Road To Success with Benedict Fowler Jan 26, 2026

Jack McNeill Reveals His Next Insane Van Build’s & What Nearly Broke Him!

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Car

Dodge Journey

The Dodge Journey is a family-friendly SUV that has a lot of room inside and can fit more people. It's talked about because it's useful for families who need extra space.

Concept

engine swapped

An engine swap is when you take out the engine that came with a car and put in a different one. People do this to make their cars faster or to fix problems with the old engine.

Car

Honda Civic Type R

The Honda Civic Type R is a fast version of the regular Honda Civic. It's designed for people who want a sporty car that can go really fast and handle well on the road.

Term

forged engines

Forged engines are made with stronger materials that can take more power without breaking. This makes them better for high-performance cars.

Term

engine rods

Engine rods connect the moving parts inside an engine. They help turn the up-and-down motion of the pistons into the spinning motion that powers the car.

Car

Peugeot 107

The Peugeot 107 is another small car from Peugeot, similar to the 106. It's designed to be easy to drive around town and is good on gas, making it a smart choice for city dwellers.

Car

Peugeot 106

The Peugeot 106 is a small car made by the French company Peugeot. It's known for being easy to drive and park in tight spaces, which is great for city driving.

Term

sequential gearbox

A sequential gearbox is a special kind of transmission that lets you change gears in a straight line, making it faster and easier to shift while driving, especially in racing cars.

Car

The Toyota MR2 is a small sports car that has its engine in the middle, which helps it handle really well when driving. People talk about it because it's fun to drive and can be customized in many ways.

Concept

engine swaps

An engine swap is when you take out the engine from a car and put in a different one, usually to make the car faster or more reliable.

Part

engine mounts

Engine mounts are parts that hold the engine in place in a car. They help reduce vibrations and keep everything steady while the engine runs.

Term

petrol fuel system

A petrol fuel system is what helps get gasoline to the engine so it can run. It includes parts like the fuel tank and fuel pump.

Car

Audi A3

The Audi A3 is a small, luxury car made by Audi. It's popular for its stylish design and comfortable interior.

Concept

project car

A project car is a car that someone buys to fix up or make better. People often enjoy working on them to improve how they look or how they drive.

Car

Audi Tt

The Audi TT RS is a fast and stylish sports car that has a powerful engine and all-wheel drive, which helps it grip the road well. People talk about it because it's fun to drive and looks great.

Brand

Koenigsegg

Koenigsegg is a company that makes super-fast sports cars. They are known for creating some of the fastest cars you can buy, and they use very advanced technology in their designs.

Car

Lamborghini Gallardo

The Lamborghini Gallardo is a high-performance sports car that was made by Lamborghini. It has a powerful engine and is designed for speed and handling, which makes it very exciting to drive.

Term

twin turbo

Twin turbo means the car has two turbochargers that help the engine produce more power. This makes the car faster and improves how it accelerates.

Car

Honda Fit

The Honda Fit is a small car that's great for driving around town. It's known for being easy to park and having a lot of space inside for passengers and luggage.

Car

Ford Fusion

The Ford Fusion is a family car that is comfortable and has a lot of space inside. It's popular because it drives well and is good on gas, making it a smart choice for everyday use.

Term

LS engines

LS engines are powerful V8 engines made by General Motors. They're often used in many cars and are popular for building fast and modified vehicles.

Brand

Chevy

Chevy is a nickname for Chevrolet, a car brand that makes many different types of vehicles, including cars and trucks. They are known for their reliability and performance.

Car

Ford Mustang

The Mustang is a popular sports car made by Ford. It's known for being fast and stylish, and many people love it for its powerful engine and sporty look.

Term

drive shaft

A drive shaft is a part of a car that helps connect the engine to the wheels, allowing the car to move. It's an important piece that helps power the vehicle.

Term

hybrid

A hybrid car uses both a regular gas engine and an electric motor to help it run. This can save fuel and be better for the environment than cars that only use gas.

Term

wiring loom

A wiring loom is like a big bundle of wires that connects all the electrical parts of a car. It helps everything work together, like the lights and the engine.

Car

Toyota GR Yaris

The Toyota GR Yaris is a sporty version of the Yaris hatchback. It has a powerful engine and is built for racing, but you can also drive it on regular roads.

Car

Renault 5 Turbo

The Renault 5 Turbo is a sporty version of a small car made by Renault. It has a turbocharged engine, which gives it extra power, and it was famous for racing in the 1980s.

Car

Renault Modus

The Renault Modus is a small, boxy car that is designed to be practical and easy to drive in the city. People mention it because it has a lot of space inside, even if it doesn't look very stylish.

LIVE

Everybody knows a caddy everybody knows one they know their uncles got one or their friends got one or they take they drive it to work like

So yeah, I'm Jack something about like making a performance version of a lack of utility vehicle

People just love that concept take us through then the caddy behind the scene videos cost a lot of money

I mean we're spending thousands and thousands of all the modifications in YouTube is very competitive game now

There's lots of people doing lots of work on car. You know, we've got two new labs on board as a transit whether it's a transporter

That's the director on the take it has been the toughest part of YouTube journey. I

Mean, I know what it is, but I can't so

Jack from one van to another you're back on road to success and you have just finished one of my favorite builds

I've ever seen but for those that may have seen some of your other stuff will not seen you before in your own words

Who are you and what do you do? So yeah, my I'm Jack and

Basically, you could say I build cheap cars and try and make them cool

I take cars that people might overlook might think are boring and turn them into crazy engine swapped

Transformations with crazy paint jobs and cool modifications and I post it all to YouTube as petrol heads

We all have different tastes in cars

Some people like older stuff like an Aston Martin some people love their vans some people love

Type R Honda's the thing with you is I think you love all of it

I've never seen someone with such an eclectic mix and tasting cars as we've said before but what got you into that because you're so well

Spoken you wouldn't necessarily put you with the passion that you have when you get in a Sarah

Yeah, yeah, I don't know. I mean what got me into it

I just I just love engines and and there's something about like every car that I've got

they've all got a different engine with a different personality and I I love building projects and

Working really hard on them grafting away in the unit late at night and then for that end product with

Each individual engine with a different

Characteristic times you question though. I don't really know what got me into it. I just have always had a love for it

I think I mentioned on on our last pod. I

Always used to play GTA back in the day modifying the cars at Los Santos customs and all that sort of classic stuff top gear as well

The classic but I don't know. I've just seen my blood. I've always loved it something that's in

Everyone's blood every petrolhead no matter if they like super cars or sports cars or whatever

I think everybody genuinely appreciates a good van and you have just basically finished

Van build project. It's very close. You're not quite there, but we can basically call it done

It needs a few little tweaks in the interior

But as for all intents and purposes, it's done and yeah that van

I mean, it's been a success on all different

Sort of avenues from the fact that I just love it and like it is genuinely become alongside this era

One of my favorite builds we've ever done on the channel, but also the views on it have been great

I mean, it hasn't done a video under half a meal yet, which is you know fingers crossed it keeps going the

Audiences loved it. I've loved it and it's just been a great success

And it genuinely when I look at that thing. I'm like that is so cool

Genuinely, it's that I love that van. It is so sick

And I want to use it to help demonstrate to people because we try and get under your skin

Yes podcast try and understand what it's like to do what you do and how you do what you do

The van smashed it views have smashed it first video on 1.2 million views

Yeah, you're clearly elated because it gives you more pleasure to work on something knowing it's gonna be a success

It's like when you start losing weight and once you've lost a bit

You gain that extra like momentum of like right. I'm going even harder today to do it

But what is the difference between how you feel doing a project like that in reality to how you feel doing a project that doesn't perform?

