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Jungle -- NOW you're talking. My 1993 Toyota Supra Twin Turbo (320 HP) shows up at number 3 on your list. That makes more sense, and a better overall picture. I always considered it a "true" sports car, despite the tiny back seat and tinier trunk, because it was a true Toyota sports car design effort. Nevertheless, it brought back some nice muscle car memories -- and to the extent that mine DID NOT have the big ugly spoiler on the back, it too was a "sleeper." Thanks for the data.
- Life NRA Member
"If cowardly & dishonorable men shoot unarmed men with army guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary...and not by general deprivation of constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Don't mean to put down your TOYota, but I personally would not put it in the same category as an older American made Detroit built "Muscle Car". Yea, it's a sports car that can't be disputed, but the test to see if it classifies as a muscle car is to chain it to the rear end of a Hemi Cuda, and see what happens when each driver stomps on it. Make sure that bumper is bolted on real tight, because once traction is obtained that TOYota going to be going in reverse real quick.
Just funning friend.
Trinity +++
"Train up a child in the way he should go, even when he is old he will not depart from it."(Proverbs 22:6)
Trinity --
Careful reading of my first post indicates that this was the premise of a TV documentary on the History Channel, and made a great deal of sense in terms of the pre-gas-crunch period of the mid sixties through the early seventies of putting hemi engines in a car the size of a Dart or Road Runner.
Who says there were no Mustang muscle cars? Somebody on the show did -- and they pointed out that the only one making a muscle car out of a Mustang was Carroll Shelby (as I also said earlier) -- there was a 350 and a 500 -- my buddy owned a '69 350 which I was privileged to "pilot" more than once. It was a great car -- had a regular harness-style seatbelt, and the horn switch, if you recall, was incorporated into the steering wheel rim.
Like I said, I don't make the rules on this thread, I'm strictly reporting a fascinating "take" on muscle cars from a TV documentary, which relied rather heavily on DeLorean interviews for its information. You may quibble over definitions, but DeLorean does seem to honestly deserve credit for getting the big 3 to start putting big blocks in their small & midsize cars. It gives, I think, and interesting way to think about the phenomenon -- because the GTO DID create a stir, and probably WAS responsible for the competitors playing catch-up with their own big-block small cars -- none of which were really sports cars, unless you count the 'vette. Certainly, Corvette owners did not feel any less well equipped than any muscle car owner.
I have no stake in debating this stuff; I think the whole era was great fun. I'll leave somebody else to quibble over the details. All I know is the muscle cars I rode in (including a couple nice '68 Camaros, and an even nicer '69 Judge, among others) were great. And I enjoyed the hell out of my 93 Supra Turbo, many years later. I should have refinanced that sucker -- dam*. (Only thing was, it was a bit low in the roofline for a six-footer; had to lean back that seat a bit.)
- Life NRA Member
"If cowardly & dishonorable men shoot unarmed men with army guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary...and not by general deprivation of constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Trinity --
I won't fault you on the hemi Cuda thing, except to say that the TV show made quite a big deal about the fact that many muscle cars had far lesser tires than we have today and were a lot better at burning rubber than getting traction -- so a hemi Cuda may or may not have outdone my Supra, armed as it was with a set of wide, lo-rise, 17" Michelins that cost $1200 a set and made the car seem like it was riding on rails. What did the typical kid take delivery on with his hemi Cuda, by comparison? Some pretty skinny 15s, probably. Now, if you put fat 'ol oversized racing slicks and taller rear suspension on your hemi, you may have a point. But stock? I don't know....
- Life NRA Member
"If cowardly & dishonorable men shoot unarmed men with army guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary...and not by general deprivation of constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
While TS may disagree with my definition of "muscle car," I do not appreciate the appellation "hog wash" being applied to the definition I used. The definition is not mine. The generally accepted definition of "muscle car" is a mid-size car with a large engine, of which the GTO is the recognized first example. While I did not see the documentary on muscle cars mentioned by offeror, clearly the producers were using the GTO-type cars as the prime example of muscle cars. They must not have consulted with TS for approval.
There were many higher horsepower engines offered throughout the 1950s and 1960s before the GTO was introduced. Those are the cars that interest me the most. (The Chrysler 300 letter series cars beginning with the 1955 300 are prime examples of high horsepower cars of the 1950s. Plymouth Furies, Dodge D500s, Desoto Adventurers are other examples.) None are muscle cars.
I do not consider that I have ever owned a "muscle car," although I have several higher horsepower cars. While the horsepower rating on my "1963 1/2" Ford Galaxie 500XL Fastback 427-425HP is higher than most muscle cars, it is not a muscle car in my opinion. It is a full-size Ford, not a mid-size car like a Fairlane. The mid-size Fairlane was finally offered in "muscle car" status in 1966, although badly outclassed with the standard 390.
I stand by the generally accepted definition of "muscle car" as being a mid-sized car with a large engine. It does not include sports cars or hybrids, etc..
In closing, my nominee for fastest production car is the McLaren F1: top speed about 240 MPH and under 12-second quarter mile elapsed times. When I win the lottary, my first extra million will be spent on one.
Judge: I believe the Fairlane "Thunderbolt" preceded the GTO by six months. Of course, it will be argued that this was not a muscle car either because it was built for racing and not produced in street car numbers. Still, the idea of putting big engines in small sedans did not originate with Delorean, only the idea to market the concept on a larger scale. So it is not the origination of a concept but the marketing of it that determines what is and what is not included?
Often the mind believes it is thinking, when it is only passing from one metaphor to the next.
Edited by - DancesWithSheep on 09/23/2002 14:53:29
offeror: Just one execption, DeLorean's car (nick named "The Coke Machine") had stainless steel body panels, not aluminum.
I love this whole topic, and the finer points can be debated forever. I still like the Pantera over the pure HP cars, because it could corner like no other front engine car, weighed less than 2,800 lbs, and has the only thing I like about a FMC: the 351 Cleveland.
"If you ain't got pictures, I wasn't there."
?The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.?
Margaret Thatcher
"There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics."
Mark Twain
Many fast domestic cars predated the GTO, like the Thunderbolt, the Chrysler 300s and Studebaker's Golden Hawk. What makes the GTO the first "muscle car" is not it's acceleration or packaging a big engine into a medium-sized body, but that this combination was priced so that it was affordable! The muscle car era wasn't started by horsepower, but by price wars - which did not start until the GTO proved to be a strong seller.
Throughout the '60s the price wars continued (a good example was the development of the Plymouth Road Runner) until insurance rates and gas prices crushed the economic viability of the "muscle car" in the early '70s.
The rise of successful new muscle cars like the Mustang Cobra, Viper, Marauder, F-150 Lightning and Corvette Z06 in addition to the "import" style of hot rods like the SVT Focus, Civic R and Mini S are all attributable to simultaneously lowering costs while raising performance. It's not the "bang", but the "bang-for-your-buck" that drives consumers and therefore the market, creating a phenomenon such as the muscle car movement of the '60s and '00s.
www.ebsart.com
"Live by the three 'R's: Respect, Responsibility and Residuals."
Everytime I drive my Delorean, I get the jokes. "Where's the flux capacitor", "Is John Delorean still in jail", etc. (He isn't - he was found not guilty and lives in New Jersey)
I didn't belabor the point that the car has stainless panels; to clean and refinish it I used a BBQ grill scotch brite brush!
