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Before it ever appeared on screen, “Maximus” was already one of the most ambitious Mopar builds anywhere — a 1968 Dodge Charger built by Tom Nelson of Nelson Racing Engines, discovered by a film crew at the SEMA trade show. Over 2,000 hours of bodywork and roughly 2,000 horsepower later, it closed out Fast & Furious 7 by recreating a scene from the franchise’s original 2001 film.
Nearly 1.3 million views, zero narration, and a comment section that has spent over a decade arguing about what got left out — that’s the strange staying power of this ’20 Best Muscle Cars’ compilation. Viewers have nominated everything from the Plymouth Superbird to a 1969 AMX still parked in someone’s driveway as glaring omissions. Watch the list and see if your own pick made the cut.
This 1978 Pontiac Trans Am rolled into V8 Speed & Resto Shop running like anything but a bird of fire — and rolled out with a FAST EZ-EFI fuel injection system, a 2004R overdrive transmission, and a COMP Cams roller valvetrain under its Pontiac 400. The upgrades are the kind Pontiac purists argue about for hours. See exactly what changed and why the team made each call.
Ford has spent six decades building genuinely different kinds of muscle cars, from the original 1964 Mustang that sold 400,000 units in its first year to Shelby’s race-bred GT350 and GT500, all the way to the homologation-only Boss 302 and Boss 429. Take the quiz and the real question isn’t which car is fastest – it’s which era of Ford’s muscle car identity actually matches how you’d drive. Here’s the history behind every option on the list.
Lou Costabile heads to Schwartz Performance Inc. headquarters in Woodstock, Illinois, to check out a custom 1966 Pontiac GTO owned by Dale Schwartz, whose father Jeff runs the shop’s build team. The orange paint gets attention, but the real story is underneath: a lighter, stronger custom frame plus disc brakes and improved steering. Watch to hear directly from the builders why the chassis mattered more than the finish.
This Matchbox Garage retrospective traces the Chevrolet Camaro’s full evolution, from the original 1967 pony car built to challenge the Mustang, through six generations, a seven-year hiatus, and the retro-styled revival that landed in 2010. Along the way, the video revisits the highs of the Z/28 and IROC-Z eras and the rough patches that nearly killed the nameplate for good. Watch to see all six generations side by side and decide for yourself which era actually deserves the crown.
Detailing a modern engine bay is easy; detailing a 1969 Camaro SS’s exposed carburetor, distributor, and ignition system without frying anything is another matter entirely. The Chemical Guys Detail Garage crew bags every vulnerable component before touching a hose, then works through a specific degreasing and drying sequence built for engines that predate sealed, water-resistant electronics by decades. It’s the kind of process viewers have since applied to their own numbers-matching Camaros. Watch how they pull it off without a single misfire.
Ringbrothers built this 1972 AMC Javelin around a supercharged Hellcat engine pushing roughly 1,100 horsepower — enough to earn a genuine, rare laugh out of Jay Leno himself on Jay Leno’s Garage. Mike and Jim Ring took one of muscle car history’s most overlooked nameplates and turned it into one of the wildest builds the show has featured. Fans in the comments are already asking for more AMC. Watch to see what makes this Javelin different from anything AMC ever built.
MotorWeek puts the Jeep Grand Cherokee Trackhawk through both a track test and a street drive to answer an odd question: can a family SUV with a 707-horsepower supercharged HEMI actually behave like a performance car? The numbers, including a 0-60 time that beats plenty of dedicated sports cars, are only part of the story. Host John H. Davis brings three decades of consistency to a review of one of the strangest vehicles Jeep ever built. The verdict explains why it is still talked about years later.
This countdown of Ford’s greatest engines set off a wave of comments nominating everything from the bulletproof 300 straight-six to the underrated 351 Cleveland as glaring omissions. See which seven engines made the official cut, and judge for yourself whether the list holds up against a century of Ford engineering.
Kelley Blue Book pits the naturally aspirated Shelby GT350R, making roughly 100 horsepower per liter without a turbo or supercharger, against the supercharged Camaro ZL1 on both street and track. Viewers calling it one of the best Mustang-versus-Camaro comparisons ever filmed still can’t agree on a winner, with plenty admitting they’d happily own both. See which engineering philosophy — high-revving naturally aspirated power or supercharged torque — actually wins when both cars hit the same road.
An 11-alarm fire tore through a 530-foot warehouse at Country Classic Cars in Staunton, Illinois, destroying 143 vehicles including one-of-a-kind Hemi Road Runners, Chevelles, and Camaros. Investigators traced the blaze to one of five cars in the building’s center but never confirmed a cause. Here’s what happened, and what was lost, the night one of Route 66’s best-known classic car dealerships caught fire.
Mike Musto argues the internet has horsepower backwards, using a balanced Chevrolet Malibu SS built around an LS1 and a Viper-sourced Tremec T56 transmission to make his case for drivability over raw numbers. One commenter dismissed the build as merely ‘medium’ next to a 707-horsepower factory Hellcat — and the response it triggered turned into a real debate about what horsepower numbers actually mean without context. See why balance might matter more than bragging rights.
Why does a Ferrari V8 scream while an American muscle car V8 burbles, even at the same displacement? The answer is buried inside the crankshaft, in a design choice most drivers never think about. Engineering Explained breaks down the flatplane versus crossplane debate that keeps resurfacing every time a new flagship car, from the Shelby GT350 to the Corvette Z06, makes headlines. It is a short explanation that changes how you listen to every V8 afterward.
Only about 112 Dodge Chargers left the factory in 1970 with the 426 Hemi under the hood, and restoration shop owner Al Hickey found one hiding in plain sight. Paired with a Hurst pistol-grip four-speed and finished in burnt orange, this R/T carries details serious MOPAR collectors chase for years. Lou Costabile catches up with Hickey and the car at a Midwest MOPAR swap meet. The story behind how it landed in his eighteen-car collection is half the reason to watch.