I mean and actually good a good sort of comparison is the Sarah the Sarah is one that I've

Genuinely is one of my favorite builds, but it as far as like views on the channel. We didn't do that

Well, I think you average like between 100 and 150 which is not it's not terrible

But for me it said to cover the cost of all the videos unit rent all this sorts of stuff

You need the videos to be doing more than that because these videos cost a lot of money

I mean we're spending

Thousands and thousands on all the modifications that you need because obviously YouTube is a very competitive game now

There's lots of people doing lots of work on cars, you know Chris is one obviously Matt and a load of I mean saving salvage

That's there's honestly a million over turn Ethan over to the smashing as well

But he's obviously focusing more on the short form side of things

But you need that you need to get so much work done in the videos and obviously I'm not

Crash damage co-park guy. I'm take a chip box and just absolutely mod the hell out of it

So I've got to spend a lot of money on these modifications to make the videos work

And because we need to get a lot done in the videos

That's why the views really need to sort of back that up

But with the Sarah don't answer your question. How do I feel about it? I?

Actually don't really mind and I know because I know the Sarah had like a really niche audience that absolutely loved it that tuned in every video

There wasn't that many of them, but they absolutely love that car and I absolutely love that car and so much stuff went wrong with that honestly Ben

We had

Two engines we bought which were kaput rubbish

They had like one had a hole in the block the other had a stud came off where the head is where the exhaust manifold mounts up

So literally just it all went wrong, but the end product that car I took you out in it earlier

It that's what I do it for and really if the views can just cover the bills if it can just pay for everything

I'm happy, but that's the perception versus reality part of YouTube because I think everybody naturally looks to the top of the tree and they see

Freddy and Matt building P1

Yeah teens and big atties so I would imagine that even your friend circle away from YouTube. Oh, it's fine

You're smashing it you are yeah, you're you sly fox like that you flip and we know what you lot

But is that actually on a channel like yours?

The reality are you still in this phase of like climbing the ladder and it's probably a little bit harder than the audience?

Yes, I mean we are in the phase of climbing the ladder. I think I think something which I mean because

To make it sustainable

You need like the views off the views are so important and whilst I absolutely love the Sarah

It does play on your mind. Sometimes you're like, you know, if I this doesn't get X amount of views

I lose money on this video and it does play on your mind and see I mean

I know you know the feeling when you get a 10 out of 10. It's it's like a gut punch, but I

Feel like you just have to keep trooping on and just

Learning from each. I mean you could say it's a fairly but I just thought it's it's a way to learn for the next one

And the way I look at it is the next video

We've got a way better chance of beating the last because it's not done. Well, so I don't know

It's it's ups and downs with the emotion. Yeah, all 100%

Just clarify for someone if they haven't heard 10 out of 10 before

Yeah, you tube a speak because 10 out of 10 in the rest of our life. Yeah, it's all she's a 10

It's usually related with a good thing

Yeah, you choose one of the only places where it's not. Yeah, I think it's been spoken about a lot

But generally if you if you're not aware, it's it's a 10 out of 10 is if you've posted 10 YouTube videos in the past

And you post a new well, yeah, the previous nine you post a new one

YouTube will basically compare how that video has performed against your previous nine in the time frame

So let's say it's been up for a day

It will compare all the views that the last videos have done over the past day

And it will rank where your most recent videos gone

And if it's a 10 out of 10 that mean it's 10th place in your last videos

It feels like you're like taking a back step whereas if you get a one out of 10

YouTube shows you confetti and it goes well done more people tuning in you're doing great man

It's like a dopamine high and then you get like the loads of the 10s

But I feel like you have to sort of try and level your emotions because if you get too hung up

If you get too sad about the 10s and too happy about the ones

It's very difficult to I feel each have to be in love with the process of learning from each video and trying to make it better and better

And that's what I feel like I've done

Obviously it still does get to be sometimes when you have an under performer, but

Here's what it is

And I know how much it means because you don't actually post loads on like your stories and stuff on instagram

You're busy working most of the time, but when you do it's usually when a video is smashed to you like

Yeah

Let's go because I'm always trying to and I'm like obviously I don't I try not to look at it on a video per video basis

I try and look at it at a

Overall channel house the is that if the channel is moving in the general upwards direction

I'm happy like obviously like it'll be like this

It'll be sort of ups and downs but as long as the general trend line is up

That's what I'm sort of looking for. So when you know, for example, you get a video which

Is does 100k in the quickest time it ever has

I think to me that indicates that you're building up more of a sort of dedicated audience that go

Oh, yeah, that guy he posts really good videos. I follow him. I like his content. I'm going to click on it before

You know, and that's what you'll see is some newer channels

Um, what what will happen is they they might have videos which do really well in the end

But it'll take them a lot longer to grow because the algorithm picks it up and it grows over time

But with me I'm looking like

Okay, that's what I'm a previous video of mine did 100k in let's say 16 hours

This is the fastest one it's ever done in 14 hours

So that is like showing me that I'm getting a more loyal audience than the channels sort of that trend lines going up

So yeah, I do post that on my story a lot because yeah, it's it's proud of proud moment, you know sometimes

Let's talk about that phrase though doing really well because it can mean so many things to so many different people

We always associate it with numbers on youtube

But the problem is those numbers and benchmarks always moving

But you said one particular thing when you came on a year ago that you told me before

We started recording today is still one of your number one goals and targets, which was yes

when we filmed I'm not 100% sure the exact date but

You said to me do you think in five years time you were hitting million subs and I said

Yes, and my goal ever since then I've been like, right

I want to make sure I'm on track to get in that because I think

That it really for me is like that's the ultimate goal is getting a million subscribers

I mean, I don't know it might be difficult then like what do you do after that because I love the fact that I've got this

goal that I'm chasing

but um

But yeah, that's that's what I really want to get to before you started youtube though

If you opened your phone and was consuming content social media rot like most of us do yeah, what platform would you use the most?

Would have been it would have been tiktok probably or I mean all short form you've got how many followers on yeah

I mean I've got one and a half million on tiktok, but I just

This is that that's what I wanted to just pick up on for a second and pause that

Because when we talk about the goalposts and what our goals are and all the rest of it

It's it's mad how quickly we forget what would have mattered to us so much in the past

Yeah, been such an achievement in the past

And it's like when I heard you talk about I've got to get to this million subscribers in five years

it kind of

Relates to the audience how much?

Creators really do care about youtube and put it on a pedestal

She literally sat it with over a million followers on the platform

But I feel like tiktok it's it's undeserved success. I felt because no undeserved but like

it was

Firstly, it didn't financially reward you number one

Secondly views on tiktok are so that just chucked out and they're so easy to achieve

It diminishes the achievement for me and not to say that it's not an achievement

And like for anyone out there who has done really well on tiktok. That's like it's a it's a good job

But for me it came because with with boris and that whole series it happened so quickly

I I don't know with youtube

I feel like i'm earning it because i'm

And we're working get so much done on the cards. We're working so hard

We're editing the teams like got you know

We've got two new lads on board and we've got you know, even the got they're all individual jobs

And we're all working towards this goal and the video goes out and it's 35 minutes

And i've painstakingly edited every single minute of that and i'm proud of it

And it's a piece of like

Because it's more than the views it's it's a piece of content

Which i'm really proud to release whereas with with tiktok. I feel it it rewards

Brain rot it rewards just like

You know drama or it rewards like just a really catchy hook and then it doesn't reward quality content in my opinion

I mean again that might be up for debate, but

I like youtube not only because it rewards you financially and it allows you to actually run a business whereas tiktok doesn't

But it

It allows you to create this piece of content which you can be proud of

I think people learn a lot more from youtube than they do from tiktok

They're shown stuff on tiktok and they end up learning stuff on youtube half the time

It's like even when i was refreshing myself with a couple of your videos on the way up and i stumbled across

I think it was the fox build and it was when you were talking about um

Come on ben

Forged engines yes

And how if you put that much power through that particular engine that you had it was going to break the rods inside it

That's why you have to forge these engines and i was like all right

That's why and like that's me now even someone that's consumed so many videos

That was still something new to learn. I think when you feel like you're teaching someone something there's an element of additional value to you

Exactly 100 it's educational

And you you can actually like with youtube you can put so many different forms of value in the video you can get entertainment

Sorry like comedy sort of and like really just like entertaining someone you can get educational

Sort of side of it you can get a satisfying part of it watching something transform

You can get even like asmr

Like there's so many different things you can add to a youtube video to increase the overall value whereas

tiktok i feel like

It just doesn't allow you to have that creative freedom because it's so

It's so dependent on that first five seconds and it's also actually another thing about tiktok

You can't do integrated sections of tiktok

You cannot do it and this is one of the other reasons why i i left the platform because with tiktok think about it

If you're scrolling on tiktok, how many videos would you watch on average?

