138. Monster Trucks, K2 Fabrication and Off-Roading w/ Kasey Kromschroeder

But at some point, while you're approaching it, the ramp does disappear, you know, like you no longer see it. You're either looking right into it or it's below you. You're kind of in charge of everything, just mostly living on the road. When you're back at the shop, it's engine rebuilds, bigger projects, chassis rebuild, things like that.

Hello, ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the Minnoxide podcast. I'm your host, Harris, a.k.a. Minnoxide, man of many automotive aspirations, and I'm here with my 411 co-host, Dan, Mr. Gunner Garage.

That's what they call me, that's what you call me.

Yeah, what do you mean? Does anybody else call you?

I had somebody come up to me at Hay Days and was like, hey, Mr. Gunner Garage. So yeah, one other person.

Yeah, I was like a year ago now.

I see this stuff, you know what Hay Days is, you're up in that area too, she knows.

Where's that hosted again?

Forest Lake.

North Branch.

North Branch, yeah.

Oh, so that's like what, 10, 15 minutes from here, something like that?

Yeah.

Like 20, yeah.

20, yeah. Okay, cool. Well, anywho, today we are here with Kasey Kromshroeder. Nailed it, nailed it. I knew I would nail it. It only took four tries. K2 Fabrication, and it's kind of funny how we met, so I basically put a Facebook post out saying, I needed to talk to somebody who knows about monster trucks, somebody tags you, and here we are a week later. So go ahead and tell us a little bit about yourself, what it is you do, what you've done in the past, and we'll go from there.

All right, so I'm Kasey Kromschroeder, former monster truck driver for Triple B Motorsports, mechanic, welder, fabricator, and last year went full time with my own business, K2 Fabrication, which is where we're at right now. Gosh, a lot of, many automotive aspirations. Been involved with racing in my business now. I'm in pulling trucks, semis, snowmobiles, cars, turbo cars, C-10s, the whole gambit of stuff, off-road vehicles, so yeah, I think that's the introduction.

A little bit of everything. So where does that all start? Like, how did you get into that?

Pretty much started with my dad. Back in like 10th grade of high school, I told him that I wanted to take a welding class. He had, I might have the timeline a little mixed up, but he had started building this. And around that time, I said, I want to take a welding class. And I was afraid that I was going to be the only person in school that didn't know how to weld in 10th grade, apparently. So he's like, well, dumped out the scrap bin and started teaching me how to weld. And then I helped welding on this and pretty much just never stopped. I don't know. It's not like it was a moment where I started welding and instantly was like, this is what I want to do for the rest of my life. Just something I kept learning, kept becoming interesting and just kept doing.

So then how did it go from there? Like, how did you get involved into like motorsports?

So my dad raced growing up, so we're always at the racetrack. My brother races now. Not really something I ever got into. I kind of wanted to go off on my own, which is when I kind of took this thing over, got it finished, did a rebuild on it, and went off road and kind of made my own new group of friends to do that with. And that's probably where it started, is off-roading and then posting pictures going, off-roading with my friends and wheeling, and that led into the monster trucks. And after that, I ended up here.

Okay. What did your, so what's your brother doing? What did your pops do? Like what kind of racing?

Dirt track racing. Dirt track?

Okay.

Yes.

It's a whole other world that I haven't learned anything about yet and I want to.

Yeah.

So, okay. So you didn't have any, you didn't go into that, but how did the whole monster truck thing come into play?

Okay.

Yeah.

So I know I'm jumping right into it, but yeah.

In high school, I had raced like some Enduro cross local stuff at ERX, if you guys are familiar with that.

Okay.

So I had raced, if you call that racing. And then I had been doing the off road stuff and I was working as a welder fabricator, had been a machinist for a couple of years. And the owner of the monster truck team sent me a Facebook message of all things, asking if I ever wanted to drive a monster truck. And I had known of this guy, but I was just like, this is so random. I asked my dad, I was like, what is this about? He's like, he just bought a monster truck team. He's like, messaging back.

Okay.

For real? So I don't know. I messaged him back and I was like, not something I'd ever had on my radar, but I guess sure. And like, who wouldn't want to drive a monster truck? Right. So we set up a time to get together, and he needed a welder fabricator for the team. And he was like, it'd be cool if we had one truck, you know, for the girls, pink truck, whatever. So he had me do some test hits in a monster truck. At like, it went into the night. It was really interesting. It was not set up. It hurt really bad.

But what does test hits look like in a monster truck?

So that day we pulled two trucks out of the trailer, put the big tires on, and he had a car, van, some other stuff. And basically got me mic'd up, put a helmet on, fire suit on, strapped in, and just was like, drive, drive, drive. OK, throttle. OK, out of the throttle. And jump a van.

Oh, just right into it. Yeah.

If you know the owner of the monster truck team, that's totally his style. Just jump right in. OK. So a couple of months went by, I was still working as a welder fabricator at a shop in Ramsey. And the owner of the monster truck team reaches back out and says, stop by the shop. Like, we're ready if you want to come work here.

OK. So then how long ago was this?

Oh, gosh.

Pre or post pandemic.

Post pandemic. Yeah. My first season was 2022.

OK.

I believe.

OK.

Was there any other candidates or other drivers that were also doing test hits out there?

There was one other. She did a couple of hits. I don't know what ever panned out or played out. But OK. Months later, I got contacted again to come work there.

So how different was that compared to anything else you've done in the past? I mean, you're jumping into how taller. How tall is a monster truck anyway?

I don't even know what the height would be.

It's just more bigger, I think.

Yeah, when I'm standing next to it, my head's like where my feet would be when I'm sitting in the truck.

OK. Yeah. So obviously, I'm guessing at that point in your life, that was the biggest thing you've driven.

For sure. Yeah.

Yeah. So I mean, what's that like? Do you have any nerves going into it or you're just like send it?

I was so nervous. But at the same time, being mic'd up helped a lot. OK, as the owner of the team was just in my ear, telling me what to do, do this, do that, don't do that. And I'd also never driven anything with rear steer. So you're getting used to so many things and you can't see anything. You have almost no visibility out of a monster truck. So yeah, it was incredibly different than anything I've ever experienced. But I think I was more nervous going into it than actually doing the hit. And then once you do one, you're like, OK, I want to do more.

How does that whole rear, how does the whole rear steer thing work then?

So it's front and rear hydraulic steer, just hydraulic rams, up to solenoids. So your steering wheel is for the front wheels, obviously. And then you have a handle with a toggle switch for your rear steer.

OK.

Oh, so it's not just all at once with the steering wheel. You got to do it independently. OK.

Yeah. So when you're driving, one hand's on the steering wheel, one's on the rear steer. Yeah.

OK. OK. That makes a lot more sense. So then, OK, so you're trying this thing out. What was the hardest thing that you had to learn, especially like on that first outing?

Oh, my gosh. Everything was so brand new.

It was like overwhelming.

A little bit.

Yeah.

Everything was new. I mean, I knew nothing about the monster truck world. So when he asked me to come drive for him, the only thing I knew was Monster Jam. And I was like, wait, there's something else besides Monster Jam.

Yeah.

That was me last week, by the way. I went. So again, my entire like Facebook feed is all monster trucks. And that's why I made that Facebook post asking if anybody knew anyone. I don't know how. You just see one thing. You watch the whole video and it just keeps showing you more on Facebook. And it's literally just been all that. But then I looked into Triple B Motorsports and I'm like, all right, this is something completely different than Monster Jam. And then I learned that there's like completely different types of things that you can do. And I mean, you'd probably be better at explaining it than I am. But like, what's the difference between like what you did in Monster Jam?

So, yeah, everyone asked this question and I had the same question. I was so confused. So, Monster Jam is its own entity that a lot of their trucks are owned and managed by Monster Jam. They hire drivers to drive them. They own the truck. They own the identities, all that stuff. And then there's the independent teams, which is what Triple B Motorsports was. They're independent private parties that own the trucks and they get contracted to do shows. Some of the teams that are doing Monster Jam are independent teams that signed a contract with Monster Jam to work for them, but they're independently owned trucks. So, that's kind of the two sides. You know, if your local Fairgrounds has a show, they're going to call up an independent team, ask if they have availability for that weekend with two trucks, and they'll say yes or no, sign a contract, and they'll go do the show. So, that's what we did. We drove around to Fairgrounds, racetracks, things like that, doing shows versus running for one promotion company like Monster Jam.

So it's a show thing, then? There's no circuit, you're not running, there's no competition, anything like that. You're just doing cool s*** and driving over cars and stuff like that?

Correct, yeah. So Monster Jam has their little point series, you know? And there is some diehard fans and like Monster Truck Racing Association that kind of try to do a point series for the independents, but there's hundreds of shows going on across the country. It's not really a circuit by any means.

Oh, okay. Interesting.

Okay. Are you doing any... I probably should have done a little bit of research before I got here, but I've been really busy.

That's not your style.

Is there... Or are you doing any flips or anything like that too in this style of stuff or...?

You certainly can. Being the owner of the truck on the independent side or working for the direct owner of the truck, as long as they're okay with it, you can do it. And sometimes the people that own the truck are driving the truck. And if they want to, they will. We never did at Triple B. We were all very new, very young, very rookie team. And our boss is kind of like, no, we don't need to deal with that. OK, I mean, we were learning how to drive the truck from day one.

Well, it's like, all right, go out and flip it. You know, yeah, that'd be a pretty intense thing to ask. Yeah, OK.

We're another question I've always had. Where are you sourcing all of these cars you drive over? Are you getting a hold of like local junkyards or do you guys have another like place that's just hauling around cars everywhere? Or how does that work? Do you know?

Yeah. So we drove a ship.

Hey, now.

