Tim Willis is a popular guy in Cleveland. People from all over the world have visited his monster truck yard to see his mustard-yellow and ketchup-red monster trucks and race cars and the giant robots that overlook his Fairfax neighborhood. 

Tim Willis’ monster truck yard sits right off the corner of East 83rd Street and Central Avenue, but you can see the bright red and yellow trucks all the way down the street from Cedar Avenue. You can’t miss them. 

“Those are my signature colors,” Willis said, explaining the choice. “Building stuff is a lot of blood, sweat and tears. … When you’re working with metal, you’re gonna get cut. You’re gonna get hurt. You’re gonna bleed, you know? When you start off, everybody yellow. They innocent, you know? But when you get to working, you’re gonna bleed, and I bled a lot building these robots. A lot.”

Tim Willis’ monster truck yard on E. 83rd St. in Fairfax. It’s right off the corner of 83rd and Central, but you can see it almost all the way down the street from Cedar.
Tim Willis’ monster truck yard on East 83rd Street in Fairfax. It’s right off the corner of 83rd and Central, but you can see it almost all the way down the street from Cedar. 

Building his first race car

Willis started working with machines as a teenager because he wanted to race cars. He built his first race car at 18 years old. 

Willis talked about building his first car inside his house 😲, and how he had to cut a wall out of the house to get it out! Listen here:    

Tim Willis walks through his monster truck yard.
Tim Willis walks through his monster truck yard.

Willis was inspired to start building robots by cartoons and TV shows he’d watched as a kid.

“I always wanted to make a robot,” he said. “You know, coming up, we used to see little programs on TV. I came up in the ‘60s. We used to see ‘8th Man,’ ‘The Giant Robot,’ ‘Johnny Socko,’ and all that old stuff. All these images kept gathering up in my brain, I kept remembering different things. We had these fighting [toy] robots called Rock ’Em, Sock ’Em Robots … and they look basically like the robot I [built] up there, you know? So I got all these little robots from coming up as a child that I remembered in my head, pictures of robots, I said, ‘I’m gonna build me a robot.’”

Tim has a centaur robot in his workshop. He welded the feathers onto the centaur’s wings one at a time. He put two hydraulic cylinders under each wing to lift it up so the wings actually flap. And there’s the controller he uses to make the wings move.
Willis has a centaur robot in his workshop. He welded the feathers onto the centaur’s wings one at a time. He put two hydraulic cylinders under each wing to lift it up so the wings actually flap. And there’s the controller he uses to make the wings move.

Check out this video to see how the wings work:

Willis uses scrap and sheet metal from a local retailer to build all his machines, from a 14-gauge thickness down to 1/4 inch, depending on what he wants to create.

Tim said he studied all the parts of the human body to help him learn how to build his humanoid robots. Here’s all the anatomy charts on the walls of his office.
Willis said he studied all the parts of the human body to help learn how to build his humanoid robots. Here’s all the anatomy charts on the walls of his office.

Movable robots

Willis has his two largest robots displayed outside. They are the first machines you see when you walk into his yard. All his robots have movable parts. He uses a video-game controller he programmed himself to make the parts move.    

Tim built a two-headed dragon robot, it’s the first thing you see when you come into the yard. The heads move and their mouths open! The black box on the dragon’s tail is the controller that makes it move.
Willis built a two-headed dragon robot — it’s the first thing you see when you come into the yard. The heads move and their mouths open! The black box on the dragon’s tail is the controller that makes it move.

Willis has built several race cars, a monster van, a monster truck, and a soap box car, all painted in his signature yellow and red. Visitors can even go in some of the cars and trucks and check out the insides. 

Tim’s monster van is open for visitors to go inside. Here’s the operating system he built for the giant wheels.
Willis’ monster van is open for visitors to go inside. Here’s the operating system he built for the giant wheels. 

Working with students

He works with local school districts to let students come through the yard and learn about his work. Most of the students are interested in STEM careers (science, technology, engineering and math). Willis taught himself in all of these subjects after leaving school in the ninth grade because, he said, “I already knew what I wanted to do with my life, and I’m never gonna forsake it.”

“What’s important in engineering [is] to learn math,” he said. “I use algorithm theory, A squared plus B squared equals C squared, that’s important.”

He even built a soap box car!
He even built a soap box car.

Tim keeps the projects he’s working on indoors in a workshop he built for himself in the back of the yard. He has two robots and a centaur back there, plus all the tools, parts and machinery he uses to put his creations together.   

Tim has a CNC machine inside his shop. He can program it to make the same part the exact same way over and over. So if he needs to make four knees for his robot, he can make one himself and then program the machine to make the other three and save himself some work, but Tim says he prefers to do everything by hand.
Willis has a CNC machine inside his shop. He can program it to make the same part the exact same way over and over. So if he needs to make four knees for his robot, he can make one himself and then program the machine to make the other three and save himself some work, although he says he prefers to do everything by hand.

Willis said he is always trying to challenge himself and offered this advice for kids who are interested in building machines like him: “Things don’t always work, and I like that. If I decide something in my head and put it together and it works, but it don’t work the way I want it to work, you know, or it breaks, or something ain’t right, great. Take it apart and start all over again. I’m gonna get it right the second time. That’s when you can learn by your mistakes. That’s how I learn more.”

This is a robot still in the works, and the head that will go on to it. Tim makes all the small details himself cutting the metal by hand with a circular saw.
This is a robot still in the works, and the head that will go on to it. Willis makes all the small details himself cutting the metal by hand with a circular saw.

Come for a visit

Willis lives around the corner from the yard and can see the whole thing from his house. He has chain-link fences around the yard. But he said he doesn’t have any issues with crime. He said people in Cleveland have respect for the work he does and leave his property alone. 

He welcomes visitors during daylight hours, usually 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Just call 216-630-8982 and let him know you want to visit. Parents are allowed, but they should be on their best behavior!

Check out Tim WIllis’ monster trucks on Instagram and Tik-Tok. Call him and let him know when you want to come out!
Check out Tim WIllis’ monster trucks on Instagram and Tik-Tok. Call him and let him know when you want to come out.
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Audio Producer (she/her)
I create audio stories meant to engage and inform people in a way that pushes beyond media stereotypes. I aim to build trust between local media and the community, striving to teach people “how” to think about life in Cleveland, not “what” to think.