Maybe 20 or 30 you wouldn't even know even 50

Some people might even watch 100 videos and if you're watching that

You need to be if you're scrolling you need to be ruthlessly entertained

This is what i say you need to be ruthlessly entertained

If you're scrolling and you see one of my videos and i go oh here's bars

And i do some really entertaining bit and i go this bit is sponsored by car vertical for example everyone will go nope

Scroll off but with a youtube video not only can you integrate it into the content really well

Because you've obviously got that it's like uh, it's a sort of sort of sideways versus horizontal

Something just fell over in the unit versus represents what the unit's like everything pushed to the side to get in the shot

That's fine. Yeah, but um, it's easy to integrate stuff

But also people stick around for the integrations which means the click-through rate on the integrations are more brands are happier

They will sponsor every single video whereas with tiktok

The sponsors were coming in like once a blue moon oftentimes that have a month where i'd get three integrations

That should be great

So i could do three videos, but they'd have to be dedicated videos like for example doing a carly advert

It'd have to be a dedicated carly and it couldn't be like a video of me doing something else and then

Introduce carly because it would just people just scroll off

So you have to try and find a make try find a way of making the

The individual adverts entertaining that was a challenge in itself and getting views on that was so hard. So it's like

You it was so hard to monetize tiktok even with a million followers

Mate, honestly, you you would laugh my my rpm was like 4p

Like it was 4p and like at that point getting a million views on tiktok was like

It wasn't not even i don't know the maths, but like it wasn't paying you much at all. So yeah, I think

I think i'm in hindsight

I'm really glad i've moved away short form now for me is just posting

I'm posting cuts of the youtube stuff that's really low effort and easy to post and if one of them goes viral then great

But i'm not putting any time and effort into it because it doesn't reward you financially

And I think that's a problem that that it's an inherent problem with short format

I don't know it's a hard one to solve but

Take me through because we've got one two three four five projects

Representing different times in your channel different ideas huge success

Huge learnings and ones that didn't do as well as you've got like the sarah ones that have gone beyond expectation like the van

How many projects ahead do you have to be with what you're doing?

Like are you now thinking just because one van video has done really really well or like that series?

You're like i'm a van channel now. It literally is it what does your brain do running a channel like this constantly?

So I mean for me I always I always try and look at it two or three videos ahead

So it's maybe it isn't projects ahead. I've got ideas of projects

But nothing's really concrete until i'm like one or two videos away from having to do it

So I'll always like look two or three videos ahead. So for example now

We're just in the middle of doing the interior video on the caddy. So that's the next one of the main channel

Then we've got to finish off the forward fusion put the engine back in that with a load of different modes itbs and all sorts of stuff

That's the video after that then we're going to go take them on a road trip to spain. I think is the plan

That's the video after that. So right now. That's my focus, but then you have like a general

Okay, so this is what's doing. Well, this is what we should probably try and pursue

Later on after we've finished up with what we need to do with those two cars

So we are thinking about doing more vans like why not like if it ain't broke don't fix it

That's doing really well because it's a everybody knows a caddy

Everybody knows one they know their uncles got one or their friends got one or they take they drive it to work

So many people have them

And that's one thing so everybody knows it but also it's

Something about like making a performance version of a like a utility vehicle people just love that concept I've found

So we're going to do the same thing again. Whether it's a transit whether it's a transporter

That's sort of the the direction on the take it and then if it works then it works

Then if not, then we'll find someone else

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Is that been a lot of your story with all almost even in the short period of time that you've been around in terms

It's kind of been from lockdown onwards us. You've been like five years in the game really that there's really two years

Properly pursuing youtube

Okay, so you still fixate on that youtube part of it rather than a bit before but the story did start with boris

It did yeah

See over five years

You've pivoted from tiktok to youtube and youtube you've pivoted to different builds

Is it hard to stay confident long term when stuff moves all the time?

You could argue yes, but my mindset is that like i'm doing something really cool

I'm doing something that I love. I'm doing something where I can I've literally just employed these two lads toby and olly

Absolute legends makes working a million times more fun. We I get to wake up

And genuinely cannot wait to get into work. How many people can say that that's that's their mindset and for me

Even if in two three four five years

It becomes unsustainable because of some unknown external

Factor for me. I've done it and I've still it's all online

I've got it to show and it's a piece of my life where I can be proud of not only the achievement

But also the work that we've done and whether it becomes unsustainable in the future

I just feel like there's not too much point worrying about that because there's so many things that could go wrong

And it's like out of my control anyways, so I try to think about it that that sentence

I wake up and I genuinely look forward to going into work is the whole reason just sat on road to success

The whole reason that your channels have been horrendously successful and you've got to this point now

The problem as you say a youtube content coach, there's so much headroom to talk about where do you want to go with that?

Where are you looking at that? How are you pulling those ideas down?

But you're already the bit to where you've got to

horrendously successful and achieved a dream

But it's always still about keeping up those next dreams and goals and the goalposts are constantly moving on youtube

You mentioned earlier all the people

Lots of names of people that are smashing it and doing it even in the two years you've been on youtube

Is is there still more and more and more people cropping up that are doing there is

And you know it's hard though because you did segregate that your content is different to the rebus

You're not necessarily doing the smashed up cars all the time

You're doing the modifications to cars and stuff, but you see him more than that

And and you know what there's one specific channel that comes to mind and he's I've texted him all the time

It's called brad homes

And he is just got his own unit. He basically had this series on this purgeo 106 107

I can't remember I put a motorbike engine in it a higher booster motorbike engine and he came down

I drove it sequential gearbox absolute madness the the views he was getting he got like two videos

I think two or three videos over a million. I can't remember but several videos over a million views

that's more than I've ever had and

700,000 500,000 like

Smashing it now. He's got his own unit and he's doing this mr2 project and he's doing similar stuff to me engine swaps

but he focuses more on because he's very

Handy like he can make fabricate things. I mean, I've not got that skill yet

um, and he can make engine mounts and

Make brackets for things out of metal and bend the metal and and do it in such a way that he can make what his mind and visions

I can't I can't do that

So he's got it's similar to mine because he's doing engine swaps on cheap cars like me

But he's got his own sort of little niche with it doing like the fabrication side. I feel so he's a new channel

He's just hit 100k. I think today actually I've sent a message this morning

So yes, he's an example of someone who's brand new like not even been a year old and he's coming up and smashing it

Other than that you do see like the odd channel other than that that that tries to get into but the

The fact of the matter is that it's hard really hard to get into because

Getting the views is the first challenge. Then you've got all of the overheads. I feel like with car youtube

There's such a big barrier to entry, but if you can get over that barrier to entry

It's the best thing better up in the world in my opinion talk about just in reality some of those barriers to entry

okay, I mean

If you wanted to properly if you want to build cars and do that you've got buying the car is an expense buying the

modifications is an expense

Are you going to do it on your driveway in winter in the uk when it goes dark at 4 so you can't film past 4 p.m

Are you going to do it in the freezing cold like so you have to get a unit?

