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This 1968 Camaro looks like a tidy first-generation restoration until the timing board lights up: 7.79 seconds at 179 mph, run in Street Outlaw trim at Wild Horse Pass Raceway. A twin-turbocharged combination hides behind factory-style sheet metal, in a chassis that first went on sale more than half a century ago. Read on to find out how builders are extracting purpose-built race car numbers from a body shell most people still think of as a weekend cruiser.
The 1972 Dodge Challenger is the model year enthusiasts tend to skip past, and the reasons are all on the order form. Both big-block options were gone, the convertible was cancelled, and the front end wore a restyle that departed from the original look. Dodge built 26,658 of them, down nearly 11 percent from 1971. Read on to find out why that unloved transitional year is quietly becoming interesting to collectors.
The 1971 Dodge Demon 340 was the cheapest way into real Mopar small-block performance, and it arrived wearing a grinning cartoon devil that drew organized protests from religious groups. Under the hood sat a 275-horsepower 340 good for a 14.49-second quarter mile, in a compact that cost roughly half what a big-block Charger did. Only 10,098 were built before Dodge retired the name. Read on to find out why the joke turned into one of the most sought-after A-bodies of the era.
Most show builds are engineered to turn heads for a season. This 1971 Dodge Challenger has been doing it for roughly two decades and still looks like it left the shop last week. Pro Street was a style born from NHRA Pro Stock cars of the early eighties, and getting it to age this well takes more restraint than shock value. Read on for what defines a tubbed car, and why 1971 Challengers made such good raw material.
Jamboolio’s footage from Helsinki’s 2017 Cruising Night captures a 1970 Dodge Charger R/T SE doing nothing but idling – and somehow stopping conversation cold. The car’s 440 cubic inch big-block V8 and upscale Special Edition trim make it one of the more understated Chargers of its era, at least until the throttle opens. Nine years after it was filmed, the clip is still finding new viewers who want to hear why. Watch to see what all the quiet was about.
By 1972 Chevrolet had backed the Chevelle Malibu into a corner, and this numbers-matching 350 example is what came out the other side. The original black vinyl interior is intact, the factory air conditioning still blows cold, and the car has never strayed far from stock. That combination is getting harder to find every year. Read on for why the last year of this body style is the smart place to enter the A-body market.
A 3,000-horsepower Camaro rolled onto a freshly scraped, no-prep surface at Thunder Valley Raceway and ended up sideways against a nitrous Fox Body Mustang nicknamed Lucifer. This piece explains why no-prep racing strips away the grip that normally tames this much power, what it takes to build a big-tire car for that kind of unpredictability, and how this run compares to a properly prepped six-second pass.
Chevrolet never offered the L88 in a Camaro — it was a Corvette-only option, and only 80 Corvettes received one for all of 1968. So when a restoration describes its Camaro engine as L88-inspired, that phrase is carrying real weight. This rotisserie-restored ’68 SS runs a Gen IV 427 making 480 horsepower behind a four-speed. Read on for what the original L88 actually was and why builders still chase the name sixty years later.
A 1969 Camaro with 680 horsepower, a full custom interior, one-off wheels, and McLaren paint looks like a horsepower story. It is not. The Gen V LT1 is rated around 455 horsepower from the factory, so reaching 680 means real work, and making a 1969 unibody survive it means replacing almost everything underneath. Read on to find out where the money in a build like this actually goes, and why the power figure is the least useful thing about it.
The 1966 Pontiac GTO was the best-selling muscle car in America that year, and the hardtop coupe was the body style most of those buyers took home. It was also the last season Pontiac could offer Tri-Power, the triple-carburetor setup General Motors banned across the corporation for 1967. Between a fresh Coke-bottle restyle, 360 horsepower on tap, and nearly 97,000 cars sold, 1966 is the year the GTO peaked. Read on to find out what made it the high-water mark.
Every surface of this 1958 Oldsmobile Eighty-Eight is buried in chrome, and that is not an accident of taste — 1958 is the year Oldsmobile earned the nickname ChromeMobile. Underneath it sits a 371 cubic-inch Rocket V8 that could be ordered three different ways, including a triple two-barrel J-2 setup Oldsmobile engineered before Pontiac’s more famous Tri-Power. Read on for why that option lasted only two seasons and never came back.
Plymouth built the 440 into the 1970 ‘Cuda as one of its rarest, most serious performance options, and someone has now supercharged that same big block to a claimed 550 horsepower. This pro touring build backs that power with a completely reengineered chassis, big brakes, and modern tires, turning a fifty-year-old E-body into something that can actually use everything under the hood. Read on to find out what it took to get there.
The 1982 Corvette Collector Edition closed out the longest-running generation in Corvette history with two genuine firsts: it was the first Corvette to cross $20,000, and it brought fuel injection back after a seventeen-year absence. Only 6,759 were built, all in Silver Beige Metallic, all automatic. Here is why the most-mocked Corvette generation ended on a car that mattered more than its horsepower figure suggests.
Buick spent decades building its reputation on comfort and chrome, which turned out to be excellent cover for one of the quickest engines of the muscle car era. This 1969 GS Stage 1 convertible in triple black with a four-speed represents the combination almost nobody ordered, backed by a 400 cubic inch V8 whose official 345 horsepower rating was never taken seriously by anyone who drove one. Read on for what Stage 1 really added.
A modern Coyote 5.0 crate engine and a nearly sixty-year-old full-size Ford should not look this comfortable together, but this 1963 Galaxie makes the case. Tan PPG paint, a custom brown leather interior, and a Tremec manual behind Ford’s four-cam V8 turn a car built for NASCAR ovals and dealership showrooms into something genuinely usable. Read on for what the 1963 Galaxie originally was, and what it takes to modernize one properly.