Man, it's definitely got the vintage feel and smell.
-That's him, not me. -[laughter]
-[Bill] Oh, man. -I built it to race.
So we're not just putting wheels and tires on it.
-Full... Yeah. -Full custom.
This is for the headlight.
You turn your headlights on,
these guys come down.
Get out of your home.
Back when I was in high school, man,
this was sought-after.
It's a big job for us.
This is so compact.
Here, we're gonna work
with the existing floorboard.
Very, very good.
[Bill] This thing is gonna be a beast.
Just like the wrecker, man.
The '52 Wrecker started last year
and we're just now putting the rolling chassis
and the body together.
Got it going down.
Are you liking it?
-I'm trying not to cry. -[laughs]
[upbeat music playing]
[narrator] I'm Bill Carlton.
I built my first truck when I was 16
and ever since, me and my guys
have been out here creating with our hands.
Building the biggest, lowest,
baddest custom trucks and cars in the game.
People don't come here for what they need.
They come here for what they want.
This is Texas Metal.
[hip-hop music playing]
Brent's backing in a really cool GTO.
When I was in high school, that was a car to have.
-Hey, Bill. -What's happening to fellas?
[Nick] Hey, Bill. It's great to meet you.
-Nick. -Nick.
-Sebastian. Yeah. -Sebastian.
-Nice to meet you guys, man. -[Nick] Nice to meet you too.
So is this one of you guys?
It's both of ours.
-Both of you? -Yeah.
Like a timeshare or something?
Yeah, it's like a timeshare actually.
-[laugh] -Yeah.
My brother bought it, um,
when he was 15 in 1980.
The car's been with us for almost 42 years,
-so, uh, it's a little bit-- -What?
-[Nick] Yeah. -I was just about to ask you
if you guys bought it like this, this vintage or...
No, it was a piece of junk when we bought it. Yeah.
-Forty-two years ago. -Now running,
-42 years ago. -Forty-two years ago. Yeah.
You know, back when I was in high school, man,
this was sought-after, for sure.
I mean this was the one you had to have,
with those wheels, that size tire.
-Yep. Pretty old school now. -[Sebastian] Yeah.
But, you know, we used to race it when we were kids and--
Well, he used to work on it.
-I used to race it. -He used to race it. Drive it.
I was always afraid of it.
He's worked on it since he was like 12 years old.
How much did you get this for back then?
-$300. -$300.
-300 bucks. -[Nick] Yeah.
You know, both immigrants from Italy
and so the car became something
that tied us together and we've been, I don't know.
-Yeah. -Best friends since then,
uh, as well as brothers.
Wow, man, that's quite a story.
I've never heard one of those stories before.
It's awesome.
So this might turn into me working on it
and both of you guys racing.
-Is that what it is? -[laughs]
No, actually we built it to race
and we can't drive it.
So we're just looking for something we can get in,
push the button and go, you know,
as opposed to kind of where it is right now,
where it only runs on race, gas and stuff like that.
-So, yeah. -[Bill] Oh, wow, okay.
So we're not just putting wheels and tires on it.
No, totally custom.
Totally Something unique
that people look at on the street.
Modern, you know, touring cars.
The pro touring GTO?
-Yeah, exactly. -Man, I love that idea.
Just taking this cool car and just modernizing it.
You want something that really rides good.
Handles good, can put the power down
to the ground.
Just rip out that old frame,
just unbolt it from the body, roll it out,
and just start fresh.
Build a new way more rigid chassis.
4-link on the back, you know, coilovers all the way around.
We can adjust that stance
where it just looks absolutely perfect.
Yeah, that pro touring stance
is definitely gotta be there for us.
-Yeah. -Yeah, yeah.
Any preference on color or anything like that?
The original color for this car was red,
so we're thinking of the red and black.
Sort of the modern versions of the stock colors
from back in the day, if that makes sense.
Okay. What about interior?
Something fully custom. Totally wild.
Cool man, let's check it out.
Man, it's definitely got the vintage feel and smell.
[laughs]
That's him, not me.
[laughter]
I tell you what, your brother's done
a real good job restoring it for you
'cause this looks absolutely perfect in here,
but it's definitely, definitely dated.
It's definitely tired.
We'll modernize this, you know,
give you that pro touring feel
when you sit in it.
Of course, changing, you know, door panels,
seats, carpet, and the instrumentation
is something that'll really, really wake this car up.
-Yeah. -You know, that way you're behind the wheel
and it just looks modern in here.
[Nick] I love that.
Only request I have is we were thinking
-about four bucket seats. -Yeah.
Not sure how you think about that or--
No man, that'd be...