It's a fun car, but I still think it looks like something out of "Battlestar Galactica". My wife calls it "The Sink" since it's covered in stainless steel. Actually, the stainless is the same grade used in milk tanks!
Jim: I would rather have been found guilty just to not live in New Jersey.
Car Horror Story #1: Came back from Vietnam in June, 1966. Bought a slightly used, red 1965 Cobra 289 roadster for $4995. Drove it from Camp Pendleton to my parents' house in Santa Barbara on weekends. Thought it was too uncomfortable and too noisy for long drives, so sold it six months later... for $4300.
Often the mind believes it is thinking, when it is only passing from one metaphor to the next.
In early 1973 I had a 1972 Mark IV with about 10K miles on it, the dealer offered to trade me even for a new Pantera. I came home all excited and told my (then) wife about it, and she threw a fit! Raised so much hell, that I didn't trade. Nowadays, the Pantera is worth at least $25k, the old Mark IV would be worth about $1000.00, and she's worth about nothing, and is an EX!
Yes, I'm still craving a Pantera, in fact I found a nice one 200 miles away, but unfortunately I don't have a place to put it or the extra cash to buy it, unless I sold the Delorean or Bird, and I don't want to do that. So, I'll just keep dreaming.
I have to laugh at these lists. I know for a fact they are not correct. Without much thought, I can think of the 1989 turbo trans-am. This car is not on the list and back in 89 pontiac bragged it as being their fastest production car ever with 13.5 quarters. As for comparing classic and modern muscle car times, I wonder if the old cars were ever timed using modern tires or do these time come from the 60-70's with bais ply tires having no traction. Think how much faster these old car were when ran with slicks.
The car I miss the most is my '64 Falcon Sprint. Never should have sold it...didn't know what I had or how much I would miss it. Sold it in 1978 for $1200. Don't know what it's worth today, but if I could get only one back that would be it. Thanks for ruining my day.
Often the mind believes it is thinking, when it is only passing from one metaphor to the next.
Palantiron and Dances have both hit on another element of it. Another aspect of this TV documentary's data (I hate to keep going back to something you all haven't seen, but it is remarkable how the thinking here leads us to the same conclusions) is that the thing that set the muscle cars apart was they were affordable in the average man's, or average youth's, market. The show made this clear.
DeLorean did not market this idea. He merely put together a GTO type sedan, complete with Hurst shifter, for his own use. Every time he loaned it to somebody, the execs found it more popular. Finally it was decided to market a limited number to the dealers, maybe 5,000. They got something like five times that man.y orders, because the car was not only fun as hell, but affordable.
So you are right. I left that out of my summary of the show's premise, but you correctly deduced the source of the difference as they described it -- these cars were affordable models with big powerplants and more carbs dropped in, and the only reason they had Hurst shifters was because the standard GM product couldn't handle the stresses, nor shift as positively. The Hursts were also adjustable, which the GM shifter was not. It could literally hit the dashboard, apparently.
So again, DeLorean built a car for himself to drive, and it led to increased marketing. He used the Hurst shifter out of necessity, and it led to two departures for GM -- one, the dropping of a "large car's" engine into a smaller model, and the use of a third-party vendor's shifter as standard, or at least optional, equipment. And the whole package was still affordable to the average man. At a time when we were paying $2800-3500 for a car, the Shelby 350 at $4200 seemed rich. I imagine vette prices were similar. But the RoadRunners, the Darts, even the Firebird HO 400, could be had for much less. Man, if I had a time machine....
- Life NRA Member
"If cowardly & dishonorable men shoot unarmed men with army guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary...and not by general deprivation of constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Met a guy a few years back that had a car collection called "Cars of My Youth". This turkey had just about every car I ever wanted, muscle cars, hot rods, sleepers, etc. I have never been more jealous of anyone in my life! He is a very wealth guy, and can afford anything he wants -- has over 200 cars in his collection.
Martzkj: I didn't make up this list, the car magazines did. Many times car companies will make claims on how fast their cars are, but these listings are supposedly from actual road tests. Some of my friends and I have had "discussions" on how fast they remember a car was, and I have to defer to the list as it is the best information available. Have no idea what kind of tires they used, etc. I would imagine that they used a vehicle straight out of production.
I do remember the L-78 Nova's numbers, as I read about the car before I ordered it. I don't remember GM arguing with C&D's numbers. I also heard or read somewhere that Ford is saying that their current high performance Mustangs are faster than the mid 60 HP models. Have no idea if that's true or not.
Jim: RE: Current Mustangs being faster than 60's HPs Mustangs, I would think that, for the $25K+ additional cost and benefit of thirty years more technology, this is not much to brag about.
Often the mind believes it is thinking, when it is only passing from one metaphor to the next.
Dads-Have no idea where you receive your information on
Corvettes. Every Vette manufactured since 1953 has had a
fiberglass/plastic body. Guess my 1970 Torino Cobra SCJ
qualifies, although unloved by many. Guess my 1967 Vette
w/427/435 is a sports car, but it is still a kick to drive.
Once owned a 1962 Oldsmobile Jetfire, 215 w/ Air Research
turbo. Fun to drive and would hold it's own but an under hood
plumbing mess. 101
Don't ever confuse a Mustang with a muscle car. They were never designed to be a straight-line acceleration machine. They were envisioned more along European priorities that match handling and braking to the acceleration of the vehicle to create an overall "package" that aims to meet or exceed most driver's expectations and abilities. That, combined with the muscle-car-era concept of 'bang-for-your-buck' and cutting-edge styling made the Mustang a strong seller.
Even today, the Mustang has been chronically, albeit slightly, out-performed by the Camaro and Firebird, but not enough people care. What difference does a couple tenths of a second make when factored against the comfort of the seats or ride quality? What good is a high skidpad rating if most consumers don't want the teeth-chattering ride usually associated with it?
The Mustang has always aimed at "good" performance with minimal compromise of comfort. This is quite different than the muscle car philosophy of "cheap speed at the compromise of all else."
p.s. The fastest production car in 1985 (0-60mph) was . . .
. . . think hard . . .
. . . the Buick Grand National with the 3.8L v6! (0-60 in 5.4 seconds)
www.ebsart.com
"Live by the three 'R's: Respect, Responsibility and Residuals."
It seems some will not accept the premise that a "muscle car" is a particular type of car: A regular-production mid-1960s-early 1970s mid-size car with a large engine. Mid-size cars did not exist prior to the 1962 Ford Fairlane (bigger than a Falcon, smaller than a Galaxie), Chevrolet Chevelle, Pontiac Tempest, Mercury Meteor, etc.. Prior to 1966, the Fairlane was not offered with a big block, with one exception, the Thunderbolt. The Thunderbolt was a pure race car of which only 200 were made. It was introduced to beat the lightweight MoPars at their own game on hte drag strip: big engine, small car. While technically street legal, you had to be a known racer to get one. Despite what DWS says, I do not believe the Thunderbolt was a "muscle car" as defined by the GTO. The GTO was readily available to anyone, affordable and warranted. The Thunderbolt was none of those things.
LTS feels the 1961 409-360HP Chevrolet was the first muscle car. Again, the 1961 Chevrolet was not a mid-size car. There was only one size Chevrolet in those days (Corvair excluded). What about the 1958 Chevrolet with the 348-335 HP engine? The 1960 348-350HP? The Super Duty Pontiacs, which dominated racing in the late 1950s and early 1960s? Using the premise of an extra-high horsepower engine making a "muscle car," the first of the breed could be said to be a 1955 Chrysler 300, which dominated racing during 1955. However, before that, there was the Hudson Hornet, which REALLY dominated racing (due more to superior handling rather than superior horsepower). An SJ Dusenberg had 320 horsepower in the 1930s and would move one of those giant cars close to 120 MPH. Should we start there? No, they are NOT MID-SIZE cars.
