Indholdsfortegnelse for January 1994 i Hot Rod

O.E.M. RAGTOPS WIND-IN-THE-HAIR PONYCARS Most convertibles just don’t look right. It’s as if the designers were gazing in satisfaction at their new coupe creation when a marketing guy came busting into the room and said. “So, where’s the convertible?” The result often appears to be an afterthought rather than a planned-from-the-outset drop-top. That’s not the case with the new ponycars from Ford and General Motors. From the initial planning stages of I the new cars, I both companies had firm r plans for convertibles, and the finished products are proof of that fact. In the case of the Mustang, Ford was tired of reading magazine testers’ comments about cowl shake and general lack of chassis rigidity, so they beefed up the car considerably. An underbody X-brace and engine-compartment brace contribute…

CLASSICAL DESK Hey, good buddies! Do you have chevy pol who’s a ’57 freak, has everything, but wants more? Jeff Lilly of Jeff Lilly Restorations (Dept. HR0l, 9467 Volley Bend, Son Antonio, TX, 210/522-9016) may have the answer. Jeff hos created what he calls the Fuelie Executive—a desk in the shape of a near perfect restoration of a stock ’57 Chevy front end. Jeff’s Fuelie Executive combines original steel fenders and a hood with Donchuk’s line of reproduction hardware laced with hand-formed chunks of Honduras Mahogany to form the classic shell that houses the necessary drawers. The custom-built drawers have been fitted with repop ’57 door handles that serve as pulls, and the ’57 classic is covered with three coats of oxblood red urethane. The Fuelie Executive even has an…

THE GREAT 1994 PUBLISHER SHUFFLE Usually, only hard-core readers peruse HOT ROD’s masthead, that little one-column box that lists all of our names next to the Starting Line page. Those of you who do have probably noticed a change where it says “Publisher.” Harry Hibler, HOT ROD’S publisher for the past 12 years, has moved up a few floors in the Petersen tower to spearhead a new division. Hand Grenade Hibler. The Guardrail Nibbier, is now in charge of Petersen Publishing’s new Events division, his official title being Director of Marketing and Sales. Special Events. Hany’s already neck-deep in the planning stages of several HOT ROD-sponsored events to be held this spring and summer somewhere in the Midwest (see Starting Line). Those haps will definitely be the places to be…

POSIE’S PICK Check out this 1 1/2-ton hauler. It definitely gets the job done, and Ken “Posie” Fenicol—owner of the famed Posies street-rod shop—has selected it as his pick for January. Each month, Posie selects one car or truck for inclusion in Roddin At Random. The only requirement is that the owner/builder of the truck be under the age of 25. Il also helps if the photography submitted is clear, in focus and shows only the car (no people, please) but all of the car against a clean background. This month’s choice machine is Eric Peraft’s ’34 Ford. Eric bought the 1 1/2-ton truck during his first year of college, when he was studying for o B.S. in Automotive Ports and Service Management at the University of Southern Colorado. The…

7-SECOND UPDATE In the July ’93 issue, we told you that Rod Saboury had broken the 7-second barrier, running a 7.961-second/170.00-inph pass at Englishtown with the help of a little squirt of nitrous. Since then, Saboury wanted to trip the next barrier with a 7-second crack on just the engine alone. Working with engine builder Charlie Garrett, Saboury bolted on a new Dart single-four-barrel intake and a set of 16-degree Dart/Oldsmobile aluminum heads that were ported by Sam Gianino. Engine displacement remained at 632 inches, but Garrett installed new pistons to pump the compression to 15:1. Dyno testing revealed that the Dart heads were worth close to 150 horsepower fed by The Carb Shop’s Urban Terminator carburetor. Saboury also added a new Fred Brown 1.78:l-ratio Powerglide, a 5500-stall-speed B&M 10-inch…

