Anybody watching? I get a kick out of them because Leepu is a character and it’s fun to watch him work, and I grew up on Long Island NY near the shop, so Steve’s classic Long Island New Yorker accent reminds me of home.
And for a guy whose main tools are a pile of rusty old hammers from Bangladesh, Leepu’s body work is impressive.
The show will be much more popular when one of the main characters has a sex change or gets indicted on some deviancy charge. I quickly burned out on reality television and didn’t even make it to the first commercial on that program. It may be a great show but then it may be a has been genre already.
And speaking of reality television, does anyone remember the first season of “Billy the Exterminater?” Billy drove an old rusted out Chevrolet pickup with the floor and passenger seat covered with empty fast food cartons and styrofoam coffee cups. The last time I saw Billy he drove a top of the line Ram paid for by cleaning up orphanages for free.
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. Reality television isn’t. Ask yourself, how’d the camera man get there?
I can respect wanting to show off low buck customs but the Mitsubishi Lancer turned into a 4dr Corvette with graphics from a early 70’s Cuda was a strange combination for sure.
I tried to watch a couple of episodes but I didn’t find it entertaining. I guess it’s because I’m not a big fan of Leepu’s designs for his vehicles. I find his bodywork “garish” and that’s being kind.
Hah, yes, some Frankencar vibe going on there. But Steve knows how to get bang for his buck. He just traded a $1500 SSR frame for a Ford 5.3 liter truck motor, then threw in bigger injectors, a new cam, and an $800 turbo to get a 600 HP drag car engine for $3000 total.
Like most of these Reality Shows, they make more money producing the TV content than they do pretending to work…Pawn shops, antique trading, gold mines, gemstones on Colorado mountainsides, alligator wrestling, custom car building, storage locker clean-outs, the MONEY is made producing the show, not from the business itself…
I have no idea what everyone is talking about. Can I assume this is some type of alleged “reality” show about metal-pounder car customizers? Clearly I’m not missing much by getting only the very basic cable package.
Twenty minutes and I had to bail on that embarassment of a car show. This was the one about the Camaro and it’s all staged BS.
It looks like they plagiarized the Gas Monkey method of slapping new paint and interior over rust.
Just like Gas Monkey, I think the car build for someone is all staged unless that guy who allegedly authorized it has no problem with appearing on national TV as the biggest sucker on the planet.
And 20 grand is not going to get a custom Camaro done right; it will get a cobbled together POS though.
@TSM, yes, new reality series about a garage on Long Island, NY (my hometown) about a guy from Bangladesh named Leepu who does custom bodywork with no drawings, all by eye, very old school, along with a guy named Steve (aka Pit Bull) who owns the shop and does the mechanicals.
They build custom upgrades for relatively little money. It’s not high-class stuff but Leepu is a real character and fun to watch doing his bodywork.
Pros like ok4550 will undertandably sneer and change the channel, but it’s entertainment aimed at amateurs like me with an hour to waste. 
I’d probably enjoy it. I loved “Monster Garage”, especially the episode where they built a trike out of a Peterbuilt engine & tranny (and rearend). Coolest trike I’ve ever seen. Pure machinery overwhelming the rider/driver.
I like watching things get done without a lot of measuring and planned steps. Some people have a lot of talent. I could go to art class or tape measure practice forever and still have no talent for either one.
I liked watching “Roadkill” on Youtube more than any of the reality TV shows…
Hey mountainbike. I also have the basic TV package on cable but you can watch most of the other shows on the internet. You just have to wait until the next day…but they are free to watch. My computer is connected to a 46 inch monitor so the shows are quite enjoyable to watch. Just use the HDMI cable or your regular VGA cable.
These reality TV shows that are about Cars/Motorcycles seem to all follow one formula.
Build cool looking vehicles and bikes…and have wacky characters and/or human drama.
American Chopper was originally filmed as a serious show about how a company makes custom bikes. But the producers looked at the daily tapes and there was this drama panmning out between Paul and Jr. So they left a lot of that in. When Paul saw the show he was FURIOUS. He had thought those scenes would be edited out. Then his anger went away when the phones started ringing off the hook and he had a 200% increase in sales within a few months. Eventually they started ADDING drama scenes to the show.
Now reality shows like this follow suit. Drama and/or wacky characters SELLS. You can tell that many scenes are staged.
I like Counting cars because of the cars they build. I don’t think there was a custom build they did I didn’t like (well maybe Horny Mikes bus, or that Electric car). I can’t comment on their build quality, but they seem to know what they’re doing.
Watched Leepu and Pitbull a couple times. Too much drama and not enough substance.
My favorite reality show like this is American Restoration. Not cars…but everything else mechanical.
I agree that this Leepu guy has a artists eye. Not everyone car…by eye…put these pieces together and have it come out as well as it does.
BUT
If I had a classic car that I wanted restored, and I got back my car with totally different body lines, I’d be chasing Leepu out the door with a tire iron.
If you had a 68 Mustang (or any make & model), back in the 70s and you finally found another one to call your own…you want it mainly for the body lines…the style…the cars character.
For some guy to completely change the body lines on that car without your approval is just not acceptable to me.
Think of how many times you spot a car and say to yourself “wow, look at that nice Mustang, Roadrunner, Firebird, or Corvette”.
When was the last time you said “wow, look at that…what the heck is that”. As that old Johny Cash song starts up in your head…“One Piece At A Time”…https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rWHniL8MyMM.
I look at him as a butcher.
yosemite
“Butcher” is the correct term and it even applies to Chip Foose. I watched his show a few times and was appalled that he would take a clean, straight original car and mangle it from one end to the other by replacing everything on it except some body panels.
Remember the one-owner mid 60s Corvette which had been given new as a birthday present to a woman and stored in the garage for decades? The first thing Foose did is scrap the original 327 and replace it with a boring GM crate engine. That right there just eliminated the “numbers matching” part of it and ruined it.
He did the same thing with a clean 442 convertible and others while wiping pieces of history out… 
I can’t watch Leepu and Pitbull. It is complete BS. There is NO way to build these cars for the money they quote. There is more in parts than the final car cost! Not to mention the 50 lbs of Bondo in every one of Leepu’s designs. SO how do you keep the lights on and pay the labor let alone the painters?
I think this does a disservice to real shops that do real work. Can you imagine a car owner bringing in their rusty Camaro/Mustang/Ranchero into any custom shop and asking what the shop can do for $12,000? “Well, we can sand the rust, fix the holes in just the body and prime it for that.”
At least Fantomworks deals in reality. $50,000 to $100,000 restorations with 500-1000 hours of labor and $25,000 in parts.
If you look under the hood of most street rods and restored classics you’ll usually find a small block Chevy 350 bolted to a 350 THM. From 1930s Fords to 1990s Jaguars the bow tie crate 350 is always a good fit. No one wants to rebuild a rare engine. And restoring an old ignition system, carburetor, etc is totally out of the question. So don’t open the hood on a '40 Ford and expect to see a flat head.
The only two car shows I watch are Wheeler Dealers and Chasing Classic cars. On Wheeler Dealers the two guys actually like each other and show some of the pitfalls that can happen. Wayne Carrini does a lot of charity work while still making a great living.