Well after almost 2 years the team at Custom Offroad and most of my Buggy mates to boot have finally completed what has proven to be the most complicating Buggy build I have even managed.

In short the Iguana Buggy is now done and will be heading south on tour tomorrow. So if you see it on the road give it a wave. More details and videos will follow once we have finished shooting the promo for an upcoming TV show ...

Like most projects of this size it would never have happened without my mates and for that I not only take my hate off but extend a very large heartfelt THANKS....

I must also apologise to all the customers I fogged off to get the job done, I appreciate your patience.

In no particular order the following people need special mention as without them it would never have happened:

• Andrew – awesome sheet metal work, making the box’s from hell
  
• Dave – Barwork and fab that is beyond reproach, a 103L fuel tank on a buggy says it all, not to mention all those bells and whistles.
  
• Jarred – paint and body styling I could only dream of
  
• Nick – shaping those curves did awesome things to the image
  
• Rod – made the best soft top and trim I have ever seen on a buggy
  
• Pete – All that spanner work and he never even scratched it
  
• Wes - for all those cool drawings and keeping my crazy ideas in check
  
• Terry – without doing all those late nights it would never have made it across the line
  
• And last and most importantly my loving wife Jen, any woman that can put up with being neglected for that long without divorcing me deserves here Iguana Leaving gift…
  

That's TRICK! Love it. Want one. How much? Standing ovation. Looks like it's alive!!

[ Edited on 20-4-2007 by 65busser ]

needs more spotlights

Hats off to Jen :beer

looking great dont think that any one could posibly imagine the hours that brad and others has put into this. looks awsome.
mick..

Where do I place my order

*kidding*

Looks great. Would love to have a closer look. In the mean time have you got a pic of the back, trim and interior please Brad. Love the tools down the side. Definitely looks to mean business.

Three cheers to all involved.
With the Quality of Buggy Companies we have here in Australia soon were going to be getting into export when the neighbors check out what were getting around in.

[ Edited on 21-4-2007 by The_Bronze. ]

awesome stuff brad.

Spotted in Coogee today.:thumb

What a shame, Brad, that you didn't have either the courtesy or kindness to recognise that without this order from ME to build this machine for my TV program, you would never have gotten it to the stage its at now - or even finished!

… Or that what you are now touting as all your own creation is actually MY vehicle with all the amendments that "I" requested and paid for you to develop as required for my shooting needs.

What YOU supplied was the original concept, running gear and usual base-buggy stuff… (Which IS good – otherwise I wouldn’t have ordered it).

However what I supplied you with were all the other design details – such as camo-paintwork, tonneau style and colour, and so many OTHER accessories concepts and finishing details - the light bar, winch requirement etc. etc. (Remember – there IS correspondence to prove this).

What YOU were offering to me originally had only a small percentage of the bling and shutzpah that I commissioned you to create for ME for the purposes of my TV program.

So – credit, please, where credit is due: without my ideas and pushing you to do it - PLUS financing you for the privilege, your “IGUANA” would be a VERY pale version of this current iteration.

What an equal shame that you don't either have the decency to acknowledge my copyright on photography where they have been used.

Finally - for those readers who are interested - and if there is an element of disgust in the following it is purposely so - it should be known that on my taking delivery of this vehicle during April 2007 (after a year + in the making!) - the lights were all wrongly wired, the brakes squealed (with no solution offered), the engine kept cutting out - and no-one knew what the problem was, the Starter Motor packed-in, the exhaust pipe fell off, the fuel gauge was a joke, the tonneau zips failed and.... WHERE WAS BRAD whenever I tried to call him to get some action...???

NOWHERE. Neither answering his 'phone nor his mails. He’d gone AWOL with no forwarding address.

It took me another THIRTEEN MONTHS after re-delivering it to his workshop in Brisbane in May 2007 before I was able to finally get it in a condition to be driven out.

OK - fairness where fair is due: 9 months of that was "supposedly" because the dossier was in with the QLD. RTA for Type Approval. And then Brad sold out his personal interests in the company - as I hear - to some other people who did what they could.

… And for the record the current asking price of AU$45,000 is only slightly less than what I paid as a commissioning fee to have the buggy built in the first place – including all the accessories, design concepts etc...

If I sound pissed-off, it’s because I am. It is, according to MY experience and judgement, such good-intentioned but rankly inefficient people as this - running so-called “professional” businesses in a thoroughly amateur manner - who have given Buggies a bad name in general by being so incredibly “lightweight” in their attitude...

