Dragging 24/7 – John Trevino’s Bagged Chevrolet Silverado

Let’s introduce John Trevino of Glendale, Arizona. John’s one of those guys who really goes 110% on everything he does, and this truck is no exception. Just a few years ago, this truck was romping through the desert without a care in the world. Oh that’s right, John originally built this truck as a prerunner, designed to go 50 through the desert without a care in the world. Then, one day, something happened. Maybe it was something in the water, or meeting some buddies who were into mini truckin’, but whatever it was, John was hooked. He now had a new mission, and it was now just a matter of doing.

Under the hood, John focused a good amount of attention. The 4.8l V8 has a host of bolt on mods, like an AEM intake, JBA headers, MSD plug wires, and a Flowmaster exhaust. The tranny was completely gone through by Cottman Transmissions, and while they were there, they installed a high output torque converter, a shift kit, and Corvette servos for good measure. The rear end now houses a set of 4:10 gears too. Most people cut out the fenders on their truck and leave it as is, but not John. He took the truck to Grunion Fabrication in Phoenix, Arizona, and Kevin welded up some 33” fenders up front, and mounted the fuse box and overflow to the new tubs.

John gathered up some of the crew from his club, Perfect Poise, and they took on the big task of getting the truck from nosebleed status to dragging frame. Up front, they yanked the stock control arms and springs, and replaced them with DJM upper and lower control arms plus a pair of Slam Specialties airbags.

The stock rotors and calipers were replaced with a Baer Brakes Eradispeed plus 1 kit, which looks pretty sick behind the 22” Bonspeed Clutches and 255/30 Nitto 555’s. Out back, they yanked the axle and sent it off to be jet coated cobalt blue, and while they had some parts in the shop, they threw in the KP Components 6-link kit too and had it done in show chrome.

When everything got back, they bolted it all up and laid the truck on the newly notched frame. John hooked up the air system with a Viair 500 and a 6 gallon tank – but that’s just backup for the 50-pound nitrogen bottle held in the back of the bed. Eight SMC ½” valves are held together with ½” copper hardline, and the switches are housed in the custom center console with the Dakota Digital gauges – but more on that later.

On the outside, there’s the usual things like the shaved handles, taillights, tailgate, rollpan, and stake pockets, but there are a few killer tricks too. Like the custom wheel wells that are molded to the fender, or the Chevy HD hood, or the AMP billet gas door. John also has a Street Scene shaved cowl and cal-vu mirrors, plus a SnugTop tonneau cover.

Russel at H13 Kustoms in Phoenix, Arizona, took care of the body work that needed to be cleaned up, then he laid down the paint, which was all done with House of Kolor products. The paint scheme starts with a black upper half, then goes to Orion Silver on the bottom, and the two colors are separated by a Kandy Cobalt blue marbleized pinstripe. It took a while to get done, but now that it is, the truck looks sicker than ever.

John went to Todd Jubert at The Interior Shop for his interior, and as a result, has a sizeable collection of awards in his living room. Todd started by wrapping the headliner in suede and incorporating a killer flame pattern. Then the seats were wrapped in suede and BMW leather in a custom pattern. While Todd had the leather out, he wrapped the dash in it too, incorporating the same flame pattern. The door panels, were built by Todd, almost from scratch, using fiberglass, foam, and that same BMW black leather. If it’s billet, John has it. There’s the Trenz mirror, the vents, steering wheel and the numerous other accessories scattered around the inside of the truck.

The center console is really one of the cooler parts of the truck, and it was built by Aaron Ruddy from POE. Aaron built a custom fiberglass console that houses John’s A/C controls, airbag switches, and an Alpine DVD/CD player. That’s just one of the 5 monitors hidden in the truck, including a big one in the middle of the dash. The gauge surround and the console were painted in the same Kandy Cobalt blue that pinstripes the truck. Speaking of stereo stuff, the current setup was built by Tony at Noise Audio, and utilizes a MTX amp, and other components in the doors and pillars.

A truck like this isn’t built in a day, and John wouldn’t have been able to do it without a little bit of help from his friends. John would like to thank his club Perfect Poise, his family, Russel at H13 Kustoms, Tony at Noise Audio, AEM, Trenz, and Bill at Bonspeed. A lot of people doubted that John would ever get this truck done, but the important thing was that he never did.

