Innehållsförteckning för December 2010 från Hot Rod

EMISSIONSAND MILEAGE Our cover story this month is an idea we’ve been contemplating for the last few years: an updated version of one of the most memorable covers HOT ROD has ever done. The circle-and-slash “Can They Outlaw Hot Rodding?” cover was done for the Oct. ’84 issue, and the story discussed the government’s coming emissions and mileage regulations that threatened our ability to live the gearhead life. We didn’t reprise that cover for the last few years because we thought with the economy and job situation being what it is, readers didn’t need another punch in the gut. I mean, if you’re struggling to make ends meet or looking for a job, do you really want your favorite car mag spelling out the doom and gloom that potentially sits…

SALTINES, 1955 This month’s issue contains coverage of the August speed trials at the Bonneville Salt Flats, just as HOT ROD has done more often than not since 1949, when the magazine had a hand in talking the local government into allowing hot rodders to use the land for top speed racing. Between then and now, a lot has changed and nothing has changed. There are different classes, and procedures, and course layouts, and of course there’s much new technology, but at its core, Speed Week is still just a gathering of hot rodders running for glory and little else. And now, more than any time since the ’70s or ’80s, the race cars themselves are often solid representations of the cars that ran at Bonneville at the beginning. The…

The names from the early years of SCTA dry lakes racing in Southern California are legendary. Chrisman, Edelbrock, Hilborn, Meyers, and Navarro were big then, as they are now, each contributing to the beginnings of racing and hot rodding as we know it. This is not a story about one of those heroes, however. This is the story of one of the hundreds, if not thousands, of young men in the postwar era of dry lakes racing who tried their best to go their fastest but faded into history as the decades passed. This little ’29 Model A roadster is not a famous car, and you’ve probably never heard of its builder, but it gives us a very good look at those early days. It survived daily use, WWII, three…

It has been approximately 40 years since the government agency that became California’s Air Resources Board (CARB) first met with specialty aftermarket parts manufacturers. The agency had become aware that nonstock, emissions-related aftermarket parts were being installed on California vehicles and wanted to establish guidelines for their use. The resulting “design limits” were based on the most robust parts options available from the OE manufacturers. In other words, if an OE offered any “high-performance” parts as options to stock counterparts, emissions-related specialty aftermarket parts could not exceed the design criteria of higher-performance OE components. In the ’70s and early ’80s, enthusiasts began to experience the impact of OE emissions controls. Federal emissions standards imposed on the OEs were mandated in shorter time periods and included the downsizing of piston displacements,…

Surf Kansas. Go land speed racing in Maine. Both ludicrous thoughts— yet a guy just ran 273 mph on a motorcycle in the far-flung Northeast wilderness. A few years ago, racers Bob Wanner (of New York) and Mark Sotomayor (of Maine) realized there was a 12,100-foot (2 1/4-mile) runway sitting virtually abandoned at the site of Loring Air Force Base in very nearly the farthest northeast corner of the country, just northeast of Caribou, Maine. Taking a hint from the runway-race organizers of The Texas Mile near Beeville, Texas, and the Maxton Mile in Maxton, North Carolina, the guys worked with local authorities and soon had permission to operate one top-speed meet a year on the old concrete. The Loring Timing Association (LTA) was born, and with the help of…

There was a time in the ’50s when a Cadillac V-8 was the ultimate hot rod engine, and Jerry Potter thinks that time is now—but he’s thinking of the ’68 to ’76 472ci and 500ci mills. Jerry’s shop, Potter Automotive, features a division called Cadillac Performance Parts (CPP) located in Soddy, Tennessee, just north of Chattanooga. The shop houses all the equipment to make one of these big Caddies scream, and in conjunction with Stan Justus at Stallion Racing Components, CPP has released its own line of aluminum cylinder heads and complete top-end kits designed to make serious horsepower in bolt-on form. CPP spent lots of time developing the heads; this isn’t just a simple recasting of stock iron heads—it’s a complete redesign that solved one of the biggest problems…

