‘Garage’ Turns Vehicles Into Beasts

Stand back: The “Monster Garage” is open. Lurking inside are powerful, mechanically altered machines that will never be for sale on a used-car lot.

“Monster Garage” is the Discovery Channel’s new four-part series, premiering with two episodes Sunday from 9 to 11 p.m. It concludes at the same time Monday.

The series features renowned custom motorcycle builder Jesse James of Long Beach as its host. James, who says he is a descendant of the Old West outlaw, rounds up a gang of mechanics, welders, hydraulics experts, painters and graphic artists for each vehicle transformation. He prods the group into completing the job in one week, offering expensive tool sets to all as an incentive.

You don’t have to be a mechanic or a blowtorch professional to enjoy the series. Its opening episode, titled “Ford Explorer/Garbage Truck,” has wide appeal. It is entertaining, with deadpan humor that borders on high camp.

At first glance, some members of James’ team, which includes a tattoo artist, look like they barely passed high school auto shop, but when they turn a 1993 Eddie Bauer Ford Explorer into a trash collector, equipped with a hydraulic system that powers a metal arm, a rooftop-hinged door and a trash-smashing compactor, they show imagination and ingenuity to rival NASA engineers.

The episode concludes with the Explorer challenging a 10-wheel L.A. city garbage truck to a trash-collecting duel.

The other installments focus on a limousine that becomes a fully functional fire engine with a pressure hose; a floating Volkswagen Beetle/swamp airboat; and a Mustang GT fitted with lawnmower blades that cut grass at 60 mph.