Ren’s NorCal Ford F-150 – Bagged on Big Wheels

It was March 2004, and Ren Robinson of American Canyon, California was shopping around for a new custom truck to build. He did some research, and after a while realized that there weren’t many 2004 Ford F-150’s out there, so he decided he’d build one. Just a few days later, he picked up a bone stock burgundy crew-cab, and got going on it. Some 22’s, a 4/6 drop, a pair of billet grills and an exhaust later, Ren rolled into a show, expecting the trophies to come pouring in, trumpets playing in the background, hailing him as the new king of all things custom. Instead, he heard the loud sound of air evacuating from valves and the distinct sound of frames slamming down on concrete. This was not going to be the day he expected.

A little setback like this wasn’t going to get him down. Instead he made a few phone calls and a few days later, he was ready to begin anew.

The journey starts at SIC Motorsports in San Jose, California, beginning with an altitude adjustment. The control arms, springs and shocks were yanked out and tossed, and in their place went a set of AirRide Shockwaves, DJM lower control arms, and Total Chaotic heavy duty titanium upper control arms. Those upper arms have a uniball with a misalignment spacer instead of the balljoint, which allows them to kick back at some wicked angles without binding,letting the truck lay frame up front. All that work kicked the wheels into the engine bay, but to keep it all looking stock under the hood, they lifted the stock fenderwells three inches.

Out back, they bridged the frame and made mounts for AirRide 9100lb bags that were mounted on top of the axle. The whole system was done with ½-inch line, ½-inch AirRide valves, dual Viair compressors and a pair of chromed 6 gallon tanks. Keeping an eye on the system is a digital AirRide control panel, and a SIC Motorsports switch box. With all that work on the suspension, the booty 22” chromies had to go, so he ditched those and got a set of 22X8.5” Intro Twisted Vista 6’s, and mounted 265/40 Nitto’s on all four corners.

He had to be ready for the car shows now, right? Sure enough, Ren hit the scene and he was looking pretty tight, but wasn’t pulling any heavy jewelry home yet. What was the deal? Now he noticed people rolling around with custom paint, and he knew that graphics were next on his list. After getting a good referral from Dan at F.B.I., Ren decided to meet up with James Cashman of Cashman Customs in Concord, California. The two discussed ideas, and Ren showed James a few sketches of what he had in mind. After the meeting, it was time to go to work.

Ren wanted a clean look, but he didn’t want to move up a class because he had done too much. James kept it simple by shaving the tailgate handle and emblems, then smoothing out the stock door handles and painting them to match the graphics. Since the truck was still pretty new, and the stock toreador red looked clean, they decided to base the graphics on the stock color. The truck was painted using House of Kolor products, including Kandy Tangerine, Cinnamon Pearl, Candy Apple Red, and metallic silver. No detail was left untouched, even the bridge cover was decorated to match. By the time the truck was done, it was a whole new ride.

You should know by now what was next, another visit to a show, another new idea, and this time, his wife Rose brought it up. “You know, you might as well take it to the top,” she said. That woman is a keeper.

The interior was a whole new land for Ren, and it started by going back to Cashman Customs for some custom paint. James took the stock door panels, smoothed them flat and sprayed them the factory toreador red with some wicked tangerine pinstriping.Next, it was off to Larry’s Custom Upholstery in Napa, California to stitch in some red leather into the seat inserts. The whole family helps out with this truck too, as evidenced by the purchase of chromed interior pieces by Ren’s son Chris. Throw in some aluminum floor mats, and a Colorado Custom Climax steering wheel, and it’s a formula for a show winner, right?

Now it was time for the stereo, but it’s never just about the sound these days. Any cool truck has to have monitors everywhere, and Ren’s ride is no exception. It all starts with a double-din Kenwood DDX-7015 DVD Monitor head unit. The DVD portion feeds a video signal to a pair of Eiger Vision 5.6” monitors in the headrests, and a Microvision MTV-7SW mounted in a drop down off the headliner. For speakers, Bazooka mids and highs cover the front, while Eclipse’s run the rear doors. There’s also a JL Audio stealth box hidden under the seat, next to a pair of JL Audio amps; an e4300 for the mids & highs, and an e1800 for the sub. Motor Music of Concord, California hooked Ren up with the setup and the install for the Ford.

It took a long time, but Ren finally did make it to that show. That show was the SEMA Show in Las Vegas. Now it’s time for the trophies.