Then you've got all of the expenses that come with a unit rent business rates

Uh, the heat gas electric water all that stuff and then you've got

Um, do you want any help on board? You've got us pay for your employees

you and then and then all of this is just

It's hanging on like a a seesaw

because

If you can't get the views you can't pay for all that stuff

So it's like it's such a hard thing to get into I think but the people that have done it

It it pays dividends in the end and I feel like I mean just being able to do it every day

Ben to be honest is like it is such a dream job and I wake up and I'm smiling about it because of the past month

there's been amazing with these two new lads that I've got on board and

Yeah, and as long as the views as long as the channel is growing and as long as we're progressing

And as long as we can pay for everything and as long as we get to do it every day, that's

That's that's what I want the thing that I've noticed learn can see so clearly in people that do make it pass that barrier

When they sit opposite me in the van no matter what kind of content style thing that they're known for

And it's a cliche so we hear all these like little sentences that our elders say to us when we're younger

But so many of them I'm learning are so true and it's like if you don't have passion for what it is that you're doing

You may as well not be doing it because I genuinely have started to realise that is the secret magic source that makes a channel

Go from maybe not working to working is the passion side of it and you took me out in the serah

And I'll put some videos over this now

Just before I got here in the van

And the passion you have for every single one of the projects that you do just shines through

But how you mentioned a little bit there about brad and the kind of stuff that he's doing

How far can you go with madness to create views like I don't know

Is there like some wild ideas that you've had there like is that possible? Oh, yeah, we've had some crazy ideas

Okay, I'll share one. I mean I'm hoping nobody try

I don't think anyone will be stupid enough to try and steal this idea because it is like suicide

But I don't actually think I don't think it's will this happen. I don't know but I had a thought of

I've seen all the gear. Do you know that channel? Yeah, yeah with with jack and ethan

They bought a boat and they called it bept and

And they just bought a really cheap boat for a hundred quid and they did it up and it looked great

And they took it on like they camped in it and I thought that was great

So I thought why don't we do a boat challenge by like we but like me and ollie who's who's sort of the other sort of

presenter slash mechanic on the channel

We both buy a cheap boat or try and quash the channel. I don't know how do you want one a cheap boat?

Yeah, well, I'm not in the I'm not in the market one just yet. It is more of a distant idea

No, do you want one do I want to do the project on for nothing? It's yours

I mean, I'm not gonna say no to it. Did you see what I bought about a month ago?

But I've done like nothing on it because I just haven't I haven't I haven't

I may have bought

a jet ski powered

boat

Oh, no, I did see that. No, I did see that and I have just got it sat at home and it needs another engineer

Imagine that title crossing the channel with a jet ski powered boat with a k20 jet ski powered boat

I think you could put a k20 in it

I don't know that'll be challenging

This is the fabrication

You never know guys an idea that we talk about because so many of these times something that we talk about on the actual podcast ends up

Making it into reality and that's happened so many times, but I have a boat sat there if you want one

I just I'll vote it down when it comes to those crazy ideas

Do you have anybody in your life though that?

Makes you consider all the bits around it or do you have to be that level headed person?

Around the idea as well and be like I really want to do this one

But it's just not going to be financially viable on the business side. I think

I mean not really I make the decisions of what goes ahead and what doesn't but I've got my dad

You know, I'm still living at home

And my dad is bouncing ideas off him all the time and my mum

We always have chats about you know, where's the channel going to go what we're going to do xyz but

But no, I mean that that idea was a bit of a crazy one and whether it happens or not is yet to be seen

but

I think with your earlier question worrying about like

How how far can we take just doing crazy stuff to cars? The answer is I don't know but my suspicion is that

If you make a good video and good piece of content and you learn from it like

If it's just little things like making that first five seconds way more engaging with some sound effects and some zooms and you know

Really sort of hooking people into the video and you really try and like

Upgrade that first minute to get people invested in the content

Or whether it's getting more characters on board and people falling in love with the characters because I think we can both agree

Match channel who we all look up to

Wouldn't be where it is without all the characters like with jonesy and with his dad and with and with tobin with all those people

That work on the channel and and hannah and I think that's something that's a that's a different side to the content completely

Uh irrespective of the cars

That's a side of the content which can massively elevate it and help people get more invested and help you get more views

Is building like sort of a team and and like a group of people that people can like relate to and know the characters

That's one side that I could improve. That's another side, you know, we could

The editing there's the storytelling which we could improve. There's so many different avenues where even if you're doing the exact same thing

You can improve the content on these different aspects to help get more views and help push the channel forward

So that's sort of my opinion on it at the minute, but the answer really is I don't know but I'm enjoying it

So I'm going to keep going you mentioned you just took on two new lads become part of the channel

Is it really hard with that utopia in mind of bringing personalities forward bringing people onto camera?

Wanting that to be a reality

Is that a very hard thing to manage when you've got new people?

Because you also need to make sure that they they make it that far

And the audience don't get too invested if something happened in six months. Is it really difficult?

I think I don't I think my my opinion is that I'm running on the assumption that we're going to be doing it for a year or two

At least and then into the future past that so I'm not

Thinking all these guys might not be right because firstly, I think they are bloody perfect, but

I'm I'm not going to run on the assumption that it might not work out because again that will come through in the content

I want to make it

especially with them as well because

You know that they've just come on board and it's it's insecure for them at the mix

I don't know, you know, they're just they're just coming with all this new thing

Which is you know, people are still learning to accept as a real job

And you know, I want to create as a secure environment as possible. You're like we're doing this for the long run

You know, I'm not thinking about it if if it if it goes tits up because if it goes tits up

Then we'll we'll worry about that when we come to it

But I'm not going to think about the effect of

How that would have on the channel if they've people have got invested in certain characters because I just don't

I think that's that constructive to think about what makes you think in 2026 that people still don't think it's a real job

I don't I don't think

I mean, I know a lot of people think that it is

But I I feel like there's always going to be a contingent of people that think it's not really a real job

You know because even even when you're down at the pub with your mates and they ask you

Oh, what what what jobs have you done? And I say, oh, I've done youtube and tip. I was like, no

What actual jobs have you done? It's like I feel like

Even though it earns money people are never going to equate it to a real job

Well, some people won't but

I just I don't think there's any wrong with that. I don't really bother me because they don't think it's hard

Do you think there's a degree of no one actually realizes the hours put into the things that are being done on the channel?

Possibly

Possibly, but I feel like it's just the image of it really like

You know filming yourself and it just doesn't seem like you know, it's it's not like I'm

Waking up super early. I'm back breaking myself doing like manual labor on on a building site when they

You know when people like that you a manual labor, you know

Jobs like whether it's a you know builder or a plumb or whatever

They're probably looking at it go. That's like an easy

I'd do that on what I do that on my on my weekends, mate

That's that's that's that's a bit of fun

But what they won't see is the editing the camera angles making sure that it's all sort of excruciatingly

Like a thought about every single shot and every single, you know part of the part of the content

But I don't I don't think there's a facility a problem with that

Like I don't really mind that some people don't think it's a job at the end of the day

I'm I'm making a living out of it and I enjoy it. So that's all I care about really

Take us through then a little bit of a project like the caddy behind the scenes the stuff that the people wouldn't necessarily see

That have tuned into you engaging with you

But they're things they don't see that goes into making a 35 minute video about about that

I mean, how many parts has that been four three at the minute? Yeah, three. Yeah, three three parts

fourth part parts coming out soon

But I think the the big thing that people do not think about when they're watching the content is the organization

It requires so with that first caddy video which did 1.2 mil views, which is absolutely smashed it like that that video to me was such a

such a like a

Breath of fresh I was like, oh my god, we can go in this direction

But the things that the people wouldn't have seen was, you know, we had to firstly plan right

I want to do a caddy. What engine swap can I do? What engine stops even feasible?