There are lots of wonderful higher-than-normal horsepower cars going way back, but the "muscle car" as generally accepted and defined originated in the 1964 Pontiac GTO.
greetings, ok guys i got my info at a corvette show a few years back and pretty much memorized all the papers. but after reading the vette museum .com i can see that my info was posibly faulty and altho it was free material and i rarely throw anything out ,i'm needing some paper in the john, soo... i conceide i was wrong. i'm sooo ashamed. respt submitted dads-freehold
quote:
a "muscle car" is a...regular-production mid-1960s-early 1970s mid-size car with a large engine...readily available to anyone, affordable and warranted.
Prior to 1964, the Pontiac Tempest was a compact, comparable to the Olds F85, Buick Skylark, Chevy Nova, Ford Falcon, Mercury Comet and Plymouth Valiant.
So now it's 1964. For GM, only the compact Nova remains; Tempest, F55 and Skylark are transformed into mid-size cars, sharing the new Chevy Malibu frame. Delorean comes along and matches a Hurst shifter to a 389, replacing the original tranny and 326, and the "muscle car" is born.
"John, Falcon came out with a small-block V8 in 1963. They also have a Fairlane with a 427."
"Well, by definition a muscle car has to have a big block, and it has to be available to the common man."
"John, Chrysler has been putting big block Hemis in their cars since the 50's. And the 1964 Hemi Polara is cheaper than the 1964 GTO."
"Well, by definition a muscle car has to be mid-size; Chrysler only puts big blocks in full-size sedans."
"Yeah, but why does a muscle car have to be mid-size?"
"Because that's what I did and that's what I say."
"Oh. Thank you, John."
Often the mind believes it is thinking, when it is only passing from one metaphor to the next.
Edited by - DancesWithSheep on 09/24/2002 19:10:31
I hadn't even considered price when it comes to muscle cars, But that's so obvious.......mine....brand new....$3,300.
Of course, back them, I was only making about $5,000 a year.
The car I REALLY kick myself for not going into total hock for was a Ferrari Berlinetta for $6,000. Needed a clutch ($1,000) but what a beauty and a steal. AAAARRRRGGGGHHHH
Mudge the dreamer
ps. OF COURSE it was RED
I can't come to work today. The voices said, STAY HOME AND CLEAN THE GUNS!
I owned a 70 Cuda with a 383-4-speed.It did not have any bottom end but it sure had some top end speed.It was a plain car with no decals,nothing indicated it had the 383 magnum motor,sure had some fun with that car,most people thought it had the 340 engine.
My friend had a 1962 Ford with a 406 engine-3 deuces,3-speed on the column with overdrive.It would fly but it weighed as much as a tank.
I also owned a 1958 chevy truck with 327 built with 4 speed,bucket seats,411 rear end.It had headers and what looked like straight pipes to headers,never could figure out why I could not hear the radio.
I also owned a 1952 ford truck with 283 chevy engine,it would scream.
Sorry about the rambling but this post brings back wonderful memories.
The best motor General Motors engine ever made in my opinion was the 302 it used in the Camaro's for a year or two to oust the Mustangs in racing. It was essentially a short stroke 350 that would scream it's cahoney's off. I was going to put one together a couple years ago, I got a forged 283 crank and a small journal 327 block....but then the kid came. Sure would of liked to of experienced that engine. Backed with a 700R4 it could of even got decent gas mileage on the highway.
....Just my two cents.
*If there is one gun for every 7 people in the world, I'm saving alot of people money*
I hate to bring this to the attention of all you folks who wish you could have another one -- but eBay's car section is chock full of cars of all makes, models and years. Specialty cars? No problem. Restored models? Every now and then, heck yes...
I have watched '64-66 Jaguar XKE 4.2 coupes come and go for quite a while, hoping the right car will come along at the right time to match my wallet. I wager that you can have ANYTHING you want again, literally any muscle car you can name, if you're willing to search the eBay car auctions for it and have enough patience -- and the right sum of money. Have it delivered, or drive it home cross country. I live down the road from Kruse in Auburn, Indiana, by the way, which holds the famous car auction each year, and now that eBay owns them, things should only get better.
- Life NRA Member
"If cowardly & dishonorable men shoot unarmed men with army guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary...and not by general deprivation of constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
What about the Studebaker Avanti.Some had a 289 ci Supercharged engine of Studebakers design.The best engine if i remember was called the R2.I seem to remember a ad in the mid.1960s with Andy Granatelli saying it was the only American car that cost less than $5.000 that could reach speeds around 150 MPH.
Dr.Evil
All of us seem to love cars; maybe as well as we love guns!
We all remember the fast cars of yesterday, some we owned -- some we wish we could've owned, but just remembering them causes a little spark of happiness in our minds. Those were better times, cheap gas, pretty girls and fast cars. It didn't cost a fortune to go to a drive in movie, and you didn't have to worry about a crack head robbing you in a parking lot. I didn't carry a gun with me everywhere in those days; these days I'm never without one.
We've come a long way since those innocent days of the 50's, 60's and 70's --- sometimes wish my Delorean was a real time machine, and I could go back --- just to visit, not stay --- and figure out a way to smuggle some of those cars back with me!
I am lucky enough to have a '64 Studebaker Avanti (Thanks to EVILDR235 for remembering this great American sleeper), which was the last year of Studebaker-produced Avantis, and consequently the last year of Avanti's with Studebaker engines. FYI: My Avanti is EARLY '64 and as such retains the '62-'63 round headlights and aircraft-style climate control switches.
History:
'66-'68 Avantis were produced at the old Studebaker facility after it was bought by a former employee (chief of somethingorother), and these Avantis were powered by the Chevy 327 (non-fuelie). The late-'60s Avantis all have the '64-and-later square headlights. In the late '70s Avantis were produced by a Canadian company through to the mid '80s. Somewhere in time there was an ugly little thing that looked like a mini-Avanti that was marketed after the Canadian company went bust, but I forget the details. The latest incarnation is produced in Florida and is based on the 93+ Firebird chassis with LT1 base engines - 500+HP blown engines are optional. This company's next-generation-Avanti will probably be based of Ford's Thunderbird chassis.
Back to my favorite years:
The early ones!!! The Avanti was first produced in 1962. The body was penned by the same guy who designed the trademark Coke bottle, which is very evident in the Avanti's body lines. The Avanti was the first American production car to have disc brakes (front only of course), and had many cool ergonomic features: Three separate ashtrays (one for each back-seat passenger!), multiple interior dome lights, ceiling-mounted lighting controls, a HUGE flip-up mirror as part of a separate vanity section inside the ample glove compartment, forward-opening hood (a must for fast cars) and remote hood and truck releases accessible ONLY from the inside by the driver - which is immensly practical and safe when compared to the more common external releases found on most pre-'70 cars.
Performance:
R1, Studebaker 289 v8, about 220hp, 0-60 in around 7.5-8.0 seconds depending on gearing and transmission.
R2, blown 289, about 300hp, 0-60 in the low-to-mid 6s.
R3, non-blown 289 with aluminum heads and LOTs of race-prepped parts. I think the R3s put out around 350hp and were damn quick...but...
