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No car show in the country claims a longer unbroken run than the one that kicks off the West Coast’s season every January — and its nine-foot America’s Most Beautiful Roadster trophy has been chased by legendary builders for generations. What started as a tightly focused 1950 roadster show in Oakland has grown into an everything-under-one-roof event covering tri-fives, muscle cars, customs, and rat rods.
A 2016 Camaro, Challenger, and Mustang went through the same violent small overlap crash test, and the three modern pony cars did not come out looking anywhere close to equal. A physics teacher breaks down exactly why using a whiteboard, a test track, and the wreckage itself, while the comments argue over whether the test format even reflects real-world driving. Watch to see which of Detroit’s three headline muscle cars held up best.
Dodge spent twelve separate teaser videos building up to the Challenger SRT Demon, and this installment hinted at something no factory muscle car had claimed before: a car sold with its own crate of drag strip tools. The Demon arrived with drag radials, a transbrake, and a horsepower figure that required a trip to the race gas pump. Read on to find out how far Dodge actually went to back up the “dual purpose” claim.
Justin Bieber’s Ferrari was just one of many high-profile cars at this Barrett-Jackson Scottsdale sale, alongside NASCAR and Hollywood names on hand for the show. The event traces back to a 1967 local car show turned annual auction empire. Here is how it grew, and why some of the cars on the block that day were not for profit at all.
From the outside it reads as a pearl orange Plymouth Cuda with a Hemi under the shaker, which is already a serious thing to own. Look through the driver’s window and the story changes completely, because the steering wheel is on the wrong side. Schwartz Performance built this E-body for an owner in India, and moving the wheel turned out to be the smallest part of the job. Read on to find out what had to move with it.
There’s a version of the muscle car dream where a numbers-matching classic turns up for a few thousand dollars and a handshake. There’s also a much more common version, where that same “bargain” hides a mismatched engine, a rusted floor pan, or a repaint covering old damage. Before chasing a low-buck deal, a handful of overlooked checks — starting with the VIN — can be the difference between a great find and an expensive lesson.
Casey Underdahl and his father dragged a 1969 Camaro body from Georgia to Minnesota believing it was ready for paint. What they actually bought was a shell with filler and seam sealer hiding rust in the firewall, roof, and window channels. What came out the other end was a pro-touring car built to be judged on a stopwatch, not a show field. Read on to find out what it takes to make a G-machine that actually does everything.
Ahead of its New York Auto Show debut, rumors swirled that the Dodge Challenger SRT Demon would ship with just a driver’s seat and nothing else. The rumor turned out to be true, and it was only the beginning of a weight-loss campaign that stripped carpeting, sound-deadening, and even the power steering wheel controls in pursuit of one specific record. Read on to find out exactly how far Dodge went, and what buyers could still get back.
Dodge handed over the keys to a 707-horsepower Challenger SRT Hellcat and it delivered exactly the kind of experience the numbers promise, which is to say a slightly alarming one. But the Hellcat’s real significance was not the power figure. It was what that figure forced every other manufacturer in Detroit to do next, and how quickly Dodge itself made the car obsolete. Here is what actually made it work.
The State Street Nationals began in the 1990s as a small fundraiser for Santa Barbara’s Page Youth Center and has since grown into one of California’s largest downtown car shows, drawing 300-plus vehicles across roughly ten city blocks. Because every worker volunteers their time, 100 percent of the proceeds reach the charities involved. The cars are the draw, but the mission is what keeps it running.
What turns a brake-and-fuel-line manufacturer’s parking lot into one of the season’s most anticipated car gatherings? Inline Tube’s annual open house has grown from a modest shop event into a magnet for restorers and muscle car owners across the Detroit area, drawing bigger crowds than some sanctioned shows. The appeal isn’t trophies — it’s the chance to talk shop with the people who built the parts holding your restoration together.
Jeff Lutz has a pattern: flat black paint, twin-turbo big-blocks, and Drag Week wins to back it up. His newest build, revealed at the Tri-Five Nationals, keeps that formula but adds bigger turbos and a serious horsepower jump. Here is how this car stacks up against the two that built his reputation.
In 1997 Chevrolet replaced the most successful American V8 ever built with a clean-sheet design that shared almost nothing with it but the layout. The LS1 brought an all-aluminum deep-skirt block, six-bolt mains, cathedral-port heads, and coil-near-plug ignition, and it became the default swap engine for an entire generation. Here is what changed, where the stock parts run out of room, and the unglamorous details that end fresh builds early.
Automakers build pilot cars to shake down a new model before the assembly line starts, then usually destroy them. That makes any survivor a genuinely strange thing to find in a driveway. This early-build 1970 Chevelle SS396 carries the sort of details that make researchers reach for a flashlight and start checking stampings. Read on to find out what the metal underneath would actually have to prove.
Larry F. bought his first car in 1977 for $400: a white 1970 Pontiac GTO that broke his father’s one rule about first cars. He spent two years rebuilding it, drove it for years, and sold it in 1988 for $800 before the muscle car market took off. Years later, walking through an Illinois junkyard with his son, he found out exactly what became of it. Read on to find out what he saw.