I'm trying to look at people who have done it before see if I can get some advice

um, and there's a guy called

Dan who did the wiring for that who really helped me out. He said, you know, this is how you do it

You can literally just buy this car. You can use these engine mounts. You can use these drive shafts

I can wire it up for you

You need to buy the the petrol fuel system if your van's a diesel which it was so he

Again, I I often reach out to people who have done it before who know what to do and say look

Mate, can you just give me the lowdown on this? How does it? How does this work? And then you've got to not only

Plan that and say right. This is the avenue. We're going to go down, but we're also going to

We've also got to buy this find an Audi a3 for example find one this one was in

Uh, university. What's the university up north? Good university top three. What's it called?

Durham Durham

That's it. So Durham. So I had to I had to go to Durham to pick up the a3

I had to go pick up the caddy, which was more local and slow

lovely place to pick up a van

And yeah, you got to get these two cars together and then you got to figure out how it all works

It's the first time I've done it. So a lot of people don't see the organization beside of it

But for a project like the fusion when we're going to get put the engine and we're doing all sorts of mods

You've got to think right flywheel clutch itb's exhaust manifold. Are we going to do 2.3 bottom end?

Where can we get one from? How does it work? Can you just make the two engines together?

This is all the stuff I'm thinking about how to actually do the content because on the camera when you're watching the video

It's like, oh, it just goes straight on

But there's so much research that goes into it and I know Chris has the exact same thing with his channel

It's chris licks. I'm talking about

He obviously does his team of body kits and he has he does a lot of modifying in his videos too

And there's a lot of research that goes into like finding out what you need to make a certain idea come to life

So is that your evenings? Oh, mate 100% it's always on ebay getting you know, which part do I need to buy?

And that's the a lot of the time

Consume that people don't really see do you ever buy stuff that doesn't fit and it doesn't make it in the videos all the time

All the time we buy so much stuff

And then and then oftentimes like for example with the caddy

We bought a center console which you've already seen the one we've put in it's like got an armrest on it

But we bought another one before that and we didn't realize that you had to cut out a little bit of the caddies sort of

I don't know what to call it's like where the sort of separation between

The back and the front seats is like a little metal lip you've got to cut a bit of that out

But I was like to make that center console for how do I bloody make this fit?

You know, I've got a

I've got a cut out and I ended up cutting the center console completely ruining it not realizing I had to cut the metal

So things like that happen all the time, but it's just the game at the end of the day

What is it the most valuable skill you've learned is that you use a lot of the times now in your video over the last like

Two years I'd say there's two that spring to mind

It's the mechanical skill

And in that I sort of include not only like the spandering and the actual physically getting on the car and working on it

But also

Knowing what to buy because it's different like if I if I said to someone who hadn't got any mechanical experience

Oh, yeah, buy all the bits we need for an engine

Is it if I said buy all the bits we need for an engine swap ben and you'd be like

By this tiny amount of people that have written that k20s don't fit

It's I've jet skied

This is it

And you but like what else so there's a there's a skill in just knowing what to buy and knowing what things you need to do it

So there's the mechanical side, but then there's also the editing is a real skill

And I feel like it's just gradually improved over time

It's just gradually got better and better and that's what's really leveled up the videos

I think as well. So it's the editing and the mechanical side

I'm the presenting's always sort of come naturally to me because I've been I've always been quite sort of a loud

upgoing character, but

The editing and the mechanical side wasn't natural and I didn't know what I was doing before I started and those are two skills

I've really

sort of

Got better at I do. Do you actively

Watch every video that the top boys drop

When I say the top boys what I mean because there's so many channels

What you're doing is incredible the bit subscribers you built is incredible

But the channels that are like one million plus that you look up to you talk about

Do you actively watch every video they drop? Not every single video

I'd say I'd say I watch pretty much everyone the maths videos

Um, I watch pretty much not all of them, but pretty much all of martin cans. I watch all the chrisses

I watch all the tdc's

Those are the channels that I really like look out for their videos. So I'd say yes

Do you ever get these moments where you're like I'd love to include that style?

That's such a good idea

But if I do that that's going to be too close to what they do and like have these men

Yes

And have these mental battles that what should I do for my content to make jack mcneal jack mcneal

So that it doesn't become inspired by x y z is that always quite a tight battle to run

I feel like there's nothing wrong with looking at what someone's doing well and taking aspects of their content

For example, whether it is with matt how he's got so many good characters

If I introduce you some good characters to mine, it's not copying

But if I then went and said if I just you know, you know copy word for word or I don't know

Then I feel like that crosses the line. So

I feel it as a balance you can take inspiration from people and take, you know, what aspects they're doing well

and try and emulate it with your own content, but

I feel like there's a there's a line somewhere, but

Who are the channels you watched growing up before you even started on your journey?

I actually weirdly I watched strad man like I watched strad man before I went to yeah when I was in school

I used to watch strad man and and

I still watch his the occasional video of his and it's it's been crazy to see his journey

You know going from like an Audi TT to his garage house garage build and car elevator

You know, oh, yeah, Koenigsegg like that's been crazy to see. He's a child

Like I actually didn't I can't think of anyone that's around now that I watched

When I was younger apart from him

What do you love about about him? What is it that drew drew to like his content? I don't know

I think it was just I think it was just his his car collection and just like he's he's got he's very obviously passionate and enthusiastic about it

And I don't know I just I just really liked his vlogs and it was it was actually another thing is that it was quite

It was quite short and snappy. It wasn't like, you know

Don't get me wrong the hour long videos like when you're watching, you know, I'm at armstrong hour long video

That's just so engaging because of the progress they make but with strad man's content. I think

Because it's it's like a daily vlog or like not maybe not daily

But it's like a vlog style short snappy like this is what we're doing with the cars and it's engaging to watch for that

But I couldn't watch probably an hour long strad man video

So I think they're the short and snappiness of the content the cars that he had the progress he was making

I remember he did his his twin turbo Lamborghini Giardo, which went completely tits up and that was and that was you know

I mean, I felt felt for him, but it was entertaining to watch

So so, yeah, I don't know probably probably I'll just say that

I would love to do a thing is I wouldn't know what I'd do because the cars in the us are so different

Like what none of these cars you could build in the us

I mean the honda and the honda jazz they do have they call it the fit

I'm not sure if they have caddies. They definitely don't have fusions. I know that

And while the serra the uk didn't have either but that's a japan only car

But so there's lots of cars up there, which I wouldn't even know what to do

But then you've got the ls the ls engines of v8 and you could do sort of builds like that

But I would love to do it one day is a big part of your audience japanese

No, I don't they can't understand it. Can they they do speak very good english a lot of them

I just come back from korea and I was

Once again, I think as english and we get these moments in our life where we realize

How everyone else is

Everyone languages

The french all learn english the germans all the germans really don't even know english after time and it's like

And we are so bad. We're like, oh, I don't know

I was wondered kind of what made up because your cars are different and then I guess a lot of people would have gone

Oh, yeah, like I'm thinking when I drive down the the road in la or something like that

Of the kind of cars that pass me and it's like mustang chevy

Mustang truck so that's what I mean. It's very different to what I do

So I don't know how it would work, but I'm sure you could make something work

And it would be a good way to expand the audience

But we have a very prominent second country that watch the channel obviously uk is the main one

But you have a very problem. Let's see if you can guess what it is

English speaking is it european?

