KRIS EDWARDS
Part2
BACK in the August ’19 issue, we explored some of Kris Edwards’ history with cars, touching on the influence of his parents Colin and Jenny and the strong bond they shared building and racing all manner of cool rides as a family. After Colin passed in 2000, Jenny and Kris have continued to immerse themselves in the shared passion, bringing a third generation into the fold to cement the family tradition.
01: BOOM! Kris’s father Colin was a keen speedway racer for many years, and his blue humpy sedan ran a triple Su-equipped 186 stroker donk backed by an M20 four-speed and welded banjo diff. “This pretty heavy crash back in 1976 was the beginning of the end for Dad and speedway racing,” Kris says. “Poor old #58 was soon stripped of any salvageable parts and dumped.”
02: COLIN built the #76 white EH – with puristmelting XR Falcon grille – as his last shot at speedway in 1979, before settling down to do the family thing. “It ran a 202 with a 12-port head and triple Webers, backed by a Saginaw ’box and the ‘old faithful’ welded banjo,” Kris says. “Sadly, its career was short-lived. Dad got punted hard into the wall, which bent the shit out of it. It was more damage than he was willing to fix so he gave the game away.”
03: COLIN loved this yellow HK GTS Monaro. “When it was about eight years old he made it his street weapon of choice, ripping out the 327 and Saginaw, replacing it with a Ron Spink-built 350 Chev and Muncie ‘rock crusher’ trans topped with a Hurst vertical-gate shifter,” Kris recalls. “Dad always said it was quick, but I just figured they were your standard ‘dad’ stories, until many years later when I was talking to some older blokes at my work about the illegal drags at Brickies. They said there used to be an absolute ball-tearer of a yellow HK Monaro that raced there, and after asking about other cars it hung with, I confirmed they were talking about Dad. Sadly, one day Dad returned home from work to find our shed’s roller door sitting in the front yard along with half of its supporting brickwork, as well as tyre drag marks and a very empty space where the HK used to sit. A few days later its very naked and partly burnt-out shell was found in a back street, so my grandfather went and chained its remains to the nearest telegraph pole. He and Dad planned to pick it up later that day and start the build all over again, but, you guessed it, the chain got cut and the shell was stolen! That’s how you kick a man when he’s already down. Nothing of the car ever turned up.”
04: THE stylish man in the fire suit is Ron Spink, the owner of Ron Spink Automotive back in the day. “Ron hailed from the Beverly Hills area of Sydney and built all of my dad’s engines, from the high-strung race six-cylinders to the smallblock Chev that powered his Monaro,” Kris says. An HQ towing a race Torana is a sadly long-lost sight on Australian roads!
05: THIS yellow LJ Torana Sports Sedan was built and raced by one of Colin’s mates. “It won pretty much everything in its day with a hot sixcylinder,” Kris says. “Fast-forward 20 years and its cylinder head ended up on one of the angry
red motors I built for my LJ; it has sat in the roof of my grandfather’s shed for years.”
06: THE ‘Brown Bomber’ was Kris’s grandfather’s HG GTS, running a 253 backed by a Saginaw and banjo diff. “It was the full stocker apart from a set of Tasman mags, and I ended up with it in 2005. I had grand plans to cut it up and transform it into my Super Street racer, but got convinced to save it – it was a full matching-numbers car even down to the date codes on the glass and steering box. I sold it to one of those restorer types, and last I heard it was still sitting in his shed untouched! It is my biggest car regret – I should have kept it and cut it up.”
07: WITH three kids now on the go, the Edwards family needed something cool for Kris’s better half, Cilyse, to drive. Her VP Commodore wagon is loaded with HSV options true to the era, and a part-resto included the fitment of a Walkinshaw twin-throttlebody intake and further tweaked suspension. Tidy panel and paint make the VP the perfect cruiser and show-goer for the whole family to enjoy together.
08: THIS is Kris’s daughter Shay at about 18 months old. “She’s helping me with a brake overhaul by using a bolt to get the grease out of the hub,” Kris says. “Shay was having a ball and I thought it was cute – the wife not so much unfortunately; it was something to do with her trying to get grease stains out of Shay’s clothes!”
09: THE April/may ’93 issue of SM featured Ralph Stratton’s Wild Plum-with-graphics HX ute on the cover, which immediately became one of Kris’s all-time favourites. At the time, it was one of a new wave of visually high-impact street machines that retained fairly stock drivetrains to keep the law on their side. “I would still own that ute in a heartbeat today and daily-drive the wheels off it,” Kris says. “I love my Holden commercials, and once the kids get a bit older, I’m hoping to build an 80s-style One Tonner with all the period-correct fruit.”
10: KRIS’S mum Jenny still knows where it’s at in the tough daily driver stakes, running her VU Maloo both at the track and to the tip! “Mum bought this Maloo back in 2005; it has brown leather trim and full Harrop brakes,” Kris says. “This thing does it all – Bunnings runs, garden centre trips, usually filled to the brim with all sorts of gear. I dropped into Mum’s once when she was doing house renos; the rear bumper was almost on the ground being filled with new tiles for the place! It’s only just clicked over 100,000 kays and she’s raced it a fair bit, but it still runs cruiser-spec diff gears, which keeps times in the low 13-second range.”
11: JENNY’S weekender is this white Lsapowered VF Maloo that she bought brand new back in ’16 and has since covered a mere 5000 kays. It went straight from the showroom floor to Walkinshaw Performance, who tweaked it with some extra boost, a tune, exhaust and lowering job. With just over 500rwhp, it’s Jenny’s pride and joy and has seen some strip action: “Mum’s raced it twice, but wasn’t too comfy with the traction control and reverse-pattern shifter, so there’s still more practice to come. And after hearing a few other Lsa-powered cars at shows, she’ll be adding a better cam to give it more street cred. Who doesn’t love a cammed and blown ute!”