Every once in a while, a street-rod builder makes a pass at a late-model automobile. The end result is generally superb. When Boyd Coddington and his crafty crew of constructive creatures decide to work their magic on a ’69 Camaro—once intended for Jamie Musselman, a car-loving collector with an eclectic taste in hat rads—the end product goes one step further. During a visit to Boyds a couple of years back, Ron Craft—the owner of a Cadillac, Chevrolet and Oldsmobile dealership in Baytown, Texas—caught a glimpse of Jamie’s partially completed Camaro. Ron, whose automotive appetite is every bit as strong as Jamie’s, saw an audio/visual promotional possibility. He rightly felt that a performance-style ’69 Camaro would look great in his showroom…and better on the street, should he drive it to work…

Sometimes hot rodders ran be downright stupid. Most nitrous users know that bottle pressure is directly related to the temperature of the bottle. Higher bottle temperatures mean more pressure. Most nitrous companies prefer the system to operate at between 900 and 950 psi at 72 degrees Fahrenheit for optimal performance. The safety pressure-relief valves are usually rated at around 3000 psi. Unfortunately, a few hot rodders use an open flame, such as that from a hand-held propane or butane torch, to quickly heat the bottle to raise the pressure. This extremely dangerous and life-threatening procedure should never be attempted for any reason! The extremely high localized temperatures of a torch embrittles the aluminum bottle, causing cracks to form that could immediately fracture the bottle. Consider that a 25-pound nitrous bottle…

It used to be that hot rodders were satisfied with single-purpose vehicles. Drag cars were kept to the strip. Bonneville cars stayed on the salt, and street rods stalked the boulevards. Now, however. everyone wants his car to do everything—and at outrageous performance levels. That was Dick Dickerman s plan with his Thom Taylor-inspired ’33 Ford. The concept was simple: Build a street rod that could do it all, including too-quick dragstrip e.t.’s, road-hugging handling and everyday-driver dependability integrated into a four-passenger ride that could knock ’em dead at a car show. A tall order, indeed. Street-rod builder Steve Winkler of ’Hie Rod Shop in Kissimmee. Florida, took on the daunting project with a custom chassis fitting the all-steel ’33 Ford sedan body over an NHRA-certified 14-point rollcage. He then…

The event-promotion business can be rough. Not only must you contend with weather, locations, parking and a million other variables, but you also have to know the locale well and stay abreast of all of the area’s happenings so that you can schedule your event at a time that doesn’t coincide with another huge event. When the folks at Goodguys, led by Gary “Goodguy” Meadors, scheduled the 3rd Annual Rod & Custom D’Elegance at the beautiful seaside community of Monterey, California, for the weekend of September 11 and 12, they didn’t realize that the same weekend marked the only U.S. stop on the worldwide grand prix motorcycle schedule, held at nearby Laguna Seca Raceway. The USGP is a big deal among bike people (similar to a Formula 1 race coming…

No matter what vehicle you start with or what your final goal is, the first thing you do with any project is fix simple problems and make mild improvements. Even though we will be installing a complete General Motors Performance Parts H.O. 350 Camaro Conversion kit in our ’82 Camaro project car. we wanted to see what kind of performance we could squeeze from the existing engine. After all. it ran on all eight cylinders, and trying a couple of upgrades we know will reduce e.t. would be fun. Sure. Last month we replaced the TH350 transmission with a high-performance TH700-R4 from General Motors (part No. 24502478). We expected an e.t. advantage with the deeper First gear of the TH700 (3.07 compared to 2.52 in a TH350). The TH700 high-performance…

Unless you’re revealing a 6-71 lung, a hole in the hood is a styling faux pas. Today’s trend is to use a hoodscoop rather than leaving carbs flapping in the breeze. Fortunately, fiberglass manufacturers will bond a scoop and hood together for a reasonable fee. But if your hood isn’t available in ’glass, if you want to keep a steel hood, or if you want to save some coin, you’ll need to do it yourself. Read on as we find out from Mike Paradis at Cars. Truck & Concepts the right way to install a Harwood fiberglass scoop onto a steel hood. Then we’ll visit George Crabtree at Fiberglass Trends to see what’s different about bonding ’glass to ’glass. And finally, Mark Mahood and Wendall Pigman at Manhood’s Auto Body…