No, so it's english speaking and it's not america

Wow, it's very weird. I didn't expect it to be australia. Nope

Don't want to put your imagery

Yeah, South africa is it weird that is very unusual because they have a very similar modifying scene out there

The reason I said australia is because I sometimes see my mighty car mods comment on some of these videos

I know the guys actually do enjoy the podcast and when they if they come here lads like come come to the van

But that's why I said it because I thought mods australia. Maybe it's that yeah

No, it's it's south africa, which is which is not one I would expect but I get like so many like greetings from south africa

We love your videos. I'm like, oh, that's so cool. I've never been but

But yeah, it's it's interesting, isn't it like when you look at those analytics like where like what make up your audience is

Because you can really get an idea of like the average person that the watches your videos

So maybe not the us but maybe there's other countries that you could go to to actually do a build in the future

100% it's gonna it's gonna happen, but I want to this year my main focus is

Really getting on weekly content no excuses every tuesday we post

Whether that's on the second channel or the main channel obviously the main channel

I want to keep the quality up

So if the main channel video isn't ready and it's out of our control and we can't just you know

Do late nights to get it done whether we're waiting for a part or whatever

We still post on the second channel and I want to focus on that for this year and see where it leaves us with brands

With views with subscribers with growth and then once you've got a really good solid year under our belt

Then we can

Decide okay. What else do you want to do? Do we want to go to?

America or wherever else to go and do something like that

Because it would be cool. Did did you not get to a video a week last year? No talk us through how many videos actually made up the channel

Not many because I'm such a perfectionist with that with the content and also I force myself to give people a

Like a satisfying end product and sometimes with modifying that's really hard like with the first videos a lot

you know youtube back in the day used to be

I bought a car

You spent two or three grand in my case with lots of my cars are that much

But even if someone else you spent a 10 grand car a 50 grand car

That's not enough for a youtube video these days. You can't just say I bought a new car

Here it is. Let me walk you around it. Let me go drive it. That is not enough. So what

What I've got to do is buy the car

Buy all the bits I need to do the engine swap

Which I've never done before

And then do the engine swap get it started and get it driving all in the first video that I've introduced a project

And that's what formula worked with the caddy

It was like people don't really care that you bought a new car. You have to understand people watching they just want to be entertained

And don't get me wrong

Maybe back in the day it would have worked and people would be entertained by that

But now people just want they want to see something

That maybe hasn't been documented like that before and they want to see something

You know that really entertains them a transformation from this boring start point or this with obviously the crash damage boys

They're starting off with a crash car. They want to make in the first video

They want to make a load of progress in the first video with me. I want to get the engine sort done

Started and driving in the first video. That's how you get the views, but it's hard. I kid is really hard

But that's because then you get that as I call it dmo moment because I think he's basically copyrighted them

That's what you get from doing the engine stops right like I remember watching the first caddy video going down the road

Because that's the bit you know when I say like passion and magic and sheer joy

I think that's when the audience like it's almost like a blue tick. It's like, oh, they're legit

I buy I buy into this. They're not just doing this for the video views or any financial or anything like

That's because they actually love that and I think that's the bit that actually shines for you

Love it when when you post a video and what they like all youtubers know what their viewers want to see

I think well not what no, maybe not but not me with the podcast. I have absolutely no idea

But with me, I know that my audience wants to see the car done and driving

And they want to see me enjoying it the finished product because that's what they're clicking on the video for

they're not clicking on the video to see us mount up the engine or you know or

Put a drive shaft in or whatever the hell we're doing

They want to see the car running and drive it and they want to see the process that it took to get there in a really quick

Snappy succinct edit with good narration good music choice and you know all that sort of stuff

So I know that's what they want to see so I'm going to strive to make sure that all of my videos have a payoff

Whether it's with the interior video on the fusion making so that they can see the finished product of the interior

Over it's the paint job video that we've done on the van where they get to see the van at its end product

Like you know, you know

I could have ended the video after we did the paint job and the van still needed to be assembled

But I didn't do that because I know people want to see what the van looks like with all the bumpers and the

In the headlights and the engine all of it back in they want to see what it looks like

So I push to try and get to that point in my videos and that's why

Sometimes the content isn't as

Frequent or wasn't as frequent last year

But now we've got the second channel we we can post some more relaxed laid back lower effort videos if we need

And it keeps people engaged and invested in the channel and like, you know, or what's the update on everything

What's jack doing here with with ollie and toby what are they doing?

Yeah

From a financial business part of it as well

That's a big deal right because I'm imagining if you took every single one of your videos and wrote them down and then underneath had

cost to make video

Profit on video

Sometimes I'm just happy if it breaks even

Do you if you did that would it be impossible to run the channel?

You actively like that first video where you have to do the engine swap get the vehicle do everything you actively like

Okay, that is going to make a loss, but I should be okay on the project. Oh, yeah

That's that's that's a big thing. I don't I do not think about

As long as I have enough money in the bank to pay for that video and maybe the next one as well

I don't think about

Cost like because it's all so unknown. You can say. Oh, I guess it gets 200 000 views and at this rpm. We earn this but

It could do a half a million. It could do 100k. You don't know so with me

I'm just focused on trying to make the best possible content. What money do I need? Have I got that in the bank?

Yes, I have let's do this video

Um, so yeah, I don't run it like a business

I feel like that's been the death of so many youtube channels if you didn't mean katharot was an example of that

I mean, I'm actually quite like, you know, the guys running it at the minute

But obviously that they were on such a hiatus with obviously alex and all the boys running it getting really good views

Because they had the passion there

They had the investment in the videos but as soon as that stopped that investment stopped some private equity came in and said

No, you've got to have you can't spend a hundred pound on that car

You can't do it because we were worried about the bottom line post the video and it will still earn money

You don't need to do that. That's the death of the channel. So for me. I don't try and run it like that

All I'm looking at is the numbers how many of you the views growing or the subscribers growing is the channel growing

You can make money later. You can make profits, you know

When your channel gets, you know averaging millions of views and doing all that sort of stuff right now

The focus is on growth and making sure, you know, more people see the videos and enjoy them

It's so funny how many people

Are obsessed with the idea the concept of starting a youtube channel and as you said sometimes if if that youtube channel is doing

What you do for example

You have to break past that hurdle of getting the unit getting the cars getting the overheads

But there's also so many similarities to a lot of people that do a lot of

Normal jobs that you wouldn't realize I sometimes think with the van that i'm you know doing the podcast in the van here

That i'm like a digital tradesman

Like I leave the house in the morning in the van I come out I set up I talk

I come back have to get the edits done have to get everything done as part of it

And I think what difference is there really between the plumber that's also had a similar journey that day

And me the difference is the fact that it's online. It's digital the internet

But he has still has to do creativity to overcome a problem

I still have to have creativity to overcome a problem

And I think that there's so many things that people don't necessarily realize about the thing of being

On camera youtube with this type of job. Yeah

The reality is it's a little bit different to what I think comes across

Yeah, absolutely. And you know people probably don't envision me sitting down doing my bookkeeping

But that's what I was doing this morning

I was I had my my excel spreadsheet out and I had my receipts out and I was like right take a picture of that

So you put it on hub doc

Then I've got to make sure that all my my invoices are sent out from zero

I've got to do this

People don't think i'm doing that people don't think you know i'm sat looking

I mean they probably do sat thinking looking for car parts

They probably do imagine me doing that but there's a load of different sides to it the editing like honestly the amount of time