-That's a great idea. -Okay.
Maybe even give you a little bit more...
I mean, you guys look like
you might need a little more...
-[Nick laughs] -room inside here too, right?
-It's tight. -It's been 42 years,
so yeah, we need a little bit more room.
[laughter]
And you guys were saying
that you run race gas in it.
Now, what's under the hood?
Uh, it's a 600-inch Pontiac,
but we're open to anything.
Let's check it out.
Damn it.
[Bill] Oh, man.
Definitely isn't original under the hood.
-[Nick] No. -So about how much horsepower?
About seven without the nitrous.
Close to nine.
So it is a fun drive.
-[Nick] Yeah. -[Sebastian] It is fun.
Quarter mile, though, fun to drive.
-[Nick] Yeah, yeah. -[Sebastian] After that...
You can't even drive it on the freeway, Bill.
You're doing 55 and the car sounds like
it's doing, you know, 5,000 grand.
-About to blow up? -[Nick] Yeah, 6 grand.
So you want that practicality.
You want to be able to get in it
and drive it wherever you want.
-And get gas wherever we can pump gas. -Yes. Yeah.
But you still want a ton of power?
-Can never have too much power. -Yeah.
You know what'd be real cool?
I mean, if we're taking this engine out,
we're replacing it with a nice,
new clean engine,
we could just add a bunch of sheet metal panels
-around it just to-- -Man.
Man, when you pop the hood you're like just wow,
that's just super clean, simplified everything.
That sounds great. I mean, that's...
We've always dreamed about having something like that.
Well, if you guys are ready to make it happen.
Let's go. Yeah, thank you so much.
-Come on with it. -All right.
-[Bill] Definitely a cool car. -[Nick] Thank you.
[upbeat music playing]
[Bill] You know, the GTO has a long muscle car history,
but this car also has a long history
with Nick and Sebastian.
Messing with a car like this
is kind of delicate.
This isn't just an easy project,
get in, tear it apart, change it up
and give it back to 'em kind of deal.
This is sentimental.
It's a big job for us.
It's a big job for any car shop.
Transforming what's already a really, really cool,
clean car into something
that not only fits the family history,
but fits the muscle car history.
There's a lot of unique challenges
all throughout this.
On top of all that it's part of their family,
so we're not gonna take that lightly,
but no matter how long that history is,
sometimes you just gotta start over.
[Dustin] This is cool.
-Very cool, huh? -Yeah.
Nice outfit today.
Looking good, guys.
He's always paying attention to me, I guess.
Yeah, he texted me and asked me what I was wearing.
-FaceTime. -That's what it was. Yeah.
You know this car's got a really cool history.
They're two brothers who own this car jointly.
They bought this car back, one of them was 14 years old.
Oh, wow.
[Bill] You know, the guys are getting older now
and they're tired of working on it, you know,
they've been working on it their whole lives, right?
[Dustin] Right, right.
They want us to work on it now
and build them something
where they can just get in it,
go wherever they want to go.
So we're gonna turn this into something really,
really cool, super low to the ground,
modern everything and we're gonna build
a new chassis...
-[Dustin] Right on. -[Bill] all new suspension,
brand new LT4 in it.
So it's gonna have a ton of horsepower.
10-speed transmission so they can drive it
-wherever they want to go. -Yeah.
I mean the interior looks almost perfect.
-[Ryan] It looks great. -[Dustin] Right.
And they spend a lot of time, you know,
fixing every little single piece in there
just for us to tear it all out.
All new interior, all new paint,
all new everything, 100% all custom.
-All right. -It's definitely gonna be,
you know, one of a kind.
Yeah, no, this is gonna be a cool one, man.
There's a lot to do on this guy.
[hip-hop music playing]
For a 50-year-old car,
the body's in pretty good shape,
but everything else gotta go.
Just going through and getting everything
that's going from the body
to the chassis right now.
Getting everything loose,
cutting all the zip ties,
getting everything outta the way,
making sure that we're free.
That way, once we get these body bolts loose,
we can drop it down, take what we gotta take down
up there and then this body will just separate
and come right off the chassis
and then we'll be able to roll it out.
It'll come. There you go.
This is for the headlight.
We'll do it right here.
Oh, really?
You turn your headlights on.
-[Dustin] Yup. -These guys come down.
I mean, cool stuff man.
Oh, yeah, yeah. A bunch of juice in the juice box.
[upbeat music playing]
That's the lightest tire.
It's kinda funny.
I've never seen anything like that before.
It took the cutoff bolts right there
and then used them as, like, a little anchor
to where they could zip tie to and hold their wire
loom nice and straight over the fender.
