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Classic vintage car with shiny red and silver paint at a car show.

Back To The 50’s 2017—A ’64 Falcon With Sixties Personality Wins Best Ford In A Ford

A 1964 Ford Falcon took home the Best Ford in a Ford award at the Back to the 50’s 2017 car show, an unusual win for a car built as economical transportation rather than a performance machine. Ford’s optional Sprint package added the Fairlane’s 260-cubic-inch V8 and a stiffer suspension, giving select Falcons real personality behind the wheel. The Falcon’s unibody platform also directly influenced the Mustang launched later that same model year. This deep dive covers why the humble Falcon earned its trophy.

A red sports car showcased under bright lights with a reflective floor.

Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 Model Swerves Best in Corners, labeled as Fastest Muscle Car to date

by Kiril

The sixth-generation Camaro ZL1 was called the fastest muscle car on the market when it debuted at the New York Auto Show, but the number that proved it came a year later on Germany’s Nurburgring. A ZL1 1LE lapped the Nordschleife in 7:16.04, shaving 13.56 seconds off its own sibling without adding a single horsepower. Here is exactly where that time came from, and why it changed how the Camaro is judged.

Classic silver muscle car parked in front of a brick wall.

700 HP 1969 Camaro 540 BBC Detroit Speed Suspension and Holley EFI At V8 Speed & Resto

by Kiril

This 1969 Camaro already looked finished when its new owner bought it: fresh silver paint, red leather interior, professional build quality throughout. Then he found out what was actually sitting under that hood, and decided a freshly completed car wasn’t nearly finished enough. What came next involved a 540 cubic inch big block, a six-speed manual, and a shop that specializes in exactly this kind of relentless refinement.

1950s classic blue Pontiac Grand Prix car on display.

Great Cars Review and History: GTO

by Wes

Before the Pontiac GTO existed, corporate policy at General Motors made it impossible: no mid-size car could carry an engine over 330 cubic inches, period. John DeLorean and a small team of engineers built one anyway, testing it in nighttime street races before their bosses even knew it existed. This archival documentary traces how that quiet act of rule-breaking, plus a name borrowed from Ferrari, turned into the car that saved Pontiac and launched an entire era of American muscle. Watch to find out how close it came to never happening at all.

A classic muscle car burning rubber on a drag strip.

Inside the 15th Annual NHRA Holley National Hot Rod Reunion at Beech Bend

by Kiril

The fifteenth NHRA Holley National Hot Rod Reunion brought vintage front-engine dragsters, Funny Cars, and gassers back to Beech Bend Raceway Park in Bowling Green, Kentucky, along with a Thursday thunderstorm and a weekend of brutal heat. The covered bleachers filled anyway. What keeps a nostalgia crowd this loyal to a small-town strip, and why does the NHRA Motorsports Museum keep bringing its living-history event back here? Read on to find out.

Two men standing by an orange classic car in a desert at sunset.

In the Muscle Car’s Heyday, Just Like Today, Chrysler Cranked Out Hot Cars That Weren’t for the Inhibited

by Kiril

Mopar loyalty was forged in the muscle car’s heyday, and 1971 gave the faithful a Charger that earned every bit of it. Dodge reinvented the car with a fuselage-style third-generation body, split grille, and hidden headlights, and it was the final year Chrysler offered the 426 Hemi in any car. R/T production totaled just 3,118 units, with only 332 four-speed 440 Magnums. Read on to find out why the 1971 Charger marks the end of one era and the beginning of another.

Classic blue muscle car with hood open at auto show.

Chevy Muscle Cars and Trucks Rule the Chicago World of Wheels

by Kiril

Chevrolet did not just show up at the 2017 Chicago World of Wheels, it took over the floor. A hood-up Nova, rows of Chevelles and Camaros, and a growing fleet of vintage C10 pickups outnumbered nearly everything else in the Rosemont convention center during the show’s 55th year. Why does one brand keep winning a show that welcomes every make and every kind of build? The reasons run from a shared small-block to the Midwest’s long history with GM. Read on to see why the bowtie count runs so high in Chicago.

A white SUV airborne during a drag race on a straight track.