So we drove for promotion companies. So the company would I guess the path to get a monster truck show would be the fairgrounds calls the promotion company, the promotion company calls us. So the promotion company is building the track, is sourcing the cars. And usually they are from local junkyards. They'll usually try to get a sponsorship from a junkyard and or pay whatever. And the junkyard will haul cars there and set them up. And then the promotion company will build the track with them. At our hometown show, the owner of the team had a towing company, worked out perfect. We got junk cars that way.

Okay.

So are you working with only one for the promotion company then? Or how did that work at the time? Or is it multiple promotions?

Yep, multiple. So Triple B had, I believe, eight trucks running, so four trailers. Each trailer has two trucks in it. And sometimes we would all go to one show for one promotion company. Sometimes we would go to three different shows for that company, three different shows for three different promoters, just whoever needed us that weekend.

Okay. And then, are you working for this team full time? Because you said you're doing fabrication and mechanic work also. So is it like drive for a weekend, and then you guys are in the shop working on the trucks too, or?

Yeah, so I was working for them full time. I was actually hired as the welder fabricator and maybe someday fill-in driver, and that very quickly changed to a full time schedule. But yeah, we, as an employee at Triple B and most independent teams, you're doing it all. You're getting the trucks ready, you're loading the trailer, you're driving the semi, you're unloading, setting up for the show, doing the show, tear down, fix it and go to the next one. So you're kind of in charge of everything, just mostly living on the road. When you're back at the shop, it's engine rebuilds, it's bigger projects, chassis rebuild, things like that.

Are you getting anything extra for being the driver too? And you don't have to answer this if you don't want, but like, is that, or is it just everybody's getting paid, everybody's working?

Yup, everyone's getting paid, everyone's working. I can't speak for every team, but that's how our team was. The crew guys certainly, most teams on the road have two drivers for the two trucks in the trailer, and then one crew guy, and that crew guy puts in work. So, I think it's pretty fair to do that. The driver gets the fun of driving.

Okay, that seems fair.

Yeah.

How demanding is the schedule on the road?

It's every day, it's very demanding, which is part of the reason I ended up getting out of it. But it is fun. It's a good experience. You're doing these shows, you're in West Virginia, North Dakota, Montana, all over the country, meeting different people, traveling. But some days, you are just sitting at a truck stop and that's not super fun.

So is there a season? Is there a summer off sort of deal or how does that work?

Usually, it's December, January off. You certainly could work all year if you wanted, but most of the time teams will take that off as their first quarter prep is what they call it. And they'll tear the trucks down and do those projects that just need to get done, the big maintenance, so that they can come out first quarter strong.

What's the furthest you've ever had to go for that?

Gosh, we've been all over. I mean, Washington, New Mexico, North Carolina. We didn't do a lot on the East Coast, my trailer specifically, but other teams went up to Maine. So literally everywhere, being in the Midwest, having the team located in the Midwest definitely helped to not have to travel all the way across the country so much.

Right.

So then are you, do you ever come back home during that period or are you just on the road for literally like 10 months sort of deal?

We came home pretty often. We were pretty lucky that way.

Because it was in the Midwest sort of deal?

Yeah, or just needed to restock on parts or fuel or something that wasn't feasible to necessarily get out to us. So we do maybe, I'd say three weeks is pretty common.

So be like on the road for three weeks and then come back for like a week or something?

Yeah.

Okay, that makes sense.

Are these built similar to Monster Jam ones or Monster Jam trucks on a whole different level? Or are they pretty much the same?

They're pretty much identical. Our chassis were older, little older technology. Monster Jam has some proprietary stuff that they do. They're also moving more into EFI, whereas we all our trucks were still just old school mechanical fuel injection. Okay. Okay. But that's kind of a new thing. Same axles. There's either Clark's or Pettibones. Some people have Rockwell's and some other niche stuff, but pretty much the same thing.

So there's when it comes to a monster truck, there's like a cookie cutter build that's this is what you put in them. What's in them for drivetrain?

So it's a 540 big block with an 871 blower, two-speed power glide, and then a custom drop SCS transfer case. And that's pretty much the standard. If you're doing a Ford, it'd be a 572.

Okay. Hmm, okay. I'm curious, what are they making horsepower-wise?

I've never gotten a real dyno number. Everyone just says 1500 horsepower.

Yeah, big block with a blower. And it's carbureted still, he said.

So, yeah.

How crazy is those? I guess, how often are you having to rebuild them?

I mean, if you take care of it, I had one motor for, I got the truck with the engine in it, had already done half of a season, I believe. Then I had it in there for another season and a half. So that was two seasons on one engine, which is a long time and it never blew up. It eventually got to the point where it was just making no power and got to rebuild. But I mean, sometimes we're doing three, four, five motors in one truck in a season for whatever reason. Everything's just hard on them. Like the stoppies and reverse poppers where all the oils in one side of the engine, it's obviously hard on things unless you're doing something to counteract that.

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Methanol.

Methanol, oh geez, okay. That explains the burning in my eyes.

Yeah, that's intense. Being in the confined shop, trying to time one of them or something, your eyes are watering, it's loud, nobody can see or hear each other.

We'll just delete that part from the OSHA.

Yeah.

What, California Air Resources Board, who, what? Yeah. So like how many of you guys are going out on the road at a time? Like for some of the more like independent shows that I've seen, it's like six or eight trucks, is that sort of a similar deal or?

Yeah, I'd say that's common. Not always all from our team sometimes. Three or four different teams show up.

Okay.

What do one of these trucks cost?

Do you know?

We got ours used for like 150,000. I wouldn't know a number to do brand new. And you can certainly do, I mean, junkyard parts, Clark and Pettybone, heavy equipment, axles, or you can buy billet, custom housings, all of that stuff. So you could very easily swing 100 grand.

Either way.

I just remembered how this whole slippery slope started. It was about a month ago. I saw a monster truck for sale on racingjunk.com.

Oh.

That's where it came from. And I started looking into it because I can't remember, it was sub 100,000, but it looks like it was missing a lot of stuff because it's been used. But how often are trucks changing hands? Because like you kind of hopped into a seat, does that change hands frequently or?

I don't know. Not that often, I really don't think. It's usually some of the higher teams, I feel like it'd be some of the higher teams that want to get a new chassis, a new truck and are passing theirs down to a team that is willing to run the older stuff, I guess. Yeah, I don't know. I feel like they generally try to keep theirs. Once you get your truck set up for you, you like it, you understand how it feels, how it works, you kind of want to keep it. That's how I felt at least. I didn't want to jump around seats within Triple B. I wanted my truck. I didn't care what body was on it.

Yeah.

Well, that's another thing, like the body's on it. Like that's just, you just can change it as needed, right?

Yeah. So some people, when they hear that I drive or used to drive Monster Patrol, they think it was the original Monster Patrol from the 90s, the Paul Schaeffer one, because they think that monster truck is the one I'm driving. No, we just, we swap bodies all the time. You wreck a body, put a different one on there. Sometimes shows one, a pickup truck body or a 3D body, and we'll just swap them around, make it work.

That's a pretty simple process, or I mean, I've seen it. It basically is just a thin aluminum skin on them, isn't it?

They're fiberglass bodies.

Oh, OK.

I mean, it takes time to build the mounts because you certainly can't just like pull one off and put it back on and have the mounts all line up or anything. But if you know you have to do it, you just make it happen.

OK.

How often were you like replacing like those panels or bodies?

I didn't have to very often. I didn't roll my truck bad enough or often enough to need to do that.

I was going to say, that probably depends on the driver, right?

I was going to say.

And their skill building body mounts. If you don't mount your body well enough, it's literally just going to like rattle off and crack. OK. So people had to deal with that. And I don't know, I had mine mounted pretty well and didn't have too many issues.

OK.

So when you're with a team of six or eight trucks like that, are you pretty much just responsible for your truck then? So you're working on yours. You're you're not. Are you guys bouncing around, helping each other out or?

We certainly bounce around, help each other out. I'd say your priority is your truck, your teammates truck, and then the rest of the team's truck.

OK.

Is there anything to the teammate thing? Because like you mentioned, like there's not like points or anything. Is it just basically just you two help each other sort of deal or?

It's pretty much your trailer, mate. So when we're on the road, it's two trucks and one trailer, like I said.

Yeah.

And that's your teammate. So you guys are doing shows together. So if you have to get to Massachusetts next Saturday, you got to make sure your truck's ready, make sure their truck's ready. And then if you have extra time, you go help the rest of the team. OK, because they might not have a show for two or three more weeks, but you have yours next week and you need to get your stuff done, you know.

Are you so you guys are doing like work on the road to then? Yeah. OK.

You break something, you're not driving all the way back here, probably to do it. And you got like a route you're taking.

No, if we have parts in the trailer, we'll do it. We'll get to the next show early and do it there or see if we can stay at the previous show late and do it there.

OK.

Now, obviously, like you're not the one working with the promoter or the event, but what does it cost to get a team out to a show? Any idea?

It was so varying. I got different numbers. I'd say, I don't know, like four or five thousand a truck. Maybe I'm off.

OK.

Something like that.

OK.

But they're getting paid to go to the show. It's not like racing where you're paying an entry fee. You've paid your truck or your car. You've built all the stuff you do out there. Racing is such a crazy sport in itself is the fact that it just bleeds you dry. Unless you're really, really, really good at it. You get hired by a team, I guess, but.

Or like Aaron was saying last week, really, really, really, really rich.

Yeah.

Yeah, that's okay. That's crazy. So then, okay, so then you have it. So you're able to put everything in touch. It's like those wheels aren't exactly small. You're able to stuff two trucks and all that in one trailer just fine.

