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Roughly 7,802 Dodge Challengers built for 2017 with the 5.7-liter Hemi and 8-speed automatic carried a transmission control module glitch that could leave the car showing Park while the gearbox was actually in 6th-gear limp mode. The fault traced back to software meant to smooth shift quality, and Chrysler fixed it with a free dealer update. Read on for how the failure worked, how it fit into FCA’s larger rollaway problem, and what owners should still check.
In June 2017 the Dodge Challenger did something it had not managed in at least seven years: it outsold both the Ford Mustang and the Chevrolet Camaro in a single month, 6,605 units to 6,186 and 4,691. The platform underneath it dated to 2008, and both rivals were far newer. Here is how the segment’s supposed underdog pulled off the upset, and why the year-to-date numbers tell a more complicated story.
When Ford engineer Steve von Foerster had a neighbor call the police over his Shelby GT350’s exhaust note during an early-morning drive, he brought the story back to the office and helped create Good Neighbor Mode for the 2018 Mustang GT. Quiet Start and Quiet Exhaust drop the V8 to roughly 72 decibels, about the level of a dishwasher, and can be scheduled from the steering wheel for the hours when a loud car is least welcome. Read on to find out how a 911 call became a factory feature.
Mark Lieberman spent three years talking an Ohio owner into selling a Tucker ’48 that had sat since 1982 with barely 8,000 miles on the odometer. Only 51 of these cars were ever built, and 47 are known to survive today, which is part of why one sold for nearly $3 million in 2013. Read on to find out how this particular barn find compares to every other Tucker Lieberman has restored.
A chance encounter with a brand-new Oxford White 2014 Mustang GT while cruising in a 1987 5.0 turned into an unexpected lesson in just how far Ford’s small-block had evolved. The Fox-body’s 225-horsepower pushrod V8 and the Coyote’s 420-horsepower DOHC screamer share a name and a displacement, but almost nothing else under the surface. What one owner discovered comparing them side by side says a lot about a quarter-century of Mustang engineering, and about the friendships that get built around cars like these.
The SRT Demon captured headlines with 840 horsepower and a waiting list that filled overnight, but Dodge had quietly been selling something nearly as ferocious for years before the Demon ever existed. The Challenger SRT Hellcat skips the race fuel, the stripped interior, and the six-figure markups while still delivering 707 horsepower you can drive to work. Read on to find out why buyers chasing supercharged Hemi drama might already have the better deal.
Mal Forys built his custom Dodge Challenger alone, in a home garage, without a professional shop’s budget or a sponsor behind him. Getting it accepted onto the floor at Detroit’s Autorama — one of the biggest hot rod shows in the country — for a second time took years of nights and weekends. Read on to find out what a garage-built show car actually takes to compete with the pros.
In 2016, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety put three iconic American muscle coupes through its full crash test battery — and none of them earned a Top Safety Pick award. The results reignited a debate that’s still running in the comments years later: is muscle car styling fundamentally at odds with occupant protection, or is the real problem driver behavior and lax licensing standards? Watch to see exactly where each car came up short.
This 1969 Chevrolet Camaro Z/28 spent forty years sitting untouched, accumulating dust while the collector market around it exploded. Built from a Trans-Am homologation special that Chevrolet only ever intended for racing, it represents the peak production year of one of the most celebrated small-block muscle cars ever built. Read on to find out what forty years of storage actually does to a car like this.
The Hemi Challenger convertible now ranks among the most valuable classic Mopars ever sold at auction — a strange fate for a car that, by 1970s sales figures, came remarkably close to being called a commercial failure. Discontinued after just five years on the market, the original Challenger’s brief production run quietly built the foundation for its soaring collector value today. Read on to find out what actually went wrong, and why it stopped mattering.
Every May, a decommissioned coal mine in Herten, Germany fills with rat-rodded Ford Model Bs, chopped Chevrolet Bel Airs, slammed Volkswagen Kombis, and custom choppers for Kustom Kulture Forever, arguably the biggest custom culture show on the European continent. The 2017 edition brought tattoo artists, a skate ramp, and two tents of late-night parties alongside the cars. Read on to find out how postwar California car culture ended up thriving in the heart of the Ruhr Valley.
Fifty years after breaking Ferrari six-year stranglehold on Le Mans, Ford is putting that victory back on the road with a heritage-liveried GT. This gloss red, red-stitched special edition ties back to one of the greatest underdog wins in racing history. See how Ford turned a decades-old Le Mans triumph into a modern tribute.
Mecum’s Kissimmee auction is famous for volume — acres of muscle cars crossing the block over more than a week. But the real draw for serious collectors is the oddball that shouldn’t exist at all, like a factory-built Pontiac Trans Am wagon GM never intended to sell to the public. Here’s the story behind one of the strangest survivors to ever roll across an auction stage.
The 2018 Dodge Challenger SRT Demon shipped with two different keys, each unlocking a genuinely different power output depending on what fuel is in the tank — 808 horsepower on regular pump gas, or the full 840 on 100+ octane race fuel. Making that switch safe required a second engine computer and a built-in failsafe against mixing fuels. Read on to find out how the system actually works.
Pontiac built just 3,797 Judges for 1970, wrapped in Hurst shifters, Ram Air 400 power, and a name borrowed straight from Laugh-In. What started as a plan for a budget alternative to the Road Runner ended up as one of the most recognizable muscle car packages Detroit ever built. Read on to find out how a sitcom catchphrase became a six-figure auction star.