Pretty creative. I like that.
[upbeat music playing]
Come on.
Get out of your home.
That's not the correct way to do it.
Oh, rat's nest.
I wonder how fast that rat went.
[Dustin] Huh, pretty fast.
[Ryan] All right, go ahead.
Bump it, bump it.
Hey, you're all clear.
Take it all away.
Oh, my God.
Dude this thing sucks.
This thing sucks.
Ah, it's slippery.
[rock music playing]
You know, it's always the challenge
to take an iconic vehicle
like the '68 GTO
and improve upon it.
For me, the best way to do that
is that custom chassis
because we can just build
that exact right chassis
for the car and the customer.
[Ryan] We're gonna start with our two frame rails
and then we'll stick 'em up there and we'll see
exactly where our body mounts are falling.
Then we can start building the whole chassis as a whole.
We're gonna do this chassis just a little bit different.
I'm using DOM to connect to my body mounts.
It's gonna be a little bit cooler of a look on this car
and it'll be built directly to the car
instead of doing it on the table like we normally do.
I made some marks so I know exactly
where the center of my very first body mount is gonna be.
So I can transfer that on both rails right here
and I can use that point to measure off
of everything else I need to build.
[dramatic music playing]
Yeah, dude, I like that.
All right, cool.
So now you can see
what we've accomplished here by adding the DOM
with the through bolt.
So I'll get a three-quarter bolt,
put that in there and once I get that established
I can make my mark for the other four body mounts
that we have to do,
get it all connected
and keep moving with our chassis.
[dramatic music playing]
[Bill] Hey. That'll work?
Ryan's off to a good start
on the '68 GTO chassis,
but the frame rails aren't lining up
with the original body mounts
so he is gonna change things up to make it work.
That's the advantage of doing it custom.
We're gonna change things up
till it's exactly right.
All right, so we got the rail in there,
got the DOM in place.
Everything's tacked in.
When we put our rail up
underneath the channel
where it needs to go,
all of the original body mount holes are off.
They're not in a straight line.
So using DOM on every single one of them
isn't gonna work.
We're just gonna take a flat bar,
put a bend at an inch and a half,
put a hole at two and three quarters
and then chop the end off at 4 inches
and I can put that bend right there.
It will flow the channel underneath the car.
So now that we have our bracket here,
I can take some chipboard
and make me a little side gusset here,
I'll make four of them.
I think it'll flow good
with everything else we got.
So transferring some metal.
How about four of these guys.
Get 'em cleaned up and then get 'em tacked onto the car.
We'll just tack 'em right here.
We'll corner it.
This gusset will get stronger
and make this to where this cannot collapse.
[upbeat music playing]
[grunting] All right, bar.
Stop, stop, stop, stop.
Inch it down.
When I look back to where we started over
25 years ago, we're mostly doing custom suspensions,
but we grew and grew to where now
it takes over a year to do ground-up builds.
There's so many steps of doing the really, really big ones
and there's definitely been a learning curve.
Yeah, my tabs are on the side of the frame.
The '52 wrecker started last year
and we're just now putting the rolling chassis
and the body together.
[man] Go. I just gotta--
Go down, go down, go down.
I got it going down.
[Bill] I look at it this way.
We're in the business
of making customer's dreams happen.
Slow, slow, slow, slow. You gotta go back.
passing the side, keep going down.
That's on it right there. You're on the body...
-[man] All right. -you put it down right there.
Thank y'all.
You could barely put a piece of paper
-in-between the wire... -[man] [indistinct]
The more time and effort
and skill we put into all of it,
the more excited I get to get 'em done
and get 'em back out on the road.
It's about time I catch you working.
Yeah. [laughs]
-I'm always working here. -Yeah. Uh-huh.
Man, are we all set up for the tow show?
You know, I just spoke with Ryan and, uh,
he's got a great prime location for this thing.
It's all set up, ready to go.
Man, that's perfect, man.
I can't wait for Terry to see it.
You know, giving Terry back that '52 tow truck
at the tow show, that's the perfect place
to reveal this, right?
And when Terry sees his truck there
amongst all these other ones,
he's just gonna be blown away.
Everybody else is too.
Yeah, definitely.
[Bill] I mean just think back when it came in.
Man, it was horrible, right?
I didn't know if I needed to start ordering parts
or tetanus shots for you guys when that thing first came in.
I didn't know what part to get.
[Bill] I mean starting off picking the cab up,
rolling everything else out
and just building everything else
from that 2 by 5 frame.
How it goes up to the 2 by 4
with the truss underneath it is super, super strong.
It can haul whatever it wants to haul.