They called ’em Street Hemis and Race Hemis because they were meant to be driven on the street and raced at the track. Most collectors forget that, but our buddy Steve Atwell has the right idea about how to use his collection of rare Mo Muscle: He drives ’em, and he races ’em! His awesome collection focuses on factory Hemi race cars (in addition to the cars shown here. Steve is half owner of the Golden Commando A/FX’r and is looking for a ’70 Pro Stock Duster), and it’s hard to believe that each car is street driven—frequently. In fact, we’ve personally throttled one of the Super Stock Darts all over Detroit—which made it clear that these cars were built to flog, not to stare at. Rest assured that Steve’s…

MOVIE TO GO In your January ’92 issue, a fellow inquired about a movie called Hot Rod that featured a Hemi-powered Willys coupe. I saw the movie way back in ’86 on late-night TV and have been searching for it ever since. Can you help me locate it? Mark Marraccini Cincinnati, Ohio The movie you’re after starred Gregg Henry and a ’40 Willys that currently runs 8s in the hands of Steve Castelli. You can find Hot Rod and many other older films through Main Attractions (Dept. HROI, P.O. Box 4923, Chatsworth, CA 91313-4923, 818/883-3408). PHOTO FLOP Gary and Sue Alexander’s ’71 Camaro on the October ’93 cover really does look nasty. What’s even nastier is the brake master cylinder on the passenger’s side of the engine compartment. Is that…

B-400 STREET ROD While weirdo body styles are hip for the cruise, here’s one we’d wager you’ve never seen: a street rod ’32 B-4OO. The B-400 was a one-year body style, and only a few were made. We’d like to tell you that this beautifully executed rod was a hacked-up gennie, but it’s actually a pieced-together car built by the crew at Ginny and Barry Lobeck’s V8 Shop and Just-A-Hobby. The bogus B-400 is cut together with pieces from Lobeck’s roadster, Tudor and highboy delivery bodies. What started as a Thom Taylor drawing turned into the ultimate driver; Americruise participants had to plead with Lobeck to slow down on the cross-country drive!…

SWEEPSTAKES GIVEAWAY Once again, a HOT ROD reader has won a Petersen Publishing Company sweepstakes. Even though the contest was run in the full gamut of PPC automotive publications—including Cor Craft, Motor Trend, Circle Track and Chevy High Performance as well as Motorcyclist and Sport—the lucky winner was one of our own. Nancy Elmore of Marianne, Florida, chose to forgo the ZR-1, however, electing instead to accept a cash payment from the dealership. Bob Goode, General Sales Manager of the World Chevrolet/Geo dealership in Orlando, Florida, handed over the check to Ms. Elmore. It pays to read HOT ROD!…

At any out-of-town event, you can count on the HOT ROD staff to seek and destroy any and all local go-kart tracks. Nothing is more fun than dragging racers and automotive execs to the kart track and watching them lose all dignity in wheel-to-wheel competition that usually ends with a hasty retreat before the track owner calculates the damage. That same type of fun is the goal of the National M-Car Racing Association, but the emphasis is on safety and raising money for charities. The Association raises money by organizing a race circuit for go-kartlike little racers. It provides the track, the officials, the rules and the timing equipment. The sponsors are the racers, who buy the cars from M-Car on a spec-racer basis. Modifications aren’t allowed, but racing is…

Nitrous oxide is the power-making tool of the ’90s. Drag racers at every level have realized that nitrous can be an effective way to add power and simplify e.t. tuning. We witnessed copious amounts of nitrous being used at the Fastest Street Car Shootout. You probably see it at your local bracket races, and even if you don’t see it at the street races, it’s there, too. That’s why we have put together this nitrous-oxide section. This article on building a nitrous engine shows you ways to make the most of nitrous oxide and how to improve your engine’s longevity. Jeff Smith’s “Nitrous Basics” explains the nature of the gas. and in “Fuel-Delivery Basics,” he spells out concerns in constructing a fuel system. Finally, David Freiburger shows how to form…