The Avanti's "fatal flaw" with respect to acceleration is that the widest rear tire you can fit is a 195! You could mabey sqeeze in a 205 with a custom wheel with juuuuust the right offset, but you couldn't match that in the front. Case in point: My '64 R1/3spd auto will totally light up the rear tires without thinking twice - the 289 pulls strong from 700rpm-about 5000, and it will chirp the tires every time when it shifts to 2nd gear.
There was a slightly re-geared, otherwise-stock, Avanti R2 that ran over 170mph at Bonneville. In '68 a '63 Avanti was outfitted with twin turbos (around 600hp) and ran close to 200mph - a good testimate to the car's clean lines.
The Avanti is not at all what I would consider a "muscle car", it's too expensive, too slow, and designed more for European balanced performance than American straight-line acceleration. I think of it as a classic cruiser; it has style, limited availability, it's fun to drive and holds it speed great through turns. And it'll always be special to me because it's SO hard to get certain parts!
www.ebsart.com
"Live by the three 'R's: Respect, Responsibility and Residuals."
I had to go back and read my earlier post to see where you would have taken my comment as an insult, and I can see where you might have been offended. My intentions were not to have done that, and I am sorry if you do not appreciate my "HOG WASH" appellation (BIG WORD!) to your "Muscle Car" definition. Which by the way I do not feel is generally accepted. Like DancesWithSheep stated "this definition of muscle car is meaningless", but then we are all entitled to our opinions right? I guess if we were together face to face you could have seen that I was basically laughing when I typed that, and I was having fun going back in time, and dredging up all the old smack talk that I used to do with other friends about our cars while parked outside the local (Whites Drive In hamburger joint) in LaPorte Texas on Friday nights. We would just * each other until someone got heated enough to race the other guy. Then Katy bar the door, all holds were off, as were the capped headers! You got to admit that OFFEROR has one of the most interesting posts going here that we all have read in a long time. Again, I apologies if I offended anyone, but I must say, I think my computer is faster then anyone else's.
PALANTIRION,
Straight-line acceleration was exactly what an older Mustang was designed for. Unless you are referring to a GT 350-R coded Mustang, which was strictly a road racer, and was designed for exactly what your are speaking of. While they got a lot of interest & good press, they were factory built hybrids, and not a normal mustang by any means. I know my old 68 Shelby couldn't handle or corner to save it' *. It was too heavy in the front end with that big block FE motor. Even Steve's green 68 fastback GT in the Movie Bullet was no stock Mustang. Hollywood had to do a lot of work under that thing to make it do what it did. That includes the yellow 73 Mach 1 that was used in the original "Gone in 60 Minutes" movie. They used several of them, and they all were gone through from top to bottom.
LIKTOSHOOT,
You got a point, wasn't it the Beach Boy's who were singing about the 409, way before the 64 GTO?
OFFEROR,
I understand about the History Channel, and you may just have a point about the tires. Wonder how an old 60/70 muscle car would have ran with modern fuel injection, electronic ignition, and modern tires? Good post friend.
Trinity +++
"Train up a child in the way he should go, even when he is old he will not depart from it."(Proverbs 22:6)
quote:Straight-line acceleration was exactly what an older Mustang was designed for. Unless you are referring to a GT 350-R coded Mustang, which was strictly a road racer, and was designed for exactly what your are speaking of.
No, actually the original Mustang (commonly referred to as the '64 1/2) WAS built to corner and was not built for drag racing. The '64-'66 v6 and v8 cars were VERY balanced and aside from a little front end push were quite sharp at turn-in. My '66 has beefed-up springs and sway bars, and a better wheel/tire combination, but retains the stock '66 front and rear geometry - and will out-corner any modern domestic short of a Z06.
The Mustang also had optional disc brakes, unlike many pre-'67 "muscle cars" for which front disc brakes were an unnecessarily expensive option.
If the Mustang HAD been designed for straight-line acceleration it would have:
-Had more room in the rear wheel wells for tire.
-Had more rearend gearing options.
-Had supercharger and tripower FACTORY options instead of dealer options.
-Been designed with room for a big block from the start, which it was not.
-Would not have had a paisley vinyl roof option!
quote: I know my old 68 Shelby couldn't handle or corner to save it' *.
The '68 Mustangs are completely different from the original '64 cars. Any 3000lb car with 720lbs of engine in it's nose is going to have a lot of understeer. That doesn't mean that '68s can't corner though. Case in point: The '68 Boss 302 was a terrific handling car, even is street trim, because it didn't have the big block.
It's true that Mustangs did evolve during the later '60s into quasi-muscle cars, in particular the '69 429 CJ, but that does NOT mean that the Mustang was designed to be a muscle car from the beginning - clearly it was not.
www.ebsart.com
"Live by the three 'R's: Respect, Responsibility and Residuals."
quote:Wonder how an old 60/70 muscle car would have ran with modern fuel injection, electronic ignition, and modern tires? Good post friend.
Very, very good!
My '66 Mustang used to be my mom's company car, back in '65. It had Ford's 200 straight-6 and C4 tranny. About a year or so after I was given the Mustang as my first car I my parents went out of town and I "Ferris Bueller'd" my dad's (now my) Avanti. After that ride I was officially addicted to performance and decided to learn more about cars so I could modify my Mustang. My goal at the time was to make my Mustang competative with my friend's '93 Trans Am, while using less than $10k in parts.
I won't bore you guys with the whole learning process (at that point in my life I knew very little about cars), but what I ended up with was:
-5.0L factory crate motor with aluminum GT40 heads, Holley Pro-Jection and dual plane intake, full-length wrapped headers, 3-2 1/2 stepped crossover exhaust through glasspacks to Meg tips (It's a little loud). The engine makes about 325hp, but unfortunately was shipped with the wrong cam (cammed for a stick tranny) and I didn't know this until I installed the engine. I'll swap it out eventually, but for now it just doesn't have as much bottom-end as I'd like. To make things worse, the new auto tranny is Ford's AOD, which has a really sluggish first gear I figure I'm probably losing around a 1/2 second to 60mph with the current configuration. (engine and tranny about $7k)
-Four-wheel disc brake conversion kit from Baer Racing. ($2k)
-Much stiffer spring rates, increased front sway bar, added a rear sway bar and "Monte Carlo" bar underhood, KYB shocks (not quite as good, or expensive as, Konis), 17x7 Centerline wheels with 245/40ZR17 BFG tires. (Suspension mods $1k, wheels/tires about $2500)
Performance:
-0-60 in the mid5s (and that's with the wrong cam)
-60-0mph in about 115 feet (without ABS)
-Skidpad in the low .9s (could be improved with a upper-A-Arm relocation kit)
-14/22mpg (not bad considering it only has throttle body injection, not full EFI)
-Top speed is unknown as yet, I'll probably have to take it to the salt flats to find out for sure. I know it would run up to about 120mph with no problem with the first 302 v8 (about 200hp) I dropped in it, and without the high speed gearing advatage of the AOD tranny. I would be supprised if it didn't nose into the 150s.
Aside from the wheels, I was pretty close to my target cost. If I were doing the project over again I would have made a few different choices and saved some $, but hindsight is always that way. Figuring about $2k for the doner vehicle, the total project would run about $14,5k, plus paint and any interior changes. Not bad considering it would kick the * of the $25k Trans Am, would not be too far behind a $50k Z06 on a track, and would be a one-of-a-kind custom rod!
www.ebsart.com
"Live by the three 'R's: Respect, Responsibility and Residuals."
