Over the Easter long weekend, the 51st Australian Van Nationals brought more than 150 panel vans to Corowa, NSW, near the Victorian border – each one as colourful as the characters who drive them, and all with a story to tell.

First published in the June 2026 issue of Street Machine

Despite having no previous experience, Matt Czerny took on the responsibility of shepherding the event into its second half-century, simply because nobody else had put their hand up. “I didn’t make it last year, but it was going begging; I couldn’t let it turn 50 and then die in the arse,” Matt explained between Sunday-evening sips of beer from the back of his orange HG pano. “It takes a lot of time and effort, and while I’d never run an event before, I’m a van nut.”

Matt secured the Corowa Showgrounds to use as a home base for this year’s show, with attendees welcome to camp amongst the gum trees, as is the vanning way. The showgrounds also served as the starting point for Sunday’s cruise to the Bundalong Tavern, as well as the venue for the award ceremony afterwards. That said, the Van Nats’ centrepiece is always the massive show ’n’ shine, which this year took place on the Saturday at the Corowa RSL Park in the centre of town. Summernats chief judge Owen Webb and colleagues Brendan Turnbull and Matt Gilkes had the enviable but difficult task of deciding the many award winners from the acres of colourful metal on display.

Like Matt, I also love my panel vans, and brought along my 2004 Holden VYII SS Sandman, which is dead-stock aside from an LPG conversion done about 16 years ago. It had been too long since I’d stretched its legs, so the Van Nats provided the perfect excuse to jump in and blast it across the endless Aussie blacktop. It munched up the 820 kays from Adelaide to Corowa without complaint.

It wasn’t without trepidation that I brought a ‘ute with a canopy’ to a van show, but I needn’t have worried. In the early-morning dark of the local car wash before Saturday’s show ’n’ shine, my VY got the thumbs-up from Ash McLean, one of Matt’s team and the proud owner of a blue VE Sandman. “Nah, no worries,” he reassured me. “They’re accepted as vans now, certainly by the vanning community.”

Indeed, there were plenty of V-series (or ‘millennium’) vans, both stock-ish and wild, mixing it up with the classic Holdens, Fords, Chryslers and miscellaneouses for the duration of festivities.

Speaking of which, Saturday’s big show saw more than 150 vans spread from one end of the RSL Park to the other. It’s no secret that Holden’s HQ to WB series are by far the most popular vans both to restore and modify, but smaller vans have always punched above their weight for outright Van Nats honours.

Having won the 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2019 events, Russell and Susie Slocombe’s ‘Red Baron’ Ford Escort took out Top Small Van, Top Interior and a very credible seventh outright. The pair also had copies of Aussie Custom Vans for sale – their definitive, 453-page history of the Aussie vanning movement, as much a love letter as it is an authoritative resource. Needless to say, I bought one on the spot!

Although Jason and Jess Ackland’s ‘Eloped’ HX Sandman got third outright, medium-sized vans bagged the top two spots.

Built in 1985, Colin and Annette Proctor’s tunnel-rammed 350 Chev-powered FJ, ‘Proc’s J’, came second. Having won outright in 1993, 1994 and 2005, the van has only recently returned to the scene after a long absence. Another FJ van, owned by Kiwi Clinton Wheeler, won the day, not through wild graphics or crushed velour, but via a clinical resto and some mild, period-style upgrades (read more below).

Having the show on Saturday meant that Sunday was freed up for a cruise to the Bundalong Tavern for lunch, without the stress of road grime affecting trophy chances. The long, straight stretches between Corowa and Bundalong meant ace SM snapper Chris Thorogood could get some killer rolling shots of the vans – after all, every car looks cooler when it’s moving. Once at the lunch stop, the trick was not to go too hard; there was a dinner back at the showgrounds that night, after all.

The dinner, hosted by Budgie, featured an auction of vanning memorabilia donated by the family of the late Grant Scott. The money raised greatly benefited the local Lions and Rotary clubs, and many diners left with something cool to remember Grant by. The awards were then handed out, and the evening rolled on with stories, memories and friends before the crowd retired to their cool beers and warm campfires dotted around the showgrounds.

As this year’s Van Nats wound down, I was reminded once again that the van scene just hits different. It was vanning that begat street machining, after all, and it’s vanning that’s still here half a century later, replete with the requisite airbrushed murals of babes, barbarians and wizards. The beards might be getting greyer, but old vanners never die – they just turn into their murals.

AUSTRALIA’S TOP VAN 2026

Holden’s FJ van was never sold in New Zealand – only the sedans and utes made it across the ditch – but that didn’t stop Kiwi Clinton Wheeler from sourcing one and turning it into a show-shopper.

