GIVEN some of the mad prices being fetched for old FJ Land Cruisers in recent times, you’d reckon that Greg Abrehart may have pissed off a few Toyota fans with his pull truck, Sudden Impact.

Fear not, Greg reckons that there’s enough bog in this FJ45 cab to justify its role as a wheelhouse in the 2WD Truck pulling class.

In fact, that’s pretty much all that is Toyota on the whole rig. Under that bonnet is a Dandy Engines-built and stroked 510-cube big-block Chev. The mumbo gets to the gumbo via a Powerglide, a 10-speed overdrive Road Ranger and the planetary diff out of a Leyland bus. All that sits in a Mazda T3500 truck chassis!

Truck-class pullers are restricted to naturally aspirated powerplants, and most opt for big-block donks.

Sudden Impact was the result of a four-year build and this has been its first season out of the shed. It debuted at this year’s Tooradin pull. Greg is pretty happy with the results so far: “It’s been a crowd-pleaser, that’s for sure,” he says. “And we haven’t had any breakages this season either!”

It was clearly a crowd favourite at the recent Diesel & Dirt Derby in Keith, South Australia, with the Cruiser hanging the wheels in the air more than a couple of times with that raging big-block Chevy bellowing down the track.

“We’re just having fun at this stage!” Greg says with a grin. Fun indeed!