Father and son duo Mick and Jake Keegan have debuted one hell of a mini truck at Red CentreNATS 12 in Alice Springs, taking the attention of plenty as it rolled off the trailer at scrutineering on Thursday.

Mick has been in the street machining scene for decades, his HQ ute BLO 308 gracing the cover of our July-August 1990 issue of SM.

Now, his son Jake has taken up the mantle of building blown, eye-catching utes, collaborating with his father on this TF Rodeo under Jake’s own Keegan’s Kustoms business in their home town of Orange, NSW.

“We threw the thing together in five days to get it here,, and it’s far from finished,” says Mick. “It’ll all get blown apart again, finished properly, and then our aim is to be Top 60 at Summernats next year.”

Up front is a 6.9-litre, 6/71-blown LS2 with methanol injection and Haltech engine management. Surrounding that engine is extensive sheetmetal work by Durrys Customs, who undertook all the major fabrication work on the ute.

In the rear, a cantilever suspension setup uses Airride bags, with plenty of thought and engineering put into the layout. Jake sprayed the car in a fresh lick of what he has dubbed as Sinister.

There was plans of cruising the Rodeo at RCN, but unfortunately, a backfire with the blower meant some blown-out blower gaskets called curtain early on their driving aspirations. “It’s unfinished anyway, so we’ll take it home, finish it off properly and get it ready for Summernats so we can do some driving,” says Mick.