1957 Chevrolet Nomad
Yes, ok, I know I know-I’ve spelt the title wrong. Well no, actually, there is a story behind it. All right I’ll get on with it then and keep my rubbish puns to myself.
Held at the Pryme Street multi storey car park in Hull once a year for one weekend, is a car show that has grown to twice its size in just one year. There are twice as many cars and nearly double the attendance of previous years. This was the vision that Dik Stapley, Hull City Council’s parking manager, had in mind around five years ago. “I had the idea after realising the car park wasn’t used much on a weekend and thought it could be put to better use”, says Dik, “it took me a couple of years to convince the politicians, but I did it and here we are. It gives people a chance to show off their cars, whether that be Hot Rods, Classics or Modified”.
It’s certainly a great venue, it’s all open sided, so anyone wanting to run their engine can, but it’s also inside so the cars can be shown at their best in the dry. The reason for the title ‘multi story’, Dik explains, is that there is more then just one chapter of the car scene here, every group or club has their own taste in different cars and overall they share a passion of the same thing, but each has a different story to tell. Dik himself is a real car enthusiast owning various vehicles as a 1981 Corvette, a 1927 hot rod replica of a Fort T Trackster and a couple of motorcycles.
Eye catching hot rods line up
Speaking for the modified car scene at this event are two members of Hull Cruise, Tony Thurston and Simon Sands. “This is a great place to hold this kind of event. Over the past couple of years Dik [Stapley] has helped us out by organising legal cruises which, in turn, helped us to raise around £2000 for the charities ‘For The Kids’ and the ‘Ronald McDonald Children’s Charity’. So for this we got the word out to the modified scene about this show, which greatly adds to the number of cars here this year”. Last year there was just one floor holding 30 to 40 modified cars and a floor of hot rods, this year there are two floors with 100 modded cars, one floor full to bursting with hot rods and another floor for the scooters, classics and motorcyles. Around 1500 people attended this year and a lot of the owners of the cars were from outside the Hull area which also encourages other people to travel a bit of a distance to see the show.
One couple, Ray and Joy Young from Ravenfield, Rotherham, who are both 58, showed me around their immaculate classic;- a 1957 Chevrolet Nomad in deep red and white, that they have modernised in a very stylish, but subtle, way. They bought the car in 1982 but left the car in the garage until three years ago, when they decided to restore it to its former self, adding a few bits here and there to bring it into the modern world. “We added cross-drilled, ventilated disk brakes front and rear, some twenty inch, deep-dish, polished alloy wheels plus a new 5.7 litre V8 engine with a four speed manual gear box, which is extremely rare in a car like this” said Ray. “We drive it regularly during the summer, and the engine has around three thousand miles on it now. We tend to get out to a lot of shows, so it’s used most weekends, apart from about three months in winter time. We both really enjoy this particular show as it’s indoor and dry, have attended every year since it started three years ago, and will definitely be here again for the next time around”.
Steve Fletcher's 1946 Chevy pick-up
Another car that really stood out from the crowd was Steve Fletcher’s Chevrolet Pick-up, done up as a through and through hot rod in red and black with gold to green flames, finished off with a set of huge ten-spoke chromed alloy wheels. “I bought this car in a half finished project state, so I stripped it down and started from scratch” said Steve, aged 51, from Newport. “It was from Houston, in Texas, originally. I’ve had it for five years now, and it took me around a year, spent in my garage, to get it to the condition it’s in now. It’s a 1946 Chevy Pick-up with a 350 engine installed, which produces about 250 bhp and 240 lb/ft of torque. It has air bags under the car so I can lower or raise the ride height whenever I want. My Chevy is used regularly in summer and I’ve clocked up twenty thousand miles now. I think that these cars should be shown off like they were meant to be, not just sat like museum pieces. The pick-up has won quite a few prizes now, but I don’t come to these shows for that, I come for the atmosphere and to meet up with like minded people that enjoy looking around my Chevrolet and if it does win something it’s just an added bonus”. Steve also has a couple of other cars in his garage, a 1946 Ford Woodie, a 1934 Chevy Three Window Coupe that is eighty per cent completed and a 1934 Ford Roadster.
Rick Coulbeck's Subaru Impreza Turbo 2000
On to one of the levels of modified cars and a dark gloss red year 2000 Subaru Impreza Turbo 2000 decked out with gold rally decals immediately catches my eye. It’s owned by Rick Coulbeck of Grimsby, who is a member of the modified car club Gloyn Boyz. Rick speaks enthusiastically of his car, “when I got it two years ago, it was completely standard, but now it’s far from it. I estimate that I’ve spent £15,000 on it up to now, not including the £10,000 it cost to buy, but it’s all well worth it”. A few things that have been done are:- for in car entertainment, 2 sub woofers (bass speakers), 2 amplifiers, 2 power packs, 6 tv’s, and 2 dvd players. A few engine modifications include a dump valve (for the turbo), a Superchip for the ECU (the engines computer management), an induction kit (to push more air into the engine), and a Magnex stainless steel exhaust system. He’s also got plans to install 44 mini tv screens inside, 22 of them into the sunroof. “As Gloyn Boyz, we have won the Best Club award at this event for the past two years and out of the last five events we have attended, have won four Best Club awards. A couple of these shows were on a national scale as well, so overall I feel we have done brilliantly”.
So three completely different cars, with equally different owners, chosen out of a sea of beautiful, extreme and exquisite machines, and, as the show title reads, each has a different story to tell.
The Multi Story car show has now moved to East Park in Hull and is called the Hull Motor Show. Check out Hull Motor Show for details of next years show.
Other interesting sites:
Rod and Custom National Street Rod Association
Copyright Chris Davies 2006 - Originally published in Drive Magazine (A Hull Daily Mail publication) 
