If there was one thing I was genuinely surprised about regarding Holley’s Intergalactic Ford Fest, it was the lack of diesel among the show field. Bowling Green has at least two diesel shops that I know of…so where were the trucks? Where were all of the coal-rolling Super Duty and heavy F-series? Where were the swapped old rigs? I saw maybe two rigs. Maybe. Both were later-model duallies, and had probably towed a car into the show. It seemed strange…there were Lightnings, there were neat restored old trucks, but no diesels? Well…there was one of note. And it came in a wrapper nobody saw coming.
The 1978 Toyota Hilux belongs to Erik Stacey, and if you’re getting flavors of that strange, LS-swapped widebody Toyota that appeared not too long ago, you aren’t wrong…Josh Mazerolle has influenced a huge portion of this build and was on hand to see his latest Frankenstein get thrashed. The Hilux is a full tube frame build with Ford Crown Victoria suspension attached, with a 7.3L Power Stroke providing the torque this thing frankly didn’t need. Other than a tuner, the big diesel was left more or less alone. As far as the dimensions, the standard Hilux was widened sixteen inches and the cab was stretched an additional three inches to improve interior space. And “fresh” isn’t the word…with Plexiglass windscreens front and rear and no glass in the doors, Stacey drove this beast 1,200 miles from New Hampshire to Bowling Green for the chance to wail on this truck as if the build was a joke.
On the burnout pad, he created his own cyclone of tire smoke. On the autocross course, the truck would hike a rear tire almost a foot into the air under hard braking. The only time the Power Stroke complained was right at the end of the burnout contest, when the coolant whizzed out of the front of the truck. Once it cooled down, all was forgiven.
These guys have the recipe down pat for chop-up Toyota builds. One is GM powered, one is Ford powered. Gen 3 Hemi next?
