00:00I don't mind if it gets scratched. I don't mind if kids touch it. I don't mind the kids climb on it.
00:04It's made for burnouts. It's made to have fun.
00:08This truck has had nine engines in it. All nine of them have blown up from doing burnout contests.
00:18We chose Ford Ranger because it's a modern day vehicle. We wanted to make a modern day rat rod
00:23rather than a more traditional rat rod. I wanted to learn how to do a chop top and everyone told
00:28me to hire a professional and I figured the first professional probably did it on his own.
00:33So we just wanted to go for it. I built it with a few buddies and bare hands. A lot of sweat,
00:39blood and tears. It started out as a stock truck and from there we bagged it. We body dropped it
00:44which would be putting the body on the ground and after that we drove it for a year and we decided
00:50it needed to be lower. The truck stands at 37 and a half inches tall and I'm claiming lowest
00:55in the state of Florida. I've been building it since 2011. These builds are never truly
01:00finished. You kind of just add to them as the creativity and the ideas come.
01:06Brandon originally chopped and dropped his 1997 Ford Ranger to enter it into a limbo contest at
01:12a local car show. He had to lower the driver's seat an extra three inches so he could still
01:17wear his hat. According to Brandon getting out of the car is a lot more difficult than getting in.
01:23Some of the external features I got that are the most noticeable would be Charlie the Goose. He
01:27holds down the air cleaner and he has flown off one time but we've managed to catch him. The whole
01:31motor is powder coated white. We wanted it to stand out a little bit. A 60s Galaxy air compressor
01:37for the air ride. The wood roof is a pretty substantial part of the truck. The bottle caps
01:43are cheaper than buying washers at the store. We've got a 15.5 gallon gas tank which was a
01:49old Anheuser-Busch beer keg. The exhaust, we put a flapper on it to keep the frogs out at night.
01:56That stinks when the frog burns up in the exhaust. You don't want that. We've got a
02:011966 AMC Rambler steering wheel and column. It is a 17 inch steering wheel. We do not have power
02:08steering so the steering wheel helps to make it a little easier to drive. There's no speedometer
02:12in the truck. There's oil pressure, RPM, and engine temp. Those are the only things you need
02:18for a good burnout. She has a five speed so you do have to shift. The shifter hits the roof but
02:23that's the way we like it. If you're not dragging your knuckles on the roof, you're not shifting
02:27right. I'm actually too short to reach the pedals so I had to add a wooden block and a piston to
02:33the pedals. We've got a Unity cop light from the 60s. I powder coated it copper so she actually
02:41reflects as a mirror. The police don't really like it but that don't matter to me. Then we've
02:47got a few other add-ons that give the appearance of a modern day rat rod on the inside because in
02:54rust we trust. It did have a radio, no longer has radio. You just listen to the sounds of the truck.
03:00The truck is the music. A lot of people's jaw hits the ground when they see the truck.
03:06I mean it breaks their necks. It just leaves people speechless and every time you look at it
03:11you'll see something new on it. I probably took this truck to the extreme because I'm not one
03:16that likes to fit in in the cookie cutter. I like to stand out and show the world that you don't need
03:22to blend in with everyday society. To me this truck means freedom and a way to express myself
03:27and a way to get my ideas and my skills out there for the world to see. I would say that we leave
03:33the competition in the cloud of sparks.
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