Magazine Road Test "Ringers" again.....

The current issue of Musclecar Review touched on this subject. Several reader's had written in and asked why MCR didn't rank musclecars according to the Road Tests of the day. The editor responded that the results were wildly inaccurate because of the disparity of options on the cars, and the fact that many magazines modified the cars-i.e. re-curved the distributors, bumped the timing, re-jetted the carbs, some even added headers and traction bars and slicks. So what "Hot Rod" or "Car Life" ran with a particular car isn't really indicative of what a showroom stock example would have run. And, it wasn't just a couple of examples-it was and still is rampant. Here's a few of my personal favorites. # 1. 1964 Pontiac GTO. 40 years later Jim Wangers finally admitted what we already knew. Car&Driver's May 1964 test car that ran a blistering 4.6 second 0-60 time and a 13.10 second 1/4 while smoking the 7.75X14 Uniroyal Tiger Paws all the way down the track was a ringer. Royal Pontiac had not only replaced the 389 V8 with a 421, they had added thin head gaskets to up compression,added screw in studs and locknuts to get more rpm on the top-end,re-curved the distributor, re-jetted the 3-2bbl carbs, and replaced the stock vacuum throttle linkage with mechanical. No wonder no stock GTO or other magazine test car couldn't come close to these figures. # 2. 1969 Z/28 Camaro. Hot Rod's goal was to get the Z/28 into the 12s, and they barely missed it. However-the blistering 13.11 1/4 mile time was acheived by adding headers, re-jetting the carb,adding slicks and traction bars,and swapping the standard 3.73:1 axle ratio for 4.88:1s. Wonder why production examples could only run mid-14s?  # 3. 1969 440 "Six-Pack" Road Runner. Chrysler advertised this test done by Car Life of a "Prototype" 440 / 6. The car ran a string of very low 13 and very high 12 second 1/4 mile times. Except the "Prototype"'s 440 had been "Brought to the Top of Specifications"-the distributor custom curved, and the 3 carbs custom-jetted, and it had a 4-speed,4.30 gears, a pinion snubber, slicks, and was piloted by Pro Stock Drag Racing Champion Ronnie Sox of "Sox&Martin" fame!!  No wonder that Hot Rod's Super Bee test car a few months later was quite a bit slower-turning in a 13.56. That's still quick-but nowhere near the 12.80's that Sox was laying down!!  # 4. 1973 SD-455 Trans-Am. This is the car that Hot Rod ran a blistering 13.54 with, ( Only one-tenth slower than the 13.44 turned in by the 1970 LS6 454 Chevelle that HR tested in June 1970? ) and Car&Driver ran a 13.75 with. It's an early prototype, and in the pictures the "Shaker" hood scoop has standard "455" emblems on it, instead of the correct "SD-455" ones. And the Michigan liscence plate number is the same. We know it's a ringer because although both of these road tests were published in the April or May 1973 issues-the tests were actually done in February. And it's a fact that their were massive problems-1st with connecting rod failures,then passing emissions with EGR valve function, and the inital hot, RAIV cam was changed to the much milder RAIII cam and he hp rating changed from 310 to 290 when the engine was finally EPA certified in April. That's why only 295 were built 252 in T/A's and another 43 in Formulas and they all had May or June porduction dates. Anyhow-at the very least this car had the much hotter RAIV cam in it, and the earlier "illegal" EGR valve on the manifold. Plus the "Shaker" hood scoop was opened up-indicating the carb jetting had been messed with. ( 1970-72 T/A's had a vacuum solenoid that opened the scoop under full-throttle acceleration. Federal Noise mandates forced Pontiac to seal them for 1973 and later-making the scoop basically cosmetic. We all know a lot of guys opened them up anyway.) Hot Rod also took the liberty of bumping the timing, adding some M&H slicks and putting a shift kit in the TH400 which bumped shift points from 5,000 to 5,600 rpm. This dropped their 1/4 mile time to a blistering 13.15. Which by comparison was 3 tenths faster than the 13.44 ran by their June 1970 LS6 454,4-speed Chevelle SS test car. I'm a Pontiac Fan, but you want me to believe an 8.4:1 compression Firebird with a cam with only .410 lift and an automatic with 3.42:1 gears is faster than an 11:1 compression, 4-speed, 4.11 geared solid-lifter LS6 Chevelle??? Herb Adams and the boys slipped this one by. All other tests of '73-74 SD-455 T/A's have them running low-mid-14s. #5 1991 Ford Mustang GT. Car Craft boasted that their "Stock" "5.0" Mustang ran a blistering 14.04 e.t. Every other magazine that tested one from 1987-93 was substantially slower. The fastest being a 14.72, the slowest a 15.29. Here's why-the CC test mule had a K&N airbox and filter, a Flowmaster "Cat-Back" exhaust,and the P225/60VR15 Goodyear Gatorback radials were swapped for 235/60R15 M&H Soft-compund drag radials and the stock 2.73 or 3.08 axle ratio was swapped for a 3.73:1 set. Not exactly stock is it??  # 6. 1993 Mitsubishi 3000 GT/VR4. This one takes the cake. Mitsubishi advertised in magazines that their sports car ran sub-5 second 0-60 times and mid-13 second 1/4 mile times "With a Professional driver, under controlled conditions." Here's the "Conditions"-the engineers had disconnected the rev limiter, disconnected the knock sensor,filled the gas tank with 105 octane racing gas, lowered the tire pressure to 15 psi all around, and had the "Professional driver" pop the clutch at 6,200 rpm and powershift at 7,000, which grenaded the $5,749 transaxle after 3 runs. Gee, why were production examples with a functioning rev limiter and functioning knock sensor, filled with 89 octane gas and 35 psi in the tires a full second slower? Why do you ask? Anyhow-bench racing can be fun, but you have to be careful quoting these old road tests. Mastermind