It's tight. Yeah. So we have a 53 foot like van trailer and the front is so on the like the dance floor, the deck of the trailer that goes over the fifth wheel plate. There's four tires that go up there. And then usually teams will build a loft above that with the tools you don't use as often kind of go up there. And then behind that is a lift. So you put two tires on the lift, put those up to the ceiling, roll two more underneath. So that's your eight tires all in the front. And then there's a, I don't know, maybe two, three foot tall ramps on both sides. So the first truck drives up on the ramp, second truck drives up on the back of the ramp, strap them all down. All your parts are below on the floor and jacks and toolboxes and all that stuff.

What's the biggest pain in the a** of it? Is it loading and unloading the trailer?

Probably restocking the trailer. Loading and unloading, you do it every weekend. You just get efficient, especially if your teammate helps keep it organized. But when you get back to the shop and your methanol barrels and parts and everything, and you're trying to see like, shoot, what did we use? What's not here? Like, keep track.

You just got done being on the road, you're probably tired and don't want to deal with all that crap.

Yeah. Actually, you know what I'd even say, washing the trucks is worse. Trucks and tires. You wash the truck and then you get that over and then you wash each tire individually. And a 66 inch tire, it's a lot of surface area to sit with the pressure washer and then roll it. Man, it just drains me.

Oh, I bet.

Well, what's a monster truck way anyway?

They say 12,000 pounds.

Okay.

Plus or minus.

Tires and the wheels are probably a good chunk of that too.

Yeah, those things are heavy.

Okay.

So then on the fab side of things, how intense is the cage on there? Because for example, I see the cockpit footage of inside a truck, and it's just bars everywhere.

Yeah. So the cockpit area is probably the most dense with bars. It's kind of like NHRA where around the driver is just insane, and everything else is just only as much as needed. So it's all two inch DOM, eighth inch wall. The cradle would be maybe like quarter inch wall in some areas to take the shock from the four links. But everything else is very, very simple. Shock towers, and then just basically tie it all together.

Do you guys build your chassis? Or is there like a place where you get chassis from?

We didn't build our chassis. Some teams do, or we'll buy a chassis kit and weld it themselves. There's, I don't know, maybe three, four monster truck chassis manufacturers. So they're pretty, it's usually one of the four. There's not a lot of custom chassis out there, but there certainly are.

I would think that that's not like, probably not selling a bunch of monster truck chassis is super often.

I wouldn't think so. Usually they also sell parts, and we definitely go through parts. So that's probably where the money is.

What are the most consumable parts?

Corner parts, so axles, hubs. I'd say corner parts for sure, or four link bars. You land a little funny, and you'll just fold up a four link.

I see where the wheel goes. That's not supposed to be like that.

Yeah.

But I'd say most often we're tearing corners down, axles or planetary gears or something in the corner.

So that's probably your most common maintenance then, or?

Yeah.

Okay. So okay, what's the... Has there been any like, oh s***, sketchy moments in your career of doing it?

Plenty, yeah. Okay. So like I said, we were a really young team, lots of rookie drivers, which was cool because, I mean, nobody had an ego, like we were all learning this together and kind of building this team, which was really fun. And my first big show was the toughest... Yeah, it was a toughest show, which is a promotion company. And we were there with some bigger names, not people we were used to running with. And it was kind of like, you know, you guys are going to do this show, like do good. And I was still very, very new at this time. And we went out and did this crazy Z course racing. We did two wheel skills and for freestyle. Went out there, was hitting jumps, whatever, and came around to hit a jump and realize I was about to hit it backwards. Once I was already like committed full speed and it was like a double basically. So I jumped this side and plowed the truck straight into the second double. And I mean, I knew I was going to do this the second my tires hit the ramp and it was already too late and hit it and just somersaulted the truck.

Oh, geez.

Okay. But what was the landing like?

It was violent.

So did you at least land right side up or no?

No, I think it was on my side.

On the side. Okay.

Yeah. And the truck, I mean, it just looks so mangled. And I was so new at this time that to me, that was like so overwhelming. And to everyone else, it was like grabbing an inch and an eighth wrench, pull the shocks off, get in the trailer. And we just figured out and get it back in there.

What was the owner like? Are they cool with that kind of stuff or do you get a stern talking to you after doing something like that or?

He was pretty cool. At first, it was really frustrating, I think. But once he realized like, none of us are trying to do this, we're not driving stupid on purpose. As long as he was like genuine accident, you guys are new, it's gonna happen. I think he was pretty cool about it. And it was like, well, you're gonna have to fix it now.

So, okay, so the owner, is he trying to find people that have that kind of like mechanical experience or fab experience?

Yeah, so on the independent side, you're working on your truck. Most of the time, the driver is also working on his truck. So you have to have mechanical aptitude as well. Whereas in Monster Jam, they're hired drivers. They drive the truck. Some of them might be able to work on it. I don't know, but.

They show up in their limo, they get out, they put their sunglasses on, they walk into the arena, they just climb into their truck.

Some guys just sweaty.

Somebody takes their cape off of them and they get into the truck.

Well, it's like the Whistling Diesel 1 videos. It's like all the time you see like his mechanics like freaking out in the background. It's like, oh, I have to fix this again. Like the Monster Max video. Like, did you see that one a few months ago? Like when he just did a s*** ton of damage? Oh, no. We'll fix it. No problem. The mechanic just freaking out. Yeah. OK. What was your favorite part about racing monster trucks? Or driving, I guess, is it racing or driving? Correct me on my terminology.

I don't know. We we do in a show. So we do two wheel skills, which is like your stoppies, your reverse poppers or any special trick bicycles. And then we do a racing segment and then we do freestyle. So, OK, whatever called driving. The best part is just like when your truck is dialed in, your shocks feel good and you could just stay out there for 10 minutes. Not that you can, but like you would want to. And you get back and the truck's in one piece. You don't have to thrash the next week. You and your teammate both like that's the best when you can just go to the next show and you're like, we got our trucks dialed in like we're good.

What does dialing in look like? Like are you like tuning certain suspension settings or whatever?

With the shocks specifically, your shocks aren't set right, it hurts, it's not fun. So when they do feel good, I mean, it feels like you're landing on a marshmallow. Like you feel no pain, you're having a great time. When they're not set up, it just hurts. It's violent and you get done and you're just like, what are we doing wrong? And rebuilding shocks is not a quick process. You can just like grab and turn or move something. You're rebuilding the whole shock. You're putting different stuff in and you don't know if it worked until the next show. Yeah. And then it could be worse. Yeah.

Yeah.

Is it because you were such a new team, was there somebody on your team that was like, okay, this is how you should set it up? Or is it basically like, here you go.

Good luck.

So we got used trucks that had been running. So we kind of got handed like, this works, don't mess it up. Then we had a couple of resources to talk to, to ask questions and whatever. But a lot of it was just kind of trial by fire and figure it out. Which is fun. I mean, we all got to figure this stuff out together. And sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't and we bounce ideas off of each other. And like I said, nobody had an ego, nobody was said, this is the answer, this is the way you have to do it. And we got to just find what worked for us. The more time we spent on the road doing shows, like collaborating with each other, I'd say the better things got.

OK.

Are you still in contact with some of your like old teammates? Are everybody at Triple B?

Oh, for sure.

OK.

I mean, we basically live together on the road. So they're like your like your old roommates.

Is everybody that you were involved with back then, are they still over there? Did they go out and do their own thing or?

No, pretty much everyone's actually gone.

OK.

There's a couple left. And Triple B has since changed hands for ownership.

OK.

But yeah, a lot of them have gone to different teams or got out of monster trucks. Couple left, though.

OK. Are you do you know who the new ownership is then? Are you involved at all since you kind of went on your own to do your own thing?

So the new ownership is a promoter. So now he, like Monster Jam, owns a promotion company in the trucks. I don't know how the management is all broken down there. But yeah, I'm good with him. I've done some fab work for them.

OK.

Very small stuff.

But yeah, you ever get a call to be like, hey, we everybody's got covid. Can you come drive or anything like that?

I haven't threatened with it.

OK.

I haven't said yes.

All right.

Is there anything you learned from that whole experience that's translated into building stuff like this or doing anything like that? Did you? Is any of that helped you, you think for sure?

So before I was doing Monster Trucks, I was working at a custom fab shop, higher end, like architectural and food grade stuff. And everything's engineered, everything to blueprints. This is how you build it. Everything is polished, finished, all pre-planned for you. Monster Trucks, you just throw all that out the window. It's basically like an episode of Chopped, like the cooking show, you know, like open your basket, like here's what you have, make it work. You open the trailer door and you're like, I have a hub with threads ripped out of it. Like I don't have another hub. What do I have though? I'll just weld this to that and put this there and we'll make it happen, you know? So that was a good experience to go to before coming on my own. I got to do, you know, the engineered blueprints all the way to the absolute caveman, make it happen. And now I kind of get to use those two together in my own fab shop as kind of like, all right, I can build stuff without really having a plan and I can also do full engineered drawings.

Okay, so what then for your shop, what are you mostly working on? Or what are you doing? Or is it just all over the place?

Any one of the business is going to laugh at me, but it is all over the place right now. I would like to get a little more niche, but snowmobiles, pulling trucks, ATVs, side by side stuff, got surge tank for a street sweeper, ice tank for a pulling truck, stainless lid for a fryer over there, custom trophies, it's completely random.

If you were to niche down a little bit more, what would you like to stick to?

I'd like to get more into something off-road related. That's genuinely where my passion is. I don't know what that'll be yet. I think it'll just kinda happen.

Okay, so off-road more the slow stuff or the fast stuff or just anything that's not on pavement?

Yeah, I'd say anything, but more so the slow stuff like the rock crawling.

Okay.

Not that I don't love watching rock bouncing, but yeah.

That was what I was gonna ask.

Oh, okay.

I know you were coming back to me, but yeah, what aspect of off-roading?

No, it's back and forth is great today. I hear you go, and I'm like, I must say something. It's that lip smack. Okay. So you've been full-time, what'd you say, a year and a half now?

