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Untitled-4 1 7/25/13 10:43 AM
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Overdrive spoke with him
in 2011, the rig had been
painted all black and stowed
for safekeeping at a friend's
garage.
"I wasn't really sure how
to restore it" or exactly what
work to put into it, says
Mariani, but he wanted to
go a different route than
some of the replicas of the
Blue Mule (the Ford W9000
from "White Line Fever")
he'd seen. He also wanted
something to "steal a little
thunder" on the truck show
circuit – "really turn some
heads," he said.
"Unfortunately, I'm an
anal-retentive perfectionist,"
says Mariani.
As longtime designer
Mariani strove to bring his
dream to reality, he and
friend Brad Wike of Brad's
Classic Trucks continued
working on it through 2013
and this year. The vision of
a true big-rig hot rod kept
them on their toes before the truck
made its debut in the Cobra Electron-
ics booth at the Mid-America Trucking
Show in March this year.
Mariani also has caught some atten-
tion on the show circuit, winning Best
Show Truck at this year's Shell Rotella
SuperRigs show and 1st Place in the
Overdrive's Pride & Polish event at the
Fitzgerald Truck Show in Tennessee in
July.
Visit OverdriveOnline.com/
LowPatrol to see more photos and
backstory on the rig.
Before the 13-inch roof chop,
Low Patrol was anything but low.
After the chop, the team lowered
the truck 9 inches, resisting the
urge to air-bag the hot rod. Such
trucks "look great slammed down,
but you've got to air it up" again,
Mariani says. "We made this one as
low as we could get it" by trial and
error.