-And then some. Yeah. -Right?
[Bill] He wanted a whole lot of power.
The LT4 in it, supercharged 6.2 man.
He definitely got the power.
-[Bill] He definitely got that. -[Carlos] Yeah.
In the bed. How much labor went
into building with that bed?
[Carlos] When you first brought this up
and said we're gonna build it off from scratch?
I didn't believe how it was gonna be done,
but then when I started seeing you guys
lay everything out, man, I don't know how the lines
just matched up, but that's what you do you.
Yeah. Just getting towards the end of projects like this,
man, really get me excited, man.
Figuring out the size, the shape,
the dimensions of that bed,
once that's established, actually building it,
you know, using the skills to shape the metal, the weld,
the grind, the polish to make it what it is,
is a ton of work.
When you told me you were gonna come out
and make that boom yourself,
I didn't take it against you,
but I came to look for stuff that maybe we could,
you know, maybe order but there's nothing out there
to order for that.
-You just gotta do it. -Don't Be scared.
[Bill] Going from chipboard to plasma table
to a part you're actually welding together,
grinding, sanding, turning it into a hot rod wrecker man,
I love how it's come together.
Then once all that's made off to the body shop,
there's a lot of panels on there to get straight.
I mean the paint's done looking right,
you know the major thing we have left
is just letting John Burgess do his thing.
Yeah, he was just in here and we went through
and picked all the materials out
and the color scheme and stuff
that he's gonna put in that thing
is gonna really tie everything together.
It's gonna show your guys' craftsmanship with his
and it's gonna really set that truck apart.
After that, tow show.
-Road trip. -Uh, you got work to do.
[sighs]
[rock music playing]
You know, a lot of the times
the last thing we do on a ground-up build,
is that interior, but last is definitely not least.
Everything else is just so custom.
So over the top.
John definitely has his work cut out for him.
[John] So it's finally my turn to get started
making something cool in the interior.
So I'm gonna start out with seats.
I've already got my design laid out.
I'm gonna make a patch that'll actually overlay
on top of this.
We'll get it all sewn
straight down to the cover.
We'll get after it and make something happen.
So now that I've got my patterns all worked out,
just take some clear vinyl
and I can see through that
and draw out all my pieces
and then back to transfer into our leather.
It takes time to make sure
you get everything laid out and straight.
Because if you mess it up here,
it's messed up all the way to the end.
It's probably one of the more tedious processes,
but it's one of the more satisfying for me too.
A few more pieces to do so, same process over and over
and over until I get all the pieces mapped up.
Next step, start transferring this onto some leather.
Get it cut out.
Let's start sewing this puzzle together.
Something's gonna compliment
the blue on that truck really nice.
Keep it looking kind of retro,
but still modernized at the same time.
[rock music playing]
[John] We're gonna use a half inch of foam,
it gives a little bit more cushion to the cover
and it helps the cover to kinda fill out
and fluff out a little more.
So without this, it just kinda lay...
It'll lay loose on the seat.
So this gives us something to sew together,
hold it all together and next step,
get on a laser.
Cut out our pieces for our patches.
I'm actually gonna wrap this part three times.
So I want it to look like different layers.
So I'm gonna wrap it down to this first level
and then we'll wrap the top level,
all three of 'em separately.
Somethin' a little different, a little challenging.
Just think about trying to do things outside of the box
and always trying to think.
And think outside of the box and come up with new ideas
is you gotta try 'em
to see if they're gonna work.
You can think about it all you want,
but until you actually try it, there's no telling.
But if it doesn't work I'll throw it in the trash
and we'll do something else.
One upside to it being so hot around here
is it doesn't take as long for the glue to dry,
downside, not as nice of a break.
Inserts are all finished up so now it's time to start
putting the rest of the pieces together and make a cover.
It's just helping to lay the seams down,
make sure everything's where they need to be.
It's kinda like ironing your clothes,
you know, you hit a little bit of steam,
go through, iron out everything,
get it laid in nice and smooth
and flat where it needs to go.
Next thing I'm gonna do,
about 135 degrees out there right now.
So let Mother Nature do her job
for a little while.
[upbeat music playing]
Because we're building a frame for the GTO totally custom.
We can work with the shape of the vehicle
to make it a perfect fit.
This is so compact underneath here.
We're gonna work with the existing floorboard
in this car
versus cutting everything out
for big wheels, big tires.
The easy way for me is just using
a 3-inch piece of flat bar.
What I'm gonna do is tack this to the floor.
Once we have this flat bar tacked in place,
we can just clamp flat bar off of it.
So we're gonna take this pattern that we have now,
transfer it over onto the table.