Yes.

So we've had a number of people on the show where it's like they make the transition from a W2 job or 1099 or whatever, to being owners. How did that come into play? Why did you decide to go out on your own instead of just finding a day job elsewhere?

Gosh, I don't even have a good answer. I just didn't like any of the jobs that I saw. And I was like, well, I don't need a job immediately. I'll just freelance stuff. And I made a list and I was like, I can pressure wash houses with equipment that I have. I can do welding. I can do moving. I made a list of random stuff I could do to make money. I was like, well, I'll just entrepreneur it for a while. And I don't think I got anywhere on that list besides welding. I pretty much just defaulted and I had welding work pretty much instantly, which was awesome.

How did you start that? Just throw out a marketplace thing and be like, hey, anybody need something welded together?

So I've had K2 Fabrication since the name, since 2018. So I've been doing various welding jobs for people very sporadically, randomly as I have time. And then towards the end of being at Triple B, I knew that I was going to be leaving at some point in the next 3-4 months. And so I started taking on a little bit more side work. People would look for something super odd, niche, don't have a rush, just kind of need to get it done at some point and I would get referred. I did a hot side on an S10. I did some pipes on a vintage snowmobiles and just started posting on social media. And that's pretty much how it's got to here.

To your point, you're doing it since 2018, so it's like you weren't exactly a nobody, right? So that kind of helps. I did that same thing, by the way, last year, like a list of all my skills and ways I could make money. Because last year, I actually looked at my bank statements, like April through September is when my credit card just went whew, but I did that whole list thing. That's a good way of going about it. Then I stuck to one thing just like that too.

Yeah, you gotta have to.

Yeah.

I'd make a list of all my skills, but I'd need a lot of paper.

No.

Do you know how to make paper out of trees? I probably could figure it out. You probably could figure it out.

Yeah.

By the way, I noticed your whole like, because I mean, you can do even like land clearing, and you're always doing that for your neighbor for free.

Yeah.

Well, I'd bought two acres of woods and cleared it all out and built a spot. Yeah, I used skid loaders and stuff. Although I have had my skid loader bucket repaired a couple of times, by a fab person.

So how translatable is your skill? Like, let's say you're doing like off-road stuff, and you're doing a cage for like a drag car or whatever. Is it all pretty transferable skills?

Pretty much, yeah. Having been through the different sides of welding, having been through monster trucks, I'm just kind of willing to just figure it out. And that's what a lot of my customers are is people that they're like, there's not a shop that does this. They don't specialize in this. It's super odd. It's niche. It's weird. But if you can make it work, like, just do it. They just need someone willing to take the time to figure it out. And that's pretty much where all my work has come from, is people that I've had no other options and they're just like, I don't know, please, I have this and I want it to do this.

You're my last resort, please. Yeah. Do you have like a shop rate or anything like that then? Like an hourly?

I try to. I try. Yeah. Estimating is not my strong suit.

Okay.

I've been in business since 2007 and I still hate doing it. I hate doing the job. Have you had anything that you've turned down?

Four.

Sorry, I'm on one today.

Yeah, I guess. It must be that blazer sign staring you in the face.

I know. Yeah, that's what it is.

Yeah, I'm sure there has been. Gosh, I tried to stay away from like too much cage work. I just, it's not even a lot of stuff that's just not efficient for me to do. Like I tell people, I'm willing to do your exhaust, but it's going to be all stainless mandrel bends because I don't have an exhaust bender and it's going to be outrageously priced. Like, is that what you want? Do you want like a show quality stainless exhaust all the way back? Or are you cool with just a luminized steel mandrel bend from the exhaust shop? So that kind of stuff is usually where I end up turning down a job, just like, this isn't worth it to you.

Well, especially like when people can just buy China exhaust sort of deal to and it's like, and what do we talk about this with? Was it Count Nelson or somebody else? Where they're just like, oh yeah, like I can make you a custom exhaust, but it's gonna be three times what you're gonna pay for, you know, an already finished one online.

Yeah, so that kind of stuff usually turned down just cause it's not worth it for either of us.

Do you have a favorite type of project that you've done recently? Anything like really cool come to mind?

The turbo kits are always one of my favorites, even if during them I'm just frustrated. It's not something I had any experience with. You know, some of these guys that have worked at MAP and gone to their own shops and they do incredible work. I came from architectural food grade and then monster trucks. I had never fit pipes in my life and I've just been figuring that out. So every kit I do, I get done with and I'm like, man, this one's even cooler. This one's even better. Looks even sleeker. Welds are even better. So those are always satisfying in their bigger projects. You know, you got the boost pipe, the charge pipe, the down pipe, making everything work, extra little fab stuff here and there. And when it's done, you get to button all up and see the finished project. And just the learning and growth that comes with doing another turbo kit and another turbo kit, those have probably been my favorite.

Do you have like a mentor in this space or are you like just YouTube University? Like how are you learning?

Just literally trying. I'm not even one to watch YouTube videos. Okay. Unless I'm really frustrated, I just kind of keep trying it. There's a couple people I've reached out to and been like, is this seriously how you do this? Like this is miserable. They're like, yep. And once I've just accepted, I'm like, okay, this is just the process you go through. You have a lot of scrap. There's no way to measure that. You just got to cut pieces until they start fitting together. Yeah, that's pretty much how I've gone through it.

So when somebody wants a turbo kit, you have like a stock of, you just have like a bunch of pre-bends that you can cut and manipulate and do all that to make your turbo kit. Is that how that's done then? Or, because some of them I've seen are like, I don't even know how they snake all that stuff together.

Yeah, I just buy mandrel bends. I try to do mandrel bends. I don't love pie cuts, but, and just cut and fit them together. Like, I mean, those two buckets over there are just full of scrap pieces and up there from-

You can practice with that.

Trying to fit stuff together. No way.

I would imagine that sometimes you got to dip into that bucket and grab stuff out of there.

Yeah, that's why I've never emptied them.

Yeah, right?

No, we were just talking about- So we had one guy's garage on yesterday and like that's, you know, he does pretty much only fab work and that was one of the things that he told Dan is like, just start welding s*** together every day because like that's something you want to improve on. So, take that little bucket and I'll get you a bunch of C4 cans.

I have my own bucket.

Yeah, I've seen your bucket.

If you can weld two pop cans together, you're doing pretty damn good.

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What are you doing in between jobs, then? I see you've got some fire pit stuff over there. Do you like doing that kind of stuff, too? You see yourself building some things and selling that kind of stuff or?

Yeah. So March and April, springtime is insanity for me around here, which is good. And a lot of fab shops probably experience that same thing. Everyone wants to get their cars out for summer and whatever yard projects. So when I have slow times, I'm usually working on those other projects like that, prototyping stuff to go on my website, or maybe actually working on my own stuff once in a while.

Business owners aren't allowed to do that.

Right. Yeah.

So then is there anything that you're trying to just kind of like mass produce for your website or not really?

I don't know. I keep trying to think of different ideas and I have a lot of ideas to kind of explore. It's a hard thing deciding like what you want to build and what the market is willing to accept and doing it at a price range that people are willing to pay for it. But I was also like very high quality because I just hate selling junk and I don't want to push anything that I don't believe in. So I'm hoping one day that the website will be maybe half of what I do every day, like a little more consistent, a little more niche, like I said before, kind of like honing in on all the custom stuff because it does get a little overwhelming some days.

You never know when it's going to take off and all of a sudden you got a solo stove in your right that's gone and now they sell them at Cabela's and all that kind of stuff. Yeah. What is your best seller on your website?

Probably the Smudge Pots. They're currently taken down while I make the new ones. Because like I said, there was improvements to be made and once I knew better, I took them down and now I'm building a different version.

Is that what those are?

Yep.

Okay.

So yeah, I sold so many of those last year. It was insane. I was at UPS all the time and they're like 50 pound boxes and they just shake their head when I walk in.

I don't miss shipping. Shipping wasn't funny either.

Yeah.

Okay. So then I kind of already asked that question already as to like what's next. So obviously be cool if you could do more off road stuff, obviously build out the website. What about in general, like the business side of things? Where are you learning all that from or is that kind of like go back to just figure it out?

Yeah, just figuring it out. My mom's an accountant, so she's been helpful with quick books and stuff like that. Yeah, the accounting side is kind of a drag, but the business side, I really struggle not having a mentor because there's a lot of opportunities that come my way, a lot of ideas that I have and I'm like, man, I wish I could just bounce this off someone that's been there. It's pretty hard to manage that right now, but hopefully that'll get better.

Is there anybody like locally like other fab people that you are like communicating with, right? Like you mentioned earlier, like, oh, is this supposed to be the way? But like on the business side of things, does anybody help you on that as well?

Not yet. There are a lot of local fab shops though, and I just recently started getting connected with them. And hopefully that will be an avenue to talk business. I have some other friends that have their own business and we kind of just, they're not any further along, but we can gripe about the same things together. And you're like, okay, like I'm not alone at least.

Do you have anything, any ideas or anything coming down the pipe that you want to talk about or?

Oh gosh. Not really, like soon. I'm hoping to, exploring the idea of moving into a commercial space, which I think would be huge.

Like around here?

Yep.

I think that would be big and be able to get bigger stuff in. Not that that's super exciting for anybody else, but it is for me to not to work outside and just have a, you know, a big sign out front, a commercial address. I think that would be really nice.

This isn't a bad setup either though. Like you just had this dedicated to the shop. Like are you stuffing it like at night, like putting cars and stuff back in here or not really? Like, or is this just dedicated to fab work?

