20/09/2003	Updates Alright, I've had a big clean up today, there are new pages for the Readers Rides pages for Rod Maxwell's original 32 Sedan, Rodney Reprogle's beautiful F100, Gus Patel from the UK and his 61 Cadillac Coupe Deville, Terry Locke's 34 Ford 5W Coupe and an update for Ken Smith's beautiful red 32 Ford Coupe, now with flames!! Also updated Bob Pankhurst's 36 Coupe in the Under Construction pages. You will also note the new look of the front page, and links to those events we are sponsoring this year, including The Picnic, The Kustom Nationals, Chainsaw Bob's East Coast Cruise, The 2005 ASRF Nationals and 2005 2 Bay Rod Run. There is also a new search facility on the home page, this is a selective keyword driven search and should help you find your way around the site a bit better. I've also added links from the forum pages back to the Swap Meet and the home page. And there's a heap of new questions for you to answer in the Hot Rod Survey. There should be sumptin' in this lot to keep everyone happy.
07/09/2003	The News For regular readers of the news page, you can see that it not been used in the same way it has been for the last 3 years, it's become more of an editorial page, or a members update. This is due in no small part to the overwhelming popularity of the Bench Racing Forum. This has become "the" place for all the latest news and views from rodders all over and Australia and around the world for that matter. I must also make clear that this was not intentional on our part, rather something that has just happened. There is also a fair amount of maintenance in a forum especially when it gets popular and this big. All the threads are moderated, by that I mean that I view each one to ensure that they don't get out of hand and that comments contained in the posts do not offend anyone. And to date the members have been pretty well behaved. But it means we don't have the time to maintain the news page as often as we used to. (so far no complaints) The most outstanding thing has been the amount of high quality, accurate hot rod information that has been transferred by the forum. We are very fortunate to have some very clever and experienced rodders who take the time to help out their fellow rodders via the forum. Events pages I have just finished an update of the events pages, with the new rodding season just around the corner there is heaps of events for you to attend. Also if your rod is on a permit print off a copy and stuff it in your glovebox, as it is a requirement of permit systems to have a flyer or documentation as to the event you are attending with the car. Advertizers We are in the process of re-negotiating with the various sponsors and advertisers on Hot Rod Internet. Now is the best time to talk to us about promoting your business on the most popular Australian Hot Rod web site. Contact Dave at info@kustom.net
June	Scams - An important warning for ALL Australian and N.Z. small businesses One of our member sites was recently stung with a Scam which is running from Indonesia and we know of another local business in Maldon who were also stung for thousands of dollars. Basically it involves mail order of goods (of all sorts and sometimes multiple orders) to Indonesia using Credit Cards. Everything goes through okay and you send the items like any other order. The only thing is that several weeks later the Card Number turns out to have been 'skimmed' and the banks will not pay you despite them not rejecting the number when the order is placed. If you read your bank contract you find that it is your bad luck, which means you end up with no money and no stock! The addresses given are usually unable to be chased up and even though it becomes a criminal matter your couple of thousand dollars becomes a low priority with little chance of capturing the offender let alone convicting them or getting your goods back. Sadly there are many very lovely and genuine people in Indonesia who do order from Australian companies and pay with legitimate cards. Our advice however is that if you receive any large orders from Indonesia using Credit Cards, no matter how legitimate and decent they sound (all good con men sound decent!) unless it is a previous customer personally known to you, DO NOT accept the card. Demand payment by Cheque or Bank Order which must clear prior to you sending any goods. If they are genuine they should happily do this. Sadly credit card scams are the latest, but don't forget the good old scams such as trying to sell you something valuable sight unseen (such as an original 32 Roadster!) for a price too good to be true. Anyone can email or post you a photo of anything. It does not mean they actually have one! Of course we bought our Cadillac sight unseen from Interstate for a large sum of money but I sent an Uncle round to make sure it existed and was as described first! Remember the old adage "if it sounds too good to be true it probably is."
May	Billy Carts The annual Billy Cart Bash was held again in Castlemaine on Sunday the 18th May (same weekend as Adelaide Rod Show) and was lots of fun despite the threatening weather. I was too busy organising to get photos, so if anyone has some that can go onto the web site please let me know! Only a few rodders attended with their families this time but they had a great day. We know T.J. (from our Bench Racing) did as he carried off a trophy! It was FREE, yes free as in no charge, and results etc. can be found at www.billycart.com soon! The event was won by Troy Davey-Milne from Collingwood who clocked 58 km/h (yes 8 km/h over the speed limit!) with plenty of other good speeds. Keep Sunday 17th May 2004 free for the 8th one.
