When John Thomas Drics was a senior in high school, his parents gave him a gift that would stay with him far longer than he ever expected: a brand-new ’81 Pontiac Trans Am. Some three decades later, he still owns the car, but it’s in far different condition than original, after a two-year buildup project that not only restored it, but took its performance to extraordinary new heights. How did he happen to receive such an enduring ride?

“I really don’t why they gave it to me,” Drics admits. But there was an added and unexpected satisfaction after his folks handed him the keys. He had just broken up with a girl who didn’t believe he’d be getting a new car, and then she spotted him behind the wheel. Noting her surprised wave, he just kept on heading for the horizon. Some 100,000 miles and a dozen years later, he rolled it into a storage garage, and there it sat for a 15 more years, rode hard and put away wet. But never forgotten.

So when the owner of the storage garage took ill and asked Drics to pull it out, he showed it to his then six-year-old son. “Let’s do something with it!” came the enthusiastic reaction. And indeed Dad did.

Realizing it needed a thorough reconditioning, and having neither the time nor the skills to personally handle the job, he had an epiphany while on a business trip from his home in Carmel, Indiana to Los Angeles, California. While cruising down Wilshire Boulevard, he spotted a really sick Mach I, and realized that So Cal was the place for custom car fabrication. He surfed around for a shop, and finally settled on Hot Rods and Custom Stuff (HR&CS) in Escondido, CA. “The owner Randy Clark was the only one who itemized the estimates and costs,” Drics relates. “That’s the best thing you can do on a project like this.” Other shops were too general in their quotes, and Drics expected a certain amount of  “project creep” (adding extra mods as time went on). More...

For many years now, the closest a customer could get to customizing a production car from the factory was to choose the car’s paint color. Even exotic car owners, who could have their cars tailored to their exact specifications and loaded with all manner of expensive goodies, were still unable to see anything more than snippets of what the finished product would look like. But now, thanks to the magic of technology and graphic design, anyone, regardless of the number of banks, oil fields, and Super Bowl rings they may own, can now create and customize a life like version of their dream car online.

Mini has, for a long time, had one of the best company websites when it came to being able to build and create a custom vehicle right on your home computer. Their car configurator not only allowed the user to choose options such as color, trim levels, body kits, and wheels, but actually updated the car’s image with the chosen selections. This, aside from being immensely fun and entertaining, helps give the user and potential customer the ability to make their dream Mini come to life right before their eyes. More...

Forget what your mom, your dad, and your teachers said about becoming a doctor or a lawyer. The business to be in is the automotive industry. Why? Two words: SEMA shows.

SEMA is the Specialty Equipment Market Association, and every year it puts on a huge show that spotlights the newest, coolest, and trickest cars, parts, and accessories that you and your buddies will be drooling over all year––until the next show brings even more.

Strolling up and down the aisles you’ll see paddle shifters for new Camaros, weight-saving aluminum radiators, high-performance intake kits and exhaust systems, and more alloy wheels than you can shake a dipstick at. Suspension kits, sway bars, springs, shocks and struts. Tires for drifting, drag racing, and track days. Trim kits, dress-up parts, and car-care products. It’s like walking through every auto parts store and speed shop in America at once.

And the cars? No matter what form your four-wheel addiction takes, whether street rods, sport compacts, trucks, luxury and exotic cars, racing, or off-road, there’s something there for you. Concept cars, one-offs, next year’s models, they’re all there, and probably all the parts to make your car look just like them, too. The SEMA show is where manufacturers like to pull the wraps off their latest models, and the people who are there to see them get the scoop before anyone else.

But here’s the catch. SEMA membership, and admission to the show, is open only to car manufacturers, importers, and builders, and people who work in, for, and around the car business. Which means, sadly, probably not you.

But don’t worry. The next SEMA show takes place November 1-4 at the Las Vegas Convention Center in Las Vegas, Nevada. That leaves you plenty of time to drop out of medical school, get a job at Krazy Karl’s Kar Kare Klinic, and save up for a SEMA membership of your own.

First up you need graphics to install. You can buy them ready-made, but the hot tip these days is to have them custom-made on a computer at a sign shop or graphics studio. The sky’s the limit as far as the design goes, but remember that big graphics won’t always conform to large, curved surfaces, so it’s a good idea to bring your car along when you have the graphics made up to make sure you’re not asking the impossible.

After your idea is turned into a graphic, you can pay the graphics shop to install the graphics on your car. If money’s tight, though––and when isn’t it?––you can do the job yourself.

Start by cleaning the surface the graphic will go on. Wash it with a mixture of soap and water, and clean it with lint-free towels. Don’t use red shop rags, especially used ones, even if they’re clean. The laundering process that red rags go through removes grease and oil, but sometimes leaves behind tiny metal chips that can scratch your paint.

Now’s the time to repair any surface imperfections in the paint, too. Skip this step and the dings will be enshrined forever beneath the graphic. More...