678HQ panel van as the infamous Alien, which has
skirted the van scene in unfinished form for
the past 30-plus years. “One of our Renegade
Vanners, Phil Roseman, bought it from a car
show and removed the body from the heavily
detailed chassis to sort more of the panelwork,”
Nick explains. “It ran a 308 with the tunnel-ram
and carbs off Alley Cat, but didn’t progress
much further under Phil’s ownership. That
chop was six inches or something wild; this
project definitely wasn’t for the faint-hearted.
It had a really cool fabricated centre console,
and I heard recently it is still around, so it may
get finished one day.”
06: CRAIG Norman from South Coast Van Club
built this clean Holden van dubbed Centrefold,
which was typical of mild custom vans of the
late 70s and early 80s. A full grille with quarter
bumpers, Ford side vents, sunroof and wagon
rear bumper may have been fairly common
modifications, but choosing an identity for a van
and wrapping that theme up via colour, artwork
or styling choices was often all it took to make
your ride stand out from the rest. “The beauty
of Holden, Falcon and Valiant panel vans is
they’re all great shapes that lend themselves
easily to personal touches,” Nick says. “Sure,
there were a heap of Holden vans around, but
our club was proof that you could make that
same basic body shape look markedly different
using a bit of individual creativity.”07: JOHN Strachan, of Alley Cat Jag V12
van fame, became an honorary member of
Renegade Vanners and is pictured here at
the counter of his old business The Chrome
Exchange. “John’s shop was a mecca for hot
rodders, street machiners and vanners alike,
and I was like a kid in a lolly shop with all
the cool stuff he had available.” The business
started here in a rented half of a Shell service
station at Kensington, Sydney, before shifting
to larger premises in Arncliffe. John shaped
vanning in many ways with his various builds
of Alley Cat, and his innovative personality
was evident in what he offered at The Chrome
Exchange – like his mail-order Big Mutha 80A
alternators or his Hotbitz range of Allen-head
bolt sets: “They were great; you could walk
in and buy a shrink-wrapped packet with all
the chrome bolts you’d need for, say, a 308Holden or 350 Chev, or for the engine bay of
your FX-WB Holden or XW-XD Falcon.”08: A MOVE to the west coast saw Nick shift
focus to his passion for two wheels, and his
current ride is a 2008 Kawasaki ZX-14. “I’ve
owned this since new and have clocked up
plenty of miles, including a return trip home to
Sydney,” he says. “I airbrushed the front guard
to personalise it a little. The love for modified
cars still burns brightly too; travelling around
on this bike has opened my eyes to what sorts
of raw materials are still lurking around, so you
can never say never – there are plenty of vans
here in WA that are just dying to be bought
up and built, so maybe it’s time to dust off
my Renegade Vanners jacket and turn back
the clock!” s45