2017 SEMA Show Report
This year’s SEMA Show packed a huge surprise. For more than a year, we’ve been working on a ’35 pick-up truck based on the proven ’33 Hot Rod chassis. We introduced the truck and made the truck section of our website live on the first day of the show. The truck wasn’t the only thing new at SEMA for us. This year, we would try a radical experiment having only two crew members from Factory Five in a massive 20′ x 80′ booth filled with seven cars! How did we do that? Customers. We asked several customers to help us for the week, we brought some customer cars, and the week went great.
The crew from the Factory Five Build School check out the new ’35 Hot Rod Pick-Up Truck before SEMA kicked off on Tuesday morning.
Power Automedia’s Dennis Pittsenbarger previews the Factory Five ’35 Hot Rod Truck with Dave Smith and Tony Zullo.
Customer Ron Ewerth’s 818R was one of three customer cars featured in our booth this year. Ron races his 818R out west.
Customer Wayne Mills’ brought his show-winning GTM Supercar to flank Ron’s 818R. The modern Factory Five designs were staged on one end of our booth with the vintage Hot Rods on the other side with Coupes and Roadsters in-between.
Customer Erik Treves stole the show with this stealthy twin-turbo Coyote-powered Gen 3 Type 65 Coupe. The SEMA Show would be the first time anyone saw the car completed while many people followed Erik’s build on The Factory Five Forum. Erik built his latest Coupe with a United States Army theme as Erik is a pilot in the US Army.
Next to Erik’s Coupe was our brand-new Gen 3 street car, serial #001.
Customer Fred Simmons Jr. from SMG Motoring brought a steel body ’33 Hot Rod and entered it in the “Battle of the Builders” at SEMA this year. Freddy’s build was absolutely flawless, 400 HP LS-powered in a deep blue, custom interior, and Magnesium-look wheel highlights.
Here’s an interior shot of the SMG Motoring-built ’33 Hot Rod.
The ’33 Hot Rod build by SMG Motoring is next to the new ’35 Hot Rod Pick-Up Truck.
The Factory Five booth was crowded from the first day all the way through closing time at 4 pm on Friday.
The crew at Factory Five brought our famous Mk4 “Half-Mobile” Roadster. This car is always very popular at shows because you can sit in it, test fit it, and still see all of the construction underneath the skin.
There was never 5 minutes without a crowd around the new truck!
The Factory Five Gen 3 Coupe-R that was built with Snap-On and featured on the show “From the Ground-Up” was on display in the KONI Shocks booth, which was directly behind our booth and on the main aisle across from GM. FFR President Dave Smith and KONI’s Lee Grimes in the calm before the doors opened.
Fred helped out in the our booth each day, talking to customers, and showing off his build. Watch the cool 3-minute video on Freddy’s Hot Rod.
LS-power in a Ford!
SEMA is a homecoming of sorts. Above: Longstanding Factory Five customer Russ Thompson (L) stopped by the booth with his wife Lin, and Wayne Presley. Wayne volunteered to work the Factory Five booth and was a HUGE help answering questions on every car, especially the 818. His company Very Cool Parts helps Factory Five customers with parts and tech help.
Below: Longstanding Factory Five customer Don DePontee (center) and Sue Howe (right) stopped by to say hi here with customer Karen Salvaggio (left). Karen volunteered in the Factory Five booth the entire week!
More homecomings! Factory Five President Dave Smith with Mk1 customer Ray McEdward, Coupe builder Garry Bopp, and friends.
It was standing room only most of the week.
The Mk4 “Half-Mobile” Roadster is powered by a 390 HP BluePrint Engines crate motor. Check out the video below:
The middle of the booth was filled with two Coupes and a Mk4.
A Factory Five ’33 Hot Rod was featured in Cover King’s booth (right behind Ford) sporting a new car cover we are working on featuring the ’33 chassis.
Cover King used their lycra cover and printing technology to make these racey leggings for the ladies.
From this angle, you can’t even tell our Mk4 Roadster is missing the other half of the body.
“All Girls Garage” host Cristy Lee stopped by the Factory Five booth on Wednesday to sign autographs and take pictures with customers.
Our Gen 3 Type 65 Coupe-R that was featured in the KONI Shocks booth spent half of the time up in the air on these cool pneumatic pistons!
FFR President Dave Smith with Ford Performance’s Doug White and Cristy Lee. Ford delivered huge for us this year with the brand-new 5.2L Aluminator XS engine for our Coupe-R!
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We filmed a segment of Power Automedia’s SEMA Show coverage featuring the Gen 3 Coupe in KONI’s booth with Joey Logano, Ford Performance, and Snap-On Tools.
NASCAR’s Joey Logano was interviewed on the Coupe-R that he drove. Check out the video below.
Logano is awesome to work with. He’s a great driver, and a fun guy to have behind the wheel.
SEMA is a place to do business with suppliers and partners in the auto-industry. We like to put our partners to work! BASF’s Brian Fox and Auto Trader Classics Andrea Valenti help prep decals on the Gen 3 Coupe-R!
Chris Ronni (right) drove the Factory Five big rig and worked the show. Customer Ron Everitt came out to help the crew for the entire week! Ron builds Factory Fives to customer specifications and is one of the best builders in the country.
The boys from Speedmaster79 built this stunning black Gen 3 Type 65 Coupe in only six weeks! Speedmaster79 is an amazing warehouse of parts and sells a variety of bolt-on parts that work great with Factory Five cars. Their display was directly behind the Ford Performance booth, and they were just featured in the latest issue of “Power & Performance News” magazine. They sell this amazing stack injection system among other parts (above).
Tuesday night, SEMA hosts the SEMA PAC dinner. Factory Five President Dave Smith with Karen Salvaggio and SEMA President Chris Kersting.
NASA’s Chris Cobbetto has been racing with us since 2000. His leadership in NASA and his friendship have helped countless Factory Five road racers.
SEMA is a four-day show, but the big awards dinner is Thursday night. This year, we had some special guests at our table for the SEMA dinner. Above: Cristy Lee from “All Girls Garage” and Pat Topolinski from “Engine Power”. Below: Both Mike and Pat from PowerNation’s “Engine Power” show joined us for the dinner.
Factory Five customer Ron Everitt (right) with Ryan Valin and Stacey Jones. Stacey worked the booth and collected customer names for sale leads. She did an outstanding job, and we were so lucky to have her work with us.
Almost everyone in the car industry attends the SEMA Dinner. Miss Linda Vaughn was gracious to take a picture with Factory Five’s Dave Smith.
Karen Salvaggio’s Gen 3 Type 65 Coupe was featured in Snap-On Tools’ booth.
The 2017 SEMA Show was a huge success and it would not have been without the tremendous help of these great people: Ron Everitt, John Kabacinski, Erik Treves, Fred Simmons Jr., Karen Salvaggio, Wayne Mills, Ron Ewerth, Gary Cheney, Wayne Presley, Ryan Valin, Stacey Jones, Dale Anthony, Frank Maslowski, and Jim and Todd from the Factory Five Build School.
