American Fork Steel Days

Today was exciting.. We got to go to a car show, play in the park, have a picnic, play with a cute puppy, then go cruise main street in Thunderpig! What did you do? ;-)

Thunderpig had a nice spot under a shade tree.. But when the sun started to shine on it, boy did it sparkle!

















Just before lunch time Jen noticed this sticker on the windshield of the pickup.. She said "did you put this here?" I of course replied.. "No! Why would I put a sticker in the window?"

Then the light bulbs turned on.. We won!!! Now where's our award? :)

Now that the pressure to win was behind us, we set off to enjoy the rest of our day at the park! What better way to do that then by having a picnic in the park!

Afterwards we went back over to check on Thunderpig.. Logan made sure the exhaust was still clean..

And that the step was still securely fashioned to the bed.. Logan loves to sit on the steps of the truck.. We joke and say they're actually seats, not steps. hah!

Then it was off to the park to play on the playscape! Zach has more fun running up the slide, then going down the slide.. Too funny.

Logan and Zach always seem to find the puppies at each show.. This was Logan's favorite.

Thunderpig ended up winning a nice big Sponsors Choice award! So I told Zach "Do you wanna go with me in the cruise with all the other hotrods since we won?" He said "YEAH!"

Logan and Mom drove down the block and found a great spot on the grass while Zach and I started the cruise

Here comes Thunderpig! Zach loved it.. We would zip down the road reving the engine and blinking the lights.. He had a blast.

From the looks of it, I think Logan had fun watching all of the cars drive by too!

There goes Daddy and Zach in Thunderpig!


Yep, we had one heck of a great day today.

Preparing for Steel Days!

This afternoon is the Steel Days car show in American Fork. Joe and I installed the door panels last night so Thunderpig can make a proper appearance to the show with as much of it's interior finished as possible. So.... What'cha think?

Joe is shown here installing the handle on the drivers side door "the first time" (soon after we realized that I had messed up the door latch when I had earlier taken the latch a part to grind down a bolt head that was binding with the latch mechanism.. ooops! heh heh)

Passenger door prepped for the new door panel (holes drilled for the fasteners, latch adjusted to open just right -- learned from the previous door, and an arm rest pull reinforcement installed).. ready to go!

Tadah! It's amazing how much better the door looks with some nice leather interior panels. I really think the door panels turned out great. Don't you?

Here are the rear cab corner speakers.. They look awesome and sound sweet too!

Now the fun part! Time to drive the truck back home!

It was a long night, but rest assured, the effort will be well worth the time. :)

This morning we woke up early to wax and clean the truck for the show.

The engine is nice and shiny.. Look at it sparkle!

Here is a shot of the drivers side door with the handle and power window switch installed.

Check out the interior now!






The underside of the bed is tough to clean, but is a unique way to show off the chassis beneath, so its worth the work. Only 2 hours to go till the car show!

June 2011 Cruise Night

While I was in Alaska on a fishing trip with my friend Steve Atherton from Texas, Joe took Thunderpig over to a local diner that hosts a cruise night every month.. Mikes One Man Band in Spanish Fork UT.

On the evening of June 22nd, I received the following text message that said: "You won hottest hot rod at SF cruise night!" I was thrilled. Way to go Thunderpig!

Here are a few of the pictures I was able to dig up from the event

Way to go Joe!!! Thanks for taking the time to go to the show. Thats one of my favorite awards.. Hottest Hot Rod.. Just sounds cool doesn't it?

Show and Tell day at work

Today was one of those days where I just couldn't resist the temptation to take the truck to work.. blue skies, a freshly polished paint job.. why not! :)

Zach and I agreed that today was the day.. We high fived, then he went to day care and I sped off to work.. whoohooo!

It was fun showing the truck off to all of my co-workers.. they've been hearing about the truck for a long time, so it was fun to finally show them it in person.

I even parked in the cool car section. That's my friend Sam's Porsche, I doubt he'll door ding Thunderpig.. but just to be safe I parked one parking space over.. heh heh.. ;-)

Art City Days 2011

This weekend we took Thunderpig to Springville Utah for the car show during Art City Days.

Before we headed over to the car show we walked downtown to check out the parade. The kids loved it.. candy, cars, and music.. awesome.
Thunderpig had a front row spot at the Art City Body Shop (the heart of the car show)

There were a lot of people at the show, this picture made me laugh, because I barely caught Logan as he zipped by in this photo..

The freshly painted head panel of the bed looked great and we received a lot of comments from spectators asking why we named it Thunderpig and how beautiful the truck turned out.

Apparently the judges agreed.. We won TWO trophies at the show! Best Truck 2011 and Best of Show 2011. We were really excited because these were Thunderpig's first awards and we received two from the same show. Pretty awesome. I owe it all to the hard work and amazing workmanship of my Dad and everyone from Horvath Hotrods as well as No Limit Engineering, and Doug Herbert Engines.. :)

More finishing touches

We wanted to give the truck a little more flair so we had Eric paint "Thunderpig" on the front bed panel, and the bowtie on the tailgate received a nice deep coat of red paint. The same tone that was used in the darker layer of flames on the truck. It's subtle but makes the bowtie pop out more when you look at it.

Here's a close up of the new airbrush work in the front panel of the bed.. Thunderpig!!!!

The panel was just sprayed and still needs a coat of clear on it before it can be reinstalled in the truck.

The tailgate (shown in the paint booth) now has a deeper shade of red on the bowtie which really makes it stand out better now.

Next up.. reassembly and bedwood! :-)