T
HE Bergamin brothers are Mopar-
mad and truly live by the motto: ‘If
it ain’t Mopar, it’s below par.’ About
the only thing they love more than
the cars themselves is drag racing
said Mopars. Frank Bergamin has
this ’70 Dodge Charger and another ’69
Charger in the build, while brother Robert
has a ’70 Road Runner and a VF Valiant
coupe that’s run a best of 9.74 over the
quarter-mile.
“We’ve raced most of our lives withValiants,” Frank says. “The VF has a naturally
aspirated small-block. It’s got W9 heads with
an R3 race block, but it’s a big small-block;
it’s been bored and stroked to 440 cubes.”
While the Bergamin Brothers Racing
sticker across the windscreen might look
pretty official, it’s really just a bunch of blokes
having fun and helping each other out with
their cars, something Frank’s been doing
since he was 16 years old. “My first car wasa VG Valiant, which I brought home and put
a 265 and four-speed in,” he says. “When
I was 19 I had an RX-2 Mazda with a 265
and a rollcage. Back then it was all about
power-to-weight and I couldn’t afford the big
V8 stuff.” The little Mazda ran an 11.8 on its
one and only pass down the quarter. Pretty
impressive stuff for a self-taught young bloke.
Fans of the Fast & Furious
movie franchise
may notice a strong resemblance between
Frank’s ’70 Charger and the one used in
those films, but the trainspotters amongstyou will also notice it’s not an exact clone,
more of a tribute really, as Frank explains: “I
based it on the first movie when Vin Diesel
pulled the shed door open and walked in with
Paul Walker – the blown motor, no bonnet.”
Truth be told, the reason Frank doesn’t run
a bonnet is that these cars are getting too
expensive to cut up! It’s not registered or
street-driven, and the lack of a bonnet makes
it a lot easier for people to see that blown big-block Chrysler. The other main difference is
that the movie car had a Hemi, but at least the
blower on Frank’s car is the real deal, unlike
its celluloid counterpart. “People always ask,
so we’ve done a few powerskids out the front
of my house just to prove it’s real,” he says.
Frank used to race a Dodge Dart with a
big-block, which he sold as a roller, so he
had an engine sitting around gathering dust.
“Bench-racing with mates one night, we
decided we would build a VH coupe into a
burnout competition car. That fell through,but then a mate told me he knew someone
who had a ’70 Dodge Charger sitting in their
shed,” he says.
As it turned out, the bloke in question also
had a VH Charger that he was doing up and a
new baby on the way, and as the Dodge was
a long way off being finished, he decided to
let it go and get some cash. “It had been
painted but had been sitting in a carport for
nearly 10 years collecting dust and birdshit,”WHEN I WAS 19 I HAD AN RX-2 MAZDA WITH A 265 AND A
ROLLCAGE. BACK THEN IT WAS ALL ABOUT POWER-TO-WEIGHT
AND I COULDN’T AFFORD THE BIG V8 STUFF