First published in Street Machine’s Hot Rod magazine #1, 2004
The rocker covers were there. So were the seats and the rear wheels. That was the start. Mark Course then built this orange ’32 coupe around them and won Summernats Grand Champion. Sounds a bit arse about but Mark’s rocker covers were a super-rare aftermarket set made for the small-block Chevy of the late 1950s. They didn’t fit under the bonnet of the ’28 A Tudor rod he had at the time, but he swore they’d go on his next car.
He’d kept the Recaros that were in his trophy-trapping Gemini panel van. Naturally, they’d be used in his new project along with his prized Center Line alloys — unless he could get a set of genuine, but expensive, Halibrands.
Mark got into street rods through his mates, Rob and Laine Engellener of Concord Panels. He bought a partly-built Model A Tudor in 1990 and finished it, but it still wasn’t exactly what he wanted. It wasn’t like this ’32 five-window.
“I reckoned by then that I knew everything there was to know in hot rodding,” he says. “The Model A won a few shows, but it was really just a good clean street car. With this one I wanted to go to a higher level, although I didn’t expect to go this much higher.”
Mark wanted his car to be a tough, blown pro streeter with big back wheels, and it had to be orange. He handed over fabrication of the frame to Wayne Ballot of FT Mobile who used original ’32 rails and fabricated crossmembers to get the front nice and low.
The front end is a dropped tube axle with a Rod City stainless four-bar and Pete & Jakes stainless shocks. An HQ steering box, Commodore steering column and a Boyd Coddington billet steering wheel takes care of corners.
Out back is a stainless four-bar and American Howe aluminium coil-overs set-up with a shortened nine-inch running a 4.11 ratio. Front stoppers are XY Falcon ventilated discs with DBA rotors and HZ Holden calipers, with big Galaxie drums at the rear, set up by Hoppers Stoppers.
After building the chassis around the Centre Lines he’d bought before anything else, Mark gave in to his craving for Halibrands, but it wasn’t an easy path to take.
“I went to the factory to buy a set in 1990,” he explained. “They told me it would take six weeks, but they took 18 months, and I had to pay for ’em up front.”
Even then, after such a wait, they didn’t deliver the wheels that he had ordered.
“They said the 10-inch wheels would take a year so I told them to send the 11s. I didn’t even know what the offset was — I was prepared to work around that, whatever it was.”
When they arrived he slept with them, and his wife slept on the sofa.
Power comes from a 350 small-block Chevy. The 010 standard-bore four-bolt block from the States was handed over to Duggan Engineering along with a steel crank, gear drive, standard rods and Keith Black pistons.
The heads are Edelbrock alloys which Mark sent to B&M in the States to be matched to the B&M blower kit. B&M supplied the manifold, blower and pulleys. Mark also added a B&M cam, lifters, pushrods and valve springs.
Carbs are a pair of 600 vacuum secondary Holleys, on top of which he’s adapted a super-rare Hilborn shotgun scoop.
Max Craggill fabricated the two-inch headers, which feed into three-inch pipes flowing to five-inch Supertraps.
It’s hard to see it, but the block is highly-detailed. Mark spent four months deburring and smoothing it before it was painted. And it was cut and polished before assembly.
A full fendered Deuce Customs fibreglass five-window coupe body is sitting on the chassis now, in place of the old three-window coupe that didn’t come up to Mark’s standard, even after steeling it out, fitting windows and getting the gaps right.
“I was going to have to spend big money on it to get it right, so I sold it,” he said.
The chassis was basically finished by then, which meant he had to trust Ken Brownlee to fit the body without scratching the paint.
Concord Panels was given the job of spraying the custom-mixed PPG Switchboard Orange.
“I had a switchboard that colour at work, and I liked it,” he says, “so I got them to match that.”
Pat Mesiti trimmed the interior in biscuit leather, but he had to cut down the Recaros to get them fitting and looking right, much to Mark’s horror. Mesiti also fitted the matching biscuit carpets.
While the Melbourne sparkie admits he’s had a dream run with the ’32, he says his next car, the Boydster coupe in his garage, will be even better.
“There are a few things I’ll do better next time,” he says. “The body fit will be a little bit better, and it will be finished just as well under the guards as it is on top.”
We’re not sure what he’ll do for rocker covers, seats and wheels, though. These ones are staying on the ’32.
COURSE RECORD (to 2003)
Mark Course is a bloke who has goals and Summernats has always been his Everest. He’s been in the Top 10 at the last three Summernats, finishing second in 2002 to Anthony Fabris, and he found himself up against his mate again this year. When he was congratulated by Summernats’ Owen Webb, he thought it was for being runner-up again, but was speechless when told he’d won.
“I was shocked, I couldn’t believe it,” he says. “Summernats is a street machine show and I never thought a hot rod would win. I couldn’t talk, I had to give my mobile to a mate so he could let people know we’d won.”
MARK COURSE
’32 Ford CoupeColour:Custom mixed ‘Switchboard’ orangeMAKIN’ MUMBOType:Chev 350Crank:SteelRods:StandardPistons:Keith Black, 8.0:1 compHeads:Edelbrock alloy matched to B&M manifoldIntake:B&M blower, dual 600cfm Holleys, vacuum secondaryHIDDEN BELOWGearbox:THM350Converter:B&M 2500rpm stallDiff:9in, 4.11 gearsChassis:Original ’32, modifiedFront-end:Dropped tube axle, stainless four-barRear-end:Stainless four-barBrakes:Ventilated discs(f), Galaxie drums(r)ROLLIN’ ONWheels:15×4 (f), 14×11(r) HalibrandTyres:135×15 Michelin (f), 12.5×15 Mickey Thompson (r)ON THE INSIDESeats:RecaroTrim:Biscuit leather, matching carpetsGauges:Auto MeterWheel:Boyd Coddington billet
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