How did you get started?

Just wondering how everybody got started in minitrucks and/or lowriders. This is typically a sport that people get in to on accident or a truck around town that they just fell in love with as a youngin. I will start.


I had an 89 S10 that i dropped a sbc in because my neighbor had a 65 chevy truck with a built 327 in it and i fell in love with hot rods. The S10 is all i could afford so i tried to hot rod it out. Well after building the engine up and then tearing the tranny out i needed to get a little beater to drive. Friend had an ext cab mazda for 200 bucks. blown headgasket with over 300 thousand on it. Fired up and drove it home haha. Pulled the head off slapped a gasket on and did no work to the head or even got it checked. Threw it back on and bam purred like a kitten. Well needless to say my 200 dollar truck caught some hell seeing as i was only like 16 years old. Well why i was in the field rally drivin it i hit a small pine tree in the right front which bent something and gave me tons of negative camber. Chewed the tire up in a day and a half. Figured i would have to lower it so i didnt kill tires. Dropped it down and fell in love with the bumpy terrible ride that rode just an inch or two from the ground. Bought the biggest drop blocks for the rear i could. Been in somethin lowered ever since. Never thought i would be in a lowrider or minitruck until i was forced to do it and just happen to fall in love. What is your story?




-Justin

I was really into VWs. I learned to drive in my dad's VW powered sand rail and by the time I was sixteen had over 20 different VWs. I would buy one, fix it up, sell it, by another, fix it and sell it. When I finally got a driver's licence my grandparents surprised me with a 1978 Datsun 620 king cab (bullet door). They said I needed a truck to haul the parts for my bugs. I had been constantly asking my grandfather to haul this or that in his truck (I even took my driver's test in his truck), so I guess that is where they got the idea.

Needless to say I fell in love with the little truck. It had Western mesh Mag wheels, I put on 195-50-15 Perelli Tires and figured out how to lower it with blocks and turned torsions. It was a great truck. Two years later, there were truck clubs everywhere here in So Cal. It was 1988 and I joined California Cruizers. I had the truck painted pearl white and added a 5 speed transmission from a 280zx, a header and webber carbs to the L20B engine.
This same year the truck was stolen and stripped. I saw ads for the new B2200 and never looked back.

Haha its kinda funny you was doing this in 1988 considering that was the year i was born!!! Thank you for making this what it is today.








-Justin

Well this is my first mini, and I had always wanted a mazda. Loved the way they looked...then in late 08 I had a chance to buy it in denver...8 hour drive haha.so went and got the truck and started off as pure audio competitions....then I noticed all the guys with first gen s10s were way lower then me. So I asked them how...they told me drop spindles and blocks...haha so needing info...I found mazdabscene...and found out how to lower my truck...then I saw cl(chris) black single cab with the tahoe 20s...and told my self I want to do that! Met my buddy covert...he told me he would bag it iff I helped and learned...I. did..and got her bagged. Then went to west coast nationals and saw everything bodiy. Dropped and had altitude envy...lol so with no idea how to body drop covert and I started cutting the floor out lol. And that's where I am today. So I can honestly say...cl(chris) and mazdabscene took my infatuation to an addiction and unconditional love lol

When i first got my license i always like messing with things...I started with the interior stuff (note this was about the time fast and furious came along) so all of my buddies had (Civics, accords, eclipses, 3000gts, etc...) I had the dakota....I then decided i wanted to lower it....Did the whole block and control arm deal...It was good until i got my wheels on...Made one trip to Louisville KY (roads are aweful) bottomed out so many times, in which my driver tire just got gashed to pieces.....SOOO....I started thinking about air (I was one of the first to have it in my area)....i know of maybe 2 or 3 that u would c on occassion...but not very often.....One of which was a local guy who had a bagged Dodge Ram....I would see it at local events...I absolutely loved it....Turned out my dad new him....So i went to his house and looked at it one day,etc.....I was sold at that point.....In 2005 he had me go to Slammin n Jammin with him..... At that time i bought all of my parts for air.....Then from there....well....I just started wanting to learn more....and i live in a small town...so what better to do then spend all ur weekends, etc.. hanging out in the garage....

I got into it for the pussy. I thought that if I had a clean as fuck mini I could hook up with no problem. Well I found out that I was wrong and what I got was a life long hobby got into a kick ass club and a ton of friends instead. lol! OH! Yes I did touch a lot of boobies too! Mmmmmm yeah......

I've always been into trucks. When I was a child I was really into Monster Trucks, then muscle cars but eventually it evolved into a love of anything custom. I worked in a body shop to pursue a career in the business but decided to do it as a hobby.

my dad was a car guy and iv always been around them, but as i was growin up i seen trucks that were done up and they looked really good, so i started to lean to the truck side of things and then i seen a nissan layed out and was hooked from then on, it just was awsome how they could take a truck and get it that low that was what got me in to it.. the work put in to one

My husband and I met because of mini trucks. We were on opposite sides of the same group of friends and knew of each other for several months before we hooked up. I had a clean 84 S-10 all shaved with a walk-thru and awesome 80's-style scallops and he had a hooptie of a closed-bed Toy, slammed, shaved and in primer.

Well, I had no intention of ever showing my S-10, I was just having fun crusing around and getting looks.

One night, my (soon-to-be-husband) decided he didnt like my music that I was playing in the parking lot and pulls up next to me that he heap he called a truck (it truly was hedious) and turned up his stereo - loud.

He didn't know it, but I had a competition-grade system in my truck, so I just changed to a bass CD and steadily increased the volume with my remote.

After about 15 minutes, he shut up his truck and moved it - all the way across the lot.

4 months later, we got married.

A few months after we married, we founded the AZ Chapter of Seductive Minis and then discovered that my sweet S-10 had a serious engine problem - it needed a motor, so we traded it in on a new 93 B2600i. We've been Mazda people ever since.

Being from Socal I was always seeing minis rollin around. I was always infatuated with them from a young age. I was also into the Air Cooled Vee Dubs as well and would always bump into minitruckers when at VW shows or get togethers. I was overseas about a year ago and decided i would finally build a mini (the maz you guys see in my sig). Mazdas by far have the best body style out of all of the mini and mid size trucks. I will finish this truck eventually and most likely keep it forever, cut, weld, cut weld, repeat. 4 months in i had her bagged on bar in the rear (all parts made by me)bagged up front, layin frame, and some custom interior done. Seeing that i was capable of doing all the fab myself in such a short period of time really showed me what building minis is about. I will never have somebody else build something for me again, with the help of these forums and the guys on them anything is possible with the right attitude. I plan on revamping my back half and to some tubing, this will come at a much slower pace of course to make sure everything is just right. Body drop may be in the works and i REALLLLLY want to do a unibody since you never see a maz with a unibody. Going to do a fullsize build as well soon, but the minitruckin scene will always be my home.