Engineer Robi Fekete of Fekete Fabrications is forever pushing his own limits and those of what’s legally possible with his car builds, and this 1970 F100 prerunner would have to be one of his most ambitious yet.

Yep, Robi has full intentions of having this thing 100 per cent approved, engineered and VASS-legal with full registration in Victoria.

“It’s basically me pushing the limits of what’s possible within the rules, showing everyone something like this can be done legally if all the right processes are followed,” says Robi.

The project kicked off in early January, with Robi fabricating everything in-house at Fekete Fabrications from the ground up. “It comes under the new chassis replacement rules, so the chassis and everything on top is brand new and made here in-house by me,” he says. “It allows us to undertake a project like this that we couldn’t do previously and have it be compliant, so it’s exciting.”

Using a 1970 Ford F100 steel cab means the F-truck will be registered as exactly that, rather than as an ICV (individually contructed vehicle). Being a 1970 model, it also doesn’t have to comply with the Motor Vehicle Standards act of 1989, making the process a much simpler one.

The words tell the pictures with this car, with the whole structure made from extensive rollbar work. Robi has designed it so that the F100 cab can be lifted on and off from this core structure. “That makes it more serviceable as a race car – no need to cut the body off the ’cage if there’s any damage,” he says.

A fully forged Coyote V8 not only wears an Edelbrock blower, but sits heavily recessed in the chassis. “That’s for weight balance and to keep room for the suspension in the front, but it’s also the first time I’ve seen one of these Coyotes mounted this far back in a prerunner before,” says Robi. “Usually they’re all the way forward.” It’s paired to a T56 Magnum, which’ll be sequentially shifted.

The shocks and springs are all the top-end Fox Racing stuff, using arms Robi designed himself and had laser cut. The rear-end barwork is made to take a 300-litre fuel cell, along with a spare wheel.

Speaking of wheels, Robi is currently in talks to have what’ll be Australia’s first aftermarket road-legal beadlock wheels ADR-complied for this car. “I’m working with the company I always get my custom wheels made by, and they’re keen to get the first set of road-legal beadlocks in Australia,” he says. They’ll be wrapped in 39-inch tyres in race form, which will also be road legal for the F100.

This is Robi’s first offroad build, using all the knowledge he gained from his various customer projects, including a two-door XW wagon currently in the build. We did a full workshop tour of the Fekete Fabrications premises in 2021, which you can read here.

What is a prerunner?

Prerunners are a big deal in the States, and are vehicles used by offroad racing teams to scout the route of an event before jumping in their proper race machines. Robi’s F100 is inspired by such trucks, and he has dubbed it Project PRERAN.

We’ll be following Robi’s progress with the PRERAN F100, as he aims to give the car its first public outing at MotorEx next year, alongside the XW wagon. “We’ll have them both in sort of a half-finished state, so people can get the idea of what they’ll look like while still getting to see what’s under the skin,” he says.