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Jay Leno owns hundreds of cars, but few tell a story as understated as his 1966 Dodge Coronet, a boxy family coupe hiding one of the most feared engines Detroit ever sold to the public. That small “426 Hemi” fender badge marks the first model year Chrysler offered the Hemi as a genuine street engine rather than a race-only exotic, sold in just three B-body nameplates. Read on to find out why a car this plain-looking still commands serious respect from collectors like Leno.
A small Wisconsin shop turned heads at SEMA by building classic Mopars with body panels made almost entirely of carbon fiber — hoods, fenders, even fender flares, shaving roughly 600 pounds off cars already packing supercharged Hemi power. SpeedKore’s builds have since gone from show-floor curiosities to Kevin Hart’s personal fleet, a Fast & Furious movie car, and an actual Dodge parts catalog. Here’s how a carbon-fiber gimmick became one of the most respected names in modern muscle car building.
Chevrolet sold 777,000 Impalas in 1969, making it America’s best-selling car that year, and this Custom Coupe survivor carries an oddball spec: a 265-horsepower 396 that was somehow rated lower than the 350 in the same lineup, yet cost more to order. Riding on its original 1969 Texas plates with a stout 12-bolt rear end, this full-size cruiser has a stranger story than its badge suggests. Read on to find out why GM built an engine that looks like a mistake on paper.
Shot from a first-person view with the camera near the driver’s own eye line, this 1970 Dodge Challenger gets pushed to its 150-mph speedometer limit on Germany’s unrestricted autobahn, a kind of sustained high-speed run American owners rarely get to attempt legally. Other drivers scatter once they spot it in their mirrors. Ride along for a rare look at what these cars can really do.
Hennessey built the Exorcist Camaro ZL1 to push a factory 650 horsepower platform to 1,000 horsepower and a 217 mph top speed. A larger supercharger, custom camshaft, and ported heads make the jump possible without sacrificing the factory warranty structure. A Final Edition run of just 57 cars marked 57 years of the Camaro nameplate.
A Mustang crossing into a barricaded construction zone, a driver who may have hit both pedals at once, and a comment section that has spent years trying to figure out exactly what happened — this brief dashcam clip punches well above its modest view count. One recurring theory blames pedal confusion; another blames the tires entirely. Watch the few seconds of footage and decide for yourself which explanation holds up.
This meme is riffing on a rivalry that goes back to the 1970s fuel crisis, when import fuel economy started chipping away at muscle car dominance and a dismissive slang term was born in response. The joke still works because the regional divide it pokes fun at never really closed. Heres where the insult actually came from and why its still debated today.
Every Memorial Day, a parking lot behind a Sacramento museum fills with a very particular kind of car, one built less for daily driving and more for making a statement. The 8th Annual Vettes & Vets show pairs two things California car culture takes seriously. Read on to find out what the event is actually raising money for.
Dodge did what no other muscle car maker had tried when it gave the Challenger GT all-wheel drive, pairing the system with the 305-horsepower Pentastar V6 and an eight-speed automatic. The front axle engages automatically in freezing temperatures, when the wipers come on, in Sport Mode, or the instant traction is lost, then disconnects to protect fuel economy while keeping a rear-drive feel. Read on to find out how Dodge built the first factory muscle car that does not have to hibernate every winter.
Bob Gough grew up idolizing European sports cars after a few childhood years in France — until a 1967 Plymouth Barracuda Formula S changed his mind. Over more than twenty-three years of ownership, he’s swapped in a 340-cubic-inch V8, a Tremec five-speed, and nitrogen shocks, building a car with enough torque to ‘leave Porsches behind’ on the straights. Watch to see why one habit still catches him out in the corners.
Helsinki holds its own muscle car cruising night every month from April through October, and the July 2012 edition proves American iron has fans far outside the United States. A matte black 663-horsepower Shelby GT500 convertible shares the lot with a Bullitt tribute Mustang, a fleet of Mopar muscle, and even a 1930s Auburn Speedster. It is proof that horsepower obsession does not stop at the American border. See which car steals the show.
Two muscle cars can look nearly identical and still be built on completely different structural philosophies underneath — one relying on a separate steel frame, the other building strength directly into the body. This guide breaks down body-on-frame and unibody construction, the bolt-on front subframe hybrid used by cars like the Camaro, and why that distinction matters for rust inspection and restoration decisions today. Read on to find out which type your muscle car actually uses.
Ford’s design studios didn’t stop at the Mustang that made it to showrooms, they also sketched a mid-engine two-seat exotic, a European-flavored roadster, an 855-horsepower one-off, and even a station wagon wearing the pony badge. Some near-misses shaped legendary programs that did get built; others vanished after a single running prototype. Read on to see which unbuilt Mustangs came closest to changing the car’s entire story.
An editor spent hours splicing together the greatest car chases from more than a dozen films, Bullitt, The French Connection, Vanishing Point, Mad Max, and beyond, into one continuous five-minute sequence. The result plays like an entire decade of practical stunt driving compressed into a single unbroken chase. Watch to see how many of these iconic films you can spot.
When GM wanted to revive the GTO nameplate in 2004, it didn’t design a new car, it imported one, rebadging the Australian-built Holden Monaro after board member Bob Lutz read a single magazine article that convinced him. The resulting car packed a Corvette-sourced LS1 V8, then a 400-horsepower LS2 in 2005, but a currency-inflated price tag and understated styling kept American buyers cold. Read on to find out how a business trip to Australia became one of GM’s most divisive muscle car revivals.