 2015. If you want to own a piece of drag-racing and hot-rod history, bring your cheque book and get a bid in on this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

Bronze treasure unearthed

20 August, 2026

The car was put away in favour of something more practical, and when his father was unable to drive any more, Matt’s friend asked him to come and take a look at his dad’s old Holden. It turned out this was one of those phone calls that leads to that feeling of pure joy in the classic car world — the ‘barn find’ that turns out to be even better than expected. The HT Monaro had been put to bed some years before and had not seen the light of day since. Layers of dust and boxes of junk littered her undercarriage and bodywork and access points all around.

NZ Classic Car magazine, September/October 2026 issue 407, on sale now

16 August, 2026

We love bugs!
A bit of TLC that became a major restoration
The 1302S, or ‘Super Beetle’ as it became known, was built for two years before it, too, was replaced by a further-enhanced Beetle, the 1303, continuing an amazing 65-year lineage for one of the World’s best-known shapes.
The world’s best-selling single-model vehicle, the VW Beetle, possibly established another record for the amount of controversy it has created since the inception of the Type 1.
In a meeting with Hitler in June 1934, Ferdinand Porsche was contracted to build a ‘People’s Car’ that could accommodate two adults and three children, was air-cooled and simple to maintain, and could cruise economically at moderate speed along Germany’s proposed new Autobahns.
Our feature car, a 1972 1302S ‘Super Beetle’, was found by Dave and Michelle Dickie in Mosgiel a few years back. It was a runner, but like most VWs of this age, it needed a little TLC. They were looking for a daily driver for Michelle when they first came upon the VW being sold locally on behalf of its owner.
“The owner offered it to his grandchildren, and they didn’t want it, so he got the guy out at Mosgiel in the Mobil petrol station to sell it for him, and he put it on Trade Me for them. We never met the owner, and we were always dealing with the guy at the petrol station. We put a bid on it, and we were the only people that bid on it.”
Their bid was eventually successful, eight years ago. Not knowing much of the history, in situations like that, it’s always a risk buying a car, but they were in for a bit of a surprise.