CRANKY AS

RAY ELIA'S VH VALIANT REGAL HAS GONE FROM P-PLATE CHARIOT TO BAD-ARSE, 543-CUBE TYRE-FRYER

-  JACK HOULIHAN

WE’VE all dreamed of finding that perfect one-owner project car, and Sydney’s Ray Elia wound up with one of these elusive gems – not through years of hunting, but straight from his Chrysler-mad old man, John! “My dad bought it new; I drove it when I was on my L- and P-plates,” Ray grins. “I bought it off Dad when I was 16 years old – 27 years ago. I met my girlfriend, who’s my wife now, in the car as well.” By the way, don’t get him confused with Ray Elia of blown VN fame (SM, Dec ’22) – that’d be his namesake and cousin!

“I was 22 when I stripped the car,” Ray continues. “It’s just been a slow build ever since; obviously with starting a business and starting a family, it went on the back-burner.” 

Ray’s first iteration of CRNKY1 hit the blacktop back in 2014, having been doused in custom-mix PPG metallic silver by Keven at Grange Smash Repairs to replace the original black-vinyl-on-white combo. “It was a really good base,” Ray says. “I was actually going to paint it in [Mopar] Vitamin C or Dukes of Hazzard orange, or maybe even a purple, but I reckon the silver came up all right with the chrome!” The wraparound stripe kit from Angel Signs isn’t directly based on a particular design, though similar treatments feature all over American Mopar hotties of the era.

“The paint and body are 10 years old now and still in bloody awesome nick, but the rest of the stuff got changed in the past couple of years,” Ray says. Aside from the generous bonnet relief and smoothed rear filler panel seams, the exterior metalwork is basically as-stock, down to the VH 770 front end often associated with Chargers.