Check your mailboxes, servos, supermarkets and newsagents, because odds are
you’ll find a brand-spanking copy of Street Machine waiting for you!

It’s another cracker of a mag, just quietly. First up is Brett Hewerdine’s genre-busting ’49 Ford single-spinner – a platform usually reserved for low-and-slow lead sled-type builds. Brett’s example is low and fast, however.

Dumped over a custom chassis and suspended by innovative Hydroshox coil-over struts, it’s got a nasty blown and injected 589-cube big-block riding up front, all put together by the wizards at ProFlo Performance.

It’s Brett’s second Street Machine cover in recent times, with his epic HT Monaro the headliner of our April 2019 issue. You’ll notice a few commonalities between the two cars – a slammed stance, a thumping fat-block adorned with a blower and hat, plenty of rubber and attitude in spades. It’s how he rolls.

Speaking of black Monaros, we’ve got a beauty for you this issue. Greg Eslick’s LS3-powered HQ coupe is an Elite-level stunner with exquisite body and paint.

It’s powered by an LS3 with a nifty dual-quad-style EFI set-up, and has continued to evolve from when it was unveiled at Summernats 32. A blower is next, he reckons.

Likewise, Mike Roycroft’s VJ Valiant has never stopped changing since he bought it back in 2009. It’s now sporting a 470ci Indy Maxx Hemi V8 topped by a 14/71 blower.

These days, it’s too gnarly for the street, too neat to skid and not really set up to race, so Mike has called it POINTLESS. We reckon it’s awesome!

Next up is an LC Torana coupe, built almost by accident by Melbourne bloke Kris Velkovski. Kris was midway through a rebuild on his iconic RB-powered CGMFLY Torana when he came across another car for sale as a painted roller. He purchased the shell, inserted the RB and Trimatic he’d already prepared for the other car, then took it to Summernats 35, enjoyed the hell out of it and won some tinware in the process.

Since then, Melbourne enthusiast Giovanni Inturrisi took an interest in the car, made Kris an offer he couldn’t refuse, and is rapt with his purchase.

We don’t see enough Coyote swaps Down Under, so it’s great to get Ossie Fish’s dead-smooth XW Falcon into the mag, resplendent in True Blue paint and powered by the highly sought-after, Aussie-fettled blown Miami variant, lifted from an FG-X XR8.

Equipped with a six-speed manual and engineered to corner, this is one epic street car.

Nick Samuel’s VL Calais follows the much more familiar recipe of an LS in a first-gen Commodore, but the devil is in the details. That and the 1000hp, Harrop-blown, Warspeed-built lump beneath the bonnet.

It was a star of the Street class at Summernats 35, and it ain’t hard to see why.

For the small Ford fans, the final car in this issue will impress. Adam Smith’s Mk1 Escort is powered by a screaming 13.5:1 Duratec 2.4-litre four-banger, adorned with a trick Jenvey individual-throttle EFI set-up.

With track-focused underpinnings and lashings of carbon details, it’s one of those ‘the more you look, the more you see’ cars.

On top of a killer line-up of feature cars, we’ve also got all the action from the epic event that is Rockynats, with burnouts, drag racing, cruising, and show-and-shine action galore.

Then we’ve got the perennially huge Geelong All Ford Day, which became the
biggest on record! Not to mention a cool yarn from one of our West Aussie contributors, Chad Atkinson.

Chad got together with a bunch of talented mates to hook into a languishing XP Falcon project over the Easter long weekend, driving it out of the shed under its own power by the end of it.

The story is a bit of an inspirational tale, proving what’s possible in a short space of time if you call in a few favours and have a bit of a crack.

I’d love it if this yarn inspires even one reader to drag their project car out of the corner, get some buddies around and hook in.

Street Machine May 2023 is out now, so hook in!