Once that's transferred on the table,
I'm gonna trace it,
lay out the lines on nice, clean, and crisp.
Make some chipboard templates of this
so we can transfer that chipboard over
to our 2 by 3 that's on our band saw.
That's it.
Boom, boom, boom, boom.
Chop our parts,
lay 'em out on the table.
Everything's real time and you know
it's gonna fit perfectly.
This is the most efficient time-saving way
that I've found over the years
to make a frame.
All right, so I got my back half jigs
up here on this table.
We're gonna pack this up,
put some stitches just on the top
and bottom here.
We'll get this all welded up real quick.
Let it cool off and then we'll break it apart.
Stand it up, build our back half
and then we can throw it in the car.
One step closer.
[power tool whirring]
[metal clangs]
[upbeat music playing]
[Bill] All right.
On the money.
All right. So I got it all stood up and squared up.
This is what our back half will look like
minus some cross members.
I'll make some just temporary 1 by 1 pieces
to connect these,
and then we'll make our back section back here
that connects the two.
Very, very good.
Like...
All right. So we got the rear member made.
Everything's level, everything looks good.
We'll get it put over there
and we'll see what changes we need to make, if any.
And if not, then we'll keep on moving along.
Hey.
[Ryan] All right. So Bill and I got
the back half stabbed in here.
It fits good.
I'm gonna make a few pieces
just to connect the existing frame rails to our back half
and then we can move on to the body mounts.
[upbeat music playing]
[machine whirring]
[John] We're getting started on the subwoofer enclosure
for the '52 wrecker.
The owner is kind of a tall guy
so we don't wanna lose any leg room in here.
So the challenge that we're gonna have
is finding enough air space for this enclosure
without encroaching on the cabin space.
So we're gonna do some modular work here
and try to build a box
that'll fit down inside of the pockets in the back.
That means the box can be smaller.
I don't have to make as much room for the magnet.
The magnet can just be out in the air
doing its own thing.
The best part about building things like this
is there's no rules,
no right or wrong.
Come up with an idea,
build it the way you want it.
It's really nice having that freedom around here.
Gives me the opportunity to be more creative,
really enjoy what I'm doing
because I get to do what I want to do.
So the next step,
get a little bit of fiberglass,
start glassing all this together.
Make it all one solid piece
so we can take it outta the truck,
take it back over to the trim shop,
and then building it.
So far, everything's worked out really nice.
You know, it fits in the truck perfect.
It's gonna be nice, fits behind the seat.
Be able to have the subwoofer,
won't lose any kind of movement in the seat.
So that'd work out really good.
All right. Fiberglass is dry.
We got the box outta the truck.
We can work on the bench now.
So the next thing, take a piece of plastic,
heat it up, mold it to shape it to the top.
The woofer needs a certain volume of airspace
in order to operate properly.
So it really doesn't matter how it gets it,
as long as it gets it so nice tight,
tight squeeze in there.
Takes up almost no space in the truck,
but yet, we still have enough air space
for the woofer to function properly.
The majority of all the body work is hand sanding
mainly because everything has contours
and shapes and nothing really flat straight to it.
Every now and then, you use blocks
but you really can't use a machine.
You start using machines and it digs in.
You don't get a feel for it,
don't know where you're headed.
I like to hand sand a whole lot.
I'll go and do some grinding rough things in
but in the end, it's all hand sanding.
There it goes.
Like a glove.
So that's a perfect fit.
Everything's working out
exactly the way I wanted it to.
So next step,
work for the armrest
forward into the center console.
[violin music playing]
[Ryan] You hungry, Bo?
[machine whirring]
[Bill] The rear half of the frame for the '68 GTO
is connected to the body.
So now we can move on to making the front half.
All right. So we got everything in the back done
and it's a good time to move on to the front.
Tie all this in together
and we'll have one full complete chassis
before we start suspension.
So I'm gonna grab some 2x5.
I got my stands here, put that 2x5 down here.
I can put my cross member directly on that.
I'm gonna draw a string line
down the center of the car right here.
And that way, I know exactly
where to put my front cross member.
That way, when we build our control arms out,
that the track and everything is straight.
Getting this centered right here is very crucial
to building this chassis out.
These are the cross members that we made.
It's already set up with the right points
for our lower control arms.
We'll take this,
draw some center marks up on it.
All right. Now, I got my temporary braces in here
holding the front cross member exactly where I need it.
We're gonna make these pieces off the frame
that are gonna come out here
and then we'll be able to tie in
our upper frame rail with the lower here.
And then we can add some pipe or do something else.
Tie it all in later.
