Hot rod and classic car heaven at Napier festival

Greg Ballot with his 1929 hot rod which he'll display on Sunday. Photo / Paul Taylor

As a bit of a petrol head Greg Bullott could be said to be in some sort of heaven working as operations manager for an oil company in Napier.

But the reality is, despite being somewhere vintage late-50s, he's more at home doing "boys stuff," where heaven emerges in the form of the Marineland Rod and Kustom Club's Hot Rod and Classic Car Festival at Meeanee at the weekend, with over 600 cars and pick-up trucks lined up and at least 4000 people expected to pass through the gates for its show, shine and swap meet on Sunday.

Bullott is an original, there when the show kicked off, having displayed his share of varied Fords over the years, including the reproduction model of a 1929 Ford Model A Roadster which he'll display on Sunday.

It'll be the 26th year of the show which started as a small event in the Meeanee Speedway inner in the early 1990s but which, from the rows and rows of shiny and chromed prized possessions to the public parking now takes over all five hectares, oddly somewhat under the radar when it comes to the significance of annual events in Hawke's Bay.

The weekend kicks in with a Hot Rod Run on Saturday with over 150 vehicles, involving about 270 people and, because of the interest, limited to those from outside Hawke's Bay.

Bullott says it's some time since the club had almost outgrown itself in terms of size, and could have grown even bigger, on the back of a reputation for attracting some of the machinery of its type in weather which tends to back-up the image of a sunny Hawke's Bay. The forecast is for a fine Saturday, and high cloud with a chance of rain on Sunday.

Bullott has had "lots of car", and first fronted with a 1948 Ford Thames, followed by two-door 1937 sedan, a 1932 Roadster, Mustangs, and "a 1960 Galaxy in there somewhere," at times barely able to drop the spanner rebuilding vehicles, or in some cases complete builds from parts, both originals and reproductions, which come from a global market.

"You really need all the parts before you start," he said, explaining the four years it took to build the '20 Roadster after he bought "a whole lot of parts off a guy in Auckland".
"Things do get stalled while you're looking," he said. "But that's part of the fun of it."

Numerous swap meets and inquiries in the US later he had the Roadster ready for the show in 2015, but it's hardly slowed him down.

Making it a family pursuit he and his son built a 1961 Falcon station wagon, and rebirthed a two-door 1971 Viva for his daughter.

While it's the vehicles that are the attraction, the club isn't averse to trotting out new ideas.

Noted hot rodder Billy Gibbons, the big-bearded guitarist with Texas rock band ZZ Top, came in 2009, and this year on Sunday there's a fashion show, and at midday the dropping of a vehicle from a crane.