Ren would like to thank his club Acrophobia, Clint & Nick at SIC Motorsports, Robert Espajo at Motor Music, and a special shout out to his parents, his son Christopher and his wife Rose.

Land Racing Jeep Comanche, Yeah, You Heard Me, A Jeep!

Bonneville Salt Flats: Jeep Race Car

This story is: “My Ride is Me”!  Combine Bonneville Salt Flats Racing, a Jeep Comanche and a father and a son.  Perfect!

Meet Peter, a new member here at MyRideisMe.com, he’s a Jeep guy, but not the off-road type  you might expect.  Here’s his story… It was too good for me to mess with.  ha ha  I asked him one question, that’s all it took to get him talking. -Hechtspeed

Written by: Peter Lechtanski

“The Inspiration?   Why do people do what they do?  What makes something (a car) so important to us?

I guess to answer your question, I have to go back 40 some years, it was 1963, and a saw a story on the evening news (on a black and white TV) about this 24 year old guy named Craig Breedlove. He’d just gone 400mph+ at the Bonneville Salt Flats, breaking a record held by the British since 1949.   He was the first man to go over 400mph in a car (and later the first man to go 500, and 600mph).

I was about 12 years old at the time, 2 years before we elected John Kennedy, the youngest President ever.  The Country was charged up.  We were challenged by our President to go out and do things, like go to the moon!  He also started the Peace Corps  and VISTA (Volunteers In Service to America).  Mostly young people joined these organizations.  We all believed our generation could change the world!

Craig Bredlove was charged up too, his car was the “Spirit of America” . His goal was to bring the Land Speed Record back to America, and he did.

The 60′s was a time of endless possibilities (I guess you had to be there).   Craig Breedlove continued to go faster and faster, but a couple of brothers from Ohio started to challenge him,  The Arfons brothers.   It was mostly Art Arfons in the Green Monster.   The record would go back and forth between Breedlove and Afrons.

On Breedlove’s return run to break the 500 mph record,  both his chutes failed, they ripped right off.  His brakes were a joke, but he was going 400 some mph, no chutes, and his steering was not working correctly.  He did put on the brakes, and although all of Breedlove’s speed records have been broken, he still holds the Guinness record for the worlds longest skid mark (5 miles i think!) After 10 miles or so he finally ran out of salt, and ended up in a pond with just the tail of the car sticking out.  He walked away without a scratch!  Talk about the invincibility of youth!  This was reality TV back in my day.

Needless to say, this was exciting! Going fast on the Bonneville Salt flats seemed like a great goal. Of course life happens, and the great hope of the early 60′s turned to civil  rights riots and the Vietnam war.  Then I got married, had 2 kids and perused my career.

I had always liked Jeeps, My grandfather has a 1949 CJ on his farm I use to drive around when I was 10 years old or so.  When I first started to drive  at 16  I had a 1962 Jeep Wagoneer.    A little later I got a 1952 CJ3a that was badly rusted and restored it over a couple of years.  I also did cool stuff like an engine swap, redesigned the steering,  put an overdrive in it, etc.  But marriage and the career left little time to work on the Jeep. It set for 2 years in the driveway with a tarp on it, and I finally ended up selling it.

So fast forward about 15 years… My son is 16 years old and tells me about a deal on a Jeep CJ7.  It belongs to a friend’s dad.   It’s broke and they wanted it out of their driveway.  I went to look at it, it was VERY rusty, it had a Chevy 383 stroker in it, TH350, Dana 300 transfer case.   The output shaft of the Transfer case was snapped off, i guess that 383 had some torque! We bought it for a couple of hundred bucks and dragged it home.

I thought it would be a good father-son project, and maybe deep down I wanted to replace the CJ I had sold so many years before.  Well I started to look for a new transfer case on the internet, and my son started to pull the body off to see what kind of repairs were required and what the condition of the frame was.  Turns out the body was not worth fixing, and the frame was pretty bad as well.  We decided to keep going with it anyway, but it went from being a quick fix to a long term project.   My son still needed some transportation.   I went on Ebay and found a 1986 Jeep J10 pickup for $2,500.  Not a bad deal for a 4wd pickup.  Problem was that it was in Joseph, Oregon and Ilived in Barrington, IL.   My wife an I flew out and drove it the 1,800 miles home, but that’s another story.

