awesome. it's a pete.

Well, I've never seen anything like that before. When I first saw the post, my reaction was "god damn, that's ugly." Then I clicked on it and realized it was a hot-rodded semi, which is pretty cool. Though if he REALLY wanted to be awesome, he'd swap in the a new Caterpillar King of the Hill engine for 625hp and 2050 lb-ft of torque.

With no frame of reference you get a 32 Ford coupe feel. Then you see the last pictures with those itty bitty humans standing next to it and go, "oh, that's F$cking awesome!"

A better take on the 32 Ford rat rod than any 32 Ford rat rod I've seen. Stunning.

Hmm. I wonder how fast it does a quarter mile?

This thing could make it 2/3 of the way across the country on one tank...

I like all the exposed mechanical elements. Pure truckedness.

THIS is the Anti-Prius! I wanna drive this slowly past Ed Begley jr's house and cackle maniacally!

orange Plymouths beware

If youve never seen it before, better look up Jim Lytle's Allison powered White cabover from the 60's. In fact, check out all the Allison powered vehicles by Jim Lytle. This Peterbuilt is pretty cool too.

I have always wanted one of these. I didn't know it until just now, but I have always wanted this.

I want to drive that sucker up Wolf Creek Pass with a flatbed full of chickens.

He also helped building the Monster Garage trike:

+ Watch video

Two words. Awe some!

It's so beautiful, I'm taking the rest of the day off to be depressed.

It needs vertical stacks. Then it would be perfect.

And the name is awesome.

Damn is that thing cool.
The tires are becoming standard on many trucks to replace the dual setup

so freakin cool...could've been used in a mad max flick.

An ispiration to Street-racing Garbagemen everywhere.

Want. So. Badly.

It's not a Rat Rod - it's a Nutria Rod!

Leeds' shop is in Santa Cruz, CA, so the hippies are well familiar with his machines & art. Here's a few pics I snapped a few months ago while wandering around his neighborhood : [slum.net]

The $64,000 question:

Do I need a CDL to terrorize the neighborhood?

'Cause if I do, I'm starting my classes right now!

Put the hitch back on it and use it to tow your drop tank dry lakes car for the ultimate hod rot set.

@P161911: rot=rod
fingers and brain out of sync

Is it me, or did he mount the headlights so they turn with the wheels?

The Peterbilt builds an answer to the Scion Hako...

@beercheck: I was just about to point that out. Yes he did, pure genius!

@FreeMan:

You don't need a cdl to drive a semi truck if you aren't using it for commercial purposes.

\remove the mounting plate.

Shit! Want to see burnout NOW!!!

You can see it this weekend in Half Moon Bay, CA (San Francisco Bay Area) at the Pacific Coast Dream Machines auto/plane/stationary/mechanical awesomeness. [www.miramarevents.com]

That's magnificent. I can't help but feel that it'd benefit from bigger tyres (think Jay Leno tank car), exhaust stacks and maybe duallies in the back, but it's still some machine. Come to think of it, did this start off as a 6x4? If it did and still was, it'd be even more magnificent!

That is freakin' bad!

That ain't shit compared to this 1964 Peterbilt 359

OK, we need a special garage for "our" hybrids, i.e., rocket+Ford Galaxie, rat rod+Peterbuilt and any other mutants...like that Russian tank-puller amphib.

I'm anti-stacks on this one--which I can hardly believe--but they would shift it too much to truck and less to ratrod.

@blindranger: Now that's MAGNIFICENT!

@jchabotte: Yee & Hawww!!!! Sign me up, I'll take two!

@blindranger: That's awesome, too.

What's with the front axle pushed so far forward on these? Is that done for lowering purposes, better ride with a longer wheel base or...

@jchabotte: Not in Masssachusetts... where have you heard this? I have a CDL.

Wonderful!! That's all you can say about that!!