Palantirion: I would sure like to see that one-of-a-kind 1968 Boss 302 you mention! Now that has to be a rare one. Ford in its ignorance does not acknowledge the Boss 302 until 1969.
While I recognize you have greatly improved the handling of your Mustang, I disagree that it will corner better than any domestic except a Z06. I suspect most C4 and C5 Corvettes will out-corner it. I acknowledge that a lot can be done to make one of the old Mustangs handle on the skid pad, but a road course will still show the limitations of the suspension design.
While I love all Mustangs, and have what I consider to be one of the most desirable of the first generation, a 1965 GT Luxury ("Pony") Fastback High Performance ("K" Code), the 1965-1966 cars are essentially Falcons. They have terrible front suspension geometry. (Look at the angle of the front wheels in a hard corner.) Being heavily based on the Falcon, which started in 1960 as an economy car with a great little six-cylinder, the first generation Mustang naturally was not designed for a big block. It had nothing to do with being "handling" oriented. With the 1967 Camaro and Firebirds having big blocks, the much-changed 1967 Mustang had to be offered with a big block to be competitive, but if you have ever changed the plugs on one, you know the car needed a lot more room between the spring towers. (The spring-tower design was not one of Ford's better ideas.)
bad part of all this is you guys are bragging up someone elses creation. Cars built on assembly lines, another person(s) idea. if you want to brag about fast cars, make it fast, build it and make it go. All this is "How fast can you spend?", anybody can go to a bank and get money for a fast car, and god knows there are too many to choose from, from the classics to the modern coffins on wheels. I don't want to sound arrogant but I have no respect for a stock car bragged as fast. A true hotrodder will build his own and wipe ALL those stockers off the track.
I didn't own this but the car is still around and can be bought if one wants to take the time to rebuild it, not sure of the year but it is a Triumph TR7 redone with Ford 9" rear and GM powerplant. You want fast and wild, drive that car, you will leave skid marks in your undies.
I'm in the process of building my own street racer, when done I coulda bought me a brand new GT 'Stang or Camaro, but I will brag this car because I built it myself.
Sell me a mint condition 'Bee or a 'Cuda or any of the above and I will make you sick, out comes the motor and in goes mine.
I disagree with you on this 7mm nut. All it takes is enough money and anyone can build or have a race car built. The muscle cars were factory iron, and were the best for the money in their time frame. Sure, you can beat a Hemi with enough speed equipment added to a 454, but when it's all said and done, what do you have? A pile of expensive parts. An original muscle car is a piece of automotive history, and when it comes time to sell it will bring a lot more cash than the pieces parts hot rod.
Please don't take this as a slam, it's not meant to be --- I am a street rodder too.
If it is so easy to add parts, why does everybody buy one already built? Go to a junkyard or used car lot, buy a car and take it home. Strip it down and build an engine from scratch, install that engine and make it go. There is a heck of alot more to it than just adding a Holley carb and headers. The engine I'm building for my 'Stang killer is going to cost me in the neighborhood of $12,000 when finished, thats just the engine, not the rest of it. I'm doing ALL of the work except the machine work myself, that includes the body and frame work on the car. I don't like factory hotrods because somebody else came up with the plans and then the car was sold.
Sure those cars are nice, I would never own one unless I could make it faster, I don't want to brag and say "Hey I just spent $XXX on a car that somebody else built, see how fast it is?" I want to say "Look at this car I just built, see how fast it is?"
Real men use little bullets.
Well now, if you are Tim The Tool Man Taylor that look may be one of fear.
As far as the TR7, I wasnt bragging on what it used to be, merely stating that the thing could be more than it ever was. It does have an SB400 that is worked over quite well with a Powerglide behind it, not good for anything but running in a straight line, handles like crap, too nose heavy. And the thing is yellow, have no idea what color it started life as.
But, tease me as you wish, my opinion stands.
Lurker, I did not take that as a slam, I respect your opinion as much as anyone elses.
Comments
- Life NRA Member
"If cowardly & dishonorable men shoot unarmed men with army guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary...and not by general deprivation of constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Don't mean to put down your TOYota, but I personally would not put it in the same category as an older American made Detroit built "Muscle Car". Yea, it's a sports car that can't be disputed, but the test to see if it classifies as a muscle car is to chain it to the rear end of a Hemi Cuda, and see what happens when each driver stomps on it. Make sure that bumper is bolted on real tight, because once traction is obtained that TOYota going to be going in reverse real quick.
Just funning friend.
Trinity +++
"Train up a child in the way he should go, even when he is old he will not depart from it."(Proverbs 22:6)
Careful reading of my first post indicates that this was the premise of a TV documentary on the History Channel, and made a great deal of sense in terms of the pre-gas-crunch period of the mid sixties through the early seventies of putting hemi engines in a car the size of a Dart or Road Runner.
Who says there were no Mustang muscle cars? Somebody on the show did -- and they pointed out that the only one making a muscle car out of a Mustang was Carroll Shelby (as I also said earlier) -- there was a 350 and a 500 -- my buddy owned a '69 350 which I was privileged to "pilot" more than once. It was a great car -- had a regular harness-style seatbelt, and the horn switch, if you recall, was incorporated into the steering wheel rim.
Like I said, I don't make the rules on this thread, I'm strictly reporting a fascinating "take" on muscle cars from a TV documentary, which relied rather heavily on DeLorean interviews for its information. You may quibble over definitions, but DeLorean does seem to honestly deserve credit for getting the big 3 to start putting big blocks in their small & midsize cars. It gives, I think, and interesting way to think about the phenomenon -- because the GTO DID create a stir, and probably WAS responsible for the competitors playing catch-up with their own big-block small cars -- none of which were really sports cars, unless you count the 'vette. Certainly, Corvette owners did not feel any less well equipped than any muscle car owner.
I have no stake in debating this stuff; I think the whole era was great fun. I'll leave somebody else to quibble over the details. All I know is the muscle cars I rode in (including a couple nice '68 Camaros, and an even nicer '69 Judge, among others) were great. And I enjoyed the hell out of my 93 Supra Turbo, many years later. I should have refinanced that sucker -- dam*. (Only thing was, it was a bit low in the roofline for a six-footer; had to lean back that seat a bit.)
- Life NRA Member
"If cowardly & dishonorable men shoot unarmed men with army guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary...and not by general deprivation of constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
I won't fault you on the hemi Cuda thing, except to say that the TV show made quite a big deal about the fact that many muscle cars had far lesser tires than we have today and were a lot better at burning rubber than getting traction -- so a hemi Cuda may or may not have outdone my Supra, armed as it was with a set of wide, lo-rise, 17" Michelins that cost $1200 a set and made the car seem like it was riding on rails. What did the typical kid take delivery on with his hemi Cuda, by comparison? Some pretty skinny 15s, probably. Now, if you put fat 'ol oversized racing slicks and taller rear suspension on your hemi, you may have a point. But stock? I don't know....
- Life NRA Member
"If cowardly & dishonorable men shoot unarmed men with army guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary...and not by general deprivation of constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
There were many higher horsepower engines offered throughout the 1950s and 1960s before the GTO was introduced. Those are the cars that interest me the most. (The Chrysler 300 letter series cars beginning with the 1955 300 are prime examples of high horsepower cars of the 1950s. Plymouth Furies, Dodge D500s, Desoto Adventurers are other examples.) None are muscle cars.