[welding torches crackling]
All right. We got the cross member tied in
to our rails as you can see.
Looks really good but we're not done yet.
We need to continue this on.
We need to tie into our core support right here
and then we'll have bumper-to-bumper
cool chassis.
I'm gonna mount this roll pan here.
Cut these frame horns off here
and we're gonna cap this
and this is where my frame structure will tie
in to the core support.
[power tool whirring]
[welding torches crackling]
I think that'll do.
Now, now that we got all this established,
everything's good.
Chassis is complete now minus suspension.
[upbeat music playing]
You know, if you want something fast,
you just buy it off the shelf,
but if you want something custom,
it just takes more time and, of course, talent.
And right now John's showing us how it's done.
Handmaking one of one console for the '52 tow truck.
[John] I'm gonna take the armrest,
float it over top of the woofer
and down and into
the part that's gonna go around the shifter.
So I'm actually gonna make this in multiple pieces.
Just gotta keep in mind all the pieces as you're going
because they all have to work together.
[rock music playing]
All right. We've got everything
for the first half of the center console.
Put together, glued up, worked up, ready to go.
Got it scuffed.
Let's take a little bit of body filler,
do a little rubbing, a little sanding,
and make this thing look good.
So I'm gonna use a little bit of this
fiberglass reinforced filler
just to give it some strength
and then we'll go back over top of it
with some regular body filler.
It's easier to sand and easier to work.
But start off with...
Gonna use this.
It's another one of those put while you're ahead moments.
[upbeat music playing]
[John] Wipe this on a little thin
just so I didn't have to fight it too much,
makes it easier to sand.
So all I'm doing now is just
knocking the high chunks off of it
so we can add our next layer.
So one of the last pieces of the armrest
is do a little bit of mold work on top
just to give it some detail
and liven it up a little bit.
So we're gonna install the air ride controller
and a wireless charger for your phone
or any other device,
incorporate it into this.
So sand, sand, and then sand.
So let's get sanding.
[upbeat music playing]
[saw whirring]
Now I'm going to trace my template.
[saw whirring]
[John] After getting the top part of the armrest,
body work in.
The next step to finish this off
is to tie in a side panel.
We're gonna use the side panels as the inserts.
That way, when we wrap it,
we only have to come down to here
instead of having to wrap the whole side of it
so we can chase wrinkles out rather easy
instead of trying to get all the way
to the end of this panel.
So I'm gonna take me some double-sided stick tape here
so that when I body work this in,
I don't have to worry about clearance for the material.
It's already built-in.
[upbeat music playing]
The owners of the '68 GTO
might've wanted to swap out that high horsepower
for something a little more drivable,
but they definitely still want some power.
So we went with a crate LT4 engine
with about 640 reliable horsepower.
Now to make it fit.
Before we can get it put in,
we gotta cut the floor out
to make room for the transmission.
And then get our motor put in.
Keep coming.
It's on the chassis now.
[Dustin] You're clear.
This thing is gonna be a beast.
Just like the wrecker man.
650 horsepower V-8 supercharged.
Yeah.
But, like, 4,000 pounds lighter.
-[Dustin] Right. -And that thing scoots so...
It's gonna be a monster. That's for sure.
You ready to start building some motor mounts
and transmission cross member and all that good stuff?
Yeah. Let's do some cool stuff.
[upbeat music playing]
[Ryan] We'll start rolling some pipe
and add some style to it.
The roll pipe always looks real cool.
So we'll connect it from the motor mount
to the chassis right here
and just catch this whole corner,
this web right here.
It'd be super strong, it'll look good.
And then we can connect down to the cross member.
[power tools whirring]
[Ryan] You got the driver side motor mounts done.
So we're gonna jump back to the transmission cross member.
Start getting that all done.
Here's a factory bolt holes
for the transmission cross member mount.
We'll start off with this point here
and then find a good connecting point.
But this being so far out,
so wide, that cross number would sag real bad.
So we added this structure here.
We'll just connect here and here to our cross member.
That way, the span isn't so long.
Keep it a little bit shorter, stronger.
You know the best part of this job
is getting to work on cards
that you love when you were a kid.
You know, that '68 GTO is one for me.
It's just super cool to be able to put my spin on it.
We finished the chassis
and once we're done with the engine mount,
we'll need to modify the firewall,
build custom suspension,
fabricate something really unique,
cool under the hood, you know, body paint,
wheels, tires, and hand making that interior.
We still got a long road but this is definitely
gonna be one for the books.
[Ryan] All right. We got our cross member tacked up.
It's looking pretty cool.