This is just dedicated to fab work. Obviously this is a personal project, but when I have other people's vehicles in here, they're obviously bigger than this. This is pretty short and they're up to here and there's, I mean, sometimes this place is just crammed with stuff. Luckily right now there's a little bit of room to breathe, but more room would be nice. I've done stuff on like pulling semis and I absolutely can't do that here. I have to go there to do that. And that's just, it is what it is, but it's not ideal.

What do you have to do for those guys? Like the pulling semis and all that. Cause again, another world that we kind of learned a bit about from the Apex Turbo guys, but like what are you doing project wise for those guys?

So I've actually been involved with pulling semis, pulling tractors and pulling trucks, like pro stock trucks. So I've built, probably my favorite pulling vehicle project was a six to one merge collector, turbo manifold, up to the turbo, down pipe, boost pipe, charge pipe, the whole works for that. That was a challenge and I had to do it all on site. So I don't know, they're great to work with and it was a good project, but it was definitely one of those that I wasn't sure what I was getting myself into. For pulling tractors, I've done like a custom fuel tank that I've caught down. For one of the trucks, I did, gosh, like bumper brackets, a dash, just completely random stuff that they just needed fabbed. But it's fun to do stuff for people like that and then go to a pulling show and see your own work going down the track. You know, I like that.

Do you think I throw a sticker or anything on that stuff when you do that or?

Oh, yeah.

Yeah?

Okay.

Nope, I lost it.

It's okay. We'll wait. No, I'm messing around. So what about like, you mentioned this is like a personal project of yours. Is there anything on the horizon like that you want to get into, like any competition wise or just personal? Like, again, I'm mostly familiar with like the streetcar world, but like anything come to mind on that front?

So I want to build a new rock crawler. This one's what, over 10 years old at this point. And I've learned a lot, been through monster trucks, all that stuff. I would love to build a new one, something that I really would be like proud to put my name, my business on. I'm also building a 1975 K5 Blazer LS4L80, the standard package. We'll be very excited when that finally sees the light of day. And like an ultimate dream would be to do like desert racing, like off-road desert racing.

Okay, are you going back more original than with the Blazer, or are you going to get pretty custom with it other than the drivetrain? Because those things are worth some pretty good money when they're done up nice.

Yeah, I've been everywhere with it. I mean, I got it when I was 18 and my I was working just a regular job, had money to blow, and I was like, I'm going to build like a show truck. It's going to be gorgeous. And now I'm like super practical. I'm like, why would I do that? So it'll just be fun. It'll be drivable, but nice. I mean, it's rust free, it's clean, it's straight. And I had already got like tubular front suspension for it. Got the 604L80 and just make it a fun driver, something nice and clean.

You can take it to a car show, but certainly take the top off and cruise it around when it's nice out.

Yeah, but not feel bad if you're out driving and it's dirt road, like darn, not ideal, but.

Right.

Do you ever make it down to like PRI? Have you been down there yet?

I have not been to PRI. That was something I was trying to swing last year and I just couldn't take the time.

That's a, for somebody like you, that's like a must, I think, especially if you're looking for mentors or somebody to like inspire you in some way to, as you're building this thing, that is full of, and who you have access to down there, and the automotive industry is pretty incredible. You're walking past some pretty big time names and celebrities, like just walking right past them.

Bruno!

Yeah. Those are for my first year to PRI with him. What was it Bruno from?

Brutal, he's in the truck stuff, Manziel or Mazel.

It was Manziel, I think.

Manziel, yeah.

Didn't we see him in Vegas too?

Yeah, I see him everywhere now.

And he blew him off.

They didn't blow him off, I shook his hand. We were, I was a little lit up at that point though.

Yeah, those $25 drinks.

They're bringing back Pink's and he's going to be the host.

Oh, okay.

Is that back yet? Cause that was a year ago now.

I don't know if it's officially, they filmed anything, but.

I just saw something about that.

Yeah. Anyway, that guy.

That guy, Bruno. It was just so funny cause he like ran back and then, it made me really.

He used to be on a show on Motor Trend Truck U. Yeah. Yeah.

I didn't have that channel, Grown Up. Yeah. He always gives me hell for, Oh, you never saw that show. No, I didn't.

I know you guys are from the streaming age. I'm from the cable TV age.

Streaming age. I, you forget I was 10 years, but I was watching Thomas the Tank Engine on VHS tapes. Get the f*** out of here. Yeah. No, dude, everybody is so nice down there. It is crazy. Like, I mean, I'll say like one or two booths where they're just obviously tired at the end of the week. But like, everybody is so willing to help. Like the guy that he bought his, was it the welder from? Yeah. He like walked across the entire convention center to help us load it up. Like, and I was like, hold on.

That's awesome.

It's just so cool.

Like they're just so willing to help.

And I did just spend $2,000 on a welder. So that was kind of-

Yeah, but this chump change compared to what's sold at that show. Yeah. The amount of like high level deals that happen there. It's just crazy. Like I've witnessed like conversations of like, yeah, we need a solution for this. And it's like, oh, and oh, man, a hundred grand.

Like, oh yeah, they sell like million dollar robot laser welders and s*** there too.

So yeah, true. I forgot about the whole CNC section too. So, OK, let's backtrack way back because I had this question earlier, like before you did the monster truck stuff, you said you were doing like some machining and stuff too, or?

Yeah. So my first job was at a machine shop.

OK.

That's what I thought I was going to do forever. I was there for like two years and then I jumped into welding. I thought the CNC side of machining really just like turned me off. I was like, and I didn't think there was really a world for manual machining or a need for it. Like, obviously there is. I didn't know at that time, though, and that's what made me take the jump to welding.

So then, he has such a backtracking like the monster truck stuff. Was there any, like obviously you mentioned like the first time you whacked into the ramp. Is there any other like kind of, oh s*** moments over the years? A year and a half, whatever it was.

Definitely, yeah. Just a lot of rookie mistakes. I mean, experienced drivers look in there like, oh yeah, I've been there, you know.

That was probably your worst crash though.

For sure, yeah. That was very early on too. That was definitely the worst.

Well, you probably felt it too, right? Like how, like obviously, you're strapped into this crazy cage, but like you still feel everything, I'm guessing.

Yeah, if you're not landing tire side down, where your suspension can absorb, you're just free falling to the ground. And it doesn't feel good.

Oh, I bet not.

At least it like cartwheeled and had a chance to slow down versus, I mean, some wrecks you've seen where it's just upside down straight to the cage. I mean, I couldn't even imagine that had hurt so bad.

Did they? Did you do one of those climb out and stand on the truck and throw your arm up in the air type deals then?

Or no, I was mortified.

So, OK. You mentioned a little bit like on the racing stuff, like the freestyle stuff. I guess how crazy were you getting with like the freestyle stuff? What's that look like? Because when you see Monster Jam, you're doing like these crazy like five or six story jumps or something ridiculous. Are you doing a lot of that like high speed stuff or is it not so much of that or what's that look like?

So it depends on the promoter. Sometimes you're at a really small track and they can only do so much and you can only jump so high before you got to stop and turn for a fence or whatever else you're not allowed to hit. But there are some shows that we did at big speedways with RVs and buses and stuff that you got to jump. I'd say bus jumps are probably the biggest error we got unless they did just a crazy step up that we got to do. Then smashing through an RV is always pretty cool.

I bet.

Stuff they don't get to do in Monster Jam.

I mean, it sounds great to drive a monster truck and destroy s***. That sounds like a really good time. What's the top speed of one of those things?

How fast are you going, I guess?

I have no idea, honestly.

You probably don't have a little whee in there.

No, there's just the very important stuff, oil pressure, tack, that's about it. Oil pressure.

Stop, go.

Yeah.

Well, are you driving mostly by feel, then, at that point?

Gosh, hard to say. You get very used to what you're supposed to be doing, feeling, look at the ramp and know how much throttle, when to get out of the throttle. You just start to get used to that. At first, you think, like your first show, you get down and all your friends are telling you, good job, you did a great job. You think you just burned the world down. You watch your video and you're like two feet off the ground. It's like embarrassing. And then from there, I don't know, you just kind of get the feel of the truck. Like I said, you want to like stick with your truck. Like you start to feel what that your truck feels like and what it wants and how you can set yourself up to land nice and flat where it's going to feel good and not hurt the next day.

What does that kind of approach look like? Like I've never jumped anything besides like my GTI on a pothole, right? So that's about as good as I've off-roaded a GTI last year, too, before I sold it. But regardless, like what does that approach look like? Like what are you thinking as you're approaching like a ramp to jump? Because I know nothing of like motocross, any of that world, anything that's not pavement.

It's like a hard thing to explain. It's something that took me like a long time to figure out. I'm like, how fast do I hit this though?

You can't under commit because that's almost worse.

Yeah, but you don't want to like over commit and have time to think about what you just did on the way down, you know? A lot of people like the general rule that you hear from everyone is the angle of the ramp should be the angle of your throttle. So a moderate ramp, moderate throttle, really steep ramp, you're going to need some speed to get the truck up and level, you know?

Oh, OK.

But it doesn't always apply, but it is a good guideline.

OK.

And then like we jump buses the long way sometimes, and you're like, man, I got to get this right or get it very wrong where I'm past the ramp, you know, land on it or way past it.

Have you had any of those moments where you're way past it?

I've definitely had some rough ones where the truck like nose down because I didn't stay in the throttle long enough. I let out too soon and it was right back down. And you're just looking straight at the ground and you're about to impact the front of the truck. Oh, but you just have to do those. You just have to do it wrong sometimes. And you're like, that wasn't what you're supposed to do. Okay, I should have done it like this. And that's just how we learned.

Was that any kind of like intense repairs you had to do?