A Melbourne car with an HR front end and a 202 for power, the FJ was shipped to NZ in 1976. By the time Clint found it, it was in primer and missing anything north of the firewall. “It’s all back to original now, with some hot-up bits from Aussiespeed and lowered two inches; they look terrible at stock height,” he said. He knows something about low, having had his radical, chopped, 350-powered EK van featured in the July 2018 issue of Street Machine.

Clint’s FJ scored the outright top spot for 2026, and also earned Top Exterior, Top Medium Van and second place in both the Undercarriage and Engine Bay categories.

The FJ was fresh off the boat, too, having been built in NZ and brought over for the Nationals, which also won Clinton the Longest Distance Travelled award. However, he’s decided against taking the van back home to Kiwiland. “I’ll do a few events, then cross that chapter off and sell it. It drives nicer here. It likes the road better; it’s just happier,” he laughed.

BREAD WINNER

TROY and Jo Maguire’s EK Holden is one of two formerly used by the local Sunicrust bakery and was sold new by Campbell Motors in Corowa. “The baker used to sell bread direct from the back,” Troy said, pointing to the vintage coin holder mounted on the inner skin of the load area. “He’d pull up, stick a rollie in his mouth and chop the bread up right there, then wrap it in wax paper.”

Troy has spoken to the EK’s previous owner and discovered that it was apparently extremely slow back in the day. “The delivery boys used to scare the Coles ladies, coming around the back sideways every morning, so the boss altered the throttle, giving it only about a quarter travel,” he laughed.

“I found it in a paddock in North Wangaratta with no bonnet or motor, but I found the bonnet nearby; local kids had been using it as a sled.”

Troy sat the whole lot in his shed for 19 years before putting it on a rotisserie, replacing the pans, and lifting the tunnel for that sick ride height. “It was surprisingly solid,” he said. “The paint was the most basic blow-over and has aged perfectly. The bonnet still has the sled marks, and there’s less red on the right-hand side because the cows used to scratch themselves against it!”

HIGHLIGHTS:

1. Top Custom and Top Engineered went to Gary and Judy Hislop’s radical FJ van, along with sixth outright. “I’ve owned it for 45 years, but I’ve only had it on the road the past eight years,” Gary explained. “I was about to turn 60 back then and thought I’d better finish it or I’ll be too old to enjoy it.”

The overhaul included an 85thou-overbored 202 with a Yella Terra big-valve head, Spool conrods, aluminium cross-cut timing gear, and a one-piece electric tilt front that Gary started building in 1982.
“It’s a pretty good jigger; I’ve got as high as third at previous Nationals,” he said.

2. This was a stock 2006 VZ SS Thunder ute when Carol Crombie and Troy Bussey bought it in 2016, but it’s now a fully fledged van. “We got the roof fitted and went to town with a 70s theme – yellows and browns, but in a modern van,” Troy said.

They’ve even deleted the rear window and bulkhead, replacing it with a gusseted step-through, just like Holden should have done in the first place.

Troy and Carol won Best Light Show, but despite its surf theme, the van is named ‘Clyde’, after Clint Eastwood’s mate in Every Which Way But Loose.

3. Built as a promo car and used by a Ford executive, Matt Ampt’s genuine JG47 XC Sundowner boasts Meadow Green paint, a factory 351 and a single-rail floor-shift – a true one-of-one.

“I bought it from the second owner, who was about 80 when he sold it,” Matt explained. “It was a pretty good car, so I’ve just brought it back to how it was.” That said, he’s done some custom work in the back using NOS factory trim. “These were just grey paint back here, so this is just a respectful upgrade without turning it into a show van.”

Matt’s XC won third place in the Exterior category, as well as the Vanners’ Choice award.

4. You may remember Milan Dokic from such builds as his blown 525ci MENTL Camaro (SM, Aug ’08), but his XY Falcon GTHO Phase III van is all factory – that is, if the factory had built one.

“It has the green shocks, commercial tailshaft, yellow paint marks on the rims and a Top Loader – all the correct stuff everywhere, even the sway-bar,” Milan explained. “It looks a bit bare in the back compared to the other vans here, but Ford wouldn’t have decked it out from the factory, so I didn’t.”

The XY was the only XR-XY Falcon at the show, and netted Milan a neat fifth outright.

5. This ex-government-issue 3.3L/column auto XC van sat under a collapsed shed in the Blue Mountains for 20 years, waiting for John Hunt and George Vergotis to give it another life.

“We got it for $1000 and thought, what would a young guy have done with it back in the day?” George said. “So, we put in a 302, Top Loader, shaker and 9in, but left the body rough.

“It drives perfectly,” he continued. “We wanted to make it look like a shitbox, but not be one!”