Got some holes for exhaust to run through
since the car's gonna be so low,
not only will it be a lot stronger,
but it'll add a lot of style to it as well.
[upbeat music playing]
[Bill] Luckily, we don't have to wait much longer
on that '52 tow truck.
Over in the interior department,
John's taken a couple of his cool interior cues
and bringing them up into the engine compartment
with some custom trim pieces.
A piece of aluminum that got powder coated
and painted to match the truck.
And we'll just take our laser.
Basically, what we're doing is going to be etching off
all of the powder coating and paint
to reveal the aluminum down in the bottom again.
Get secured inside of the machine,
close it up and hit go.
It's off to the races.
[upbeat music playing]
[John] The finish on the part is so thick
that it's gonna take multiple passes
to actually get it all cleaned off
and get down to the metal.
So two passes, we'll see what it looks like,
should be cleared off.
If not, we'll just hit it and make it go again.
157 gigawatts,
however hot that is, it's like a butt load.
All I know is that it's hot enough
but I won't put my hand underneath it.
Bill wants to try to get a tattoo by it. [chuckles]
You get free tattoos after work.
I've only had a laser cutter now
for maybe about a year, year and a half,
but in that year, year and a half,
it's really changed the game on what I'm able to make
and what I can design and build.
Plus, it saved me a lot of money and a lot of time,
and I've been able to do things
that there's no way I would've been able to do 'em by hand.
There's no other way about it.
It's just been a lifesaver.
And complete.
[upbeat music playing]
Finally ready to start wrapping the parts
for the tow truck.
I'm gonna start with the box.
So we'll be making patterns, I gotta put foam over it
and have a nice decorative seam.
[rock music playing]
This is one of my favorite parts of the process,
but this was gonna be pretty difficult.
We've got some pretty big contours, steep edges,
just a lot of things
that this vinyl's gonna have to do
in order to lay it where it needs to
so it's gotta be unique, it's gotta be one off.
So that's part of what makes this thing fun,
makes it a challenge and at the same time,
makes it a pain in the butt.
[rock music playing]
You know, part of the reason
we've got this complex shape
is because of the requirements we had
for the driver being able to fit in the truck.
We couldn't really cram it all behind the seat so,
there wasn't a whole lot we could do.
We just have to deal with what we gotta deal with.
Gotta make it work for the customer
so they needed the room, we'll give them the room.
This would be the hardest part.
So you gotta kinda work here
and hope I can stretch here,
to a point I can split it and then tuck it.
You know, after all the years of wrapping
and doing things like this,
this is probably a 10 on the scale
of how hard this is gonna be.
That's what really makes it fun around here too,
is always trying to challenge ourselves.
Do a little better, make something different,
always one off.
So all of the challenges that we go through
and at the end of the day, all said and done,
they're all worth it.
All right. Everything's built,
everything's wrapped, everything's ready to go.
[Ryan] Here at the shop, we do a bunch of builds.
but getting into the bigger builds
is always something that you really gotta step back
and take a minute.
You know there's jobs that take a year
and over a year, those...
There's thousands of hours in those.
When you get that invested in something
it just becomes special.
It's almost like it's your build
and it's not just one person.
We can have, you know,
five or six guys work on one vehicle.
So we all kind of have to have the same understanding
because he's gotta be on the same page
with the painters and with Bill
and... I mean you can't have, like,
a Lincoln in the front and a Honda in the back.
You gotta... It's gotta match.
Just as much as you guys take pride in your work
and, you know, your craftsmanship
when you're welding and stuff.
I take that same pride
if I was able to find these parts
so that you guys can make this whole project come together.
And at the end of the day
when the customer comes to see his vehicle,
if they could see where every day,
every hour, every minute went into that vehicle.
That first reaction is like, "Oh, my gosh."
-Oh, wow. -Oh, listen to that.
-Oh, look at that. -Wow.
That's when you know you did a great job on that vehicle.
-It's all worth it. -Yup.
[dramatic music playing]
[Bill] When we first looked at the '52,
it was definitely showing its age.
This is original as it gets, right?
-[Terry] Yes, sir. -[Bill laughs]
when I look at it now, I just couldn't be more proud of my guys.
[car engine turning over]
[Bill] There's not a hitch on this truck.
We didn't have to do something to
and there's definitely not gonna be one anywhere like it.
[car engine revving]
[rock music playing]
We've finally finished Terry's dream truck.
You know what better place to give it back to him
than the Fort Worth Tow Show.
It's kind of like the SEMA show is for cars.
This Tow Show is for wreckers.
[rock music playing]
-[Bill] What's up, Terry? -What's happening, Bill?
-How you doing, man? -I'm good buddy. How are you?
