January 2007 Featured Ride:

Congratulations: Tom (HALFLIFE)

I would like to thank everyone involved in this website for choosing my lighting for the 1st featured ride of 2007!!! It is a great honor and more importantly a great group of people to hang and race with!

So here is my story (sorry if it is long winded, I type like I talk): If you ask my mom, she will tell you my addiction to cars started at birth. Before I could talk I would point at cars, and my first word was “car”, no bs!!! The first car I could remember from child hood was my fathers dodge charger, I know it was not a ford but it was fast!! After that he made the switch to Ford and started buying Broncos new every few years. The Bronco I guess made me a Ford guy, working on it with him and tuning it up, I learned a lot about ford engineering. On the weekends, I could be found washing and waxing my father’s truck, years before I could drive. (Hey I had to look good getting dropped off at the arcade!) At about 10 yrs old I started building and racing R/C cars and always made sure I had the fastest and best looking cars on my block. When I got old enough I just switch from R/C cars to the real deal.

My first car was a 93 super coupe. I bought it off my friend who had a used car lot; he gave it to me for what he picked it up for, $3500 with a 110K mile on it. Had the car for a week and doing some top speed runs I blew the tranny. He offered to give me my money back but I feel in love with the super charger and opted to pay for a new tranny. 4 months later I blew the head gaskets. Did not have enough money to fix, but had good credit. So I bought a new Honda civic L. Had that 6 months and was t boned at an intersection. Next day I bought a 01 VW jetta VR6 Manuel, nice quick car and I pimped it out, all bolt ons and some chrome ottenger rims. This was my first stick car, bought it never driving stick before and picked it up in NJ and drove home teaching myself through Staten island in Friday afternoon rush hour traffic, lets just say I was a pro by the time I got to NY (damn those hills in Staten island!). 2 months later I broke the engine mounts dropping the clutch at 4000 rpm’s, and wrapped it around a tree 3 months after that. I then bought another Honda civic and went nuts. Custom interior, body kit, system, custom full exhaust, nitrous, fart can!, rims, drop, etc… Did a couple of car shows, winning first place in most. Now you say enough with the imports this is a ford site. Well I owe the imports for getting me into the Ford scene. My civic got to the point where I did not want to drive it anymore daily because I had too much money into it and I just wanted to make it a show car. So I started looking for a tow vehicle. My friend just bought a silver lightning. I went by his shop and sat in the truck, did not even drive it or start the motor but feel in love. The next day I check the specs to make sure it could tow, it did and I called 3 dealers and made a deal over the phone in about an hour.

The day I picked up the Lightning was the last day I spent a dime on my civic. I did a burnout leaving the parking lot of the dealer, shooting up a rock cracking my father’s bronco’s windshield!! By the time I got home from the dealer after hitting 140mph+ on the O.P. I forgot about my civic. The next week I started selling off parts from the civic and buying mods for the lightning. It was great, went to the track for the first time and feel in love with racing. After blowing 2 motors at the track and spitting a spark plug I got frustrated with the truck and decided to sell. I traded in both the civic and lighting for a 05 Audi nogaro blue S4. This was by far the best handling car I have ever driven. However it was a lemon, after 6 months I had a decision to make, get a 06 s4 or get my money back. I was just about to buy a house so I opted for my money back. I went to the ford dealer and ordered a 05 mustang that day, telling me it would be 4 to 6 weeks max before I got the car. I had 2 weeks before I had to turn in the S4 and just figured I would borrow or rent a car until the Mustang showed up. Well 6 weeks came and went, I needed a ride, and missed my lightning a lot. I found this Sonic Blue 03 lightning online with only 2300 miles on it and a bunch of basic bolt ons. The owner had another fully built lightning so I knew it was coming from a good owner. 5 months after I ordered it my mustang showed up, 2 weeks after I bought my house. I told my girl it was in and I was going to just check it out. She told me not to buy it as I could not really afford it with the house; I said OK and went to just take a look at it. So I go to Able Ford and check it out, looked great. I had no plans on buying it, as I already had the L, but did not tell them that. I said I want to test drive it first before I sign everything. Well I test drove it came back and signed on it!! Showed up at home with the new mustang, boy she was not happy!!

And now I am here!

So far I have done 3 car shows and took first place in 2 of the 3. I won Best Domestic Pickup at the Funk Master Flex Celebrity car show in Atlantic City and won Best Truck in the 2006 SVT Snake show!!!

So far I have done to the lightning:

Performance: 4lb lower, intake, bassani x pipe, bassani cat back, C &L polished upper and lower intake, factory tech valve body, NX kit (50% installed), 160 thermo(not installed yet), Factory tech monster box 4r100 tranny (not installed yet and not sure If I am going to), painted Eaton black

Exterior: 22 inch Chrome Foose Speedsters w/ toyos, 03 Harley Grill, J Jent lower grill, 20% tint all around, 50% tint on complete windshield, hood scoop off mustang

Interior: Wet Okale seat covers, custom built sub box wrapped in Wet okale material to match seats, 1200 watt Kenwood amp, 2 Kenwood 10 in subs, custom tweeters, triple gauge pod (boost, engine temp, oil pressure)

Suspension:

Front: Belltech drop spindles powder coated sonic blue, MOOG upper control arms, Moog lower ball joints, Rear: Western chassis front hangers, belltech 2 inch drop shackles, energy suspension low profile bump stops, so cal speed shop shorten end links, so cal shock extenders


Thanks: First I have to thank Josh aka Blwn5pnt4 for bringing me to this site! I also can not thank Sal at PSP enough. He has save me numerous times and also does A+++ work. He is the only one besides myself I let work on my lightning. Joe @ Mustang Magic and crazy bob for my newest addiction: just when you think racing could not get anymore expensive, then you go road racing! My parents for letting my pile parts up in their house and destroy their driveway when I still lived at home. Most importantly, my girlfriend for understanding that a supercharger is more important than an engagement ring!(yeah, that is getting old for her real quick!)

I also want to thank all my new friendships I have made over the last few years on this site. Everyone is willing to help another board member in anyway they can, and that is just plain cool!

Go Ford!