WHERE’DTHEY ALL GO? Do you ever wonder what happens to the cars you’ve gotten rid of over the years? By casual count, I’ve sold or otherwise disposed of 105 cars in my life. The “Where Are They Now?” stories we included in the Sept. and Oct. ’10 issues—and the story of the “Catch Me if You Can” Willys in this issue—got me thinking about the fates of those rides. Some had a destiny I was aware of the moment I sold them, others were surprise rediscoveries months or years later, and some have just been lost to time and space. The first car I ever sold was a ’71 Plymouth Road Runner—a 440 Six-Pack, four-speed, Air Grabber car that was factory black with black stripes and a black interior. In…

Welcome to the Hot Rods section of the mag, where all the car features live. Know of a great ride that should be here? Got killer photos of cars in action along with details about them? Tip us off: email HOTROD@hotrod.com or mail to HOT ROD Hot Rods, 831 S. Douglas St., El Segundo, CA 90245. It’s a just a regular ol’ red ’72 Chevelle SS except for one thing: 836 hp. And it’s just a regular ol’ 836 hp except for one thing: The engine idles like a stocker and can be driven anywhere, anytime, any distance. And with a peak of 917 lb-ft and more than 800 lb-ft on tap from 2,500 to 6,000 rpm, it can roil the tires into oblivion—anywhere, anytime, any distance. That was the…

Mark Hayden has it good and he knows it. He grew up with a dad who loves hot rods so much, he converted a barn behind his house into a garage, complete with a drive-over pit, added a shop onto the barn, and later built a paint booth onto the side of the shop, just so he could build cars himself. When Mark turned 16, he and his buddies began hanging around the barn, soaking up the knowledge and helping his dad, Scott, work on cars. Sick rides have been rolling out of the Prospect, Kentucky, location ever since. This sinister-looking ’54 Nash Metropolitan is the second Metro build for the duo. The first one had a Pro Street vibe, cemented by a massive Pro Mod-style hoodscoop, huge-by-large meats out…

Plymouth. Oldsmobile. Pontiac. Now add one more name to the list of recently lapsed American car brands: Mercury The culling of the domestic herd continues. For the Detroit Three, this is neither a good thing nor a bad thing; it’s simply a trend that has to play out so the automakers can move forward. Ford currently owns around 16 percent of the North American car market, with its junior division Mercury holding a shaky grasp on less than 1 percent. The brand no longer justifies its marketing budget, let alone the huge investment required to develop new products. So Mercury is going away. By the time you read this, the division will be in wiping-up mode, cleaning up the remaining inventory and turning off the lights one last time. We…

Ladies and gentlemen: In this corner, a blazing red ’10 Camaro; in the opposite corner, an equally red ’10 Saleen S281 Mustang. Both cars are equipped with trick suspension packages, big wheel-and-tire combos, and superchargers. And as it happens, both cars spend plenty of time on the 11-turn, 1.88-mile road course at Gingerman Raceway in western Michigan. Of course, it’s only natural that folks could get to wondering how these two cars match up on the track. Which one is faster, the Ford or the Chevy? It’s the eternal question. Pedders USA built these two cars not to race each other but as development mules for the company’s suspension hardware. Pedders, based in Australia, is a relatively new name on the domestic performance scene, but here’s how you’ll be hearing…

Like most ideas, this one started out with a simple statement: “Hey, let’s test a few LS heads.” From that innocent phrase came what would become the granddaddy of all LS cylinder head tests. Sure, we could have tossed them all on the airflow bench, provided some fancy flow numbers, and called it a day, but did we stop there? Not hardly. We here at HOT ROD are all about taking things to the next level, so we decided to add port-volume measurements and dyno testing to our already very long LS to-do list. This is part one of a series that will thoroughly test all the available LS heads we can get our hands on. We’re starting here with the LS1/LS2/LS6 cathedral-port versions. We plan on following up this…

1320 CHALLENGER What you’re looking at is a factory hot rod that won’t be found in your Dodge dealer’s showroom. If you want one, you’ll have to build it yourself. Mopar Underground, a sort of unofficial skunkworks made up of a small group of Chrysler engineers and designers, built the car as an example of how to build a street-legal (depending, of course, on where you live) version of Mopar’s Drag Pak Challenger, which is a lightweight, stripped-down, race-only, special-order version of the Dodge Challenger designed specifically for NHRA/IHRA drag racing. The Drag Pak Challengers weigh 1,000 pounds less than the production cars, but to maintain safety standards on the street, the 1320 was only able to be lightened by 300 pounds (it retains the airbags, ABS, a ventilation system,…

