 |
Dearborn Steel Tubing built 21 Mercury Comet A/FX cars for 1964, each with a NASCAR-derived 427 High Riser rated at a deeply understated 425 horsepower, fiberglass hood, fenders, doors and bumpers, and Plexiglas windows throughout. At roughly 3,200 pounds they ran 11.3 to 11.6 at around 125 mph. Dyno Don Nicholson, Ronnie Sox and Jack Chrisman all drove them. Read on for what separates a documented original from a very good tribute.
1957 was the year the Corvette stopped being just a pretty face, and this Polo White Roadster carries the 283-cubic-inch engine option that made the case. Bill Kotzum of Corvette Mike Midwest walks through why the rare, temperamental fuel-injected version briefly made this America’s quickest production car. Ford had an answer of its own that same year. See how the two rivals compared.
A 440 bored and stroked to 535 cubic inches, roughly 700 horsepower, Viper-inspired hood louvers, and rear fenders widened enough to swallow 12-inch tires. This 1968 Dodge Charger build is not chasing subtlety anywhere on the car. The bodywork alone tells you what the builder was solving for. Read on to find out what the factory 1968 Charger was, and what it takes to make one put that kind of power to the ground.
Before anyone saw the finished car, the rumor mill had settled on 900 horsepower for Dodge’s drag-strip Challenger. The truth turned out stranger: three separate power ratings, two ignition keys, and one very specific grade of gasoline standing between the driver and the full number. Only about 3,300 were ever built. Read on for what the speculation got wrong, and why the horsepower figure mattered less than the mission.
A 1957 Ford Custom 300 called 700 Proof wears a moonshine-runner theme on the outside and a supercharged modern Ford V8 underneath, and the name is a dyno number, not a joke. Almost nothing about the build is what it appears to be at a glance, from the hood scoop to the wheels to the head design bolted under the blower. Read on to find out what is actually hiding under that plain-looking paint.
The letter K in the fifth VIN position marks a 1966 Mustang as a Hi-Po 289 car, and almost nothing visible from the outside can prove it. The differences are internal: a solid-lifter camshaft, higher compression, a distinctly thicker harmonic balancer, and a rev range no ordinary 289 could reach. Fewer than 6,000 were built that year. Read on to find out how to tell a real one from a very convincing copy.
This Cranberry Red 1970 Chevrolet Chevelle SS pairs the legendary 450-horsepower LS6 454 big-block with a four-speed manual — and, almost incongruously, a factory bench seat and working 8-track player. Featured on V8TV’s Muscle Car of the Week series, the car draws a sharp-eyed comment calling out its non-factory steering wheel, plus plenty of viewers sharing decades-old memories tied to the model. Only a few thousand LS6 Chevelles were ever built. Watch the full walkaround to see what still makes this one special.
Ford hired away a General Motors executive, who promptly hired away the designer behind the Camaro Z/28, and the Boss 302 is what came out the other end. It was never really a trim level, it was a homologation special built because SCCA rules demanded Ford sell one to the public before it could go racing. Fewer than 8,700 were built across two model years. Read on to find out what made it worth the trouble.
Shawn Baca’s diesel truck had already survived 1,400-horsepower runs and sub-11-second quarter miles as a daily driver before its block cracked and got patched with cement. Chasing 2,000 horsepower on the rollers at No Zone Diesel, the truck hit 4,600 RPM and a big shot of nitrous at exactly the wrong moment. The result is the fireball this video is known for. Watch to see exactly how it happened.
This Petty’s Garage Bootlegger Edition Ford Mustang is a true 1-of-1 prototype, packing 800 horsepower and a NASCAR-rooted name honoring the moonshine runners who helped invent stock car racing. Owner Phil Lutfy bought it the same night it debuted at a Scottsdale charity gala, drawn in by both its cause and its design. A hidden Whiskey 43 detail ties the whole theme together. Watch to see what 1-of-1 really looks like.
A 1967 Mustang Fastback with a dyno-verified 370-horsepower 302 sounds like a straightforward resto-mod until you realize Ford did not build a 302 until 1968. That single detail explains the entire philosophy behind this build, and it raises the question every resto-mod eventually has to answer: at what point does a modernized classic stop being the car it started as? Here is what the 1967 Fastback platform gives a builder, and what it asks in return.
This 1970 Torino Cobra is an original N-code car, meaning the 360-horsepower 429 Thunder Jet V8 under the hood is the engine Ford installed at the factory. It pairs that big block with a close-ratio four-speed, 3.50 gears with Traction-Lok, and the genuinely odd addition of factory air conditioning. A Marti Report verifies every option. Read on for why the Thunder Jet is the most overlooked engine Ford built that year.
Nineteen sixty-seven marked a quiet turning point under the hood of Buick’s personal luxury flagship, one most people walking past a showroom would never have noticed. The engine that had powered the Riviera for years was being retired in favor of a genuinely different design, and the replacement lasted only three model years before Buick moved on again. This numbers-matching hardtop carries that engine in a color combination Buick used for a single season. Read on for what changed and why the window was so narrow.
What began as Billy Bob’s plan for a simple street cruiser turned into a 700-horsepower, 427 LSX-powered 1967 Chevrolet Chevelle with an interior from Steve Holcomb’s Pro Auto Custom Interiors that commenters are comparing to legendary customizer George Barris. Between the engine note described as sounding like a lion and interior details down to carbon fiber inner fender wells, this build escalated far past its original goal. Here’s how a casual cruiser project turned into one of the best-built Chevelles online.
A 1966 Chevrolet Impala Super Sport doesn’t look like it’s hiding anything dangerous — until you hear it idle. This full-size Chevy carries the rare L72 427 option and a four-speed manual most buyers never checked the box for, a combination V8TV tracked down for its Muscle Car Of The Week series. The exhaust note alone has viewers stopping mid-scroll. Watch to hear why a 425-horsepower family cruiser still commands this kind of reaction decades later.