We should all adopt "Dominic Toretto's" attitude from "Fast&Furious.....

I get so tired of people arguing that whatever niche of hot-rodding they personally like is the "right" one, and everyone else is an idiot. I loved Vin Diesel's answer to Gal Gadot when she caught him inspecting his rivals Gran Torino. "You like that car?" "I appreciate a fine piece of machinery, no matter who builds it." We should all take that stance. I get so tired of the Concours crowd deriding an awesome car because it has the wrong kind of hose clamps, or BFG T/A radials instead of bias-ply Coker Tire Wide Oval repro tires!  Or the idiots that say no "real" musclecars were built after 1971. Really? You don't consider the 1973-74 SD-455 Trans-Am a real musclecar?  A 1974 Dodge Charger with a 440, a 4-speed, and a 3.55:1 geared Dana 60 rear end isn't a real Musclecar?  A 1987 Buick Grand National-that ran high 13s off the showroom floor isn't a musclecar? The LT1 engined 1994 Impala SS isn't a musclecar? A new, 465 hp SRT8 Hemi Charger of Chrysler 300 isn't a musclecar because it has 4-doors?  A new "5.0" Mustang or Camaro SS that run 12s off the showroom floor aren't musclecars?  Shut the F%*&k up!  I also hate people who deride import swaps, or import cars, period. A small-block Chevy in a Datsun 240Z makes an awesome perfromance car. The SBC doesn't weigh any more than the old Datsun straight six, but has twice the power! Does anybody realize that Carrol Shelby took the AC Ace-a small British sports car and stuffed a small-block Ford V8 in it and created the legendary Cobra? Back in the day guys would put 327 Chevys into Austin-Healey 3000s. The buff magazines called them "The Poor Man's Cobra". I guess a Porsche 928 is technically a "sports car", but with a front-engine big V8, a five-speed, and rear-wheel drive, it sounds an awful lot like a musclecar to me. With a base price of $29,000-a new 332 hp Nissan 370Z isn't a screaming performance bargain? With sub 5-second 0-60 times and high 13 second 1/4 mile times, a Subaru WRX ISN'T a performance car??  Your going to argue that a big-block Corvette isn't a musclecar? How about the Pantera? Back in the day the buff magazines called them "The Poor Man's Lamborghini". However with a price over $10,000 in 1972 dollars-( a 455HO Trans-Am was $4255.75 ) I doubt that any "poor" people bought them. But the mid-ship mounted 351CJ gives it quite a bit of muscle if you ask me. Build your car any damn way you want and enjoy it, but don't make fun of other people's pride and joy. I swear, if I see one more Dodge Ram pickup with a sticker of Calvin ( of the comic strip "Calvin&Hobbes" ) pissing on a Ford emblem or a Chevy Bow-Tie, I'm going to vomit. And then shoot the offending vehicle with a paint-ball gun....Ok maybe not, but it's a nice thought.... Can't we all just get along?  Mastermind        

Some alternative bodystyles that would make cool racing tributes...

Popular Hot Rodding had a wildly popular Project Car Called "Project Talledega". It was a 1975 Chevelle Laguna done in '70's NASCAR style. Weve also seen several '71-74 Chargers done like Richard Petty's most iconic racer. I'd like to see some others that people don't usually think of. Here's my list of potentially awesome racing tributes. # 1. 1963-66 Ford Galaxie. The fastback Galaxie would look mean as hell with radiused fenderwells,huge tires and loud exhausts exiting in front of the rear wheels. And with 390 cubes under the hood it could back up the image.  # 2. 1959-66 Full-Size Pontiac. High Performance Pontiac magazine featured an article on Fireball Roberts and Smokey Yunick's Pontiacs that were the scourge of NASCAR in the early '60's. In 1961-62 Roberts won 22 races, a record that stood until Richard Petty won 27 in 1967-68. The reason the Pontiacs are a great hot rod is while most Impalas of this era are small-block powered, every Pontiac built had at least 389 cubes under the hood, and a few had 421s. # 3. 1967-70 Mercury Cougar. These Cougars look totally badass done in Trans-Am style like Parnelli Jones' racer. Radiused wheelwells, Minilite Wheels with fat tires, and side-exit exhaust. I'd build a 347 inch stroker with Edelbrock or Trick flow "Cleveland" heads and the "E-Boss" manifold to make a snarling "Boss" style engine. # 4. 1971-74 Pontiac Ventura. Pontiac's version of the Nova. One of these would be totally badass done in Trans-Am style with radiused and flared fenders, huge tires,a T/A style "Shaker" hood scoop and a snarling 400 or 455 under the hood. ( Pontiac engines are externally identical from a 326 to a 455. So swapping a 400 or 455 for the 350 is a no-brainer. ) And any suspension or brake upgrades that fit a Camaro / Firebird will fit the "X" bodys, so you could make it a real corner carver. # 5. 1974-76 AMC Matador. AMC actually had modest success in NASCAR with the swoopy fastback Matadors. 360 V8s are plentiful in junkyards ( used in millions of Jeep Grand Wagoneers through 1993 ). Edelbrock makes aluminum heads,and intakes for them,and Crane and Comp Cams make cams, so you could have the power to back up the image. # 6. 1978-79 Dodge Magnum. Richard Petty briefly campaigned a Magnum in Nascar, and then switched to the much more aerodynamic '77 Olds Cutlass. However,the Magnum is racy looking, and the engine bay will swallow anything from a 318 to a 440.  Any of these cars would be a nice change from cookie-cutter Camaros, Chevelles, Mustangs, etc.  Mastermind

