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Chevrolet built more SS 396 Chevelles in 1969 than in any other year of the option’s run, more than 86,000 of them, and yet keeping one genuinely big-block powered five decades later is its own kind of stubbornness. Jerry McLean named his build Rats Forever, and anyone who knows what a rat motor is already understands the entire philosophy. Here is what that commitment actually costs, and why the community respects it.
Chris Slee emigrated from New Zealand with more ambition than money and opened Kiwi Classics and Customs in a small Franklin, Tennessee shop. His problem was the one every new builder has: no customers and no proof. The answer was a big-block 1966 Mustang, a swap Ford itself did not attempt until it redesigned the car for 1967. Read on for why that engine choice was the entire business plan.
Ford spent five decades selling the Mustang on noise, torque, and attitude, then quietly engineered in independent rear suspension, magnetic dampers, and an exhaust system with a mode designed to avoid annoying the neighbors. The result was a better car in almost every measurable way, and it started an argument that has not ended. Read on for what changed, why it changed, and what Ford refused to give up.
There was a moment when you could count every new performance car sold with a naturally aspirated V8 on your fingers, and the list was already shrinking fast. Turbochargers had claimed nearly everything else, and the reasons had far more to do with regulation than with engineering preference. Read on for which engines held the line, why they mattered, and what is actually left for a buyer who wants displacement instead of boost.
BMW’s 8-Series Concept revived a nameplate that vanished from showrooms for nearly two decades after the original E31 coupe was discontinued in 1999. Debuted at the exclusive Concorso d’Eleganza Villa d’Este rather than a traditional auto show, the concept previewed a production coupe arriving in 2018 with a lineup topped by a twin-turbo V12. Its low hood, sweeping roofline, and 21-inch wheels signaled BMW’s intent to reclaim flagship coupe territory it had quietly ceded years earlier.
Building one movie car is expensive. Building six identical copies of the same car on purpose is a decision only a production with a serious stunt budget makes. That is exactly what happened with the widebody 1968 Dodge Charger built for The Fate of the Furious, a machine designed to cross frozen Icelandic lakes on tires packed with more than a thousand metal spikes each. Almost nothing underneath it was a Charger.
Motor Trend gathered eight of Detroit’s newest performance cars for a single comparison test, and one entry completely upended what the rest of the segment was trying to be. Every other car in that lineup had spent years adding comfort and insulation on top of a potent engine. Plymouth’s Road Runner did the opposite, stripping everything back and betting that buyers wanted less. The magazine’s verdict is still quoted today, but the timing slips underneath the praise told a more complicated story. Read on for what the numbers actually said.
A rural New Mexico parish found an unusual way to pay for seminary education: restore a classic muscle car from the ground up and give it away. What began in 2014 with one donated vehicle had grown, by the time this 1969 Pontiac Firebird convertible crossed the raffle stage, into a volunteer restoration operation. The car was no ordinary find either, with roughly eleven thousand Firebird convertibles built that year, one previous owner, and 79,000 miles. Read on for how a diocese ended up in the classic car business.
At sixteen, John C. paid $700 in paper-route savings for a 1971 Plymouth Satellite Sebring, then spent the next few years turning it into a Rallye Red, leopard-interior statement piece that eventually earned him a police citation for riding too high. His story, and the garage full of friends’ cars parked alongside his, capture a slice of 1970s car culture that never made it into any factory brochure. Read on for the full build, the ticket, and the friends who were building right alongside him.
Dodge unveiled the Challenger SRT Demon just ahead of the New York auto show with numbers so extreme the company had the NHRA certify them rather than let anyone assume marketing had been involved. An 840-horsepower supercharged Hemi, a 9.65-second quarter mile, and a front end that lifts off the pavement under power. Only 3,300 were ever built, and the NHRA responded by banning it. Here is the full story.
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.
Ford did not build the Boss 429 because customers were asking for it. NASCAR’s rulebook demanded that a race engine be sold to the public before it could compete, so Ford dropped a semi-hemi big block into the one car nobody expected — and then discovered the regular assembly line could not physically build it. Only 859 left the shop in 1969. Read on for what that homologation gamble actually cost, and whether it paid off.
The Charlie Thomas Collection brought roughly 145 vehicles to Barrett-Jackson’s 2017 Scottsdale auction, selling for a combined $7.1 million as part of a week that ultimately generated $102.5 million and set 40 world records. Here’s a look at what one of the largest single-owner collections in recent Barrett-Jackson history actually sold for, and how it fit into a record-breaking week.
Barrett-Jackson’s first Northeast auction at Mohegan Sun sold out on opening day, so for its second year, the company added an extra day, a new concours event, and a deeper lineup of collector cars. Here’s what the expanded 2017 event actually delivered, from the final sales total to the Ride ‘N Drives that let fans test-drive new muscle cars between bids.