No better place to kick off 2015 than Whangamata

23 January, 2015

If you ask a gearhead what the best way to see in the New Year is, there is an incredibly high likelihood they’ll tell you there’s nothing better than the annual Whangamata New Year’s Day car show at the Whangamata Club.

With more than 183 vehicles of both the four-wheel and two-wheel persuasion, as well as the brilliant summer weather, 2015’s show was the largest yet with people travelling from all over New Zealand to attend.

Organizer Noddy Watts reckons, “We sure kicked off 2015 in style raising over $1500 for our local youth group.”

For many this was their first chance to check out this year’s Repco Beach Hop giveaway car — a 1950 Mercury Coupe mild custom, direct from the USA, complete with a hopped-up flathead V8 under the hood.

It was also the first public showing of Neil Surtees’ latest from Whakatane. Based on a Model A roadster pickup with an all-aluminium, hand-formed body held together with over 5000 rivets. The tray slides back to reveal the rear-mounted radiators for the Ford flathead V8, and the underslung chassis is innovative; All owner built and oozing coolness.

Another new car was the bright yellow ’32 Ford Coupe of Matamata’s Bill Fryer which was cloned after the Mike Poole ’32 Coupe which carved up the quarter mile in the ’80s. Bill is a Beach Hop regular with a blown Ford Y-block-powered T-bucket.

The show attracted a diverse mix of hot rods, customs, classics, muscle cars, street machines, and motorcycles, and the atmosphere was buzzing to the tunes of the Recliner Rockers. Roll on Beach Hop!

Congratulations to the winners:

Best Ford — Peter Kidd, Kapiti Coast, 1955 Mercury Sunvalley
Best Chev — Nigel Brown, Matamata, 1939 Chev Pickup
Best Other — Robbie Metcalfe, Whangamata, 1957 Oldsmobile
Best Hot Rod — Bruce Carter, Riverhead, 1933 Ford
Best Street Machine — Steve Green, Ohaupo, 1963 Holden
Best Nostalgia — Neil Surtees, Whakatane, 1928 Ford Model A
Best Original — David Leask, Morrinsville, Kawasaki
Best Bike — Roger Kemp, Te Kauwhata, Suzuki

Coaching from the bench: Casting plastic knobs and rubber parts

16 July, 2026

Casting rubber items is simple if you have a good original to work with. The item doesn’t have to be perfect. You can use plasticine to smooth out cracks, and you can even make whole prototypes out of low-fire modelling clay available from craft stores if you need to. Prototypes can also be made of wood or metal.
You will need mould dams to contain the liquid urethane moulding solution until it cures. You can build boxes out of strips of wood, but I have found that small plastic boxes and bowls such as those you would use for leftovers in your fridge work well if you spray them with a mould release agent.
Temperature is important to the chemical processes involved, so work in an area that can be maintained at around 20 degrees. You will also need adequate ventilation because the fumes can be dangerous to breathe. And you will want to wear latex gloves to protect your hands.

Fraser Cars – low flying into the fourth decade

10 July, 2026

With almost three and a half decades under its belt, Fraser Cars is one of New Zealand’s longest-surviving car manufacturers. The company first opened its doors for business in 1988, during the boom time for kit manufacturers. During the ’80s, around 40 different companies were building kits and turnkey cars for this niche market. Of those, only Fraser and Almac Cars (established 1981) are still in business today.
Most of the new kit car companies were killed off in the cradle by the threat of new legislation that never eventuated and definitively by the sudden availability of high-performance Japanese cars when the floodgates to second-hand imports were opened. The now long-retired founder of the company, Neil Fraser, first came across Lotus Seven replicas while racing Lotus Cortinas in the early ’80s. He regularly found himself racing against a little Caterham, a Lotus Seven–styled car built in England. He was very impressed by its simplicity and handling. In 1986 Fraser built his own Lotus Seven–type car, using the knowledge he had gained from several close looks at the Caterham.

No better place to kick off 2015 than Whangamata

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