9 Second Buick GSX Stage2 GS Stage1 9.51 @ 140

by Wes

Built in 1996, this Buick GSX became the first GS Pro Street car to break into the 9-second quarter-mile bracket, debuting at the GS Nationals and winning its class outright. Fourteen years later, new owner Bob Ortolani brought it back to the same shop for a fresh powerplant, and this video captures the very first day that combination hit the strip, three passes that kept dropping the number, followed by an unplanned wheelie nobody saw coming. Watch the full run and see how close the car came to the 9.40s.

Rusty, abandoned classic Plymouth car in an overgrown lot.

Camaro SS started after 28 years…

by Wes

Matthew Betz’s dad let this 1969 Camaro RS/SS sit for 28 years before it finally started again — and that dramatic restart was just the beginning. This update picks up years later, deep into sandblasting the rusted metal ahead of a full rebuild around an aluminum big block. Longtime followers are still demanding updates. See how far a real, multi-year father-son build has come.

Video thumbnail questioning if wider tires provide more grip.

Do Wider Tires Actually Have More Grip? Testing 27 Cars

by Wes

Wider tires mean more grip — or so every car enthusiast has been told. Engineering Explained’s Jason Fenske put that assumption to the test at NWAPA’s 2017 Mudfest, running sixty-to-zero braking tests across twenty-seven different AWD and 4×4 trucks and SUVs with a Vbox data logger. The results complicate the simple version of the story muscle car owners repeat about tire width, weight, and stopping distance. Commenters, including more than one physics teacher’s former student, dig into exactly why. Watch to see what the data actually says.

Old cars and auto parts clutter a garage workspace.

2 Trans-Am Icons Found Stashed in the Same Barn: 1969 Chevrolet Camaro Z/28 & 1970 Plymouth AAR ’Cuda

by Kiril

Matt Barczak was driving to inspect a rare Hemi Road Runner when his father read a strange trim code off a classified ad from the back seat: what’s an X33 Camaro? That single question sent Matt three and a half hours across Pennsylvania in the middle of a January night — and what waited in the barn wasn’t just one forgotten Trans-Am homologation car. Read on to find out what a documented 1969 Z/28 and a 1970 AAR ‘Cuda were doing under the same dusty roof.

Customized lowrider car with gold paint and smoke at a nighttime event.

Chevrolet Nova Nitrous Wagon – No Prep MAYHEM!

by Kiril

No-prep racing strips away the safety net of a perfectly prepped track and dares drivers to make it work anyway, and this chopped-top Chevy Nova wagon is built for exactly that kind of chaos. A 632-cubic-inch big-block and two nitrous kits totaling a 600 shot turn a family hauler into a launch that shakes the grandstands. Swamp Thing and crew took it to No Prep Mayhem in Wichita to race the biggest names in the format. Read on to see why a wagon belongs there.

Classic blue 1960s Mercury Cougar parked outdoors.

The Overlooked Mercury Everyone Forgot Was a Real Muscle Car

by Kiril

The muscle car market took its hardest hit in decades after 2009, and recovery has been slow and uneven ever since. One of the quietest comeback stories belongs to a car most people forget was ever a muscle car at all: the Mercury Cougar Eliminator, built in numbers far smaller than the Mustang it was designed to beat. Here’s why collectors are paying attention now.

Person working on a car without its front end in a driveway.

Supercharged 1973 Dodge Charger R / T SOUND very nasty as hell!

by Wes

An Estonian builder captures the exact moment a freshly assembled, supercharged 440 big-block fires for the first time, destined for a 1973 Dodge Charger R/T. It’s the moment that either validates months of build work or reveals a costly problem, and the aggressive idle that follows makes clear which one this was. Hear what a genuinely blown Mopar big-block sounds like before it’s even been tuned.

Rusty old car with graffiti and dents at an outdoor event.

PROJECT X – In Honor of DAD!

by Kiril

Not every muscle car story needs a famous name attached – this small-block Chevy V8 build is built around something simpler: a dad, his son, and a car that’s more about bringing a crew together than chasing horsepower records. Here’s why builds like this one still matter as much as the six-figure survivors.

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