If you, dear Reader disagree, then ask yourself this: if YOU had ordered a buggy, paid a hefty deposit up-front, and then - when the company was patently going belly-up - NOT insisted on a refund - then took delivery to find so much wrong on it - and following which you couldn't even get hold of the company owner, how would YOU have felt...??

Please feel free to contact me at any time on majordom@monaco.net if you would like more information about my own dealings with this company or about the genesis of the IGUANA project and our TV programs’ involvement in its furtherance.

awesome stuff Brad

Ouch..Still looks awesome.

Choosing colours, asking for spolights, and requesting a winch is definitely the hardest part of building a buggy.

Hmmm Will that reply be deleted

only time i met Brad he spent half an hour of his time in his shop helping me with a wiring problem on my ej22...no charge...i fired it up the next day...cheers Brad

Some issues no doubt,
just remember that every story has more than one view / opinion,
many have had very ordinary experiences that have cost a lot of time & money, ( not personally with either party)
take things as you see them, not just what you hear,
Hope things work out for all parties involved.

mmm yawn .. I started reading this post again cause I had quite a few phone calls about it, but my attention span and vocabulary weren't sufficient enough to make it to the end so I skipped straight into writing a response. Did the usual thing and launched in to a character assassination and a he said, they said, we said sort of approach, got bored again so deleted it.

Then a few more phone calls and a couple of sayings came to mind.

There is two sides to every story.

Arguing on the internet is like the Special Olympics; even if you win you are still handicapped.

At the end of the day.... I accept full blame for any issues, what can I say, I suck (ref first saying here).

All dealings where with Iguana Offroad not Custom Offroad / Custom Vee Dub or the new owners. Must have been why I quit, I suck …(Don’t blame the poor suckers who were left standing when the music stopped)

I pissed off over seas and left them in the lurch, once again I must really suck.

Damn Brendan is right, customers are always right, I really really do suck..

Luckily I have enough mates and those people I feel like talking to these days keep my social life and spare time more than occupied enough. So I guess I will just have to avoid the other Billion people who read this forum and now know I am a fraud and do nothing myself and just steal all my ideas from others … damn I thought I had gotten away with it… damn internet ….

Oh and whoever I stole my latest idea of can you please contact me cause I have lost your original drawings you did on the napkins and am afraid I might screw it up if I continue without your input.

Buggy On !!!

Oops I mean Buggy someone else’s Buggy On !!

In case you missed what I was trying to get, damn I forget, someone tell me, I have trouble figuring stuff out on my own..

Wow, it's all fun and games at Aussieveedubbers!!!

Hmmm...you can't "suck" that much Brad,otherwise you would have lips like a Negro....and your latest idea you "stole" off me,but I can't remember what it was so if I send you a blank napkin can you fill in all the details..I'll screw up without your input

what tv program

dr phil

I was thinking more along the lines of Judge Judy

So if you buy a new car, and ask for lots of options like driving lights, sunroof, bigger wheels, etc, does that mean it's YOUR car and YOU designed it? I don't think so.

For any fans of American chopper, you will see the customers asked for a lot of things, but in the end the design is very much in the hands of the OCC staff. And even when they get paid hundreds of throusands of dollars to build a simple on-road Harley, they still get teething issues and things that mysteriously won't work. So it's understandable when a much smaller shop tries to build a far more complicated vehicle on a far smaller budget, it's going to take much longer and have more teething problems. Then consider on it's maiden voyage it gets driven thousands of kilometers and thoroughly abused offroad, then of course it's going to have problems. Even professional race teams take their new cars out for shakedown tests and get unexpected problems.

I never saw the owner down at the workshop at ridiculous hours of the morning working on the car. It took a huge amount of effort from Brad and the people he thanked for their help.

It should be remembered it's a one off custom car. I think the owner had unrealistic expectations.

Well said Wes.

Top work Brad, and great response.

if the customer is not happy......wat is the truth?

ahhhhhh..... dealing with the public.
Wasn't like he was going to Maccas and ordering a cheese burger......
Whats this guy's phone number?

YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE TRUTH.
(been waiting to say that)

Has anyone contacted Hellequin since his post? It would be interesting to read any reply to the comments made so far. I find this all very interesting (probably because I'm an outsider). Just an observation in all this though, if you bought a new car you wouldn't expect to get it delivered such a distance, and considering it was,so to speak, a prototype , it was a pretty good show of confidence by the builders that it was driven down.

I thought it was trailered down?