Oh, for sure. Okay. After that backwards jump, that was, I'm pretty sure all eight shocks and chassis repair, obviously, the whole body. I don't remember what was broken in the drivetrain. Probably both driveshafts wadded up. After my first show, I just, my first show was kind of a whirlwind. I didn't even know how to start the truck when I got in there. And they said, just don't land in the brakes. Do whatever you want. Don't land in the brakes. So I was landing like still half in the throttle, and I didn't realize that that was like also a no-go. Obviously now, like that is common sense to me, but at that time I didn't really understand and broke all eight axles, inner and outer, front and back. So I got to do that after my very first show.

This was, yeah, because you're the one has to fix it. You probably try and learn pretty quick to.

For sure.

Yeah. Yeah.

Drive conservatively, smart.

But also put on a show.

Yeah. And that's where the balance comes in of like a good independent monster truck driver. You know, can work on the truck, drive the truck, and walk that line of not breaking things, but also putting on a show.

What was the hardest skill you had to learn?

In terms of driving.

Yeah.

But I guess actually both working on it and driving.

I want to say it was like stoppies. I don't know. They kind of came natural at first, but really refining them was very difficult for me. I don't know why I struggled so much with it.

And what exactly are stoppies again?

Where you balance the truck on the front nose.

Okay, okay.

Yeah. It was easy for me to get the truck to the stoppie position, but some people can just walk the truck forward and back. I was so bad at that. I don't know what my problem was. I could not figure it out. And then judging the ramps at first, that was just every ramp was intimidating because I had no idea how to hit it.

Well, because you're also looking at it, what, eye level from inside a truck, sort of like, is that kind of how tall they are or are they even taller?

It depends on the ramp. But at some point, while you're approaching it, the ramp does disappear. You know, like you no longer see it. You're either looking right into it or it's below you.

OK, it's like a Wile E. Coyote cartoon where you go through the wall sort of.

Yeah.

I suppose you get to where some promotion company is. You're like, OK, they know how to build a track. You get some that are like, this is going to be a nightmare because it's for this promotion company.

Oh, for sure. There are certain promoters that you love to run with, and they're certain that you don't so much.

This is going to be a total s*** show.

Yeah.

Would you ever do it again?

Hmm.

Like if I were to redo my life, I would for sure have done it again. I don't know if I would get back into it fully, though. There's a huge commitment.

Yeah.

Like, let's say like Monster Jam calls tomorrow, for example, and it's like we're going to pay you whatever to, a quarter of whatever the top guy makes. Then it'd be like, all right, maybe sort of deal.

I don't know. Yeah. I'd maybe think about it. I don't know if I would do it though.

Yeah. Just drive it, not be the guy working on it.

What's that like? Is it compared to like your fabrication job? Was it a step up in pay? Is it halfway decent? Or is it the juice not worth the squeeze, as they say?

From my experience, everyone is paid very differently. Being hired there as the welder fabricator, part-time driver, whatever, I had like a variety of skills that I think got me towards the higher end of pay. But I didn't really discuss it too much with people, you know, just kind of something you don't do. But from just what I've heard, it's very varying.

Well, it's also like one of those things like, you don't talk about it in the workplace too, cause it gets weird, like, yeah, I totally get that. So let's say there's like a young person out there, whether, you know, like, let's use like dance kids as an example, like they're, you know, not 18 yet, they're still trying to figure out what they want to do in life. Let's say somebody wants to go into fab or drive monster trucks or whatever. What kind of advice would you give to somebody that's a little bit younger?

Gosh, and in regards to like getting into the career, I have no idea what I would even tell them.

Just take that first class sort of deal.

Yeah, like take the class and be willing to try, like just be willing to try something you don't know how to do, like you just have to be able to try. That's how I've grown my business the last year, doing weird stuff that they don't even know how to build it. They just know what they want and being willing to try to figure that out for them. A lot of people say if you want to drive monster trucks to find your nearest independent team and offer to volunteer, but that never really worked out for us. It was just kind of cumbersome having another person in there trying to help. And you're like, get out of the way. We're like tired, you know, we're in Arkansas. We want to go home.

That's fair.

But some teams do do accept that, I guess.

It's like it's got to be unique to have somebody that can drive the truck and still build it and work on it. That's they're probably far and few between.

Yeah, definitely.

Yeah.

And sometimes having a crew guy helps get a driver that maybe doesn't have all the mechanical knowledge a little more involved. They have a second set of hands to kind of help them with any of those difficulties. And when I started, I didn't know anything about monster trucks. So I had a decent mechanical aptitude, welding fabrication, and I had to learn everything about the monster trucks and then how to drive them. So everyone kind of started different places. Some of the people I worked with had been in monster trucks their entire life. Maybe weren't driving them, maybe weren't working on them, but around them. So they brought different experience and we just kind of worked together to figure it out.

So then on the, I guess, are you doing anything with your brother still in the, was it dirt circle stuff or?

I'm not really involved with racing at all. He does graphic design and racing and we work together a lot since he's also a business owner.

Okay. Got you.

So do they be like, hey, can you come fix this for me? Or any of that kind of stuff? Are you helping them out when they need some help?

Yeah, he pretty much manages for himself until there's something very like specific fab he wants done.

Is your dad still doing it too?

He doesn't race anymore. I guess he'd be like my brother's crew chief.

Okay.

He's there with him every weekend.

What does the remainder of the year look like for you then, just basically cranking out work out of here?

This time of year?

Yeah.

Yeah. Lots of random phone calls. Yesterday, I had a whole plan of what I was going to build for the day and it ended up being phone call, can you do this, phone call, can you do that and just getting stuff cranked out of here. It's a lot of snowmobiling season winding down, so people want their snowmobiles refreshed and then summer kicking off, so people want their cars done, want their yard stuff done, they've got all sorts of ideas, sun comes out, I don't know, just kind of crazy in the springtime, which is fine.

What are you doing on the snowmobiles? Are you like working on the mechanics part of it too, or like going through them mechanically or welding and fixing crap?

Welding and fixing crap. Usually crack chassis has been the thing lately. For a while, I was doing vintage snowmobile pipes, like two-stroke pipes retrofitting them. I mean, one after another, it felt like for a couple of weeks. And yeah, I just did like a quad with some two-stroke pipe that had to get retrofit in it. Welding stuff related to small engines, I guess.

Okay. Do you frequent? Do you try and go to hay days every year or anything like that? I mean, you know what it is. Are you going to that?

I've been a couple of times. Certainly not something I like try to get to.

Okay.

But it is pretty cool there.

Yeah.

Do you attend any events around here, like whether it's car shows or other competitions or anything or not really?

I'd say local car shows. Me and my boyfriend will go. Again, not something I'm super adamant about. If I have a weekend off, I usually go off-roading, go wheeling. That's like my favorite, just out in the woods with your friends.

Where does Kurt go? Is it like up north?

He said up to Iron Range. Yeah, Iron Range. Then what's that? Skeetlutsen area up there?

Oh, yeah.

When it comes to car stuff here though, turbo kits, things like that, do you find yourself working on one particular vehicle more than any? Are you using like BMWs, Subarus, Mustangs, Chevys or whatever?

Kind of whatever. I've only done a handful, an OBS Chev, an S10, a C10. So I guess GM pickups, varying sizes. And then I did a Corvette C5. It's pretty much the people that maybe don't need the super high quality fab and are willing to just kind of like make it fit, make it look decent. This is what I need or don't need every component. And, you know, handed to them on a silver platter, they're like, I have this and this and this, kind of need this part, or I can't figure out the boost pipe. Can you do just that one? So that's been nice as an introduction into doing the turbo kits. As you know, these people don't care as much. They just kind of want it to be done, look right and contribute as much as they want to.

Probably a little more relaxing for you than if somebody showed up with $150,000 Dodge Viper and said, build me a turbo kit.

Exactly, yeah, it's been a nice baby steps into the turbo kit world.

Well, it's kind of like you said earlier, you've had multiple times where you're like, oh, I don't know what I'm doing, and just figure it out. So that progression definitely helps, especially if there's not a rushed timetable. What's your turnaround time, and let's say if you're putting together a turbo kit for someone?

I try to do like two to three weeks from the time they drop it off, order materials, which is basically the whole first week waiting on materials to the time it leaves. Boost pipe, charge pipe, down pipe, the standard.

Who are you going through for materials?

So I'm a retailer for Ace Race Parts, so that's where I pretty much get everything. A lot of fab guys use them.

Okay.

Can't plug our other guy anymore.

Yeah, that's a bummer.

What's in this thing for a drivetrain? I'm sorry, we're going off topic here, kind of.

Oh, you're good. So this is a 16-valve geotracker, stock transmission, and then transfer case.

So the guts of it is geotracker, and then, okay.

Yeah, very low horsepower, just geared down.

Okay.

Because I was looking at it, I was looking at the exhaust manifold and all this, I'm like, doesn't look very big.

No, it's super small, especially like next to a full-size rock crawler, like it looks like decently sized, and then it just looks like, I mean, like an ATV.

So when you were working on the trucks, too, were you doing, well, actually, you said you didn't have to rebuild the engine at any point in that season and a half, did you?

No, so I had to just pull it, we didn't rebuild them in house, so just at some point in my second season, I had to pull the engine and the blower and have those sent out and slapped a new one in. But you do it so many times with that many trucks that it's just part of the process, just another day.

How many years did you do that with Monster Truck Stuff?

I was there for about two years.

Okay. Oh, that's the question I had earlier, like I was just staring off into the wall, like, what did I forget? When did you know that your transition into being a business owner was coming? Because you said it was like three or four months. What made you want to get out of that world?

Just the requirement every single day.

Being on the road, getting your a** kicked.

Yeah. I mean, there's, yeah. I fortunately had a great teammate. We got along good, gave each other our space, you know. But you're living on the road with one or two other people all of the time. Then you're just like, want to go home some days. And it just got to be a lot. I mean, every single week, you're thrashing on the trucks, driving the semis to the next show across the country, setting up, doing those shows, tearing down off to the next. You come home and you're like, I need to do laundry, sleep, eat, and then go back on the road again.