I'm sat on my desk editing again. I'm a perfectionist with it. So I'm there for a long time making sure the video is good

People see us having fun working on the cars, but there's a load behind the scenes that doesn't get shown

You also seem to keep a lot of the cars that you end up working on building

That's changing going forward

Because because I've realized that to make again again got two new guys on board paying for those is going to be sort of

You know my top priority

I'm selling the Aston so i'm in the process of selling that

I haven't put it up yet

But we've got the pictures and that will be going for sale if I get the money that I want for it

It will sell but if someone offers me 18 grand i'm not going to sell it so that's yet to be seen but then

With the fusion i'm not sure if you've seen but we

We did this video with an mr2 and a lotus lots of weird noises going on

But we did this video with an mr2 and a lotus and we started

The competition website ultimate competitions

Which is where it's basically my my own competition company where I can

Allow one of the audience to win one of the cars and that helps make it financially viable

So that's going to be a big avenue of the business going forward, you know the forward fusion

Okay, keep it a secret guys, but i'm planning to give that to one of the audience as well after that's done

You know building that site was an expense, but I think that's going to really help make the content more sustainable going forward is

Not keeping all of them

You know the only two that I really want but three that I really want to keep is I want to keep the sarah the van and borris

The fusion of the jazz might go so if you've got an offer for me

The jazz see I thought that was a future forever jack mcneil

I don't know. I don't know. I just think is that they all feel like that. So I've got to be I've got to be like

Okay, this one has to go. I can't keep them all I have to be sensible with it

I've got like again two lads my responsibility to make sure they get paid and

You know, it's not you know, it's not like back in the day where I'm just doing silly borris for a little laugh and

Like now i'm running a business. It's serious. I've got to you know, be sensible with it

So some of the things that I love like my astin like the jazz like the fusion

They're gonna have to go

Um, and then when we build another car that might have to go, you know all that sort of stuff

So it's sad in a way, but also if it's what I have to do to keep doing what I love and I can still keep some of them

It's not like I've got to get rid of all of them

Then I'm happy and is that to pursue the dream of that million subscriber. Yeah

I want to get to a million. That's you know, I want to but not only what I want to get to a million

I want it to be a million subs where we'll get we're averaging a million views

You know, that's what I mean the views actually is almost more important

It is more important than the subscribers, but the subscribers is a nice milestone

Um, but I that's what I want is you know, a lot of times you see channels that I've got a million subs that you know

Get 50 100,000 views a video. So that would be a pretty sad future as well

So I want it to be the views and the subs and that's that's the goal the way you talk about it now

I could imagine hitting it

and

If it were like today

There'd be a party and balloons and all your friends would be invited and it would kick off

Do you think that'd be the case when you get that?

I don't know

Because I used to think about about 100,000 subs and when I hit that I was like, whoa. Yeah, let's go cool

Right, what are we doing?

Do you think that's the nature of

Doing this kind of work that with a lot of the other jobs that we mentioned

That we kind of translate that there are things that cross over between this life and this life

But one of the things with youtube is the goalposts to keep moving

And the ceiling is so much higher than so many other things that you can do because the ceiling really is mr. Beast

Yeah

So it's like the the the gap between there and there is absolutely enormous

And I think that's one of the things that people don't realize is it can be so

Mentally taxing to sometimes always be chasing goalposts moving, but then that's the thing

It could be you could see it as mentally taxing or you could see it as

Motivating and exciting like I'm sure when I hit a million. I want to hit five

Do you know so if yeah when I hit a million not if when you know, I'm sure when I hit that that milestone

I want to hit five and that's totally fine. But that's I think

Remaining hungry and remaining, you know wanting to chase that next milestone, you know, I mean

A few months ago. I spent some some time with Matt and his team

Doing a video which hasn't been released yet, but very excited to see it come out

But the way he talks like we can get 10 million views of video

It can be it can happen

We can do it like there's we just need to get to this point and do this and then, you know, 30 million views of video

Like why can't we do that like they just

There's never like they're always hungry and always

Excited to push to that next goal whatever that is and and that's that's a mindset that I've tried to adopt as well

Do you ever worry about the new cars that are coming out today providing you a bigger challenge in the future?

Or do you still think you'll make them interesting? That's a 35 year old car

I will be able to make content on the era of cars that I like for for as long as I like I feel like new cars for me

Generally do not interest me in the slightest. I think there's too many computers

I think everything's got every nice car is a twin turbo v8 these days. Like there's no naturally aspirated v10

I mean, okay, there probably will be some that people will mention

But generally everything seems to be hybrid everything seems to be

A touchscreen where you got to turn your ac up using a touchscreen. I mean, who thought that

And I just don't like them and they're so complicated to work on

I mean, again, you watch some of the car rebuilders videos. They got to put a bumper on to start the engine

I mean, what the hell you could literally strip that sara back to

Nothing, but the wiring loom the fuel line

And the engine itself and it would start

But these cars these new cars are just so over complicated and then you're wrong

They're the odd ones that are cool like the gi yaris. I still think is really cool

and

You know, there's there's the odd car, which I think is all right

But old cars for me that to that 1995 to 2010 era of cars for me is the sweet spot

Maybe even a little bit older, but obviously the sara is a 91

Do you think you could achieve is I just spent some time in the little Renault 5 turbo?

I really enjoyed it. I had it for two days

I enjoyed it more than I thought I would it really impressed me

Do you think you could

We're at a point in automotive

Where we could get a car like that that is trying its absolute best to still appeal to petrol heads and be good

To actually do is the is it the Renault 5 that's electric? Yeah

Think unless I think unless laws change and the whole

uber uber safety environment

Save the planet mentality unless that changes cars are always going to be boring in the future

That's it's a depressing thing

But the good news is that we've got so many so many cars that are being kept in the road

Name me a list name me a list of the stuff that goes through your head that you'd love to do because I mean you were the king of coming up with

They never made a carry out. I'll make a carry out. They never made a type R jazz

I'll make a type R jazz. There's a few ones. Give me a list. So have you seen voxel or gila?

No, if you're on your edit, you'll flash it on the screen right now. Um, if I can even find it

It looks honestly, you'll laugh when you see it. It's literally like there was derpy looking car

And it's a voxel and it didn't have a vxr version

Make a vxr version of that. That's one idea reno modus

It is the ugliest looking

Like family car, but imagine that in liquid yellow with a clio 182

Engine in it to clear want it to engine making an rs modus or you know, whatever multiple. That's cool

Multiplutter bath. That's one that my audience are dying to see. They're always like, I'll make a multiplier bath. That would be cool

There's a million ideas transporter are again following on from the caddy. I we could do a transporter transit rs

Put a five but but there's so many you can do and I as far as I'm concerned

There's infinite content and I can keep improving on those areas that I've said editing storytelling characters

You know the amount of work that gets done in the video

They're presenting and there's so many ways that I can improve not just

You know doing bigger and better projects

Do you think that's because you've hit the nail on the head which is doing accessible cars to the wider audience?

