FROM SHOPPING BASKET TO 150MPH RACE CAR
New Lynn resident Nyle Buckley is a young man in a big hurry – he raced through his engineering apprenticeship before he was 21 and is now putting his skills to work building and racing his own drag car and others.
Nyle’s Skills4Work sponsored Toyota Corona has come a long way from being the conservative shopping trolley New Zealanders know so well – in fact it could do the length of most shopping centre carparks in a just few seconds.
The car’s best time down the quarter mile drag strip to date is 8.9 seconds, at over 150 miles per hour. Nyle has established himself as one of the up and coming racers in the Pro-Import drag racing class and is sponsored by Skills4Work,
NZ’s leading group apprentice provider.
Skills4Work is supporting Team Nyle Racing Developments as a means of showing young people the exciting and interesting places an engineering trade will take them.
A qualified fitter/turner, Nyle is an excellent ambassador for his trade and his lightning fast cars are a testament to the engineering skills he has mastered.
The 2JZ-powered Corona has been a labour of love for Nyle, who has worked tirelessly on the car since buying it in 2003. Next season he’s aiming for consistent 8-second times over the standing quarter mile. He has fitted a new transmission and lifted the little Corona’s engine to 1000hp using new and his own hand-fabricated parts.
“There’s a lot more left in it yet,” says Nyle.
Nyle says no-one writes a book on how to modify cars but he knows what he is doing from his general engineering knowledge. Considering the fact that the Corona started as a standard car and is now a red-hot drag racer, there have been plenty of decisions to make along the way.
“It’s common sense really,” he says. “I can do everything myself. I bought a transmission which suited a V8 and altered it to fit the Import for example, I made the flywheel which involved a lot of machining and measuring. It’s the general knowledge you pick up” says Nyle
Nyle’s interest in engineering goes back to his school days at Mount Roskill Grammar, when he watched his brother to prepare the cars for the famed Lighting Direct Porsche race car team. He was then introduced to toolmaking through a pre-trade course.
“I wanted to do engineering rather than being a mechanic,” he says.
After leaving school at the end of fifth form and doing a six month pre-trade course he gained a toolmaking apprenticeship at Schlage, a well known lock manufacturer. He then worked for Precision & General Engineering in Henderson, before taking up the chance to modify cars working at Quest4 for 3 years, he worked for himself for a year before going back to Precision & General Engineering again. By the age of 21 he had completed his apprenticeship and gained the skills that have not only provided him with a career but also an exciting lifestyle.
“Having a modified car and being able to create them is a lifestyle“ he says.
These days he works three days a week at P&G Engineering and spends time helping a friend at the Warkworth-based company Speed Source – a friendship that developed through tuning work on the Corona.
With the new V8 transmission, stronger diff and further upgrades to engine parts, Nyle is looking forward to October, when the drag racing season fires up again.
Look for plenty of sub nine second runs from the former shopping car as the season progresses.