I do not consider that I have ever owned a "muscle car," although I have several higher horsepower cars. While the horsepower rating on my "1963 1/2" Ford Galaxie 500XL Fastback 427-425HP is higher than most muscle cars, it is not a muscle car in my opinion. It is a full-size Ford, not a mid-size car like a Fairlane. The mid-size Fairlane was finally offered in "muscle car" status in 1966, although badly outclassed with the standard 390.
I stand by the generally accepted definition of "muscle car" as being a mid-sized car with a large engine. It does not include sports cars or hybrids, etc..
In closing, my nominee for fastest production car is the McLaren F1: top speed about 240 MPH and under 12-second quarter mile elapsed times. When I win the lottary, my first extra million will be spent on one.
Often the mind believes it is thinking, when it is only passing from one metaphor to the next.
Edited by - DancesWithSheep on 09/23/2002 14:53:29
I love this whole topic, and the finer points can be debated forever. I still like the Pantera over the pure HP cars, because it could corner like no other front engine car, weighed less than 2,800 lbs, and has the only thing I like about a FMC: the 351 Cleveland.
"If you ain't got pictures, I wasn't there."
Margaret Thatcher
"There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics."
Mark Twain
Throughout the '60s the price wars continued (a good example was the development of the Plymouth Road Runner) until insurance rates and gas prices crushed the economic viability of the "muscle car" in the early '70s.
The rise of successful new muscle cars like the Mustang Cobra, Viper, Marauder, F-150 Lightning and Corvette Z06 in addition to the "import" style of hot rods like the SVT Focus, Civic R and Mini S are all attributable to simultaneously lowering costs while raising performance. It's not the "bang", but the "bang-for-your-buck" that drives consumers and therefore the market, creating a phenomenon such as the muscle car movement of the '60s and '00s.
www.ebsart.com
"Live by the three 'R's: Respect, Responsibility and Residuals."
I didn't belabor the point that the car has stainless panels; to clean and refinish it I used a BBQ grill scotch brite brush!
It's a fun car, but I still think it looks like something out of "Battlestar Galactica". My wife calls it "The Sink" since it's covered in stainless steel. Actually, the stainless is the same grade used in milk tanks!
I just wish it would go like a Pantera!
"De Oppresso Liber"
Car Horror Story #1: Came back from Vietnam in June, 1966. Bought a slightly used, red 1965 Cobra 289 roadster for $4995. Drove it from Camp Pendleton to my parents' house in Santa Barbara on weekends. Thought it was too uncomfortable and too noisy for long drives, so sold it six months later... for $4300.
Often the mind believes it is thinking, when it is only passing from one metaphor to the next.
Yes, I'm still craving a Pantera, in fact I found a nice one 200 miles away, but unfortunately I don't have a place to put it or the extra cash to buy it, unless I sold the Delorean or Bird, and I don't want to do that. So, I'll just keep dreaming.
"De Oppresso Liber"
Often the mind believes it is thinking, when it is only passing from one metaphor to the next.
DeLorean did not market this idea. He merely put together a GTO type sedan, complete with Hurst shifter, for his own use. Every time he loaned it to somebody, the execs found it more popular. Finally it was decided to market a limited number to the dealers, maybe 5,000. They got something like five times that man.y orders, because the car was not only fun as hell, but affordable.
So you are right. I left that out of my summary of the show's premise, but you correctly deduced the source of the difference as they described it -- these cars were affordable models with big powerplants and more carbs dropped in, and the only reason they had Hurst shifters was because the standard GM product couldn't handle the stresses, nor shift as positively. The Hursts were also adjustable, which the GM shifter was not. It could literally hit the dashboard, apparently.
So again, DeLorean built a car for himself to drive, and it led to increased marketing. He used the Hurst shifter out of necessity, and it led to two departures for GM -- one, the dropping of a "large car's" engine into a smaller model, and the use of a third-party vendor's shifter as standard, or at least optional, equipment. And the whole package was still affordable to the average man. At a time when we were paying $2800-3500 for a car, the Shelby 350 at $4200 seemed rich. I imagine vette prices were similar. But the RoadRunners, the Darts, even the Firebird HO 400, could be had for much less. Man, if I had a time machine....
- Life NRA Member
"If cowardly & dishonorable men shoot unarmed men with army guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary...and not by general deprivation of constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Martzkj: I didn't make up this list, the car magazines did. Many times car companies will make claims on how fast their cars are, but these listings are supposedly from actual road tests. Some of my friends and I have had "discussions" on how fast they remember a car was, and I have to defer to the list as it is the best information available. Have no idea what kind of tires they used, etc. I would imagine that they used a vehicle straight out of production.
I do remember the L-78 Nova's numbers, as I read about the car before I ordered it. I don't remember GM arguing with C&D's numbers. I also heard or read somewhere that Ford is saying that their current high performance Mustangs are faster than the mid 60 HP models. Have no idea if that's true or not.
"De Oppresso Liber"
Often the mind believes it is thinking, when it is only passing from one metaphor to the next.
Corvettes. Every Vette manufactured since 1953 has had a
fiberglass/plastic body. Guess my 1970 Torino Cobra SCJ
qualifies, although unloved by many. Guess my 1967 Vette
w/427/435 is a sports car, but it is still a kick to drive.
Once owned a 1962 Oldsmobile Jetfire, 215 w/ Air Research
turbo. Fun to drive and would hold it's own but an under hood
plumbing mess. 101
Even today, the Mustang has been chronically, albeit slightly, out-performed by the Camaro and Firebird, but not enough people care. What difference does a couple tenths of a second make when factored against the comfort of the seats or ride quality? What good is a high skidpad rating if most consumers don't want the teeth-chattering ride usually associated with it?
The Mustang has always aimed at "good" performance with minimal compromise of comfort. This is quite different than the muscle car philosophy of "cheap speed at the compromise of all else."
p.s. The fastest production car in 1985 (0-60mph) was . . .
. . . think hard . . .
. . . the Buick Grand National with the 3.8L v6! (0-60 in 5.4 seconds)
www.ebsart.com
"Live by the three 'R's: Respect, Responsibility and Residuals."
LTS feels the 1961 409-360HP Chevrolet was the first muscle car. Again, the 1961 Chevrolet was not a mid-size car. There was only one size Chevrolet in those days (Corvair excluded). What about the 1958 Chevrolet with the 348-335 HP engine? The 1960 348-350HP? The Super Duty Pontiacs, which dominated racing in the late 1950s and early 1960s? Using the premise of an extra-high horsepower engine making a "muscle car," the first of the breed could be said to be a 1955 Chrysler 300, which dominated racing during 1955. However, before that, there was the Hudson Hornet, which REALLY dominated racing (due more to superior handling rather than superior horsepower). An SJ Dusenberg had 320 horsepower in the 1930s and would move one of those giant cars close to 120 MPH. Should we start there? No, they are NOT MID-SIZE cars.
There are lots of wonderful higher-than-normal horsepower cars going way back, but the "muscle car" as generally accepted and defined originated in the 1964 Pontiac GTO.
if your going to be a savage, be a headhunter
a "muscle car" is a...regular-production mid-1960s-early 1970s mid-size car with a large engine...readily available to anyone, affordable and warranted.
Prior to 1964, the Pontiac Tempest was a compact, comparable to the Olds F85, Buick Skylark, Chevy Nova, Ford Falcon, Mercury Comet and Plymouth Valiant.
