Across the 50 years of street machining now under our belts, each decade has created a brace of legendary car builds, many of which are still spoken of in reverent tones. The cars may not always have been the quickest, coolest, or winningest, and their builders might’ve been prolific or just one-trick ponies, but the one common thread among them is that they all just all had ‘something’.

First published in the April 2026 issue of Street Machine

One such legendary build arrived smack-bang in the middle of the 1980s: an EH Holden sedan out of Brisbane dubbed ‘Bill’s Toy’. Unmistakeable for its custom front end, and seemingly always photographed smoking its rear tyres, Bill Stonebridge’s EH represented 1980s car culture at its best – the perfect mix of individuality and performance, driven hard and enjoyed – and it built a legion of fans who still remember it fondly today.

The car was pure street machine: custom bodywork, letterbox scoop, fat Dragway wheels, and small-block Chev power in an era where an EH engineered with a V8 but still able to wear Queensland rego plates was controversial. The latter just added to its allure, and epitomised Bill’s lack of care for others’ opinions; it was Bill’s toy, after all.

A Street Machine Nationals stalwart, the EH went through a few engine combinations before Bill settled on a nitrous-assisted, 350-cube small-block Chev, which was perfect for 11-second quarter-mile times and spirited adventures on the burnout pad. The car was featured in our August-September 1985 issue – torching the rear tyres, naturally – before eventually being sold to Nigel Allwood in 1987, who made a few upgrades that saw it showcased in Street & Custom magazine in 1988.

Fast-forward to 2001, and Holden fans John and Angela Fabian were on the hunt for an EH and found a reasonably tidy, purple V8 unit for sale in Wollongong from a real-life Rebel from Running on Empty – a blind enthusiast who knew every inch of the car.

They did the deal, but John had no idea it was actually Bill’s Toy until the seller threw in the 1985 Street Machine issue with all the paperwork and told him it was the same car. John was immediately taken back to fond memories of the 1986 Street Machine Nationals, where he’d first seen and fallen in love with Bill’s EH, so it was the perfect surprise!

The front clip had been returned to standard, and the car generally needed some love, having deteriorated from a magazine feature car to a dragway beater. But John could see the EH’s original persona trying to burst through and got busy bringing it back out.

“I wasn’t even born when Dad and Mum purchased the car,” says Luke Fabian, John and Angela’s now 23-year-old son. “Dad was a fitter and turner by trade and was all about attention to detail. He rebuilt the car when he first bought it – minus body and paint – and focused heavily on the detail work and sorting it mechanically. The rear steel brake line had been crimped off with vice grips by a previous owner, and stuff like that just never cut it with him.”

John had a milling machine at home and went to town making billet parts for the EH – everything from the indicator stalk to the engine bay blanking plugs and washer jets.

John and Angela showed the car extensively from 2005 until 2014 – proudly driving it to every event – and amassed more than 40 trophies, including Top Modified EH in Victoria for five years running, along with a collection of gongs from the Victorian EH Holden Car Club shindigs. Most special to John was winning Top Sedan at the 50th Anniversary of the EH show in 2013.

Luke pretty much grew up in the back seat of the EH while his parents attended shows, and we featured the family and their famous car in our June 2011 issue as part of our 30th-anniversary celebrations.

By 2014, both John and Angela had passed away, leaving a then 11-year-old Luke to inherit the car. “I was only a kid, but even then, I knew how special this car was,” he says. “I fought off people trying to force me to sell it, and pulled several favours to store it wherever I could, so at least it was kept garaged.”

Nearly a decade later, Luke was only months away from getting off his P-plates and knew it was time to get stuck into the EH. Working at a panel shop as an assembler, he was in the right trade with the right connections to tackle the now decades-old bodywork.

“The paint itself was fantastic; it was just the ancient bodywork underneath that was failing,” he says. “Some of the insane 1980s bodywork ‘techniques’ had let go, and there were blisters and cracks in most panels. Stu at Flexx Custom Works helped me immensely with the body repairs, and once it was in primer, I blocked it back and had various parts of the car painted by three different people. Crazy, I know, but it was the only way I could finish the car without stretching too many friendships!

Reece Christensen from Bodyshop Paint Supplies Bayswater, Tim and Alex from Motorvation Custom Paint & Panel, and Daniel McIntosh from Luke’s work, Shoppingtown Body Repairs, all pitched in to sort the paintjob. Luke also wants to thank his boss Hayden, workmate Chris, and Daniel once again for letting him use the workshop and helping him complete tasks that he says were well above his skillset: “They all understood just how much this car means to me.”

With the EH’s panel and paint gleaming again, Luke got busy with the mechanical side of things, refurbing parts that don’t do well when left sitting for a decade, such as the braking system and some of the electrics. The small-block Chev, Turbo 400 trans and 3.55-geared nine-inch were simply tuned or serviced, and have covered more than 1500 kays since the car was returned to the road.

“The only major upgrade for reliability has been a custom three-core radiator from Dom at MidEast Radiators that is based on an HQ 350 tank and fits the standard EH radiator support panel,” Luke says. “It’s been a godsend, and the car happily handles even the hottest summer traffic.”

With the EH now back on the road where it belongs, Luke’s been turning his attention to another EH project – a concours-spec, unrestored, low-mileage car that he also inherited from John and Angela. It still wears its original paint and is loaded with Nasco and NOS Holden parts. “It sits on 60-year-old crossply tyres, that one, so it is definitely a trailer queen,” Luke laughs.

“I like having two of the same model of car that are polar opposites. I’m keen to fabricate some extra guards for the purple one that has the rectangular Mazda 929 headlights as per Bill Stonebridge’s original build. Some people will hate it, but that front was what made this car ‘Bill’s Toy’ and not just another V8 EH.”

Amen to that!