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A 1960 Corvette built as a tribute to a father’s military aviation career has to walk a narrow line, because too few details and the concept misses while too many turn it into a costume. Underneath the aviation theme sits a model year most casual fans skip right past, one where Chevrolet quietly built a record number of cars and started taking handling as seriously as horsepower. Read on for what makes 1960 the right starting point.
AMC built exactly one two-seat steel-bodied American sports car during the muscle car era, and it wasn’t trying to be subtle about its ambitions. The AMX set 106 world speed and endurance records before its public debut, then backed that up with genuine cornering ability alongside straight-line speed. Read on to see how a three-year model run earned back-to-back engineering awards from the Society of Automotive Engineers.
The Dodge Challenger SRT Demon was engineered to lift its front wheels off the line from the factory, with 840 horsepower and a 9.65 second quarter mile. So when a prototype turned up at a racing event with an audible engine knock, the question everyone had been quietly asking finally surfaced. Read on for what detonation actually does to a supercharged engine, and why a prototype failure is not the same as a design flaw.
Most diesel-swapped muscle cars announce themselves with zip-tied plumbing and a cowl hood hiding the mess underneath. This Plymouth Cuda carries a compound-turbo 6.7-liter Cummins that looks like it was cast for the engine bay, backed by a reported 1,500 rear-wheel horsepower and a torque figure north of 3,000 lb-ft. The parts list explains the numbers. The fabrication explains why anyone took the build seriously.
Pontiac has the strongest claim to inventing the category. Ford has the sales records by an enormous margin. Dodge and Plymouth have what collectors are willing to pay today, which is a completely different ranking. Every camp is quoting a real number and reaching a different answer, because they are all using different measuring sticks. Read on for what each one actually proves, and which one settles it.
Ford built roughly 50 genuine Cobra Jet Mustangs in each limited run since reviving the nameplate in 2008 – and every one of them was designed to run a specific index number, not chase outright records. This car left that rulebook behind entirely, pulling 1,400 horsepower from just 305 cubic inches of supercharged Coyote. Read on for how the outlaw racing scene around cars like this got started, and why a small-block ended up making numbers Ford never advertised.
A compact economy car has no business becoming one of the most feared machines at an American drag strip, but that’s exactly what happened to the Dodge Dart once Chrysler dropped a 340 small-block — and eventually a 426 Hemi — into its lightweight chassis. Factory-built Hemi Darts ran quarter-mile times most full-size muscle cars couldn’t touch. Read on to find out how a budget compact became one of Mopar’s most unlikely performance legends.
Dodge invented the Super Bee by taking everything expensive out of a Coronet and leaving everything fast, then spent 1969 escalating the engine list until a 426 Hemi was sitting on the order form. Buried inside that model year was a package aimed at drag racers that Dodge barely advertised. This Gateway Classic Cars gallery captures the result. Read on for the option code that separates a good Super Bee from a great one.
Chevrolet built only about 80 examples of the race-bred RPO L88 Corvette in 1968, stripping out the radio and heater in favor of aluminum heads, a solid-lifter cam, and brakes borrowed from the competition parts bin. This coupe from the Brothers Collection is one of the rarest, most authenticated survivors of that run, and V8TV’s cameras get an up-close look at exactly what made it different from every other 427 Corvette that year.
Samspace81’s own description of this 1972 Chevy Nova comes with a warning: hang on. Underneath the hood is a Full Roller 468-cubic-inch big block capable of up to 720 horsepower, paired with a Richmond Super T-10 four-speed built to handle exactly that kind of power. Even the comments can’t agree on the hood scoop — but nobody disagrees about what this compact GM platform can do once it’s built right.
Dodge built the only all-wheel-drive American muscle coupe ever sold, and then gave it a V6 instead of a Hemi. The 2017 Challenger GT made 305 horsepower, started at $33,395, and sent up to 38 percent of its torque forward only when it decided the situation called for it. That combination confused a lot of shoppers. It also answered a complaint Dodge had been hearing from buyers in snow states for years.
Between 1969 and 1974, Jaguar’s E-Type went through more change than any four-year stretch in its history — detuned engines for U.S. emissions rules, a completely new V12, and a dozen ultra-rare lightweight racers built alongside the roadgoing cars. The Series III’s 5.3-liter V12 turned the E-Type into a genuinely different machine, capable of 135 mph and a 14.82-second quarter mile. Read on to find out what separates a Series II from a Series III, and why twelve specific cars from 1963 and 1964 remain the most valuable E-Types ever built.
Long before car memes existed online, muscle car culture was already built on the same kind of good-natured ribbing — chalked onto staging lanes, printed on bumper stickers, or scrawled across club newsletters. The photo above is just the latest version of a tradition that’s been running for as long as these cars have existed.
Nobody at this drag event could identify the mystery vehicle drawing a crowd – until 1320video tracked down the owner and got the hood open. It turns out to be a Local Motors Rally Fighter, essentially a sand rail in body panels, hiding a supercharged LS3 V8. Watch to see it make a pass nobody expected.
A 1971 Plymouth ‘Cuda convertible surfaced after roughly thirty-five years in storage, and its VIN tells a story most barn finds cannot back up: it is one of only 17 factory 440-6 Barrel convertibles Plymouth ever built. Viewers immediately started arguing over what a car this rare is actually worth, with estimates ranging from six figures unrestored to well over a million dollars fully restored. Watch to see the car — and the debate — for yourself.