Innehållsförteckning för October 2017 från Hot Rod

At the kickoff of HOT ROD Power Tour® 2017, we held an open forum with VIP Platinum participants. It was their chance to ask the HOT ROD staff about any subject matter they wanted. I had no idea what to expect, but it ended up being an extremely memorable part of the event. Being in a room with that many like-minded car people, many of whom had double-digit Power Tours and decades of readership under their belts, was an absolute blast and the questions were heartfelt and fun to answer. One of my favorites—and the most unexpected—was, “Do you see electric cars becoming a mainstay in hot rodding?” The staff was each given a chance to relay their thoughts on the issue. Every member had a radically different…

Drift trikes aren’t new—they were called Big Wheels or Green Machines and featured mechanical tricks you might recognize on modern drift cars like “stick shift” brake handles and absurd steering angles. Fuzzy wristbands, Keds, and sliding sideways on a Big Wheel made for serious street cred in 1976. The drift trike faded away as the punks coming up preferred folding Razor scooters and adults started buying Segways. Then, a few years ago, we starting seeing drift trikes return in the form of metalframed renditions of the classics, with dirt-cheap price tags. They were designed as simple tricycles with slick wheels that drifted with a little pedaling, but let’s face it, someone took one on a high-speed downhill run as soon as it was out of the box on Christmas Day.…

At the introductory meeting of the Roadkill Takes America group in Detroit, we learned that Doug, a Ford employee who helped fix Roadkill’s General Mayhem 1968 Charger, has an amazing collection of cars and parts at his home south of Detroit. In the garage is a front-engine, slingshot dragster and two incredibly rare Mustangs: a 1967 Mustang GT Fastback ordered in Special Silver with a 390ci V8 and fourspeed, and next to that is a 1969 Mach 1 Mustang Super Cobra Jet. Both were local cars Doug was able to save. There was also a well-worn 1970 Barracuda and the 1969 Dart GT he brought to Roadkill Nights. But the most interesting car of the batch is a 1970 Dodge Challenger R/T he bought from a pawn shop. It purportedly…

MAKE IT BETTER Few are fortunate enough to work on their projects fulltime. For most, Saturday, Sunday, and a few weekday nights are the only time for tinkering. In the spirit of weekend warriors across the country, “Make It Better” is a segment dedicated to upgrades that can be accomplished between Friday and Sunday nights. Electronic fuel injection, for the majority of its existence, was a complicated and unapproachable technology. It took miles of wires, pounds of sensors, and a prodigious level of tuning tact to make it function. Carburetors, on the other hand, took one fuel line and they worked—well. But after a one-day swap into a Chevrolet C10 project truck, it’s easy to admit EFI isn’t the monster it once was. Holley’s Sniper EFI system is inline with…

You may have noticed that some 1970 Camaros are designated 1970-1/2. The 1969 Camaro production ran well into November 1969, months after regular 1970 Chevrolet production began, which is typically August of the previous year. What happened? Things had been right on schedule for the all-new Camaro body stampings at Fisher Body, when during what is called “final die tryouts” right before production stamping begins, the quarter-panels kept wrinkling and splitting. The body dies required too much draw for the sheetmetal to cooperate. Fisher decided to reconfigure the draw dies, which are the two halves needed to pound out a fender or panel from flat sheet stock. This required a short delay. Unfortunately, the resulting quarter-panels stamped from the new dies were worse than the previous attempt. What to do?…

In 2009, Michael Feinstein, owner of Nostalgia Motor Sports, spotted a rendering created by artist Steve Stanford in the September issue of HOT ROD. It was a red 1969 Camaro, but it was unlike any of the Pro Touring F-bodies that were popular. This car drew inspiration from Chevrolet’s late-1950s and early 1960s performance cars, adopting a bubbletop roof and 409 W-engine, as if Chevrolet had introduced the Camaro a decade earlier. Michael was captivated by the rendering and decided to see if the car could actually be built, starting a build process that would culminate in this complete car nearly seven years later. The first step was a scale model as a proof of concept. Michael posited that if the car could be built properly at 1:25 scale, it…