So now it's 1964. For GM, only the compact Nova remains; Tempest, F55 and Skylark are transformed into mid-size cars, sharing the new Chevy Malibu frame. Delorean comes along and matches a Hurst shifter to a 389, replacing the original tranny and 326, and the "muscle car" is born.
"John, Falcon came out with a small-block V8 in 1963. They also have a Fairlane with a 427."
"Well, by definition a muscle car has to have a big block, and it has to be available to the common man."
"John, Chrysler has been putting big block Hemis in their cars since the 50's. And the 1964 Hemi Polara is cheaper than the 1964 GTO."
"Well, by definition a muscle car has to be mid-size; Chrysler only puts big blocks in full-size sedans."
"Yeah, but why does a muscle car have to be mid-size?"
"Because that's what I did and that's what I say."
"Oh. Thank you, John."
Often the mind believes it is thinking, when it is only passing from one metaphor to the next.
Edited by - DancesWithSheep on 09/24/2002 19:10:31
Of course, back them, I was only making about $5,000 a year.
The car I REALLY kick myself for not going into total hock for was a Ferrari Berlinetta for $6,000. Needed a clutch ($1,000) but what a beauty and a steal. AAAARRRRGGGGHHHH
Mudge the dreamer
ps. OF COURSE it was RED
I can't come to work today. The voices said, STAY HOME AND CLEAN THE GUNS!
Edited by - mudge on 09/23/2002 21:59:05
My friend had a 1962 Ford with a 406 engine-3 deuces,3-speed on the column with overdrive.It would fly but it weighed as much as a tank.
I also owned a 1958 chevy truck with 327 built with 4 speed,bucket seats,411 rear end.It had headers and what looked like straight pipes to headers,never could figure out why I could not hear the radio.
I also owned a 1952 ford truck with 283 chevy engine,it would scream.
Sorry about the rambling but this post brings back wonderful memories.
"It was like that when I got here".
Any car with a big motor, sometimes with multiple carbs, loud exhaust
and that would haul *!
....Just my two cents.
*If there is one gun for every 7 people in the world, I'm saving alot of people money*
lets all be responsible! shoot a criminal! Remember 0% of firearms pull there own trigger!
I have watched '64-66 Jaguar XKE 4.2 coupes come and go for quite a while, hoping the right car will come along at the right time to match my wallet. I wager that you can have ANYTHING you want again, literally any muscle car you can name, if you're willing to search the eBay car auctions for it and have enough patience -- and the right sum of money. Have it delivered, or drive it home cross country. I live down the road from Kruse in Auburn, Indiana, by the way, which holds the famous car auction each year, and now that eBay owns them, things should only get better.
- Life NRA Member
"If cowardly & dishonorable men shoot unarmed men with army guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary...and not by general deprivation of constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Dr.Evil
Did sombody say somethin` about bees?
We all remember the fast cars of yesterday, some we owned -- some we wish we could've owned, but just remembering them causes a little spark of happiness in our minds. Those were better times, cheap gas, pretty girls and fast cars. It didn't cost a fortune to go to a drive in movie, and you didn't have to worry about a crack head robbing you in a parking lot. I didn't carry a gun with me everywhere in those days; these days I'm never without one.
We've come a long way since those innocent days of the 50's, 60's and 70's --- sometimes wish my Delorean was a real time machine, and I could go back --- just to visit, not stay --- and figure out a way to smuggle some of those cars back with me!
"De Oppresso Liber"
I am lucky enough to have a '64 Studebaker Avanti (Thanks to EVILDR235 for remembering this great American sleeper), which was the last year of Studebaker-produced Avantis, and consequently the last year of Avanti's with Studebaker engines. FYI: My Avanti is EARLY '64 and as such retains the '62-'63 round headlights and aircraft-style climate control switches.
History:
'66-'68 Avantis were produced at the old Studebaker facility after it was bought by a former employee (chief of somethingorother), and these Avantis were powered by the Chevy 327 (non-fuelie). The late-'60s Avantis all have the '64-and-later square headlights. In the late '70s Avantis were produced by a Canadian company through to the mid '80s. Somewhere in time there was an ugly little thing that looked like a mini-Avanti that was marketed after the Canadian company went bust, but I forget the details. The latest incarnation is produced in Florida and is based on the 93+ Firebird chassis with LT1 base engines - 500+HP blown engines are optional. This company's next-generation-Avanti will probably be based of Ford's Thunderbird chassis.
Back to my favorite years:
The early ones!!! The Avanti was first produced in 1962. The body was penned by the same guy who designed the trademark Coke bottle, which is very evident in the Avanti's body lines. The Avanti was the first American production car to have disc brakes (front only of course), and had many cool ergonomic features: Three separate ashtrays (one for each back-seat passenger!), multiple interior dome lights, ceiling-mounted lighting controls, a HUGE flip-up mirror as part of a separate vanity section inside the ample glove compartment, forward-opening hood (a must for fast cars) and remote hood and truck releases accessible ONLY from the inside by the driver - which is immensly practical and safe when compared to the more common external releases found on most pre-'70 cars.
Performance:
R1, Studebaker 289 v8, about 220hp, 0-60 in around 7.5-8.0 seconds depending on gearing and transmission.
R2, blown 289, about 300hp, 0-60 in the low-to-mid 6s.
R3, non-blown 289 with aluminum heads and LOTs of race-prepped parts. I think the R3s put out around 350hp and were damn quick...but...
The Avanti's "fatal flaw" with respect to acceleration is that the widest rear tire you can fit is a 195! You could mabey sqeeze in a 205 with a custom wheel with juuuuust the right offset, but you couldn't match that in the front. Case in point: My '64 R1/3spd auto will totally light up the rear tires without thinking twice - the 289 pulls strong from 700rpm-about 5000, and it will chirp the tires every time when it shifts to 2nd gear.
There was a slightly re-geared, otherwise-stock, Avanti R2 that ran over 170mph at Bonneville. In '68 a '63 Avanti was outfitted with twin turbos (around 600hp) and ran close to 200mph - a good testimate to the car's clean lines.
The Avanti is not at all what I would consider a "muscle car", it's too expensive, too slow, and designed more for European balanced performance than American straight-line acceleration. I think of it as a classic cruiser; it has style, limited availability, it's fun to drive and holds it speed great through turns. And it'll always be special to me because it's SO hard to get certain parts!
www.ebsart.com
"Live by the three 'R's: Respect, Responsibility and Residuals."
I had to go back and read my earlier post to see where you would have taken my comment as an insult, and I can see where you might have been offended. My intentions were not to have done that, and I am sorry if you do not appreciate my "HOG WASH" appellation (BIG WORD!) to your "Muscle Car" definition. Which by the way I do not feel is generally accepted. Like DancesWithSheep stated "this definition of muscle car is meaningless", but then we are all entitled to our opinions right? I guess if we were together face to face you could have seen that I was basically laughing when I typed that, and I was having fun going back in time, and dredging up all the old smack talk that I used to do with other friends about our cars while parked outside the local (Whites Drive In hamburger joint) in LaPorte Texas on Friday nights. We would just * each other until someone got heated enough to race the other guy. Then Katy bar the door, all holds were off, as were the capped headers! You got to admit that OFFEROR has one of the most interesting posts going here that we all have read in a long time. Again, I apologies if I offended anyone, but I must say, I think my computer is faster then anyone else's.
