CLARITY OF THOUGHT

A Confused Beginning Turned Clear Passion

You can’t blame Dean Sears for feeling a little confused about his love for cars. You see, he’s spent the past nine years as the head of Sport Trucks by Dean in Moorpark, California. His first car, in fact, was a truck. Well, sort of a truck. It was a ’68 El Camino. Pundits have described this vehicle as neither car nor truck, and often the word “confused” is used. Yes, even in 1978 Sears couldn’t decide between cars and trucks.

But Sears does like cars. In fact, he loves them. He’s built a few gems in the past. He even came up with a secondary name for his company, Hot Rides by Dean, so that people wouldn’t be confused and think his company built only trucks. See? More confusion. But this ’59 Chevy Biscayne is the kind of car that can end all the confusion and make it clear that Sears is a car guy.

Vision and Stance

This is the first car that Sears has taken all the way down to the last nut and bolt (he had a lot of help from Bryan Romanych) in a complete ground-up redo, and the results show. Sears had a simple vision for this car: big wheels and tires, and it had to be low, low, low.

With that in mind, Sears wrapped BFGoodrich G-Force T/A tires around Billet Specialties Legacy wheels, 20-inch in back and 18-inch in front. The ride stance was handled with a Ride Pro system from Air Ride Technologies and dropped spindles from Classic Performance Products.

Frame and Suspension Work

Of course, Sears didn’t just call it a day after bolting on these parts. There was a lot more detail work needed to get the car to a level that would satisfy him. Since this was a frame-off, let’s start at the frame. The crew at Hot Rides by Dean (which included Dan Lozon, Jon Crempa, Tim Bouchez and Dell King) tweaked the frame until it was right and then powder-coated it satin black. All of the hardware was coated either silver or gold.

Attached to the front end is a bunch of parts from Classic Performance Products. We’re talking about disc brakes with drilled rotors, dropped spindles and power steering. HAL shocks control the ride on both ends.

Power and Performance

No super rod would be complete without a stout mill under the hood, and Sears knows this as well as anyone. He had a stroker 388ci Chevy small block built and dyno-tested by Tom Schubin at the School of Automotive Machinists in Texas. Schubin used a compilation of the finest parts available to achieve 556 hp on pump gas.

The Scat crank spins Eagle Rods with Wiseco pistons attached. Air and fuel mix together in a Demon 750 carburetor, flow through Airflow Research heads, ignite with a charge from a Performance Distributors DUI HEI distributor, and are dispersed through Sanderson headers. The exhaust tone is reduced and turned into a serious rumble through Flowmaster mufflers.

The engine compartment is prettied up with a Billet Specialties air cleaner, breathers, overflow containers, and more. Painless Wiring supplied the wiring loom, and the crew at Hot Rides by Dean did a good job of making it all look sanitary.

Transmission and Rearend

All this power is sent through a B&M 700R4 overdrive transmission with a 3,000-rpm stall converter. A one-piece driveshaft connects the tranny to a Ford 9-inch Posi rearend with CPP’s disc brake conversion kit installed.

Sound and Entertainment

All of this serious hardware is complemented by hardware of another sort—electronic. The audio/video system in Sears’ ’59 is impressive without going overboard. A Pioneer AVX 7000 CD video-display head unit is the central item, with a DVD player and CD changer commanding attention, too. PPI amplifiers pump 100 watts to each mid-range speaker and tweeter and 200 watts to each Mac Daddy 10-inch subwoofer from Diamond Audio.

Scosche Industries supplied the 1/0 gauge power and ground cable, speaker wire, interconnects, fuse and ground blocks, and battery terminals. If you’re not into all the audio/visual mumbo jumbo, just rest assured that Sears can crank the tunes and watch a movie while he sits at the fairgrounds.

Built to Drive, Not Just Show

Yes, Sears is going to hit the show circuit with this car, but don’t accuse him of building a trailer queen. He drives it all over town and to reasonably close shows and will trailer it only to the shows that require a long road trip. After a year of shows, he’ll just drive the heck out of this car.

Interior and Comfort

To get the attention of judges and, frankly, just to have some comfort while driving the Biscayne, Sears turned to Mike Harper of Harper Custom Interiors in Camarillo, California. Black and tan leather was used extensively, with some multi-color tan tweed thrown in for contrast and breathability. Harper built a custom console and door panels for the ’59. The dashboard sports Auto Meter gauges and the controls for a Vintage Air A/C and heating unit.

Flawless Finish

Another way to get attention is to paint a car red. Sears didn’t just go with any old red, however. He chose PPG’s Ferrari Red. Alan Palmer of EPR Body & Paint in Camarillo took all the responsibility for bodywork and paint. The result is flawless. Absolutely flawless. Certainly, no one will question Sears’ love of cars now.