By Todd Lappin
In my house, we have a tradition: whenever a friend or family member has a firstborn child, we present the lucky parents with a brand new Tonka Mighty Dump Truck. Boy or girl, it doesn’t matter — have a kid, and you get the truck. We’ve given dozens away over the years. Kids still love ’em, and no wonder: Tonka’s classic dump truck is big, durable, fun, and extremely yellow.
When it was our turn to have a firstborn, I wanted to create a Tonka that was extra special. We were expecting a daughter, so I hit on the idea of giving her a pink Tonka. And not just pink; I wanted to give her a pink Hello Kitty Tonka, a slick mashup of two childhood icons! No child of mine could possibly go through life without one.
Happily, the venerable Tonka dump truck turns out to be a versatile platform for mods and customization. I started by building a prototype: a primer-black truck with red wheels that I nicknamed the Rat Rod Tonka. I liked it so much that I brought it to a local pinstriper to add some fancy scrollwork. The Hello Kitty Tonka came next, and I really liked the way it turned out too. There are more I still want to build — a Tonka lowrider! a Tonka painted like the Partridge Family bus! — and I’ll make them all eventually, but in the meantime you may have even better ideas. Here’s everything you need to know about creating your own Kustom Tonkas.
Steps
Step #1: Buy a classic Tonka dump truck.
Next
- This isn’t as easy as it used to be. Hasbro, the company that owns the Tonka brand, recently created an all-new Mighty Dump Truck. The new model is bigger, more modern-looking, and a bit more expensive. The older one — which employs the same basic design Tonka has used since 1964 — is still offered, but like old Coke, it’s now marketed as Tonka Classics, and it’s getting harder to find. Fortunately, most Toys “R” Us stores still carry the Tonka Classics Dump Truck right alongside the newer model, for the bargain price of about $20. Cheap!