If this ’33 Willys looks familiar, then you have a very good memory. Featured in the Aug. ’72 issue of HOT ROD, the sedan delivery was originally built and owned by Doug and Linda Gray of Pleasanton, California, to be a fun and relatively violent street car. It had a tunnel-rammed 427 Chevy under its tilt ’glass front end, a Muncie four-speed, and a 3.62:1-geared ’64 Olds rear. Art Himsl’s Custom Paint Studio in Concord, California, laid down the black lacquer and flames. The Grays showed the Willys at the Oakland Roadster Show in 1971 and 1972 and eventually sold it to someone in Pennsylvania, who sold it to a guy in Ohio. “TO ME, THIS DELIVERY WAS ALWAYS THE BADDEST. WHEN I SAW IT FOR SALE, I HAD TO…

We may not want to admit it, but hot rodding has a long history of running afoul of the law. Making a car go faster or radically altering its appearance just doesn’t sit well with The Man. It’s been that way since rodding’s first big growth spurt following World War II, when the common perception was that rodders were outlaws blatantly ignoring traffic laws in fast, noisy jalopies. The reality then, as now, is that few rodders actually lived the thug life, but it didn’t appear that way when local newspapers exploited the tragedy of street racing fatalities with lurid front-page headlines and grim accident-scene photos. In fact, one of the reasons this magazine was founded was to burnish the already tarnished reputation of the men who hopped up cars.…

Land Speed Racing, specifically on the Bonneville Salt Flats, is Freiburger territory when it comes to coverage in HRM. He’s made the trek from California to Nevada religiously, while practically memorizing the Southern California Timing Association rule book in an endless search for new classes to compete in. Show him a photo of almost any LSR car and he’ll tell you what’s under the hood and how fast it’s been. In short, the guy lives for this sport and its most iconic annual event, Speed Week, but had other corporate commitments this year and had to send me to cover it for HOT ROD. An admission of guilt: Before last week, I’d never been to Bonneville and never really paid much attention to land speed racing. I had read about…

It’s a great time to be a 409 fan, better even than back when they were new. Building a W-motor, as the 348/409 engines have been called, has always been fairly expensive if you’re trying to make power. You could use the affordable truck block, but it has some pretty serious limitations, while the more desirable car block commands big dollars. A few years ago, Edelbrock opened up things a little with the release of its aluminum 348/409 heads, taking the cost of the heads more or less out of the equation. “The only thing the market needs is a block,” 409 guru Lamar Walden told us last year. “They’re just about dried up.” Factory-backed by Chevrolet, Walden got one of the original ’69 ZL1 Camaros to campaign in the…

HEMI HEADS FOR LS ENGINES Nick Arias Jr. Racing Components 310/323-RACE NickAriasJr.com Nick Arias Jr. Racing Components presents its new LS-AH Chevy Hemi cylinder head. Poured from 356 T6 alloy and featuring full water jacketing, the LS-AH Chevy Hemi will bolt on to any GM LS factory or aftermarket block. High-efficiency ports, along with 2.260-inch intake/1.600-inch stainless steel valves, yield more than 400 cfm flow for the intake and more than 300 cfm for the exhaust [at 28 inches of water). Choose from either a true hemispherical chamber or a Pro Stock-inspired figure-eight chamber with quench pads—both designs feature a central plug location for maximum combustion efficiency. Heads are available assembled as part of a complete kit, which includes shaft rockers and tool steel springs, cast-aluminum valve covers, head gaskets,…

Regular readers of HOT ROD have seen the photo credit for Bob D’Olivo. Bob started shooting photos for Petersen Publishing in 1950 and retired in the mid-’90s. He was on the scene for a lot of racing and new car action in all those years, but as the director of photography, he was also behind the lens for everything that the myriad Petersen magazines covered, including movie stars and all sorts of stuff. Next month is part one of a look back at some of Bob’s most glorious shots. You don’t want to miss it. SEE THIS AND MUCH MORE IN THE JAN. ’11 ISSUE OF HOT ROD MAGAZINE On sale November 16, 2010 Meanwhile, Get Your Car Fix at HOTROD.com…