April	ASRF Street Rod Nats, Geelong Greg and Dave both attended the Street Rod Nationals in Geelong and Greg has photos posted already. Just click here. The Nats were pretty good, lots of cars, entries around 1500 but many more cars there that were not entered or turned up on the Saturday or Sunday only. Quite a few great new cars including the major winner, the 33 Roadster shown left (click for a bigger picture!). Dave finally got his 1946 Ford Sedan going and drove down in it (thanks to Matt Lagoon for all the help or it would still be in the driveway!). Apart from a couple of minor fuel problems it was a good shake down run for the old girl with a new engine after years off the road. He is hankering for an open car and already has too many other cars, trucks, bikes etc. so you will find it for sale in the Swap Meet! Donna left the 59 Caddy at home and took the everydayer and 7 year old Katie took her 57 Chev Bel Air Convertible (Barbie size that is) and Dragster bicycle. Greg went down in his 34 Chev Sedan which ran perfectly as always. Lots of great new colours on cars this year and a BIG trend toward Post 49 American Cars. There were a number of magnificent 57 Buicks and a few other great cars of similar era including Pontiacs, Cadillacs, Lincoln, Mercury and a beautiful 56 Oldsmobile not to mention the usual Chevs and Fords. Nice to see see some of the rarer classics turning up though! (and probably at a lower cost than a 55-57 Chev the way they are going through the roof!). Pickups are still very hot and there were some fine examples and air suspension is becoming increasingly popular. There was even an air bag lowrider caravan! One of my favourites was a Studebaker beater pickup. One down side was there was not a lot for kids to do, which was a problem for us family people who want our families to keep coming with us. They are the future of our sport and this needs to be addressed. There was a great lowrider pushbike show on Sunday (why not Saturday too?) but kids were told not to ride them around. How about an area for them to ride? Cruising was difficult with the number of cars and people there also. The bands were great and Pinky did his usual job on the PA. We will do a full write up soon and post it. Overall a good event but Sunday afternoon was saddened by a tragic accident resulting in the death of one of the Bay Rodders and one of his best mates in a fatal accident involving his Hot Rod outside of the Showgrounds. The Hot Rod burst into flames shortly after the accident and bystanders were unable to get close to the car. Details are still sketchy and the accident will be investigated by the coroner. There is more info in our Forum but we will let people know what the investigation uncovers when we can. We wish to express our Deepest sympathies to the families at this time.
	Swap Meet Why should you advertise in our Internet Swap Meet? Firstly it is free for the moment (that is a big incentive!), second we can now get your advert up within days of you sending it to us, thirdly it gives your ad access to thousands of our regular visitors who are also hotrodders, not to mention potentially millions of other Internet surfers. We have just updated again so send us your ad, but remember we want to keep it strictly Hot Rods, Classics and Kustoms or late model parts to suit. There are other web sites for Holdens, Falcons, Mustangs, Camaros etc. If you have placed an ad which has not appeared please read the next news item and try to send it again or contact us.
	Spam Email We have had major problems with Spam Email (over 100 a day) and in the past few months have filtered out some of our incoming adverts in the process of trying to clear it all. Spam has become such a problem that we know people who no longer use the Internet because of it. If I wanted a new mortgage, a penis enlargement, viagra, a college degree, the worlds smallest digital camera or access to any one of a number of porno sites I would just do it without being bombarded by junk email. There is even spam email about getting rid of spam email! I urge everyone reading this to NEVER buy anything or even respond to ANY unsolicited email (particularly the Nigerian money laundering scam!). The only way I can see us being saved from this scourge is for everyone to completely boycott it. If people don't respond to any of it at all, then these morons won't keep spending money to send them! Unfortunately some people must actually buy some of this crap. Please tell all your friends to ignore and delete spam instantly.
March	New Products If you have a new hotrodding product please contact us and let us know so that we can put some information about it on the net.   The first one we are featuring is the Mini motorised 1932 Ford Roadster shown to the left. These are being built by Castlemaine Rodder Glenn Rewell from Rewell's Mower Service in Castlemaine, Victoria and can take a child or an adult. These fibreglass body cars are available in various stages from a kit to a fully completed driving car. All brand new parts are used in their construction including Honda motors. Chassis and parts are all available seperately, including such things as a chromed dropped headlight bar, spreader bar and polished billet grille. There was one on display at the ASRF Nationals and you had to see it to believe the detail. For more information click the photo.