Man, I'm doing good.
I appreciate you meeting me out here in Fort Worth.
Man, it's kind of funny when you invited me
to the show I'm at each year for my business anyway,
so I hope you got a surprise for me.
Man, I actually do.
I know it's been quite a while
since you've seen your truck.
-You ready to check it out? Come on. -Yes, sir.
[upbeat music playing]
Oh, my God, Bill.
It's beautiful.
-Are you liking it? -I'm trying not to cry.
[laughs]
[Terry] I can't believe what I dropped off
is actually this truck sitting here right now.
-[Bill] Right? -[Terry] I just...
It's hard for me to fathom.
It's got a little transformation, right?
-Uh, yeah. Just a little. -[laughs]
But that's exactly what we were shooting for.
You know, Terry, when the truck rolled in,
there wasn't much salvageable on it.
So basically, just pick the cab up off the frame
and just rolled everything else out.
Underneath the truck, we started out building
a whole new frame front to back
and it's all made outta 2x5 rectangle tubing
and then tapers down the 2x4 in the back.
You know when we were building the frame
we had to incorporate that air suspension in it
so you can raise and lower it.
I know you're probably not gonna haul a car with this,
but it is absolutely capable.
If it ever did have weight on the back,
you have that adjustability in it also so--
No store-bought stuff,
it's all fabricated by you guys.
-All handmade. -Good deal.
I'm loving the stance, you know, I wanted it low,
wanted some big fat tires on it and you nailed it.
I'm ready to do some burnouts.
So I know you wanted that hot rod power also, right?
You ready to check out under the hood of it?
Buddy, I don't know if I can take much more,
-but let's do it. -[laughs] Let's check it out.
Oh, my God, Bill.
I asked you for a big engine, 6-liter plus,
you took it and you shoved it in this thing,
you made it fit.
It looks amazing in there.
Not a whole lot of room to move around
so it was definitely a lot of work that you did.
[Bill] We had to do a little bit of configuring
to get this sucker in there.
I can only imagine,
all the hand bent tubing and everything underneath it
matches everything just sets off
something else underneath the hood.
You can keep looking all day long.
Right?
New firewall all configured around that engine
and that 10-speed transmission.
So we had to do a lot of sheet metal work
-in the floorboard. -[Terry] Yes, sir.
Had to make room for this big old engine
underneath here, right?
Way over my expectations, that's for sure.
Man, always like hearing that.
Y'all killed it. Y'all killed it.
Man, Terry, I can tell you got an eye for custom work.
Yes, sir.
-[Bill] Let me show you what we did inside the cab. -All right.
[dramatic music playing]
Oh, my God, Bill, that is beautiful.
You guys did a great job keeping the old school feel,
but putting the modern technologies in it.
There's a lot of upgrades in there, right?
New carpet, new seats,
new headliner, door panels.
John Burgess gets down on everything he does.
[Terry] Yes.
[Bill] I mean look at that console,
it's just... That's a work of art.
Of course, the radio looks old but it's all--
[Terry] New technology.
You kept the...
Some of the original dash in there
to keep the old school looks so best of both worlds.
[Bill] Yeah, man.
I know if you like that,
I got something that's special in the back.
You're killing it so far, buddy.
Let's check this out.
[rock music playing]
[Terry] Definitely not what was on it when I dropped it off.
[Bill] Man, absolutely not.
All this is a hundred percent handmade
and, you know, the challenge on something like this, Terry,
is really getting back and seeing
what design is gonna work for this
and to make it look like it all flows
in one cohesive unit, right?
I've never built a wrecker bed before.
We've never built a wrecker boom before
or, you know, a pile on like that.
[Terry] It's sharp.
It looks like it should come that way.
And that's the whole point of building something like this.
It's one of a kind. It's one of one and it's mine,
and I'm proud for it to be mine,
and I'm proud that Bill and them took this job on
and I just... Uh, I can't say enough
about the work these guys did on my truck.
It's a labor of love, man.
And get to be able to create something like this
out of nothing just is really, really cool.
You know, I can't thank my guys enough
for stepping up doing what they do,
having the passion that they have
and just having the skillset
to do another great job.
[Terry] When I dropped this off,
I told you I wanted a show truck, tow truck,
and this checks off every box.
What better place to have it in here
with all the other wreckers, right?
Tow truck, show truck sitting at the Tow Show.
[Bill] It definitely stands out, right?
[Terry] That's what we want.
It's gonna stand out everywhere it goes.
Well, man, I know you're gonna have fun with it
and I'm gonna go check out the rest of the show.
All right. Thank you, Bill.