More on "Restification".....

Here's my opinion on "Restification".  If you want to build a Concours show car that's correct down to the hose clamps, then do it. Except we all know that on say,- a Concours '69 Mustang that the "Autolite" battery is an Interstate or an Exide in a repro case, and the Firestone Wide Ovals are Coker Tire repros,so is it really "all original?" No, it isn't. It's restored a certain way that certain people deem acceptable or correct. If that's your bag, go for it. However for the other 90% of us that want to drive and even-gasp!-race our cars on the strip occasionally, "restification" makes a lot more sense. Here's some good examples. I've mentioned it before, but 4-speed GTOs, Firebirds and Olds 442s had Hurst shifters from the factory. Chevelles, Camaros and Novas had the awful Muncie shifters which were body-mounted and would bind up under load. Forget powershifting at six grand; try to shift one quickly above 3,500 rpm. It's a crapshoot whether or not you get the next gear or neutral. Now even if your car is otherwise bone-stock, but you want to run it at the Pure Stock Drags or bracket race at your local strip-it would behoove you to replace that awful shifter with a transmission-mounted Hurst or Mr Gasket unit so you could shift it quickly when you wanted to, and be competitive in your class!  Mopar guys know how crappy Chrysler's points were. I've said it before-back in the day you never saw a Mopar racer at the strip who didn't have extra sets of points in his toolbox, and they were usually Mallory or Accel! Mopar lovers rejoiced in 1972 when electronic ignition was introduced. So if you have a 440 Charger that you like to run hard, or even just take long cruises in, you haven't "ruined" it if you put in a Mopar Performance or Accel or Mallory electronic distributor! You've made the car MORE reliable and easy to drive! If you have a 351CJ Mustang that you want to drive at all, you will be much happier with an Edelbrock or Holley carb than you will be with an Autolite 4300. They were awful when they were brand-new. My dad was a Master Ford Tech in the early '70's, and 351 Mustangs and 460 T-Birds had so many problems with cold starting, stumbling,crappy gas mileage ( even for a big V8; I'm talking a brand new car getting 5-8 mpg! ). If you bitched hard enough Ford would have their dealers replace the 4300 carbs with an electric-choke 600 Holley, and warranty it! If I remember correctly the part number was either #6619 or 6919. Anyhow, thats how bad those carburators were when new,much less 40+ years old. So why suffer with bad performance just so you can say that it's numbers-matching down to the carb?  Really?  If you have a '70-74 Firebird or Trans-Am, even if you don't want headers, by replacing that awful, restrictive "crossflow" muffler with a true dual exhaust system and re-jetting the carb, you can pick up 30 or 40 hp with the stock manifolds. That's how restrictive it was. Read some '70-72 Car Life or Hot Rod road tests. 400 and 455HO GTOs and LeMans GTs ran 1/2 second quicker in the 1/4 than Formula 400 Firebirds and 455HO T/A's!!  Because the GTO / LeMans models had true duals, and the F-bodies had that restrictive crossflow design. Bone stock it was costing 25-30 hp. Why do you think the 1970 GTO base 400 was rated at 350 hp, and the same engine in a Formula 400 was rated at 330?  Why were the RAIII and RAIV rated at 366 and 370 hp in the GTO and only 335 and 345 in Firebirds? Because of that restrictive exhaust system!!  GM, Ford or Mopar, if you have an automatic transmission, a B&M or TransGo shift improver kit will drastically increase performance. Seriously-will anyone know by looking at the car that you changed some springs and weights in the governor, or a couple of plates in the valve body?? Here's another thing-even if you have a "premium" musclecar-say you have an LS6 Chevelle or a Hemi Road Runner, but you'd like a little more performance. On the Chevelle-way back in 1970-Hot Rod gained 71 hp on the dyno by adding headers to their LS6 test car! Stock, although it was rated at 450 hp-it pulled 380 hp on the dyno. With just the addition of headers,no carb tuning or bumping the timing or anything, on the next run it pulled 451 hp! Even on a 454, you will notice a 70 hp increase! Because the intake was designed to clear the low hood of the '70 Corvette and Camaro ( The LS6 was initially going to be offered in the Camaro and Nova SS as well as Chevelles ) it loses 15 hp over the taller '69 427 aluminum manifold. By adding headers and the '69 manifold and replacing the 780 Holley with an 850, you could easily gain 100 hp, and the car is still basically stock. Just save the original intake and exhaust manifolds and carb in case you ever want to sell the car. On the Hemi Road Runner, adding headers and replacing the 625 cfm AFBs with 750 Edelbrocks will add 75-80 hp. If it's an automatic, a higher stall-speed converter will definitely help cut a few tenths off your 1/4 mile time as well. You've greatly improved the cars performance, and again, you haven't done anything major to the car that can't be put back to stock in a few hours if you need to. So don't be too hard on people who want to maximize their car's performance with a few minor mods. Yes, anyone who even thinks of putting an LS motor in a '69 Z/28 or a 6.4 Hemi in a '70 'Cuda ought to be dragged out into the street and shot. Barring that, I don't think you need to storm anyone's house with torches over an HEI distributor or a set of traction bars!!  Mastermind      

