FIRST LOVE

RENATO RILLOTTA NOT ONLY HUNG ON TO HIS FIRST CAR BUT TURNED IT INTO HIS ULTIMATE DREAM MACHINE

- KIAN HEAGNEY

PRETTY much all of us have had a moment where we wistfully look back and wish we’d kept our first car; after all, you never forget your first time. Renato Rillotta is smarter than most of us in that regard, having not only kept his first pride and joy but spent years crafting it into his ultimate dream machine.

Renato’s love affair with his VH SL/E Commodore began as a young bloke working at a restaurant, where one of his older co-workers paraded it in front of him before Renato eventually cracked and started asking for a price. “I had been admiring it for a while,” he says. “It was in pretty good nick overall; it needed a restoration, but it’d been looked after, and eventually the guy sold it to me.”

He drove it around for a few years in standard V8 form, before pulling it off the road for what was originally just supposed to be a simple respray and a beefier engine. “As we went through the process over the years, things just got a bit out of control, which is why the build took nine years,” he says.

Renato pulled the car apart himself, but the ensuing build proved to be a bit of a challenge due to setbacks with work not being up to snuff. “A good example is the engine bay,” he says. “I never intended to go to the level I did, but when we decided to go with under-dash brake reservoirs and the workshop drilled unnecessary holes, it wasn’t up to my standard, so it had to be redone, and the engine bay ended up getting modified and painted as well.”