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1958 was the year Oldsmobile earned the nickname ChromeMobile, piling trim onto every surface of the lineup, but the real story was under the hood, where the 371-cubic-inch Rocket V8 came in three distinct states of tune from a mild 265-horsepower base version up to a rare 310-horsepower triple-carburetor option. This was also the year the entry-level 88 became the Dynamic 88, a name that stuck around for nearly a decade.
Every August, thousands of Mustang owners converge on Maple Grove Raceway for what’s billed as the World’s Largest One-Day Mustang Show – a single day that mixes drag strip runs, a swap meet, and six decades of Mustang history on one show field. By 2017 the event drew more than 1,400 cars and 5,000 spectators, all while raising money for Make-A-Wish. Here’s how a parking lot meet grew into one of the biggest single-day gatherings in Mustang history.
Mecum’s 2017 Kissimmee auction ran ten days, moved nearly 2,700 cars across the block, and closed with more than million in total sales. Headline results included a ,000 Maserati Ghibli Spider and a rare ,000 Tuxedo Black Corvette convertible, while online viewership set records of its own. Here’s a look back at the auction that traditionally sets the tone for the entire collector car year.
Hertz expected to rent out a couple hundred Shelby Mustangs in 1966. They ended up building 1,000 GT350H cars instead, and weekend racers famously returned them with welded-in roll bars. This is the story of the rental counter that accidentally created one of the most legendary Mustangs Shelby American ever built, and why clean survivors now sell for six figures at auction.
Spuds Garage built this 1969 Dodge Dart around a Hemi swap and gave it a name that tells you everything about how it drives: ‘Poison.’ The clip circulating is just a cold start and walkaround, no dyno pull or time slip attached, but the sound alone explains why A-body Hemi swaps have become one of the most sought-after builds in the Mopar world. Watch to hear what a properly dialed-in Hemi swap actually sounds like at idle.
Dodge charged nearly extra for the 426 Hemi option on the 1970 Charger R/T, a steep premium that scared off plenty of buyers who settled for a 440 instead. Those who paid up got 425 horsepower, a genuinely race-bred engine, and bragging rights over a car that helped Dodge log ten NASCAR wins that season. Here’s why the Hemi Charger remains one of the most sought-after muscle cars from Dodge’s golden era.
Every original 1977 Trans Am used in Smokey and the Bandit was destroyed after filming, leaving replicas as the only way to own a piece of the film’s legacy. Burt Reynolds commissioned his own painstaking recreation, drove it for tens of thousands of miles, and it later sold at auction for ,500 – with a similar Reynolds-owned replica later fetching over ,000. Here’s why collectors pay real money for a car that’s technically not the original.
Pro Street built its reputation on cars that looked streetable but hid a full drag-race combination underneath, and a 1969 Camaro SS claiming over 1,800 horsepower is a serious example of the genre. Tubbed rear quarters, a reinforced rear end, and a fuel cell in place of the stock tank are the usual signs of a build pushed this far.
Chevrolet and Dodge have been racing to out-power each other for over fifty years, and the Camaro ZL1 versus Challenger Hellcat rivalry is the latest chapter. The Hellcat’s supercharged V8 makes more horsepower, but the ZL1 counters with track-tuned suspension and adaptive dampers built to win where raw power alone can’t. It’s proof that even as the industry moves toward electrification, the old-fashioned muscle car horsepower war is still very much alive.
A 1967 Chevy C10 wasn’t built to be fast – Chevrolet’s second-generation Action Line trucks topped out around 325 horsepower from the factory. That hasn’t stopped builders from transforming these honest work trucks into genuine muscle car rivals, some packing twin-turbo LS power well past 1,000 horsepower under bodywork nobody would suspect. Here’s how a humble half-ton became one of the truck world’s favorite muscle car disguises.
A street lined with muscle cars turns into an impromptu burnout show in this raw, unedited clip — no host, no explanation, just tire smoke and V8 sound. 247 SIMRACING typically covers virtual racing, which makes this glimpse of real horsepower on real pavement something of a detour from their usual content. It’s the kind of unscripted street culture that happens at car meets everywhere, rarely captured this cleanly. Watch, and listen, to see why the sound alone is worth the two minutes.
Chrysler Nationals, better known as Chryslers at Carlisle, has grown into the largest single gathering of Mopar vehicles anywhere – nearly 3,000 cars spanning prewar sedans to modern Hellcats. Beyond the show field, an automotive flea market and car corral let enthusiasts hunt down rare parts and buy or sell project cars directly. It’s less a car show than an annual pilgrimage for anyone who’s ever chased a factory-correct Hemi or winged warrior.
A Firebird running twin 98mm turbochargers on a 622 cubic inch big block Chevy and claiming 3,000 horsepower sounds far-fetched until you see the hardware involved. Here’s how that combination compares to other extreme twin-turbo Firebird builds – some making a fraction of the claimed power – and what it actually takes to reach four-digit horsepower numbers with a big block this size.
A C7 Corvette-bodied Pro Mod producing an estimated 3,000-plus horsepower once trapped 249.49 mph in a stunning 5.73-second quarter-mile pass, a run publicized as a new world record for the class. NHRA’s Pro Mod record books have since been rewritten by even quicker cars, but this Corvette remains one of the benchmark runs that pushed the doorslammer class forward.