Romance is making 700 horsepower on the dyno. Reality is making all that power work for you in the car. The better the car accelerates, the more g-forces are applied to the vehicle, which you feel as an invisible force shoving you back in the seat. One of the effects of acceleration is additional demands on the fuel-delivery system. Perhaps the greatest misconception that exists in fuel-delivery systems is in the relationship between pressure and volume. To state it simply, pressure is inversely proportional to volume. In other words, as fuel pressure increases, the volume of fuel decreases. We have included a fuel-pressure chart that shows the effect of pressure on the amount of fuel delivered to help illustrate this point. If a fuel pump did not have to fight…

The only thing more frustrating than not having the power to spin the tires is smoking the right rear when you’d rather be accelerating. Single-tire spin occurs with either an open differential or a dead posi-traction unit. Since two legs are better than one in any kind of butt-kicking contest, we’ll take a look at a couple of ways to improve the effectiveness of both the Eaton plate-style and the Auburn cone-design limited-slip units. The purpose of a posi-traction unit is to tie the two drive axles together for more efficient traction under acceleration. Originally designed to improve traction in mud, snow and icy conditions, such traction improvers were soon adopted to limit tire spin. Under hard acceleration in a rear-wheel-drive car, torque tries to rotate the rearend housing, lifting…

Elvis was there, but no one cared. That’s how flat-out, tire-frying, wheel-standing, flame-throwing, stand-packing wiki the ’93 HOT ROD Fastest Street Car In America Shootout was. In only its second year, the Shootout has become the event that everyone’s talking about, and it has picked up such major sponsors as Flowmaster. ’Hie Carb Shop, Competition Cams, Global Television, Mickey Thompson, Musclecars Video Magazine, Nitrous Oxide Systems, Racer Components Inc., Racing Head Service THE FASTEST STREET CAR IN AMERICA RUNNER-UP TOP TEN WINNER TOP TEN WINNER TOP TEN WINNER SUPER STREET WINNER TOP TEN WINNER TOP TEN WINNER Elvis was there, but no one cared. That’s how flat-out, tire-frying, wheel-standing, flame-throwing, stand-packing wild the ’93 HOT ROD Fastest Street Car In America Shootout was. In only its second year, the Shootout…

If you’ve considered the idea of buying a new Harley, you may have taken at least one trip to the local dealership and found the showroom floor somewhat vacant. That’s nothing new for the dealers, since the popularity of Harley-Davidsons has kept the assembly line backlogged for the past few years. The upside to that situation is booming business for the factory, but the downside can be difficulty in finding a new scooter. Fortunately, another option exists: used bikes. Buying a used Harley is often a great way to get into the Harley experience at a decent price and still obtain a workable piece of hardware—if you know what to look for. But what do you look for? While most of us have a good idea of what we want…

INJECTION SELECTION TPI/TBI RETROFIT KITS Fuel Injection Specialties offers new and reconditioned GM Tuned Port and throttle-body injection systems in the form of bolt-on kits. The kits can be configured to work with or without speed-density systems and can be used on computer-controlled vehicles. For more information. contact Fuel Injection Specialties, Dept. HR01, 4317 Center Gate, San Antonio. TX 78217,210/6544)774. STRONG ARMS F-BODY REAR-AXLE CONTROL SYSTEM Hotchkis Performance offers a complete rear-axle control system for ’82-’94 Camaros and Firebirds that includes trailing arms and a tubular Panhard bar. The system improves cornering through increased roll stiffness and sway-bar effectiveness. For more information, contact Hotchkis Performance. L.P., Dept. HR01, 8531 Wellsford Pl.. Ste. G, Santa Fe Springs, CA 90670, 310/907-7757. CONDUIT CAN DO IT FLEXIBLE WIRE CONDUIT Wires that pass through…

