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1972 marked the final year of the Chevrolet Monte Carlo’s first generation, and though the SS badge had already been retired, the lineup still ranged from a mild 165-horsepower 350 V8 to a genuine 270-horsepower 454 big block. A new Cadillac-style grille and standard variable-ratio power steering rounded out the last update before a full redesign. More than 180,000 buyers still chose one that year. Read on to find out why this quiet swan song became one of Chevrolet’s best-selling coupes.
The 1967 Shelby GT350 rode on Ford’s newly widened Mustang body and added a real back seat, trading some of its earlier ferocity for genuine daily-driver comfort. It would also be the last GT350 built under Carroll Shelby’s direct personal oversight before Ford’s own team took over the line. Read on to see why fewer than 1,200 of these cars were ever built.
A 3.91 at the eighth-mile stripe on a drag radial that looks almost too small for the job isn’t something a stock small-block Mustang was ever meant to produce, but that’s exactly what Josh Klugger’s Fox Body delivered in qualifying. Behind that number sits a 526 cubic inch stroker short block, twin 102mm turbochargers, and a FuelTech FT500 engine management system working together to survive cylinder pressures the factory 302 was never designed for. Read on to find out what it actually takes to build a small block that can run numbers like that.
A first-generation Camaro that spent twenty years buried in a barn gets a second chance in this resurrection story, one rooted in a friendship that traces back to a 1979 magazine assignment in Escondido, California. What it takes to bring a car back from two decades of decay says as much about stubbornness as it does about mechanical skill. Read on to find out what actually happened when the engine turned over again.
This 1965 Ford Mustang Fastback started life with the mildest 289 V8 Ford offered, then got rebuilt with Trick Flow heads, an Edelbrock intake, and a fresh cam to make 330 horsepower on the dyno, more than even the rare factory HiPo version ever produced. The exotic European-inspired Fastback shape hides a genuinely modern small-block underneath. Read on to see how a basic A-code engine got transformed into something the factory never built.
On paper the 2016 Shelby GT350R had 21 more horsepower than the 2015 Camaro Z/28, which should have settled the argument before either car turned a wheel. The dyno told a different story: down low, the Chevrolet made almost a hundred more pound-feet of torque. Motor Trend took both to Chuckwalla Valley Raceway with Randy Pobst driving to find out which philosophy actually worked. Read on to find out which one walked away with the title.
This 1966 Chevrolet Bel Air looks like an anonymous fleet special, but buyers could order it with the RPO L35 396 Turbo-Jet V8 — rated 325 horsepower and 410 lb-ft of torque — the same engine family turning heads in the Impala SS and Corvette that year. Skip the badges and bright trim, and a Bel Air with a 396 and four-speed became one of the fastest sleepers on the street. Read on to find out why so few dealers ever built one this way.
Volvo’s S90 R-Design earned an unlikely muscle car nickname from reviewers, not because of raw power but because of a level of visual aggression rare for the brand – blacked-out trim, sport seats, and a genuinely provocative reworked front end. Underneath, the numbers stay modest: up to 232 horsepower and a 0-60 time around 6.7 seconds. Here’s why a Swedish sedan earned a nickname usually reserved for big-block Americana.
In 1969 Chevrolet built exactly two Corvettes with the all-aluminum ZL1 427, an engine so far ahead of its time that almost nobody could buy it. Everyone else chose from a lineup running from a 300-horsepower 350 small-block up through a stack of 427 big-blocks, on a car that had just reclaimed the Stingray name. Read on to find out why 1969 was the C3 generation’s real turning point.
Dodge built 9,509 Charger R/Ts for 1970, and only about 112 of them left the factory with a 426 Hemi under the hood. This Burnt Orange car has one, backed by a Hurst pistol-grip four-speed and the Super Track Pak option that came with a 4.10-geared Dana 60. Read on to find out why the option almost nobody wanted in 1970 became the one everybody chases now.
For three days each spring, more than 2,000 hot rods, muscle cars, and custom builds line the Pigeon Forge Parkway – but the events roots trace back to a hotel parking lot in 1983, and further still to the moonshine runners who first needed fast cars on these mountain roads. Here is how a 75-car gathering became one of the Southeasts biggest rod runs.
At the 2017 Detroit Auto Show, Dodge let visitors drive a 707-horsepower Hellcat Challenger without leaving the showroom floor. The rig moved with every brake, throttle, and steering input, syncing to a virtual track on a wall of screens. It was one of the most talked-about attractions at that year’s North American International Auto Show. Read on to find out how Dodge pulled off the stunt.
Pontiac’s chief engineer reportedly named this option package after a punchline from a 1960s comedy show, and it became one of the most collectible names in muscle car history almost overnight. This particular 1969 GTO Judge wears a documented Verdoro Green paint job backed by PHS paperwork confirming its factory drivetrain. Read on to see what set the Judge’s debut year apart from everything that followed.
A gold 1966 Buick Riviera with a 425 Nailhead V8 has been in the same hands since 1991 — the same year its owner brought his newborn daughter home. Filmed at the World of Wheels show in West Allis, Wisconsin, the car’s clean fastback design and factory-correct paint draw comparisons to Buick’s best-ever styling era. What’s kept one owner holding on for three decades?
The shaker hood scoop on a 1969 Mach 1 was not styling. It bolted straight to the air cleaner and fed cold air into a 428 Cobra Jet rated at 335 horsepower, a number almost nobody believed then and nobody believes now. Car Life strapped test gear to one in March 1969 and recorded a 13.90-second quarter mile. Read on to find out what made this specific combination so feared.