“What’s in your garage?” is a common question among hot rodders, and who wouldn’t like to answer, “A Lingenfelter Performance Engineering Z06 Corvette” or “ZL1 Camaro!” Believe it or not, these 800hp supercars will be someone’s reality, as they’re up for grabs in the Dream Giveaway Garage sweepstakes. There are two sweepstakes at play: the 2017 Camaro Dream Giveaway and the 2017 Corvette Dream Giveaway. The first will award a lucky winner a 1963 Corvette and 2017 Lingenfelter Signature Edition Corvette Z06. The second wins a 1967 Rally Sport Camaro and 2017 Lingenfelter Signature Edition Camaro ZL1. Before the giveaway concludes, and the lucky winners drive off into the sunset, DGG offered the chance to drag-test both the ZL1 Camaro and Z06 Corvette. It was an opportunity too good to…

Whether you’re looking to make a statement or just want to clean up underneath the hood, a smoothed firewall will always be near the top of the to-do list. From the factory, most firewalls are a utilitarian component of the vehicle; it’s there to stop fumes and heat from getting into the passenger compartment and to hang a few accessories on—that’s about it. For hot rodders, the firewall presents yet another opportunity to customize our cars. There are many ways to go about it, from simply shaving unnecessary holes to a complete replacement. The most basic smoothing typically involves relocating or removing bits and pieces you don’t need or want, filling the holes, and sometimes filling the big A/C or heater box. This task is about as simple as shaving…

Q:I’ve always wondered why the power-brake servos on many older GM rear-drive cars are angled up. Do you know? A:The primary reason is for correct brake-pedal geometry. Back in the day, most GM vehicles were offered with both standard manual brakes as well as optionally with power-assisted brakes. The optimum manual-brake, pedal-to-master cylinder pushrod ratio (aka “pedal advantage”) is around 6:1, compared to about 4:1 for power-assisted brakes that don’t need as much pedal advantage because they “boost” the force generated by the average human leg. GM used a common brake pedal with two pushrod holes located about 1 to 1½ Inches apart; the upper hole was for the 6:1 manual brakes and the bottom hole yielded the power-brake 4:1 ratio. When the brake pushrod was installed in the lower…

This is an impressive assemblage of Top Gas dragster competitors at the almost unrecognizable Pomona dragstrip at the Los Angeles County Fairgrounds. We can’t identify many, but we can see what they’re running, so we’ll give it a try. At the far end, barely visible, is Mickey Thompson’s four-wheel-drive, twin–Chrysler Hemi rail; then a Ford flathead; a multi-carbed Chevy straightsix; a blown flathead; a front-blown Pontiac OHV; an injected, Ardun overhead– converted Ford flathead; then a blown flathead; the Cyr and Hopper carbed Chrysler Hemi 146-mph dragster; and finally another flathead. From our 2017 perspective, it would seem that by mid-1958, flathead Fords were obsolete and gone, but 25 years of abundant and cheap engines don’t evaporate in spite of the overhead onslaught. Flatheads were proven, and there was much…

When you look at Ed Roethel’s two-door Pontiac wagon, the first impression—and logical assumption—is that it’s a converted 1964 or 1965 two-door Chevelle wagon. If that’s your best guess, you’ve just had a “Kafka” moment. The car is a legit Pontiac wagon. While plenty left the factory as four-door models, two-door models never existed—until now. As a youngster, Ed would visit his cousin, who owned a 1964 GTO, and it left an indelible impression that beckoned the purchase of one in his later years. “I always wanted a ’64 GTO,” Ed said. “I kept looking for one because I wanted to build a new car. Most that I found were overpriced rusty piles of junk.” His interest in GM’s A-body offering wasn’t exclusively reserved to the GTO, as Ed owned…