A selection of holes.

 Patched! Including new 4 speed transmission tunnel.

Everything gets fully welded. The old trans tunnel was pretty beat up!

some work so far

Sandblasting in the garage. Did a few full loads of sand through the blaster, it took ages to collect and sift the sand, worked out it would take too long to do the whole front clip. Got a great price from a local blasters, so got them to do it.

The kuda trailer, ready to go to the bodyshop to get the front straightened out and some new steel put in.

On the autorobot. New inner fenders and left hand chassis rail.  The whole front was shunted over, and twisted. They de-stitched the cowl and patched the rust in that area too. Now I've something to aim for with my repairs.

At Weta Workshop in our studio. This is where a bunch of miniatures for Lord of the Rings were built, as well as a great deal of other exciting projects.

Starting the rust repairs. Spoiled with machines nearby, plasma-cam, roller, folder, drill press, etc...  Cheers Weta!

Passenger footwell. I made patch templates in cardboard, then scanned and redrew them on the computer as vector files.

Which I then cut on the Plasma cutter.

I decided to try pressing the swages in. So I cut a couple of templates and a die. It worked pretty well, but as I was only clamping a relatively small area around the swage, the metal warped and buckled quite a bit and needed a decent massage before being ready to weld in.

 

the latest concept image for the kuda. with widened police wheels, and california plate.

440

440ci big block mopar

parts

the 440

this rad illustration of the kuda is by none other than the brutally talented christian pearce, a good friend, coworker, and fellow car nerd. although even he is sick of hearing about the kuda...

this image was originally created as part of pearce's awesome 99 deadly sleds project, check it out here

alternate scheme for the engine bay of the kuda. this is a more race-oriented direction, with natural-finish fabricated alloy parts, and black engine block.

KUDA photography

a few examples of vehicular photography by aaron beck / beck kustoms. these images are of the beck kustom's kuda as it looked prior to the current rebuild. the locations are all in the wellington, new zealand, region, primarily the south coast.

440 KUDA engine bay

quick concept for the potential look of the kuda's engine bay. this scheme pays homage to the way the factory painted the whole 440 six-pack motor orange, and it looked amazing in a black or contrasting engine bay.

440 KUDA logo

here's a concept for the new hand painted WWII bomber style painting that will live on the driver side of the kuda. for the past few years the actual cuda fish logo that plymouth used to promote the late 60's barracuda's has been painted on the side. this new version is meant to be a fun reflection of the new, mean, nature of the kuda.

440 KUDA

welcome to beck kustoms.
this is a blog for the car related work of aaron beck.

and this particular car is a concept piece for the in-progress beck kustom's kuda. the paint is a homage to the factory mopar drag cars of the late 60s, and the kuda will be running a hot 440 big block, 4 speed, fiberglass front end, and hotchkis suspension.

stay tuned for updates, build images, artwork, and ideas!