Here's a quick tutorial on how to customize monster trucks and junk cars.

Question #1: Where do you find your junk cars/vans/buses/etc.?

Answer: Everywhere! You never know where you'll find something, and I recommend going to toy shows, flea markets, thrift stores/secondhand stores, as well as retailers.

For example, who wouldn't like some decently scaled '70s era American vans for freestyle objects? Johnny Lightning makes them. They were originally released in 2002 or 2003 but this series bombed horribly. KB bought most of what was left of the stock and they've been sitting at three for $5.

Here are some pictures:

A Dodge and a Ford. There's a Chevy in the series also, though I find it a bit out of scale (too high and too wide) compared to the other two.

This is the packaging to look for:

Here's one that has been drilled apart with a dremel and then stripped with Chem-Dip carb cleaner (you can find this at Auto Zone for about $15, however, don't get Gunk brand, that doesn't work- has to be Chem Dip, and make sure to follow all the directions and always strip these cars outside or in a very well ventilated area):

Delivery vans? Look no further than Wal*Mart, K-Mart, Toys R Us, or Target. Or even KB while you're searching for Boogie Vans. The brand is Hot Wheels. I think we're all familiar with the blue carded cars that run about $.99 or less.

This is the current release (the purple ones) alongside some already customized (the white ones):

Is it me, or is that pig's smirk just asking to be run over by a monster truck?

Now onto the good stuff. Making an actual customized monster truck. How about Escalade?

Step #1: Locate a good body. This time, once again, it's Johnny Lightning to the rescue. I found this black Escalade at Toys R Us. It's a 2004 release in the 2004 New Cars series. Another series that didn't do so well, you can still find these around in some toy stores, or even online auction sites. This one cost me the normal full price for a Johnny Lightning ($2.99).

Step #2: And of course, you need a good donor truck. Well, I stocked up on small wheeled trucks after the switch to larger wheels on Hot Wheels Monster Jams, and here's a He Man truck from one of the Monster Jam board games. KB Toys reduced these to buy one get one half off (that's $10 for the first, $5 for the second and you get three trucks, some playing cards, and the board!).

Step #3: Dremel them both apart. Tool selection is up to each individual customizer. I use an old drill and I pick whichever drill bit is slightly larger than the rivet. You want to drill the head of the rivet out, though with the Monster Jams your best bet is to just keep drilling til the body loosens off the chassis.

Step #4: Will the body fit onto the chassis without any major modifications? Place the body on the chassis/rollcage and see. In this case, I had to use a different rollcage (Wild Thang's). However, with the rollcage swap, this turned out nicely. It's not done, nor is it attached to the chassis yet, but here's some pictures of it looking ready for action:

Takes out a delivery van and it's own original chassis! Anyone need some used Escalade suspension parts, GPS, or some rather torn leather seats?

Sometimes you may have to do modifications to either the body or the chassis (normally grinding) or possibly modifications to the body itself such as spoilers (think Monster Patrol), etc. For my Pony Express (using a correct '68 Ford Mustang body, not a Cheetah body) truck, I had to cut away much of the plastic rollcage to get it to work right.

Step #5: At this point you'd normally want to secure your body to the chassis. Escalade is an exception we will get to in a minute, however I normally use JB Quick (Wal*Mart automotive section).

But Escalade presents a unique challenge other trucks don't have: the spinner wheels. Look to Matchbox for this one. Last year Matchbox introduced a line of cars that retail for between $1.99 and $2.49 called Superfast. Most of these have a blingy style of rims, however these are to be discontinued in favor of a more realistic wheel later this year. Now is the time to get a donor if you are planning on doing a custom Escalade. The donor for this one was a Jeep Wrangler which looked hideous on those wheels and wanted some rugged off road wheels.

The wheels will fit almost perfectly inside the rims of a small wheeled truck, and will fit (tire and all) inside a large tired truck. Unless you're a sucker for punishment I urge you to go with the large tired truck on this one... because if you go the small tired route like I am, it means taking an Exacto knife to the remove the tire part of the rims. They're all one piece, as I learned the hard way- the rims are just painted onto the plastic tire. This means trimming the "tire" off. I haven't started that part of this project yet, but here's an idea of how they look without trimming:

Now, remember I mentioned picking up the board game? Now, it comes with a playing board that is rather lame. I read the rules for the game and it doesn't sound like much fun at all. So what do you do with it? Toss it out? No way! Even this has potential. I have four of them (and ran out of paint after painting three) and this is just the right amount to set up two lanes of racing on an outdoors style course. Any brown paint will do, however I have found ColorPlace (Wal*Mart's house brand) red oxide primer spray paint to be the perfect color to imitate a nice red clay track.

The following are Carcrusher's tips on how to mount a Muscle Machines body onto a Hot Wheels Monster Jam chassis:

The way I convert Muscle Machines to Hot Wheels chassis is pretty simple.

Step 1: Get a Hot Wheels with a Ford or Chevy plastic chassis and a Muscle Machines truck. Unscrew the body of the Muscle Machine truck and take it off.

Step 2: Place a drop of lubricating oil on the rivet on the underside of the Hot Wheels chassis. I use Hoppe's Oil for firearms and fishing reels.

Step 3: Take your dremel (or any other high-RPM drill) and drill out the rivet with the stock dremel bit (or a bit relatively close to that size, preferably a scotch bigger).

*Crucial part - make sure you drill the hole straight up through the body. If you do it perfectly, the body will just fall off. You might have to work the body back and forth a little.

Step 4: Take some Testor's model glue and put it on the top crossbar of the cockpit on the Hot Wheels chassis and on the screw housing of the Muscle Machines body.

Step 5: Place the body on the Hot Wheels chassis so it looks good and make sure it stays either by itself or with a small weight in front of and behind the body. You might have to take apart the front part of the Hot Wheels chassis where it interlocks. Wrap it around the screw housing as far as it will go.

Step 6: Let the glue dry for about ten hours. Then you'll have a race-ready conversion.

*You can paint the wheel hubs to make the truck look real (Bearfoot for example).

The assembly only takes about 10-20 minutes.

Extra notes - I find that Dodge bodies mount best on a Chevy chassis, but you can do it on a Ford chassis too. The Ford chassis will hold the body better if you give the body a slight nose-down attitude.