	More Runs In Victoria John's Rod and Kustom is coming up again on the 1st and 2nd November. We went on the Sunday last year and it was a great day, although it has well and truly outgrown the venue. Sadly lots of nice Rods and Kustoms sat outside whilst Commodores and Falcons took up space inside. We will give you more details on this years run as we get them. We believe the venue is unchanged. The Harley Owners Group are also holding a Hot Rods and Harleys Show in Castlemaine on Saturday 1st November as part of their State Rally. We will be there on the Saturday and probably go to John's on the Sunday. We believe Bright is on again in November as well and there are a number of runs in October, not to mention a few swap meets in between. Don't forget to let us know about your upcoming events including those interstate which we often seem to miss!
	New Cars Is it any wonder Hot Rodding is so popular at the moment. Have you actually gone and looked at a new car lately. They all look exactly the bloody same! We wanted to update our everyday 2002 Corolla Station Wagon (which has alloys, skirts etc.) to something a little bigger. All we wanted was a normal everyday wagon which was a bit sporty, black and manual. Sounds simple enough doesn't it? Try bloody well buying one! Ford finally get back on the styling track with the BA but no longer do the XR6 or XR8 in a Falcon Wagon and you can no longer get a manual in any model Falcon wagon. Holden will not put a manual in any Commodore wagon, not even behind the V8. Toyota have dropped the Camry wagon. Mitsubishi make a supposed Magna Sports Wagon with only an Auto (what sort of Sports has only an auto?). Nissan only make a four wheel drive, Mazda have a real snazzy new 6 wagon which looks the part if you want an auto only! You can buy a number of European wagons in a manual but we cannot afford a BMW and couldn't possibly turn up to a swap meet in a Volvo or Peugeot. The only mid to large size non European traditional wagon left on the Australian market with a manual is the Subaru Liberty (Legacy in NZ) and New Zealand gets black but we don't! We have written to every major manufacturer (we are dead serious) asking for them to build us a manual wagon, after all they do make them in utes or sedans etc, but NOT ONE is bloody interested. Too much trouble. We are now busily trying to convince Subaru to bring us in a black one (so far without success!) How bloody frustrating. No wonder we build Hot Rods. You get what you want, how you want it. If you go to some of the European car web sites and see the options available during a build you would be absolutely staggered. You actually still get a choice of interior colours and fabrics like you could once do in Australia. You can even get a red leather interior in a black car! How novel is that? (although the SS Commodore has it as an option) Things have gone down hill here since the EH finished! I wish Holden or Ford would let some of us Hotrodders loose in their marketing department so that we could build something a little more stimulating than the boring stuff they are churning out. I suppose if people actually keep buying it they will keep building it (a bit like Spam). It is a shame because Ford and Holden have some great new paint colours available at present, it is a pity the cars are so darn boring to go with them (except maybe the Monaro). Maybe Holden will do a GTO Pontiac Wagon or just maybe I will win tattslotto. Maybe the real reason we build Hot Rods is to get away from these boring everyday contraptions. I will get off my soap box now but would love to see some responses in our forum.
05/02/2003	Happy New Year! Well what a year. My apologies, the first update of the year and it's February already!! Believe me it hasn't been for want of trying, but with some technical difficulties here in the HRI office and commitments to some corporate website clients it just hasn't happened. Missed the Mornington Picnic, Korumburra and Berwick Swap Meets, all very hot days, but well patronized I've been told. Hope to have some photos soon. Speaking of which, we'd like to hear from someone with a digital camera from NSW, QLD, SA and the West that would like to share a few pics and news with us. If that sounds like you, drop us a line at gregwapling@hotmail.com Queenscliffe Rod Run was on last weekend and I was there on the Sunday to catch some of the action and atmosphere. Heaps of Rods and sunshine, made for an excellent day. Check out our coverage of this great event. Updates The ASRF site now has the latest newsletter online and has been moved to a new server. The DLRA site includes all the latest news for the Speed Trials in March. The Bay Rodders pages have been updated with the latest information for their 2 Bay Rod Run in April. Well there are heaps of new links to add and I'm already working on some new features for the site for this year, so "y'all come back now, y'hear!"

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