Chucking your family into a cool car and heading out is one of life’s great pleasures for any car enthusiast. No matter if you’re aiming for dinner, an ice cream, or just to make a fat lap through the local spot, the times spent sharing your passion with those closest to you is a special thing indeed.

First published in the February 2025 issue of Street Machine

Toowoomba’s Daniel Kummerow built this killer ’71 HG Kingswood wagon for precisely that reason. While it packs a spicy turbo LS, sumptuous trim and slick bodywork, its main purpose is to transport his family around the mean streets of South-East Queensland.

In addition to that, Dan just likes to be different, and a wagon build is definitely a path less often travelled in the world of street machining. “I’ve always been a wagon fan, and when this popped up, I jumped on it,” says the shed installer. “I got it out of Caloundra from a bloke who was going to build it for his wife, but she wanted a swimming pool more.”

Dan initially planned to get the HG into shape within a year, but then his mates had a word in his ear, and we think you can see where this is going. “Now it’s been put together with the best parts I could get,” Dan laughs.

Of course, that meant several years of epic elbow grease. While the HG was fairly straight when Dan got it, it was missing pretty much one of everything, and in some cases more. “It had been sand-blasted, and a little bit of body work had been started,” he says. “There was no motor or gearbox; the bench seat was just a frame with no trim; only the dash was inside; there wasn’t much glass; and it had the stock diff. I have become a guru at finding all the parts needed to finish the car off over the past few years.”

The custom black and solid green paint scheme nails Dan’s brief for an era-correct look for the wagon’s exterior, and he has left the rest of the car mostly as The General intended. “I’ve only done little things like cutting the inner guards out to make sure the 255s don’t scrub, welding a few holes up, smoothing the engine bay, making the metal reverse-cowl, and smoothing and filling the trim around the back window,” he says. All the fab work was done in his home shed, including making the custom fuel tank that sits behind the diff.

We’ve all seen plenty of HK-T-G Holdens wearing reverse-cowl bonnets, but Dan’s wagon definitely needs one due to the powerplant now sitting between the inner guards.

Renowned LS guru Mark Tralau at OutCast Automotive sorted Dan out with a tough 5.3-litre combo, as well as a stout Powerglide that can handle its extra sauce.

An alloy Gen IV LH6 truck motor forms the basis of the combo, wearing Gen III #241 cathedral-port heads up top. The rotating assembly has been left alone, as these have been proven to make 1000hp in the past. A Melling oil pump, Rod Shop sump and BTR Stage 2 cam round out the internal upgrades, while a Holley Hi-Ram intake sits proudly above the new-age 327ci Chev.

A Haltech Nexus R5 controls Haltech smart coils to fire the E85, while the party is really started by a Garrett GTX45 mounted on custom manifolds by Kyle Bray.

With the corn juice requiring 30 per cent more headroom than regular unleaded, Bosch 1650cc injectors and an Aftermarket Industries triple-pump hanger were given the nod.

“The wagon is set up to run flex-fuel, so I can put unleaded in it, but I haven’t bothered yet,” Dan says. “We’re only running 6psi and it’s hooking up and going, but we’ll see if that’s the case when they turn it up to 14psi. Right now, nobody whinges about the fuel smell with E85, and my closest [E85] servo is only 10 minutes from my house. My longest drive so far was to Willowbank and back to watch roll racing, and I used about 45 litres to go 200km.”

A custom converter and nickel-tough Powerglide sit behind the force-fed LS, while a full Gazzard Brothers rear end replaces the stock spindly HG hardware, kitted out with traction bars and a built nine-inch diff with full-floater axles.

Reassembly and applying finishing touches can be a challenge as a car project nears completion, but Dan’s mate Jason Seng came through for him to get the HG over the line. “He knows H-K-T-Gs back-to-front and got the car finished,” Dan says. “I’ve known him for 15 years; he’s been a great mate, and he got it done.”

Although the wagon’s sturdy driveline means Dan can now get froggy with the loud pedal, he’s not planning on torturing the clean machine by racing it. “I told Mark I didn’t want a transbrake in the gearbox, because it’s not a race car,” he says. “I’ve taken a few mates in the car on the highway, and it sits at 100km/h perfectly. Racing it would wreck it, and I’m not cutting up that interior to ’cage it.”

When you can have such a beaut time cruising around in a Holden classic with your family, it’s hard to fault Dan’s thinking – who’d want to spoil that fun?

DANIEL KUMMEROW
1971 HG HOLDEN WAGON

THANKS
Jason Seng for putting it back together; Dennis Bullpitt at Toowoomba Steering & Suspension; Scott Cortina for the Gazzard Brothers rear end; Nick Barton for the wiring; Kieran Robinson for the interior; Mark Tralau for the engine and gearbox; Goleby’s Parts; Autobarn Toowoomba for the fittings; Glass 4 Classics; Brooker Ranch Coatings for the Cerakote; Alex Williams at Willman Fab for the engine bay fab; Kyle Bray for the turbo manifolds; Mick at Edge Automotive for the tune; last but not least, my wife and family for their support.