Octagon September, 2016

The JuDDi
by Dean Tighe; photos by Steve Johns
I must admit that opening the Octagon last
month and seeing a picture of JuDDi on the
cover brought a very large smile to my face,
and I very much thank Elaine for selecting
us for the cover. As a result of that she was
asked by an interested reader if I would do
an article on the car for the magazine. ‘Love
to’, I said so here we are.
Well , it all started in about December 1995,
at the dinner table at Mum and Dad’s house.
Paul Van Wijk was over for dinner - which
happened a bit - and the conversation turned
to dad’s B37 F 5000. ‘So what is happening
with that?’ was the question. ‘It needs to be
put back together’ was the answer. ‘ So.’
I asked, ‘If I put it back together, can I hill
climb it?’ ‘Yes,’ was the answer. Woo hoo, I
thought, this will be fun.
Over the next few months I pieced the B37
back together and went testing at Lakeside
in about March the next year. Never have I
ever got out of a car shaking so much. I had
to sit down and calm my nerves, but back
in I got and that year I was 3rd at Bathurst
in the AHC. The next Year at Morwell I was
2nd after a weekend where everything went
wrong.
Then work stepped in. We had to move
Ivan Tighe Engineering out of West End. I
made the decision to sell the B37 and build
a building which has turned out, over the
last ten years, to have been a very good
decision. I kept the 6 litre alloy engine and
put the cast iron 5 litre back in the car, and
sadly said goodbye. But, from that time,
I was determined to somehow build a V8
powered hill climb car.
Forward to a Wednesday morning some
time in about 2007. I had been looking for a
carbon tub to attach my 6 litre Chev to. The
F3000 cars were too big, and the price for
a car out of the UK was way outside of my
budget. But then, fate stepped in.
It was 6.30 in the morning, at Brisbane
Airport, and I was heading to Adelaide
via Sydney, and who just happened to be
getting on the same plane? John Campbell
and Stuart Hooper. ‘Where are you guys
off to?’ I asked. ‘To Sydney to buy a 1995
F3 Dallara,’ was the answer. ‘What are you
going to do with that?’ I asked. ‘We are
going to make a sports car out of it?’ Light
Bulb moment!!….. 12 months later , John
had finished with the tub and I had the next
piece of the puzzle.
We then forward to the AHC at Mt Cotton in
2013. Dad and I were watching the quick
cars going up the first hill. The Gould GR55
heads up the hill and Ivan turns to me and
says: “Your Chev isn’t going to be quick
enough son, you need something faster.”
The next day I found an EV Judd that Dad
had been working on 5 years earlier, in
Brisbane. It had a very large hole in the
side of the block where a couple of con rods
had decided to leave in a hurry.
So the work began:
I guess I am running a little late. The boys are hyped
and ready to go
The Octagon - September 2016 57