We reckon Paul Fava is a vampire. There’s no way this bloke gets any sleep with the overabundance of extraordinary Holden muscle he pumps out. We first featured Paul with his HK Monaro (SM, Jul ’22), which has since been sold for life reasons. Now he’s making up for lost time with a shedful of Lion-badged powerhouses.

First published in the March 2026 issue of Street Machine

You’re no stranger to the pages of Street Machine, Paul.

Chris Thorogood shot my cream, LS-powered HK Monaro, K1LLAK, four years ago. I sold that in my divorce, so I had to start again. But now I’m back on my feet and I have a few cars in the build, including another HK Monaro – a one-owner car in Warwick Yellow. I’ll add tubs and what-not.

Is building cars your day job?

Nah, I’m a spray seal asphalt supervisor. I do a bit of resto work for myself and friends, but I’m looking at stepping it up and starting a business. I stay up all night working on cars; I only stop because I have to go to work. I just need to make sure that I don’t burn myself out. I’m a bloke doing most of this on my own, but with help from my beautiful girlfriend, Tara.

Tell us about K1LLAQ.

I bought this ’73 HQ Kingswood about 10 years ago off a mate in Ballarat. It had a big-block Chev on avgas, but it wasn’t streetable. I bought an LSA for $10K, and then Tim Holmyard from TJH Performance built it – he’s an LS guru. I tidied up the HQ, mini-tubbed it, and added a strong reverse-pattern TH400. It’s my cruiser that I take everywhere – anything that’s a fair drive, I’ll jump in it and go. On the track, the car kept getting better and better. It was doing 9.7s on PULP; then I changed to E85 and bigger injectors and hit the 9.0. Now it’d dip into the eights, no worries. I’ve been racing since I was a young fella, but I’m more into it now; I love it. I won’t drag K1LLAQ again, as it needs a ’cage; I’m building another car for the drags. It’s an HK sedan with a 632ci engine built by James Kanaris at Kanaris Engines – that’ll have big power. It’ll be a street car that I can race, as I want to do events like Street Machine Drag Challenge.

And you’ve also pumped out two hectic five-week builds?

Yeah, I bought Matty Watts’s LX hatch (SM, Dec ’21) and wanted to make it my own, so last year, I pulled it apart for a five-week rebuild and painted it Absinth Yellow with black stripes. Then, stupid me, I did it again this year. I’ve just finished my black HQ Monaro with a Kanaris-built 8/71-blown 496. Man, I smashed myself! Another longer build I’ve got going on is a windowless HR panel van for my 18-year-old daughter. That’ll be white with original red interior, tubs and a 4/71-blown 186. She’s keen – she took my HQ for a spin and scared me a bit!