PALANTIRION,
Straight-line acceleration was exactly what an older Mustang was designed for. Unless you are referring to a GT 350-R coded Mustang, which was strictly a road racer, and was designed for exactly what your are speaking of. While they got a lot of interest & good press, they were factory built hybrids, and not a normal mustang by any means. I know my old 68 Shelby couldn't handle or corner to save it' *. It was too heavy in the front end with that big block FE motor. Even Steve's green 68 fastback GT in the Movie Bullet was no stock Mustang. Hollywood had to do a lot of work under that thing to make it do what it did. That includes the yellow 73 Mach 1 that was used in the original "Gone in 60 Minutes" movie. They used several of them, and they all were gone through from top to bottom.
LIKTOSHOOT,
You got a point, wasn't it the Beach Boy's who were singing about the 409, way before the 64 GTO?
OFFEROR,
I understand about the History Channel, and you may just have a point about the tires. Wonder how an old 60/70 muscle car would have ran with modern fuel injection, electronic ignition, and modern tires? Good post friend.
Trinity +++
"Train up a child in the way he should go, even when he is old he will not depart from it."(Proverbs 22:6)
No, actually the original Mustang (commonly referred to as the '64 1/2) WAS built to corner and was not built for drag racing. The '64-'66 v6 and v8 cars were VERY balanced and aside from a little front end push were quite sharp at turn-in. My '66 has beefed-up springs and sway bars, and a better wheel/tire combination, but retains the stock '66 front and rear geometry - and will out-corner any modern domestic short of a Z06.
The Mustang also had optional disc brakes, unlike many pre-'67 "muscle cars" for which front disc brakes were an unnecessarily expensive option.
If the Mustang HAD been designed for straight-line acceleration it would have:
-Had more room in the rear wheel wells for tire.
-Had more rearend gearing options.
-Had supercharger and tripower FACTORY options instead of dealer options.
-Been designed with room for a big block from the start, which it was not.
-Would not have had a paisley vinyl roof option!
quote: I know my old 68 Shelby couldn't handle or corner to save it' *.
The '68 Mustangs are completely different from the original '64 cars. Any 3000lb car with 720lbs of engine in it's nose is going to have a lot of understeer. That doesn't mean that '68s can't corner though. Case in point: The '68 Boss 302 was a terrific handling car, even is street trim, because it didn't have the big block.
It's true that Mustangs did evolve during the later '60s into quasi-muscle cars, in particular the '69 429 CJ, but that does NOT mean that the Mustang was designed to be a muscle car from the beginning - clearly it was not.
www.ebsart.com
"Live by the three 'R's: Respect, Responsibility and Residuals."
Man you hit most of that dead on the head, but I still feel that they couldn't steer worth a flip.
Trinity +++
"Train up a child in the way he should go, even when he is old he will not depart from it."(Proverbs 22:6)
Very, very good!
My '66 Mustang used to be my mom's company car, back in '65. It had Ford's 200 straight-6 and C4 tranny. About a year or so after I was given the Mustang as my first car I my parents went out of town and I "Ferris Bueller'd" my dad's (now my) Avanti. After that ride I was officially addicted to performance and decided to learn more about cars so I could modify my Mustang. My goal at the time was to make my Mustang competative with my friend's '93 Trans Am, while using less than $10k in parts.
I won't bore you guys with the whole learning process (at that point in my life I knew very little about cars), but what I ended up with was:
-5.0L factory crate motor with aluminum GT40 heads, Holley Pro-Jection and dual plane intake, full-length wrapped headers, 3-2 1/2 stepped crossover exhaust through glasspacks to Meg tips (It's a little loud). The engine makes about 325hp, but unfortunately was shipped with the wrong cam (cammed for a stick tranny) and I didn't know this until I installed the engine. I'll swap it out eventually, but for now it just doesn't have as much bottom-end as I'd like. To make things worse, the new auto tranny is Ford's AOD, which has a really sluggish first gear I figure I'm probably losing around a 1/2 second to 60mph with the current configuration. (engine and tranny about $7k)
-Four-wheel disc brake conversion kit from Baer Racing. ($2k)
-Much stiffer spring rates, increased front sway bar, added a rear sway bar and "Monte Carlo" bar underhood, KYB shocks (not quite as good, or expensive as, Konis), 17x7 Centerline wheels with 245/40ZR17 BFG tires. (Suspension mods $1k, wheels/tires about $2500)
Performance:
-0-60 in the mid5s (and that's with the wrong cam)
-60-0mph in about 115 feet (without ABS)
-Skidpad in the low .9s (could be improved with a upper-A-Arm relocation kit)
-14/22mpg (not bad considering it only has throttle body injection, not full EFI)
-Top speed is unknown as yet, I'll probably have to take it to the salt flats to find out for sure. I know it would run up to about 120mph with no problem with the first 302 v8 (about 200hp) I dropped in it, and without the high speed gearing advatage of the AOD tranny. I would be supprised if it didn't nose into the 150s.
Aside from the wheels, I was pretty close to my target cost. If I were doing the project over again I would have made a few different choices and saved some $, but hindsight is always that way. Figuring about $2k for the doner vehicle, the total project would run about $14,5k, plus paint and any interior changes. Not bad considering it would kick the * of the $25k Trans Am, would not be too far behind a $50k Z06 on a track, and would be a one-of-a-kind custom rod!
www.ebsart.com
"Live by the three 'R's: Respect, Responsibility and Residuals."
While I recognize you have greatly improved the handling of your Mustang, I disagree that it will corner better than any domestic except a Z06. I suspect most C4 and C5 Corvettes will out-corner it. I acknowledge that a lot can be done to make one of the old Mustangs handle on the skid pad, but a road course will still show the limitations of the suspension design.
While I love all Mustangs, and have what I consider to be one of the most desirable of the first generation, a 1965 GT Luxury ("Pony") Fastback High Performance ("K" Code), the 1965-1966 cars are essentially Falcons. They have terrible front suspension geometry. (Look at the angle of the front wheels in a hard corner.) Being heavily based on the Falcon, which started in 1960 as an economy car with a great little six-cylinder, the first generation Mustang naturally was not designed for a big block. It had nothing to do with being "handling" oriented. With the 1967 Camaro and Firebirds having big blocks, the much-changed 1967 Mustang had to be offered with a big block to be competitive, but if you have ever changed the plugs on one, you know the car needed a lot more room between the spring towers. (The spring-tower design was not one of Ford's better ideas.)
I didn't own this but the car is still around and can be bought if one wants to take the time to rebuild it, not sure of the year but it is a Triumph TR7 redone with Ford 9" rear and GM powerplant. You want fast and wild, drive that car, you will leave skid marks in your undies.
I'm in the process of building my own street racer, when done I coulda bought me a brand new GT 'Stang or Camaro, but I will brag this car because I built it myself.
Sell me a mint condition 'Bee or a 'Cuda or any of the above and I will make you sick, out comes the motor and in goes mine.
Please don't take this as a slam, it's not meant to be --- I am a street rodder too.
Sure those cars are nice, I would never own one unless I could make it faster, I don't want to brag and say "Hey I just spent $XXX on a car that somebody else built, see how fast it is?" I want to say "Look at this car I just built, see how fast it is?"
Real men use little bullets.
As far as the TR7, I wasnt bragging on what it used to be, merely stating that the thing could be more than it ever was. It does have an SB400 that is worked over quite well with a Powerglide behind it, not good for anything but running in a straight line, handles like crap, too nose heavy. And the thing is yellow, have no idea what color it started life as.
But, tease me as you wish, my opinion stands.
Lurker, I did not take that as a slam, I respect your opinion as much as anyone elses.
Real men use little bullets.