Torn, discolored or missing door panels can min the look of an otherwise good interior. Since reproduction door panels are available at affordable prices for nearly any car worth restoring or hot rodding, there is no reason not to swap the old and tattered for the new and nice. To illustrate how easy such a swap can be, we pulled some tuck ’n’roll out of a ’68 Nova and applied C.A.R.S., Inc. skins to the inside of the doors. On this generation Nova and ’68-’81 Camaros, the door panel must be stretched over and attached to the windowsill. The door panels on most other cars slip into a metal trim piece near the top of the door, making removal and replacement easier and more straightforward. SOURCES C.A.R.S., Inc. Dept. HROL…

OLE BLUE Starting from scratch. Jimmy McDonald and his girlfriend, Barb, of Grand Prairie. Texas, transformed a $500 junk ’70 Camaro into a fine ride. Beneath the shiny hood rumbles a 350 four-bolt block with a 400 crank (making 383 cubes), a Competition Cains Magnum cam, ported and polished heads, a Carter 750 carb, a Holley electric fuel pump, a Turbo 350 tranny and loads of other goodies. Jimmy designed and built the interior, which features a custom oak dash, air conditioning, oak door panels and Technics tunes. Ole Blue is driven daily on Center Line wheels and BEG meats. SELF-STARTER When Kelly Anderson returned from Saudi Arabia to Weatherford. Oklahoma, two years ago he needed wheels, so he set to work on a wrecked and stripped ’87 Camaro. After…

CARS TO DREAM OF It should come as no surprise to anyone that Vic Edelbrock Jr. is into hot rods. When we were at the Edelbrock facility recently, we snapped a couple of quick photos of most of the cars in Uncle Vic’s collection. You may have seen some of them in the Edelbrock catalog or at car shows, but they’ve never been shown all together at one time. At the far left (top photo) is a ’59 Lister with small-block Chevy power, perhaps one of the most complete and nicest vintage racing Listers in the world. And, yes, Vic races the car at numerous vintage-car events every year. Next door is daughter Camee’s ’66 Shelby Mustang vintage racer, which she campaigns with dad’s ’63 ZO6 small-block Corvette. The ’Vette,…

WILD IN THE STREETS They do things differently in Texas. They even hot rod different kinds of cars in the Lone Star state. As an example, we give you Bonneville racer Bob Norwood. He discovered this derelict 77 Cadillac Seville with a tube chassis under it that had supposedly been built for an obscure movie, but no one seems to remember. The wild part comes to light when you take a spin in it and discover that it’s powered by a fire-breathing 540ci Donovan with twin Turbonetics turbochargers injecting massive amounts of (are you ready for this?) propane to thump to the tune of 1000 Ibs-ft of torque and. when Norwood squeezes it with nitrous, 1000 horsepower! Wait! There’s more! This two-ton terror spins all this through a single 11.5-inch…

One way to judge the popularity of a part or process is by the number of labels it acquires over the years. In the case of nitrous oxide, it has been called squeeze, spray, juice, fast gas, on the bottle, bottle fed or the single-syllable word nos. But no matter what you call it, nitrous oxide injection is die simplest, easiest and cheapest way to go fast that exists in hot rodding today. WHAT IT DOES Nitrous oxide is a gaseous mixture of two parts nitrogen and one part oxygen (NO). The gas helps make power in two ways. While nonflammable, its single oxygen molecule is used as an oxidizer to allow more fuel to be burned to create more heat and pressure during the combustion process. That is why…

BLAM! Flames leap for heaven. Hoodscoops blaze. Carb butterflies assume taco-shell shape. And races are lost. Is nitrous to blame? No—at least not directly. Most of the time when an engine is damaged by nitrous, it’s because of a fault in the fuel-enrichment system. If the fuel system allows or even causes an air bubble. or if it can’t deliver the volume required, the nitrous will use engine parts as a fuel instead of gasoline. And you’ll hate it when that happens! To avoid those nightmares, we asked Harold Bettes at SuperFlow Performance to design a fuel system for a typical Super Street car in Fastest Street Car competition. We assumed a car (hat rolls at least 9.80s with a 500-inch big-block running a single four-barrel and a 300hp nitrous…