On your team and in the sport altogether, how many female drivers did you come across in your time doing it?

Gosh, maybe like a dozen in the independent side, not all of them driving all the time. There's a set of twins that I did a lot of shows with, both girls, super nice. And then in Monster Jam, there's, I don't know, five or six. They have quite a few.

But on your team, were you the only female driver?

Oh, yes.

Yeah, okay.

Yeah, we had one girl running merchandise, but the only driver, only female in the shop.

Did you get to meet some pretty cool people over the years, too? Like, did you meet anybody, I guess, famous or well known as well?

I wouldn't say famous or well known, really. Just made a lot of connections across the country, which is really cool now, getting to see everyone doing their things, you know, and if you go on a road trip, you have a place you can stop. Yeah, you just do shows with all these other teams and you meet them. And sometimes you've got a week off between shows and it's not worth driving all the way back to the shop because you're in Colorado going to Wyoming and they'll just invite you to come over and eat dinner with their family and work on your trucks at their house and go off to your next show. So that was fun. That was a cool, cool part of the job.

That's the best part, man. Like we get to travel the country too. And it's like, all right, and we have a pit stop here. Let's swing by and ask. Like now, every time we pass through Chicago, we try to get together with Gary, for example.

Yep.

Get Detroit style pizza in Chicago for some reason, but yeah.

One time we did that one time.

One time. One time. It's okay. We got a free lunch out of it. Thanks, Gary. Okay. Damn, I'm losing them today. I'll be honest with you. You're like really efficient at answering questions. But it's like really good. Like I look down in like an hour, I'm like, oh damn.

We're like firing them off left and right.

Dude, this C4, that Elani is doing a job.

Yeah.

Usually like it gets drug out. This is really efficient.

I got one. All right. So you said you want to build another one of these or rebuild this. What does your next build look like for a rock crawler? Like drivetrain, chassis. What are you thinking? What's cooking in there?

It would be like the standard issue. You know, if you can't beat them trying them, just go straight into what everyone's doing. The LS, the 14 bolt rears, that's super duty 60 front end. And whatever for a chassis. I'm not super picky about that. I keep saying I'm going to build my own, but at the same time, it'd be really nice to just not have to work on my own thing for once and just grab a bomber chassis, a rock lizard or whatever, and just do the standard that everyone's doing. It works and it's proven. And, you know, when I do have weekends off, just go out and be with people that have parts for what you need, if you need anything. And have that stuff readily available.

Any aspirations to do something like King of the Hammers or anything like that, or get out to Utah and do some of that stuff?

Absolutely. Yeah, that's like that's the ultimate dream. Desert racing, King of the Hammers, something of that nature would be awesome someday. I've been out to Moab and like stock vehicles, and it's so cool out there. I don't know if you guys have been.

It's on the bucket list. Yeah.

Oh gosh, it's incredible. Like, yeah, we know we're action everywhere.

Kurt more often. We're going to end up in Moab here in the next couple of weeks because he keeps talking it up.

He's like, come on, man, jump on.

You got to do it. Yeah.

So like one of the questions I asked him, like off air the other day, it's like, so when you go out there, like, do you bring any weapons? Because like, there's like, like, I don't know about you, but like, for example, like Manuel was clearing his land the other day, and he's like showing all these snakes he caught in his yard because he's down in Houston. And I'm like, all right, Moad, like, I know it's desolate, but there's slithery monsters out there. And again, like, if it's not poisonous, who cares? They're monsters. I had this argument with Caleb the other day. I'm like, listen, I don't care about the small little ones. I, who gives a s***, right?

Some of those are the most deadly ones, though.

But then there's that, right? Like, I'm like, it's like, what's that old meme from years ago? It's like, yeah, spiders are smaller than you. So was a grenade. Like, it's like, it's like just because it's small doesn't mean it's insignificant. So like, how did I get on that rant? Yeah, if we ever go to Moab, I'm bringing a machete and something else because I know Kurt is way too comfortable.

That never even crossed my mind the whole time we were out there. Not once.

That doesn't bother me either.

I'm a worrier.

I'm a planner.

Oh yeah, now you're going to think of all these things?

Well, it's like another meme that comes to mind. It's like, oh, some people just literally just walk out the door and they don't even think where their drop of water is going to be from. I bring a water bottle with me. You do too, because you're a planner. Like, this isn't just a planner.

I just do it because I'm a thirsty guy and it's not as thirsty as it now.

That makes me seem to be, oh, Harris Hole is drinking water. I have a lot of problems today. But no, it would be really cool over there. For some reason, I don't know what it is. The slow stuff freaks me out way more than the fast stuff. I've hopped in 2,000 horsepower street cars, no problem. But it's like, when Kurt talks about going off-roading, I'm like, I will die. I don't know what it is.

I mean, worst case, you tumble down a hill and you're strapped into a thing, you got a cage. It might hurt a little bit, but.

Yeah, but he's talking about looking down, straight down into canyons and stuff.

Oh, yeah, that one's rough.

It's probably because it's so technical and you're not driving. You're like, you're going to move over.

Have you done any super fun off-roading stuff, like any cool vertical stuff or whatever come to mind?

I love going to the Iron Range up in Gilbert. This isn't super capable of anything, like insanely gnarly, but I've definitely put it through some stuff that was a challenge for this build, and it's fun to drive through, kind of technical.

Has it been upside down before?

On its side, yeah. I don't think it's ever been fully upside down, thankfully. We went out to Moab with just a stock Tacoma TRD, and that was a blast. It was almost more fun just in something completely stock, AC radio on. We did Hell's Gate and whatever else, top of the world, Devil's Hot Tub, all that kind of stuff. That was fun.

Some of these names are great. I haven't heard of Devil's Hot Tub before. That's how it is.

I might have the name wrong. It was Mickey's Hot Tub.

Mickey's Hot Tub. No, we actually rented a TRD down in Texas this last time. I was like, it's a cool little thing. We showed up to Cobb and they were like, yeah, we're going to plug in and just get information off of this because it's a platform we're expanding to. I'm like, oh, okay.

Yeah, they're super capable from factory. I was blown away. We did Hell's Gate in a stock Tacoma, which is like the rock crawling Moab.

Yeah.

We, I used to have a gladiator and that's like a hit or miss, depending on who you bring it up to, but I enjoyed it. I didn't do anything. I just did a little bit of mudding with it in Arrows backyard.

Gee, people are in their own little cloud.

That's fair.

You be my ducks alone. I had one duck.

You mentioned getting a commercial space and moving out at some point in time, hopefully. Are you envisioning this growing into something where you have other fabricators and things like that? And do you have somebody on your short list of people you might call first?

I struggle with the idea of bringing someone in, but I know I will need to. I just don't know where I would bring in the first person. Would it be in the engineering side? Because I, gosh, I hate doing it. I sit in the computer for 10 hours and I get a piece of paper out of it. This isn't fun. I like to build things. But everything right now that I do is so custom that the person I would need is so specific. You know, they have to look at a problem. There's no drawing. There's no blueprint, no dimensions. They're just like, I need this to go here and do this. And you just have to dream it up. So the person that it would take to do that would be very difficult to find. So I struggle with the idea of bringing in a second fabricator, but I know at some point I will have to, and hopefully if I get more niche, do more stuff from my website that's already been designed and engineered and I can just have someone build it. That would be ideal. I also want to do a small retail space with some of the Ace Race Parts stuff, because I know firsthand there is nobody locally you can get that stuff from unless you call another fabricator and they have an extra piece from the last job they did, or maybe do a pickup at MAP or something. So yeah, that would be good. I like the idea of having a small retail space. I like the idea of buy this price market up, sell it. In terms of business is very straightforward, simple, and I have my own little stash to pick from.

Yeah, no, that's definitely a plus.

Although all that seems to be dying as of late, all the brick and mortar stuff, retail, sale, kind of stuff like that. But if it's your stock that you have, that you may need, a bin you're digging from anyway, why not? How is it hurt in that situation?

The commercial space, yeah, I feel like that would just be the next step, fill more room, get room for a plasma table, things like that, that would eliminate some of the outside vendors that I have to use and rely on constantly, and then have a space for a second person, have space for two vehicles at a time, side by side, stuff like that, to come in. Whereas right now, I have to just schedule everything back to back, and then schedule gets behind, and the next person's behind.

Well, sometimes you might just need like a dummy with a torch, right? I mean, just come in and be like, here's all the parts, weld this together.

Yeah, and there are people on my short list.

Yeah, you got some dummies on your short list?

If I need part-time something, anything done, I could call them.

I feel like there's a good, like this has to be a good thing too, because that's not, you know, that can be where it's not costing you a lot of overhead to sell something like that either. So you could have stuff like that in your store. Um, yeah, I was going somewhere entirely with that point and then I lost it. So it's, uh, no, it's gone. I mean, even like, like pellet smokers, uh, you know, hog roasters, things like that. Oh, I know where I was going with it. I, uh, the other day I saw somebody on Marketplace was selling, uh, like an old stainless tanker trailer, like a semi truck tanker. You know, haul like milk or something like that, stainless steel. I'm like, dude, if you could buy that, it was wrecked in the middle, like kinked. But if you could cut like 24 inch rings out of what's left of the trailer and sell them as fighter pits or make something else out of it, I mean, it was like two grand for the whole semi truck trailer. Like, I feel like I could build something out of that.

Yeah.

Um, so I think there's lots of opportunities like that, too. That would be really good.

Yeah. I almost like get paralyzed from so many ideas. I'm just like, oh, I could, I could, I could. And then I'm like, you need to work on what you need to work on right now. Right. And like product development takes so much longer than you think. You're like, I can do this in a day. I can develop this product. Three days later, you're testing and you're like, oh, what if I do this instead? Like this countersunk screw instead of this. You just get so into the weeds on it in product development, which is just, man, I just struggle with that.