How to get the most "Bang for the Buck" out of your "Restification" project...

I often get asked by various people how to get the most "bang" for the buck out of a "restification"-( Restoration / Modification ) project. There's no one generic answer, as it depends on what type of project your building. Is it going to be a daily driver, a weekend cruiser, or an all-out race car?  Or a combination of the three?  You need to be really specific and honest about what you really want. I've touched on this before but it's worth re-visiting. A guy comes to my shop and wants me to build him a 350 Chevy. He says he wants "As much power as he can possibly get for "X" amount of dollars."  "I can do that." I say. "But what are you using it for?"  "Why does that matter?" He asks. Here's why. If I'm building the engine to put in a Suburban that he's going to tow 40 ft horse trailer or a 25 ft boat with I'm going to build it to make maximum low-end and mid-range torque, which is what you need for pulling heavy loads. I don't care if it won't rev over 5,500 rpm. I'm shooting for maximum torque between 2,000-4,500 rpm. I'd use a dual-plane intake like an Edelbrock Performer and a short duration, medium lift cam to maximize torque and engine vacuum at idle to work with power accessories and a stock torque converter. Now if the engine is going in a Nova or a Camaro with a stick and low gears ( higher numeric ) or a higher-stall speed torque converter, I'm going to use a hotter, longer duration cam and a single-plane intake like an Edelbrock Torker II or Weiand Team G to make max power between 3,000-6,500 rpm. See what I'm saying? If we put the Camaro engine in the Suburban it probably wouldn't run as good as the stock engine, because were sacrificing low-end torque for top-end rush. If you put the Suburban engine in the Camaro it would do spectacular burnouts because of the massive low-end torque, but big burnouts aren't conducive to good 0-60 or 1/4 mile times, and it would probably run out of rpm before the end of the 1/4!! So building a "Max Power" 350 Chevy or anything else depends on the application. Another question I get asked is "What's the first thing I should buy?"  Again, it depends on the car. For example if you've got a late '70's Pontiac Trans-Am with an automatic- most of them had 2.41:1 or 2.56:1 gears. The single biggest performance upgrade you could make would be switching the gears to something in the 3.23:1-3.73:1 range. This would give you a stunning improvement in acceleration-easily more than 1/2 a second off your 0-60 and 1/4 mile time, without hurting fuel economy or freeway crusing rpm too much. Now, if you had a late '70's Chevy Z/28 Camaro with an automatic-they had 3.42:1 gears from the factory-I'd say get a set of shorty headers ( for ground clearance ) and good dual exhausts. If you had a '69 Mustang with a 351W with a 2bbl-( a lot of Mach 1s did ) I'd say get an Edelbrock Performer intake manifold and matching 4bbl carb. If you had a '65 GTO with a 389 and a 2-speed ST300 ( read Powerglide ) automatic, I'd say swap it for a TH350. ( ST300s have a 1.76:1 1st gear and 1.00:1 2nd. TH350s have a 2.52:1 1st, a 1.52:1 2nd and a 1.00:1 3rd. And they are the exact same length and use the same rear trans mount and driveshaft yoke! It's practically a bolt-in. ) This will give you a stunning improvement in acceleration and drivability, way more than headers or a tri-power setup would! If you had a late '80's "5.0" Mustang I'd say get a Ford SVT or Vortech centrfigal supercharger. See what I mean? Every application is different. The bottom line is do some research on what other people have done with a car like yours and read parts catalogs carefully. Edelbrock, Competition Cams, Lunati, Trick Flow Holley and other companies offer guidelines-i.e.-"Makes power from 1500-5,500 rpm." or "Needs 2,500 rpm torque converter and 3.55:1 gears" Those recommendations are usually pretty spot-on. The main thing is err on the side of caution, don't go too wild on cam timing or converter stall speed. Hope this helps. Mastermind.