When you hear the phrase “street machine.” images of Camaros, Mustangs and E-body Mopars usually come racing to mind. It’s not the average guy who envisions a pickup as the ideal street machine, but that was the case at last year’s Hot Rod Super Nationals, where apparently a whole bunch of people thought Richard Mitcham’s ’54 Chevy pickup was the best street machine of the lot. In fact, it was voted Grand Champion Street Machine. What does it take for a vintage pickup to take top honors over hundreds of ’69 Camaros? l ots of work, attention to detail and. surprisingly enough, not very much cash. Working out of his shop (Richard Mitcham Street Rods & Restorations in Townville, Pennsylvania), Richard took 4 inches out of the lid, grafted in…

The scenario is a most familiar one: Boy builds a chopped and channeled Deuce three-window in high school, then arms it with a bored 265 and a Cad/LaSalle trans. Boy joins the military and becomes a member of the special forces. Boy is discharged, finds gainful employment, gets married, creates a family and finally sees the kiddies leave the nest. About four years ago. boy receives a care package from his mother. In that care package are snapshots of his old coupe, and one shows a copy of HOT ROD on his bunk. “Those photos got me thinking about building another Deuce coupe.” said Bill Currie, the hero of our narrative. “1 got a subscription to HOT ROD and began cutting out photographs of cars or parts of cars that…

Al Scheib asks, “How much horsepower am I allowed to have and still go to Heaven?” We’d say he has no worries because Hell hath no Fury like a blown Hemi ’57. Sure, some nonbelievers think it’s a sin to build a gargantuan-finned Mopar, but all is forgiven when you stick a 51 lei. 6-71-blown Hemi between the front tires. The Elephant came out of the old Vel’s Pamelli Jones’Fop Fuel Funny Car before Al swapped in a bigger 650-lift roller cam. lost the magneto and added Hilborn four-port mechanical fuel injection complete with nitrous oxide. Pro Comp Engineering in Van Nuys, California, slipped the motor in with a set of 2 1/2-inch headers by Rich Manchen. Pro Comp was also responsible for the tub job to fit the 33x21.5…

Street rodding may allow greater individual expression than any other form of hot rodding. The range of raw material itself gives a huge panorama from which to choose. A builder may select a ’23 T-bucket or a ’48 Chevy two-door, a ’32 highboy road-Fats will be expected to perform all of the duties of a modern commuter car but with the style and personality that only a street rod embodies. The base car in any project is determined as much by ultimate purpose as by personal taste. In the case of this ster or a ’41 Willys coupe. From cabriolets to convertibles, from pickups to panels, from four-door sedans to sedan deliveries, street rods run the gamut of body types (some no longer available in modem versions) and the full…

A true artist is not bound by his materials. Someone with genuine artistic talent can make something beautiful using ugly pieces, but he can also take something that’s good looking to start with and turn it into an even more breathtaking piece of work. That is especially true with those artists who dabble in steel, rubber, glass and gas fumes—the heroes of the hot rod art scene. Scott Sullivan is one of those artists. He’s built some of his own cars and personalized countless others with graphics, but he has recently taken on a slightly left-of-center niche of hot rodding: Harleys. A few years back, Scott’s attitude was different. A Harley’s lack of power, abundance of noise and general poseur personality made it the source of jokes in his mind.…

REPLACEMENT POWER Q I have an ’81 Chevrolet C-10 pickup with a completely stock four-barrel 305 V8. The truck has over 100,000 miles on it, and I am planning to eventually pull the 305 out and drop in a new 350 four-bolt-main engine. I see that the Mr. Goodwrench replacement 350 engine is rated at around 200 horsepower. I would like to improve on that, but I also want to keep the engine reliable. Marc Allen Seattle, Washington A To the best of our knowledge, the Mr. Goodwrench 350 replacement engine does not have an official horsepower rating from GM. but Kevin McClelland at Flowmaster has had numerous opportunities to put those engines on the dyno. He tells us that out of the crate, the 350 equipped with a ’69…