I do agree with that and don't give me wrong the odd car

If we have the odd car, that's nice, you know, that's fine, but I think an important staple of my channel is

Relatability everybody was always commenting about jackalove like I can see myself doing this project

You know like this you've inspired me to modify my caddy because I've already got one and that's why a lot of people like it

My current mindset again, I don't want to ever box myself in and say I'm never going to do an expensive car because I think that's

I don't even that's that's a wise thing to say but

My mindset right now is people love relate the relatability. They love the cheaper cars

I'm going to keep doing that and there's so many project ideas that I've got to do that. So

Yeah, I think that answers it's quite nice because there's so many youtubers

I do know that worry about not having builds in the future. I mean, I'm not one of them

We're kind of doing everything because yeah, I mean between matt and chris. I mean, how many

Supercars are there left to do? I mean, they've done pretty much everything. I mean, I don't know but they've done loads of them

So yeah, I do see that but with me there's like because no one's really been weird enough to chase this

What were your audience like when you showed your Aston because they get buying an Aston Martin huge party your journey

Tick the box. Yeah done it. You'll set the next goal once you've got rid of it

Yeah, and do the next bit of working business tip the next goal, but that was so

Not Jack McNeil. No, it wasn't but again like one day

I want to own a Lamborghini and I know everybody watching this has seen a youtuber a million times buy a Lamborghini

They're probably think oh god not another one

But like it is a goal and I do think having a Ferrari or a Lambo one day would be great and I might do a video showing it

but what I'm not going to do is

I mean unless there's some real I don't know unless there's some really ambitious project out there, which I've got but

My the baseline and the the foundation of my youtube will always be cheap cars

I I think but I don't want to box myself in when I say that but

There might be the odd the odd car which I show as like a like a personal goal of mine that I that I want and I don't

For my audience really minds that when I introduced the Aston I told the story about how you know, I had a sort of

I had these brand deals going on on my tiktok. I had a specific EA deal

which was a very nice and very nice deal which actually pretty much paid for the whole deposit on the Aston and

you know

I had this S this the social media marketing agency which I ran where I'd like sort of very similar to yours but on a very small scale

where I sort of made companies

I made their content for them and posted it for them. I did that for the exhaust company

So I had this story of like me working really hard for this car and working to be able to pay the deposit on the finance and

People didn't mind it because you know, I told the story and it

It's it's not actually that unattainable. I don't think it's a 20 20 20 grand car now

They're not actually not not in the realms of likes cars like that. It's not actually that bad

I put 10 grand down on it and I told the story and people didn't mind it

I feel lucky if I do that again with a future car

I don't think people have a problem with that either but as long as my base content

The people love the relatability doesn't change. I think that's the key. How much do you care about the comment section?

I actually don't

Because you're talking there about how much people loving and how much it matters and all the rest of it

So how much does it affect you when you see things?

The positive affects me

But I try not to let the negative affect me because obviously do you get much negative?

Everybody gets negative everybody gets it

Some videos will have so little that you some videos have more than others

And actually, but there's a little story here because I posted a video with my vaults wagon fox, right?

Had the clunkiest gearbox ever this car clunk is very hard to shift fast

And I did it took a video to santa pod and I couldn't shift it fast because it just a clunky gear

I can shift fast another cars

But anyways, I got rinsed in the comments and that did affect me. I was like, oh my god

I'm getting ripped and shreds here, but

generally the general day-to-day videos when it's just like

The last five or 10 percent comments being negative

I genuinely don't care because I know that it's just it's the game. There's always going to be someone that's worrying about something

I've not painted that I've not cleaned that I've not done this right. I've not done that right

But that's the game if you haven't got negative comments the the worst scenario would be people not caring no comments

You know imagine that

There's I'd much rather have a portion of my comments being negative because that's shown

It's that shows that it's going to a wider audience who have never seen me before go who the hell is this guy?

He's doing it wrong. You know, so I really don't mind about the negative

I actually almost see it as a positive sometimes. It's like, you know

That's showing my my videos to a new audience

So what has been the absolute toughest part of the last two years of the youtube journey?

I mean, I know what it is, but I can't basically okay. I'll so

So my mate one of my good mates jav who was working with me

Decided to leave and that's totally fair enough and anyone's like probably you know, it wasn't right for the job

He wasn't he's not as like calm mad as you or you or I are so it's sort of understand

It's sort of understandable and he wanted to go back into his career where she had his degree and which totally makes sense

But that was a hard time for me because again, I had some other news where like, you know video wasn't being posted

I think literally the same day and I was like

God, this is like feels like the world's falling apart right now. You know, I've not got any videos to post

I've spent all my money on this and my employees even I was like bloody hell, but

I now I'm in such a good place with these new guys that have got on board and with the content that we're making with the new schedule that

When when you go through a moment like that you just have to tell yourself like it will

Like this will pass we'll be back on top of the world soon. Like you just got to keep going going through it. So

So, yeah, I'd say there's but there's been hard moments and it definitely hasn't been plain sailing as you know

It is up and down with the emotions and with with the success and whatever but

You have to you have to keep your head up and I had a chat with my dad that night when all that happened

I was like bloody hell dad. This is happen. That's happened and he's like

Yo, McNeil like come on head up and I'm like, okay. All right

And you know, just you just got to keep going. Is that you go to when you need to console in your channel?

Yeah, if you didn't have those people around you, would you be able to do all the rest of it below?

It'd be tough

I mean, I suppose I'd have to but

It'd be tough

Well, I think that's given a brilliant insight into the life of Jack McNeil everything that's happened since 2020 when your story started

And everything that's happened since there another story that started for starting your youtube channel from 2023

So mr. McNeil, thank you so much for sitting in this van once again

I hope that you can snip out a piece of this conversation for your million subscriber video within the next few years

Absolutely looking forward to watching it. So thank you so much. Good. Good. See you

About this episode

Jack McNeill shares insights into his latest van build and the challenges of creating engaging automotive content on YouTube. He discusses the balance between passion and profitability, the importance of relatability in his projects, and the emotional rollercoaster of video performance. With a focus on modifying accessible cars, Jack reflects on his journey, the lessons learned from both successful and underperforming builds, and his aspirations for future projects. The episode captures the essence of pursuing automotive creativity while navigating the complexities of content creation.

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Original notes

Why do vans work so well on YouTube — and what does it really cost to build them?In this episode of Road To Success, I sit down with Jack McNeill, one of the most consistent and honest creators in the automotive YouTube space, to break down why van builds perform, what’s coming next, and the pressure most people never see.Jack opens up about:Why “everybody knows a Caddy” — and why that mattersTurning everyday work vans into high-performing YouTube buildsThe strategy behind sticking with what worksHis next insane van build ideasThe real cost of builds and chasing viewsWhy some videos nearly broke him mentally and financiallyThe responsibility that comes with employing a teamWhy YouTube success is earned, not viral luckThis isn’t just a conversation about cars.It’s about building something sustainable, understanding your audience, and surviving the pressure that comes with growth.If you’re building a channel, a business, or just love automotive content — this episode will give you real perspective.Don’t forget to subscribe to our channel for more exciting content about your favourite shows and celebrities. Hit the bell icon to stay updated on all our latest episodes👍 Like, Comment, and Share this episode. Join our discussion in the comments sectionCheck out Tweak: https://www.tweakuk.com/🔗 Follow Us:Instagram: @Roadtosuccessofficialpodcast@benedictfowlerTimestamps:00:00 – Trailer01:05 – Why vans are so relatable02:30 – Performance vans vs normal builds03:55 – Why audiences buy into van projects05:20 – Wanting the car finished and driving06:45 – “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”08:10 – Why vans are doing so well on the channel09:30 – Jack’s next van build ideas11:05 – Thinking beyond just one model (Transit, Transporter, etc.)12:40 – The real cost of YouTube car builds14:15 – Spending thousands on every project16:00 – When videos underperform17:30 – The mental hit of a “10 out of 10”19:10 – Learning from videos that don’t land20:40 – YouTube vs TikTok: earned vs viral22:30 – Why YouTube feels more sustainable24:10 – Employing a team and real responsibility26:00 – Pressure people don’t see behind the scenes27:45 – Loving the process despite the stress29:15 – Why Jack keeps pushing forward30:40 – What success actually looks like now32:10 – Final thoughts on sticking with vansContact: [email protected]

Road To Success with Benedict Fowler

Tweak Marketing

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