So my son drove a Jeep pickup to High School.  The truck was made the same year my son was born.   People would ask him “what is that?” or “Jeep makes pickup trucks?”  The truck was in great shape, and I think my son liked being a little different then everybody else.

I guess it is not uncommon that when you have some special type of car, they tend to multiply.

One day a guy I worked with said “I have a friend that has a Jeep Wagoneer that’s been sitting in his garage for 10 years and he wants it out, you interested?”  My son and I went over and looked at it. Turns out it was not a Wagoneer, but a full size Cherokee in great shape.   It had a 360 V8 with a Holley, Edelebrock intake, headers, cam, etc.   I asked ” why is it sitting “  the owner said,”After I put all of the performance stuff on, the transmission took a crap, I just never got around to fixing it.”  We bought it for $100 and dragged it home.  My son actually fixed it himself.  Turns out there was nothing wrong with the trans!  When the previous owner put the carb on he didn’t adjust the kick down linkage correctly so the transmission would not shift correctly.  In the mean time the J truck had engine problems (another story) so my son started driving the Cherokee.  After about 6 month of driving he hit some ice and slid into a tree.  The frame was bent pretty bad and he needed transportation to get to his job and school.  Back to Ebay to buy what else? Another Jeep.  Found a Jeep Comanche not too far away for $1,200.  My daughter wrecked her car about a year later and needed some transportation, I also bought her a Comanche for $700.

I guess kept buying the Jeeps because they were cool, cheap, reliable and just a little different. Maybe it all started when I was 10 years old driving the CJ around my Grandfathers farm.  It’s kind of like the guy who rode in the back of his dad’s 56 Chevy, and 50 years later he buys one of his own.  Maybe alot of this car thing is about reliving your youth, I don’t know if it is or it isn’t but  I do know I enjoy it and passing it all along to my son.

But a piece was missing, and it didn’t come to me until I saw a special on the Speed Channel about Craig Breedlove and the Spirit of America.   I recalled the days of my youth when my friends an I would follow what was going on in the late summer and fall at the Bonneville Salt Flats.  I guess it was a few months later, the spring of 2008  when I typed the letters S-C-T-A  into the Google search box.   It took me to the Southern California Timing association website.  I clicked on “Event schedules”  and scrolled down to Bonneville.  There it was,  Speed week.  I called up my son and told him we were going to Bonneville 2nd week of  August, he said, ” I’m in” and it was set: Our pilgrimage to the Mecca of Speed.

Bonneville is like no other event I’ve been to in my life. The place, the people, the cars, all just amazing!  But, to get back to the story, I think it was on Tuesday afternoon of Speed Week… I was looking at the program, and I noticed that the record for E/PP  (4.3L  Production Pickup)  was only about 115 mph.  Jeep had offered a 258 (4.2L) inline 6 in the J Trucks.  The Jeep pickup was designed around 1960, so it was not as large as current full size pickups, so it should have less wind resistance.  My son and I talked and agreed that running a truck would be way more fun that just watching.  We also still had the J truck my son drove in High School.

When we returned from  Bonneville I started emailing several companies asking if they could build an engine for me, they asked, “What’s the application?”  I would say “Land Speed Racing.” Lee Hurley from Hesco in Birmingham AL replied back: “We already built an engine for a Jeep Land Speed truck.”  Huh? What? Another Jeep land speed truck?   What is this all about?

Well back to the internet. After some research, I found that in 1986 An engineer at JTE  (Jeep and Truck Engineering) came up with the idea to show the performance of  new 4.0L engine by setting a land speed record with a Comanche Pickup, they actually ending up setting 13 records.  They built the truck over 4-5 months and originally ran it at El Mirage as the LSR 1.   They destroyed the engine by overheating it.  They then took the truck to Bonneville with a new engine and relabeled it the LSR 2.  It was at Bonneville that they set all the records.

During my research I was able to locate the LSR2 at the Chrysler archives in Michigan.  My son and I were able to visit the archives and examine the truck.  After seeing the truck, we realized that a full size Jeep Pickup land speed vehicle would be cool,  but a Comanche (mini pickup)  would actually have some history behind it.   The decision was made. The project was begun.
I am out of time for now.

More in part 2.  Stay tuned!

To be continued.