We had that question for Aaron Miller, too. I remember in Entho, it's like, how do you stop iterating?

Oh my gosh, yeah.

Because you can go down this rabbit hole and it's like, all right, I actually have to get this to the customer. I have to actually sell this now, too. Do you know at what point is, when is it good enough for you? Like, do you have like an internal, like for whatever project, like do you ever have to catch yourself and be like, all right, I have to stop this now, like this is good enough?

Yeah, I was just talking to somebody about that because at my previous job, it was like, this is about what time you have to get this done. Once you get it done, we need to ship it. Like, we're on a schedule, this is a shop and you keep things moving. But working for myself, I'm like, I could stay up till midnight and just like make this absolutely perfect. And there are some nights where I just like go inside and I'm like, oh my gosh, I just spent five hours and nobody's going to care about that detail. I'm just obsessed over, you know? But I do enjoy it because I think that's what's grown my business, is obsessing over those details. The internal monologue, this might sound like absolutely ridiculous, but I post everything on social media. That's how I've grown my business. I'm like, if I were to post this to a million people, how many people are going to be in the comment section? Like, oh my gosh, didn't grind your weld or blah, blah, blah. Like that's what I go through in my head. I'm like, what would the internet keyboard warriors gripe about about this?

I think Jose said the same thing too. Wasn't Jose or was it somebody else? Like, basically, like if they were to post it to...

Weld porn?

Yeah, that's what it was. Or somebody saw it there, like what the, yeah. Wasn't him or was it Max Odegard?

Doesn't matter.

I don't know. One of the many fab people we have.

One of the old map junkies.

One of the old map, yeah, that one rolls it down. Okay, you mentioned the engineering side of things. What does that look like? What are you doing for that?

So that I'm just drawing parts in SolidWorks.

Okay.

When there's stuff that's like a little too big to fully design and grasp in my head and just like sketch it out and build it, that's when I'll go to SolidWorks and just draw it in there. Certainly not great at SolidWorks. I just kind of make it work and know how to work it so that it can show me what I need. Like, okay, yes, if I do this, this will clear, this will work. So it's not for every job, but for some.

Is that something that you've had some kind of training on or learned in school at all? Or is that just something you've just had to kind of teach yourself?

Yeah, I did that in college. So that's where I got that training from. There's tons of free CAD programs and I'm just like, I'm not going to learn another one for just doing this one.

Yeah.

Well, that's like you said, too. Sometimes you do what works for you and not knowing, not using the software to its full potential. Because it's like me with Excel, like, oh, this isn't just graph paper. I don't just use this to put, and I can do formulations and things like that.

Nah.

So that's a month of college. I won't get back. So, okay. Well, shoot.

All that college is to be sitting next to an electrician and a rock crawler.

I have a lot more fun doing this. Yeah, I'm sure you do. A lot more fun than calling truckers and being like, hey, where are you at? Oh, okay. You didn't load all right? Yeah, this is my life before. Or do you count inside things? Okay, you're turning this into a personal b****. I know I am.

I'm sorry.

I don't know, man. Like I'm kind of out. Do you want to pop the usual three?

You have anything? Sure. No, I think I've gotten all mine there, even the ones that I've forgotten and had to come back and do again.

Yeah, your top three most efficient podcasts we've ever done. I'm pretty sure I'm going to have to be a trophy.

That would be a thing. Whenever I was interviewed for Monster Trucks, it was just like the quickest answer I could give and get back to my trailer because they always wanted to interview one random driver and then the girl driver.

So you're always in the mix?

Yeah.

Actually, that's a good question before you stop. Don't ask the question. I'm going to try to ask this in a not weird way like that one guy. How was it being one of the few women in the sport? Did that have any, I guess...

Downsides or plus sides?

Yeah, I guess downsides or plus sides. Yeah, thanks. Great. No problem.

I'd say it was equal plus sides and downsides. People, they try to frame it one way or the other that it's a good or bad thing, and it really is just kind of neutral. You do get to be in the limelight a lot more. You're the one girl of the show. Every little girl comes up after the show and wants to talk to you, wants your autograph, whatever. You sell the most merch, and you just kind of stand out more, but at the same time, going back to the mentor thing, my experience in my professional life, that coworkers would get together outside of work, but they wouldn't invite the girl because they're like, well, we don't want to make it weird, we don't want her to think, or whatever, and so you kind of do end up feeling a little alone in that regard, and I'd say that's the biggest downside, but then the plus side balances it out. You're noticed more, you're top of mind for people more, you inspire some other small girls to... Yeah, so I've definitely experienced very 50-50, whatever one negative, there's a positive for it as well.

I got to keep telling my wife that all the time too, because she's into cars and stuff too, and very much supports me on riding around here with Harris, but she always feels weird. Like the other night when we went out after NoTune, and she just feels out of place. I'm like, I don't know why. I mean, nobody's holding back jokes around you or doing anything.

Yeah, we definitely weren't. Yeah, no.

So yeah, I think people need to get out of their head on that too. Not women in general, but guys too, like start...

Yeah, just the stigma around it.

Absolutely. Some of the coolest people that hang out with are girls, so who gives a s***? And I've got three dollars that I hope...

Three dollars?

I don't have that. I have three daughters that I hope want to do some b***** s*** too.

Yeah, I think it's getting better. There's a lot more women in the industry even than five years ago.

It's crazy. Well, then you have like, like Leah Block is out there right now. She's doing like every type of motorsport. Like she's not carrying on her, you know, her dad's legacy. And it's like she's doing Formula One. She was doing NitroCross, not Formula One, sorry, whatever, Formula Academy, whatever it's called. And like all these other various things, like I think that's pretty sweet. That's going to be cool though, signing autographs for like kids. Like if you think ever like 10 or 15 years from now, they're going to be like, oh, look.

Yeah. Yeah. That was kind of a fun part of monster trucks. Kind of a draining part. After show autographs, I was just like, man, this line can't get done fast enough. We've been up all day, but it is cool. Like you do meet a lot of, a lot of kids that are like just stoked to meet you. They're so excited. And you just kind of have to like get back and be like, you know what? This is good for them. This is good for me. This is a good thing. Like this is a positive thing for the world. And it's something that you just kind of learn to enjoy.

Well, at the end of the day, if they're not coming out and buying tickets and going to the shows and doing stuff like that, then you don't, you don't have a business there either.

Yeah. So it's easy to gripe about standing there for three hours, standing out of the grass in the sun or whatever. But at the end of the day, it's what keeps the business going, the industry going. And I mean, no kid is walking up to a monster truck side. They're so excited.

Oh yeah.

That and WWE. Okay, I'm gonna get so many comments on this. My entire Facebook feed is WWE monster truck stuff. I had to watch either in a decade, but for some reason it just piques my interest whenever it's on Facebook.

And they're weirdly hand in hand.

Yes, I was thinking the same thing.

I think it's just like, Yeah. Because there's so much more entertainment than they are competition. I don't know what the deal is, but man, monster trucks and wrestling are just so tied.

I, whatever reason the last two or three months, I've like gone backwards 15 years. I don't know what it is.

Cool.

Let's do the usual three and then the 45 minute Minnesota goodbye.

All right.

At the end of every episode, we like to ask our guests to pick three cars or trucks, whatever you want. I need a show car, a daily driver and a track car. It could be crawler. We'll let her have a crawler for track car. Or maybe whatever you make it. Yeah, OK. You have a limited budget. Build whatever you want. What are you picking?

OK, dang it, I needed this too. And I told myself to be prepared.

Nobody ever is.

Gosh, OK, I like weird. Like I would love like a mint Geo tracker, but I'm not going to say that because.

Why? My wife loves those things too. She really wants one bad. I think they're kind of cool.

Yeah, or like a 60s Nova wagon, like with a roof rack.

Has to have that.

OK, show car daily. That's just like. I'm very practical, so I want to say like a brand new Toyota Camry or something, but if I have an unlimited budget, I hope I don't get that. I'm not super into cars, but it'd probably be a car, maybe like a CTSB. I don't know, something I wanted when I was like 15. What was the other one? Track car.

Yeah.

I would say my Blazer, like that's not really the goal with it, but the idea of seeing like the Blazers, the C10s going down the track is just like, I like that.

I think that's sweet.

There was a Blazer that won Optima Streetcar Challenge that I ran last year. I'll be going back again here at the end of June. But yeah, it was obviously just basically the shell of a K5 Blazer on a custom chassis. Yeah, but that thing was ripping around the road course.

Yeah, I think it was like some crazy roadster shop build. Like, just nuts. You know, when you say going down a track, you mean like a drag strip or road course or whatever?

No, in my head, I was picturing drag strip. It was like seeing full size trucks or C10 pickups going down the track. I think that's sweet.

Yeah.

I never really got into cars that much. Not that I don't like them, but just not something I've been around a lot.

Yeah, just that niche on that side.

Yeah.

No, yeah, that's legit. Well, sweet. On that note, where can everybody find you?

Oh, social media, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, all K2 Fabrication, YouTube, website, k2fabrication.com. All the information is on there. Sweet.

Cool.

Dan?

You can find us at Gunna Garage on all the things or Mr. Gunna Garage on Facebook.

I haven't seen that on Facebook, by the way. Is it just your personal account?

Yeah.

Okay. We have questions. And as for me, you just found it this far. Well, Kasey, thank you very much for coming on the show. This is awesome. Dan, thanks for existing. You're doing great. Yeah. And we'll see you all next time. Thanks again for watching the show, guys. Be sure to go into the description down below and check out all of our sponsors. They are what make this show possible. It allows us to travel the country and talk to some really cool guests. So be sure to check them out, support them just like you support us and see you all next time.