Posts Tagged: Rebel Machine
The 1970 AMC Rebel Machine put 340 horsepower and 430 lb-ft of 390 V8 torque into a mid-size body for ,475, ran a 14.4-second quarter mile, and wore a hood scoop with the tachometer mounted inside it. AMC built 2,326 and never made another. Here is why the smallest automaker in Detroit’s boldest muscle car vanished after one year.
American Motors built muscle cars on a fraction of what Ford, GM, and Chrysler spent — yet fielded a genuine two-seat performance car in the AMX, a Trans-Am-proven Javelin, and the tachometer-hooded 1970 Rebel Machine. This countdown video draws a passionate, correction-heavy response from AMC loyalists in the comments. Watch to see which cars actually earned AMC’s reputation for hiding real speed in unglamorous bodies.
AMC arrived late to the muscle car wars, but its 1970 Rebel Machine — loaded standard with a 340-horsepower 390, Twin-Grip differential, and that unmistakable red, white, and blue paint — gave the independent automaker a legitimate seat at the table alongside the GTX, Road Runner, and Chevelle SS. One owner even ordered his sight unseen from Vietnam, picking it up the same month he returned home. Fewer than 2,400 were built. Watch to see why this AMC still commands respect decades later.
These three overlooked muscle cars all earned obscurity in different ways, from a Hemi Dart built purely for the drag strip to a Rebel Machine unveiled at NHRA’s biggest stage. The Hemi Dart’s 426 engine ran quarter-mile times in the nine-second range not long after leaving the factory, numbers that still hold up decades later. AMC’s Machine countered with a standard 340-horsepower V8 built for straight-line bragging rights of its own. Here’s what made each of these forgotten muscle cars worth a second look.