For the last time...."Fakes" don't affect the value of the "Real Deal"...

Got some gripes on the posts about "Replicars". Apparently, some people think that if I buy one of the 299,000 '69 Mustangs built, and put Edelbrock or Trick Flow "Cleveland" style heads and an Edelbrock "E-Boss" manifold on the 302, and tap Year One or Phoenix Graphics for "Boss 302" stripes, spoilers, and rear window louvers, that I have somehow diminished the value of the remaining 1,603 "Real" '69 Boss 302s out there!! Huh?  If I buy one of the 113,000 '69 Firebirds built, and make it look like a T/A, does that "Ruin" the value of the 697 "Real" ones?  If I take a beater '68 Cutlass, stuff a 455 and a Hurst Dual / Gate shifted TH400 in it and paint it silver and black, does that "compromise" the value of the 515 "real" "Hurst / Olds" models ever built? No!!!  For God's sake, get over yourselves people!  Like I said in another post-Sports car guys are smarter. If I buy a 1977 Porsche 911 and put a "Whale Tail" and and a Air Research Turbo on it, none of the 2,819 "Real" 930 Turbo owners are going to have a hissy fit and cry that I have somehow "hurt" the value of their car!!  So, again, if you want to "clone" your dream car, go ahead and do it. If you buy one of the 93,000 '78 Trans-Ams built and get the stencils from Phoenix Graphics and paint it like a "Macho T/A", I seriously doubt that Dennis Mecham ( Creator of the "Machos" ) or any of the 203 owners of documented ones are going to sue you!!  If you buy a '69 Dodge Coronet and stuff a Mopar Performance 426 Hemi crate engine in it and paint it like a Super Bee, you haven't done anyone any financial harm. Do you really think the owners of the 17 455HO 1971 GTO Judge Convertibles ever built give a shit in hell if you take a 350 LeMans Sport drop-top with the Endura front bumper and put a spoiler and Judge stripes on it???  So build your car the way you want it, and ignore these morons that come up with this nonsense. Mastermind.            

More cool '60's and '70's full-sizes that people overlook.....

Here's some more cool '60's and '70's full-sizes that you might not have thought of.  # 1. 1966-70 Olds Toronado. These cars still look cool today. And with 425 or 455 cubes under the hood they move pretty good too. Car Life's 1970 test car ran the 1/4 mile in 15.0 seconds flat. "George Stark" writer Thad Beaumont's killer alter ego in the Stephen King thriller "The Dark Half" drove a black '67 with a bumper sticker that read "A High Toned Son of a Bitch".  And if you live where it snows, their front-wheel drive.       # 2. 1967-69 Olds Delta 88. These have sleek fastback styling and 425 or 455 cubes under the hood. Since they were the top of the line, they also usually have good stuff like factory a/c and front disc brakes. # 3. 1970-71 Ford Thunderbird. These have racy, Nascar inspired styling, and 429 cubes under the hood with 375 hp. This was about the time that American car makers started to care about handling, so these handle surprisingly well for a big car. The 1972-76 models had 460s, but they were low-compression, and the car was based on the much heavier and uglier Lincoln MKIV platform. # 4. 1967-68 Cadillac Eldorado. I think these are still one of the best-looking cars GM ever put out. With their sharp edges and hidden headlights, they still look futuristic even 50 years after their introduction. And with 429 or 472 cubes under the long hood they move good, too. #5. 1975-78 Plymouth Sport Fury. To quote Elwood Blues-"Its got cop tires, cop shocks,cop brakes,....and with 400 or 440 cubes under the hood they scoot pretty good too. Fred Dryer drove one on the hit action show "Hunter". The 2 dr models are good looking. # 6. 1977-78 Ford Thunderbird. The 'Bird was down-sized from the Lincoln MkIV platform to the LTD II platform, and completely restyled. The new body was sleek, and you could still get a 460 under the hood. '79 models are identical, but the largest engine is a 2bbl 400M. Yuk. Stick with the '77-78's. Mastermind