First published in Street Machine’s Hot Rod magazine #1, 2004

Sweet ute, huh? Not outrageous, just beautifully subtle. Some rods have more immediate impact, but Clinton Hornes’ 1934 coupe ute makes its mark with a collection of careful mods that add up to a gorgeous whole.

It was inevitable that Clinton was going to own a 1933 or ’34 Ford. His dad, mum and brother each drive one. They run in his blood. His initiation into the family’s early Ford fan club began when he was a tacker. He was just four back in the 1980s when his dad, Tony, put together a ’33 sedan, which has since been rebuilt, and is now driven by mum Denise. Tony added a ’33 roadster to the family fleet in the early ’90s, but he really wanted a coupe, so he sold the roadster when he finally found one.

Clinton was still a teenager, a couple of years away from being legally able to drive, when he spotted a sign at a Melbourne swap meet advertising a ’34 Aussie coupe ute.

“I’d seen a ’34 ute in a guy’s shed and said I had to have one,” he says, “but they’re so rare that I never thought I’d actually get one.”

At the time Clinton had an XW Falcon GT replica on the go, but he wanted the old ute so much that he was prepared to sacrifice the Falc to buy it.

“Everyone thought I was mad because I sold a complete driving car to buy a body shell,” he says, “but it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, so I had to do it.”

What he dragged home was a complete body, minus the tailgate. A previous owner had started to rod the rusty old ute, chopping the roof two inches and replacing the original wooden body framing with steel. Clinton’s idea was to build a nostalgic rod in ’60s style, but that presented him with a dilemma because he also wanted to drag race it.

“I was hooked on the styling of the 1950s and ’60s,” he says, “but the problem I had was that, while I liked that style, I wanted to go fast. I was drag racing the XW at the time and I was really getting into it.”

He started down this dual road in a dramatic way by tubbing the ute so that he could get some decent racing rubber under it, but he soon realised it was going to be too difficult to make it a racer that could also be road-driven, particularly considering he had to fit a roll cage, so he ended up dropping the race idea altogether.

The foundation of the rare Aussie ute uses original ’34 chassis rails which have been tubbed three inches, stepped up three inches at the rear, and braced by custom crossmembers Clint fabricated himself. A custom four-bar set-up is used under the rear, with a Falcon Watts link mounted on the front of the nine-inch diff, along with Firestone airbags and Monroe gas shocks.

Up front, there’s an HR Holden cross-member, chopped off and sectioned, running custom stainless wishbones, Firestone airbags and stainless shocks.

The body of Clinton’s ute could almost be considered stock, but it is the result of bucketloads of blood, sweat and tears, mainly Laurie Gray’s.

The roof had already been chopped when Clinton got the ute, so Laurie only had to fill the turret to complete the top end. From there, he fabricated the stainless bed liners, leaving the tubs exposed, crafted the hard tonneau, and smoothed the rear pan with its inset licence plate and ’59 Caddy bullet tail-lamps and turn signals.

Laurie also laid on the Surfer Orange coat. Clint chose the colour after he saw pictures of Ford’s 1970 XW concept ute, the Surferoo, which had also been painted in the sharp orange tone.

“I remember seeing the Surferoo,” Clinton says. “It was painted Surfer Orange, and was special, like mine. So I thought I’d paint it the same colour. Most people think it’s a custom mix and are surprised when I tell them it’s a standard Ford colour.”

How do you contrast the gleaming orange on the inside? By enlisting the help of Pat Mesiti of Sunshine Motor Trimming to put together the pearl white vinyl in traditional tuck-and-roll with orange piping.

The hood lining is now old-style perforated white, and the carpets are black. The Hornes made the bench seat before handing it to Pat for trimming.

The original dash was filled, then fitted with period Stewart Warner Wings-series gauges and matching dials for the airbags. The modern Stewart Warner tacho fitted to the right of the column is at odds with the rest of the gauges, but that’s because Clint fitted it when still planning to race the ute and needed the redial facility the tacho offers.

The white XR Falcon dished wheel, modified with a chrome bullet in the centre of the horn ring, completes the ’60s theme. It’s flanked by a Hurst Indy shifter on the floor. The steering is handled by an XW Falcon GT box hooked up to an HR drag link, with an XW Falcon GT column.

To blast out his rockin’ sounds, Clint selected a JVC MP3 player, running a pair of Fusion amps, a 12-inch Fusion dual-voice coil sub, and two Fusion 6x9s, all kept discreetly out of sight.

For power, Clinton rebuilt the 302W that he had kept when he sold his Falcon. “The 302 pulled consistent low 13s at Calder in my XW,” he says. “I raced that for more than six years and it never let me down.”

The engine stuns with its Surfer Orange hue and looks dressed to thrill with chromed and finned rocker covers, air cleaner and a full set of shiny accessories. Inside, it runs a standard 302 Windsor crank, 289 Windsor rods with ARP bolts, and TRW forged pistons, all balanced. It also sports original XW 302 heads, ported and polished, as well as Manley stainless steel 351 Windsor valves with 1.65:1 Crane roller rockers operated by a high-lift custom-grind cam by John Knight.

A 750 double-pumper Holley feeds fuel into an Edelbrock Victor Junior manifold, where the go-juice gets ignited via a Mallory Comp 9000 distributor and Eagle nine-millimetre leads.

Horne, um, extracted a set of extractors from his mum’s four-door ’34, cutting them up to suit the ute. He also fabricated the dual two-inch system himself, which he says is a little restrictive but it gets him through the rego check.

In order to get all that grunt grounded safely, a four-speed top loader backs up the Windsor engine, using a Yella Terra steel flywheel and dual-friction clutch by Precision Clutch and Brake to relay the stonk through to the trannie.

A shortened XW tailshaft sends it all rearward to the shortened limited-slip nine-inch diff, running 4.11 gears.

And when the time comes to bring it all to a halt, a familiar combination of P76 discs and Holden HQ calipers under the front guards, and big Ford drums at the back, puts a stop to things. An XB Falcon power booster and master cylinder combo applies pressure via a modified ’34 Ford pedal assembly.

Clinton completed his unique ute in time to head up to Coffs Harbour, NSW, for the Valla Rod Run in September 2003. Since then, it’s become a regular sight at rod runs around Victoria, racking up 10,000 trouble-free kays in the process. He says it drives like a dream. Not surprising because, after all, it’s a dream come true.

Clinton Horne
1934 Ford Coupe Ute