Hechtspeed

Fastest SS In the West – John Melvin’s Supercharged Silverado SS

John Melvin of Laveen, Arizona is nothing if not a character. Standing 6’1 or so, with a slight accent and a positive attitude about trucks that’s infectious, he brings a fresh take to the scene. For example, when we met John at our shoot in Scottsdale, he brought the SS you see here in the back of a huge enclosed trailer, towed by a 2005 Silverado crew-cab dually all decked out in SS Trim and boasting 479 horses. Not two weeks later, when we setup to shoot some burnout shots, we found out that he had traded the truck in for a 2006 Crew-cab HD, and it was already lifted on 20’s. And of course, there’s also his orange crew cab, featured here: True Flamed Silverado.

See, John owns a bodyshop out in Laveen, named JM Collison Center. There he does all the usual things you’d expect from a guy who runs a shop: he repairs quarter panels, fixes dents, and sprays things all day long. The business was doing great, and he decided to expand a bit and add a new branch to the company, named JM Custom Concepts. There John uses his creative talents to bring out trucks with killer graphics, nutty paint jobs, and super straight lines. Along the way, John started collecting a small fleet of Chevrolet trucks, and decided to pick up a Silverado SS when they first came out to add to the stable.

This all came about when John first bought the truck, a few years ago, and took it to the track. It pulled a 15.3, which wasn’t real inspiring too him since his tow rig ’03 Duramax was running 14.7s. He had this 408 motor now that he was going to put into another truck – an ’02 Chevy – but since that wasn’t going anywhere, he figured he’d put the bottle on his SS. First time out, 12.88. Then at the Truckin’ Nats in 2003, he pulled a 12.65, putting it at the top of the list of the SilveradoSS.com forums, a spot it held for a long time.

With the need for speed now coursing through his veins, John needed to step up. It took a bit of time, but he got a Vortech supercharger kit for the truck, then pulled a few low 12 passes. After some tweaks and a belt change, it was high 11’s on the squeeze, and John was happy. Not everyone was, though.

This started a huge trash talking war between John and some of the guys with Ford Lightnings on their online forums. John ended up smoking one of the Ford crew members on the track, pulling a mid-11 pass. Between the smack talking and the other rule restrictions, John ended up getting put on probation by the NHRA. It’s all been worked out since, and John even started building a Lightning.

It takes a lot of hard work and dedication to make a truck this fast, and keep it looking this good. From the attention to detail under the hood, and the flawless black paint, this is one truck that looks amazing going down the track in the 11’s.

On Fire – John Melvin’s True Flamed 2005 Chevrolet Silverado

The name John Melvin may not quite be a household name, but that depends a little bit on what kind of circles you run in. Performance junkies know that John is famous for building a killer Supercharged Silverado SS; one that set records just a few years ago. But while he was building that black-and-silver supercharged terror, he also was working on this 2005 crew cab Chevrolet Silverado. This gave him a duo of amazing trucks, both featured here at MyRideisMe.com.

Let’s start with the crew cab, a truck that also isn’t a slouch in the performance world. When we first found it, the truck needed only an interior to get to the upper level. The taillights were shaved, the true-fire flames on the front were painted, and from the outside, the truck was complete.

At the time, John owned a crew cab dually, but he was losing interest in it, so he traded it off at the dealership for a crew cab 4X4. Now he had two crew cabs, and two different interior colors, so he decided to make the swap and give his orange one a little classier look. After he called to say his Katzkin kit was on order, a photo shoot was lined up and things seemed to be moving forward.

Before that shoot could happen, another call came. “Hey, I got a supercharger. I’m going to put it on and get it all handled, then we’ll shoot it.” Nothing is simple though for John. Instead of just slapping the Vortech supercharger in the truck, he went the extra mile and airbrushed all of the plastic pieces under the hood silver with a rusted rivet look to match the iron cross on the hood. Everywhere from the valve covers on up was painted by John at his shop, JM Custom Concepts in Laveen, Arizona. Then the whole kit, painted up and pretty, was expertly installed by Kevin and Scott at Bartling Motorsports in Queen Creek, Arizona.

It may have taken some time, but in the end, John put out yet another high quality ride. Since this truck was finished, he’s built quite a few in the meantime, and also painted a few other magazine-worthy rides as well. But if you think this truck is hot, make sure you check out John’s silver and black supercharge terror.

Are you digging the hot truck features? Let us know with a comment below.

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