Kiwi Michael Crawley likes what he likes, and the world is a better place for having blokes like that in it, as it takes somebody special to go against the grain in the way that Michael has with this ’81 Camaro. Or as Kayton Coughey bluntly puts it, “Michael wanted to make a good-looking car out of an ugly duckling.” 

First published in the August 2026 issue of Street Machine

As the owner of Real Rides Ltd in Auckland, where the majority of this transformation was undertaken, Kayton has more of a right than most to make a claim like that. “Michael started the build in his shed with his friend Vince, who did race car fabrication, so when it came to us, much of the mechanical work was already completed and ready for finesse and paint,” he recalls. “He’d done the diff and driveline, suspension, brakes, and he’d installed the right-hand-drive steering box, dash framing, and electric power-steer conversion – it was assembled, but it wasn’t complete, and he got us to finish it.” 

Michael had a set of 2015 Camaro tail-lights he wanted to put in the car, so Kayton and the Real Rides team began fab work on the rear end to make it work, crafting a metal rear spoiler while they were at it. That’s when the build really began to accumulate momentum. 

The team then moved on to shaping the steel flares and rear wing to blend them seamlessly into the body, which then led to the ground effects – sill extensions, carbonfibre front splitter and rear diffuser. 

“The ’81 Camaros had those plastic flares on just one side of the wheelarch, so we wanted to emulate that, but on both sides of the wheel,” Kayton explains of the extra body width. “That flowed into the ground effects, and the new front guards with air vents.”

The styling found its direction through the Real Rides team offering suggestions to Michael, inspired by their frequent trips to Meguiar’s MotorEx in Melbourne and SEMA in the States and bringing plenty of that overseas influence back to NZ. 

The front and rear screens are now flush-fitting, the nosecone has been shortened by 70mm and reworked to hell and back, and functional brake cooling ducts were added. The bonnet also had the centre section raised 50mm to clear the massive mill – a thumping White Performance 572ci big-block, backed by a Tremec TKO600 five-speed. 

“When Michael started the build around nine years ago, he wanted it to be as bad-arse as you could get, and I suppose that fits the bill!” Kayton says of the stonking BBC. 

There’s nothing standard about the underpinnings, either, comprising a full suite of Baer brakes, Hotchkis suspension, and a Krysler Shop nine-inch hung off a Detroit Speed four-link. These work with those special Forgeline GA3C three-piece wheels and big fat meats – sized at 18 inches for practicality and driveability rather than internet points. 

Of course, even on a build of this calibre, there’s still room for the shit to hit the fan. Michael had taken the car back home after the first lot of metalwork, and while he had it upside down on the rotisserie, the bolts broke and crushed the car’s roof, leading to a lull in progress while he weighed up how he should proceed. Cue a whole load of extra man-hours as the Camaro ended up back at Real Rides for a full roof replacement – no small task on any vehicle, let alone one with this amount of custom work! 

And the interior did not escape the surgeon’s scalpel either. Michael wanted Porsche GT3 styling, which has come through in the custom rear seat pods, with the modified Subaru WRX front bucket seats trimmed by Auto Interior Specialists.

As these cars never came out in right-hand drive, the dash is also totally custom. “The basic layout had been done,” Kayton says. “We did all the carbonfibre inserts, the switches and buttons, and matched the centre console to it.” 

It’s also worth mentioning that there were no legal factors behind the right-hand drive conversion, as a left-hook car like this can be registered and certified in New Zealand without issue. Michael simply wanted right-hand drive, and readers familiar with the sometimes patchy quality of Kiwi roads will understand why – he wanted to be able to drive it the way a pro touring car should be. 

To help achieve that, the Real Rides team put the hammer down and got the car finished and back to Michael in time for Christmas 2024, before taking it to a few shows, where it commanded attention – how could it not? 

Included in its trophy haul is Best Chev at the 2025 Kumeu Classic Car & Hot Rod Festival – its debut outing – and Top 10 at the Prowear Chrome Showcase later that year. 

Trophies are a given for a Camaro with this sort of cosmetic surgery on display, but it’s got muscles to flex, too. Michael is certainly much happier rowing gears and using every last one of those 572 cubic inches on the road!  

MICHAEL CRAWLEY
1981 CHEVROLET CAMARO Z28

THANKS
Kayton and the team at Real Rides Ltd; Auto Interior Specialists; Vince Gee