6. Flying the flag for Toyota was Brendan Huxtable with the only Corolla van at the show, a 1978-build KE36.

“I’ve got a 1.8L TownAce 7K motor going in next week with a 45mm sidedraught Weber,” he said. At the Van Nats, however, Brendan and son AJ had to be content with the power of a 1290cc 4K for Sunday’s cruise. “It threw a flywheel bolt on the way home, and then the tow car dropped a ball joint,” Brendan sighed.

Despite the dramas, the ratty ’Rolla looked sweet on a set of reset rear leaf springs and mismatched SSR Speed Stars.

7. Bob and Joanne Kernot’s ‘Midnite Fantasy’ XB is no stranger to the pages of Street Machine, having been featured back in April 2004. Running a 6/71-blown 351 Clevo with twin Carter 650s, the front end makes as big an impact as the rear – no mean feat given those killer murals and fat rubber out back.

Bob missed out on the tinware in 2026, but maybe that’s because the van gets used so much these days: “It’s got stone chips all over it,” he said, but it was surely worth every one of them – it was one of the toughest cars on the cruise!

8. Corowa local and lifetime vanner Cindy Carter brought out her HJ van for the 2026 event. “The Van Nationals has always been a bucket-list thing,” she said. “I’d always been meaning to go, and this year it’s right here.”

Looking resplendent in Malachite green, Cindy’s HJ is a factory 308 with a four-on-the-floor and a Bad Girl sticker on the window. “I’ve been a vanner since the 80s, and have owned this one since 1998,” she said.

9. With the three-layer pearl on her freshly completed HJ pano matching the paint on her Monaro CV8 and Yamaha FZ1, it’s fair to say that Cheryl Tebby has a thing for yellow.

“My husband Paul and I did most of the car ourselves; the whole rotisserie, body-off thing,” Cheryl said. When her brother, Neil ‘Smiley’ Hay passed away in 2013, Cheryl dove into the project head-first as a tribute, installing a tough 383ci stroker and a TH350 with a 2500 stall. “You wouldn’t believe it; we rolled it out of the shed 13 years to the day that he passed.”

A tribute to Smiley can be spied as part of the Sandman-style STNGZ tailgate mural, and the HJ was rewarded with the Top Graphics award at Van Nats 2026.

10. Curtis Mowbray (reclining) took his white XG van off the dyno on Wednesday arvo, conducted no test drives, and loaded up the bed in the back before heading off the next day on the six-hour drive from Wollongong to Corowa, making it to the Van Nats with no issues. It runs an OG 4.0L with a Pulsar 35/82 turbo hanging off the side, producing 425hp on 98 pump fuel, all with a stock bottom end.

Curtis dosed it up hard over the course of the weekend, unlike his other ’Gong-based mates from the Southern Districts Vanners. The beige XE of Matt Teixeira (left) runs a 302 Clevo, while Reece Morgan’s red XF has an XG grille and not much else mod-wise, but it makes up for it in personality.

11. This wildly modified EJ Holden van, ‘Old Timer’, was set to be featured in a vanning magazine back in the 80s, but both it and owner Alan Quilty moved to California instead.

The Chev-powered, Statesman-fronted beast certainly caught our eye at Van Nats, with all its period charm well and truly intact.

12. Jenny Barnes’s HZ van, ‘The Player’, came fourth outright, and also scored gongs for 2nd Top Interior, 3rd Top Undercarriage and 3rd Top Medium Van.

13. Michael and Jenny Denny rocked matching HQ vans. Michael’s Aquamarine example was Adelaide-built, while Jenny’s Wild Orchid-painted Quey is a Brisbane car.

14. Ginny Ross has owned her 1977 Drifter for 30 years. It’s a factory 318 with a four-speed, and neither have been out of the car in all that time.

15. Possibly the best HX Sandman resto ever, Jason and Jess Ackland’s van copped third outright, Top Restored, and runner-up in Top Exterior.

16. Van Nationals organiser Matt Czerny brought along his orange HG. Matt used to drag race it, wheels up and flat-out. “I gave it a birthday a while back – cut the ’cage out and put it back on the street,” he said. It runs a 383ci stroker and Trimatic, with a mini-tubbed, four-link rear end.

Australia’s Top 15 Vans

1st: Clint Wheeler – FJ Holden
2nd: Colin Proctor – FJ Holden
3rd: Jason Ackland – HX Holden
4th: Jenny Barnes – HZ Holden
5th: Milan Dokic – XY Falcon
6th: Gary Hislop – FJ Holden
7th: Russell Slocombe – Ford Escort
8th: Tony Hegyesi – FE Holden
9th: Andrew Damme – WB Holden
10th: Matt Ampt – Ford XC Sundowner
11th: Samantha Scoles – FB Holden
12th: Jack Hislop – WB Holden
13th: Mark Corse – HJ Holden
14th: Cheryl Tebby – HJ Holden
15th: Paul Campbell – HX Holden