Innehållsförteckning för October 2020 från Hot Rod

Editor-in-Chief @john.mcgann Though the notion is strange to my non–car-enthusiast friends, HOT ROD readers will appreciate this—I like to go to junkyards, whether or not I’m actually looking for a specific part. There are a number of reasons why. First, it’s a good way to spend a couple hours on a weekend. Second, walking the aisles in a big junkyard is pretty good exercise, though I don’t suspect any fitness gurus will be making any workout videos in this particular setting. Third, and the main reason why I like going, is that you never know what you’ll find there. Yes, the self-service junkyards can be a great learning experience. Seeing cars in various states of disassembly, laid bare in front of you, shows the inner workings of all kinds of…

There are few hot rods or individuals that have garnered as much attention or generated as much excitement as this 1922 Ford Model T and the guy who originally built it. If you are a fan of all things cool, and know a little about rodding history, then the name Norm Grabowski will be familiar to you. The 1959 hit song inspired by the car, “Kookie, Kookie, Lend Me Your Comb,” might be forgotten by everyone except oldies fans, but the car is still wildly popular and is still inspiring everybody who sees it—pretty amazing considering that the car was virtually nonexistent for almost 60 years. In its day, the flamed roadster pickup that would become famous as the Kookie T was one of the most groundbreaking hot…

So far in the build of this neglected 5.7L Hemi, we got the engine running to establish a baseline of 376 hp and 414 lb-ft. Next, we changed the cam and springs, and on Westech’s Superflow engine dyno, we saw power jump to 434 hp and 440 lb-ft. After that, we experimented with different header designs, settling on a set of Hooker 1⅞-inch long-tube headers with 3-inch collectors, which bumped the power up to 442 hp at 6,200 rpm and just slightly reduced torque output to 437 lb-ft at 4,500 rpm. Now, we turn our attention to the induction side. The intake and exhaust are often thought of as independent entities, but the reality is they not only have much in common, but they are also interdependent. As we…

Paging through an ignition catalog reveals all sorts of different ignition coils for conventional distributor-type ignition systems. To say it’s a mite confusing is an understatement! Just how does an ignition coil work to step up a battery’s 12 volts (even less with a ballast resistor) to the tens of thousands of volts needed to fire the spark plugs? A windings road. It all starts with the concepts of inductance and electromagnetism. Inside an ignition coil, there are two sets of wire windings (aka coils). The two windings—known as a primary set and a secondary set—surround an iron core. When battery current flows into the primary windings, it produces a magnetic field. When a switch—the distributor points opening or an electronic trigger—interrupts the flow of battery current, the magnetic field…

Roadkill @davidfreiburger I still view myself as a gearhead journalist, but the reality is that I’m a TV guy. I’ve recently found myself rapt with nostalgia for the early-’90s days of being a HOT ROD magazine staffer under the wing of Gray Baskerville, mingling with the pioneers of the industry, hanging out at the Street Machine Nationals in Du Quoin, Illinois, and being part of the founding days of the Fastest Street Car Shootout. My video and TV followers are a younger crowd oblivious to such things. I meet glazed eyes when I discuss my editorial history at HOT ROD, Hot Rod Deluxe, Rod & Custom, Car Craft, and 4-Wheel & Off-Road magazines. Inversely, I’m curious if you readers understand what I’m up to. Many don’t realize I’m no longer…

Stu Hilborn (1917-2013) was one of the pioneers of hot rodding and the performance parts industry. He is best known for developing mechanical fuel-injection systems for race cars. Before he was famous, however, he was just a young hot rodder trying to go as fast as he could on the dry lakes of Southern California. Several kinds of hot rods were racing on the lakes in the 1940s. Open-wheel cars with purpose-built custom streamlined bodies were classified as “streamliners” by the Southern California Timing Association (SCTA). Today, they are referred to as “lakesters”. Stu Hilborn’s streamliner was one of the best known, best looking, and most successful on the lakes—and served as Hilborn’s mule car for testing his fuel-injection technology. It was the first streamliner to run 150…

This stunning 2016 Cadillac built at Larson Race Cars in Oak Grove, Missouri, can be seen regularly on Street Outlaws: No Prep Kings (NPK) on Discovery. NPK is a spinoff of the original Street Outlaws, a show that began in 2013. No Prep racing quickly gained favor with fans and racers, and NPK is now in its fourth season. Larry Larson began competing on NPK during its inaugural year in 2016 behind the wheel of his big tire S10. Because the truck did not fit the rules of No Prep racing, Larry was told by the sanctioning body to make changes to the bed in order to comply. Larry famously spliced a bed section onto his truck and was permitted to compete in the latter part of the first…

When deciding on an engine build for a project, the key factor is how that car will be used. While a drag car might be all about top-end power, a street car will be the exact opposite. If your plan is a Pro-Touring car that will drive on the street, yet be able to tackle road and autocross courses, then you need an engine that can do a little bit of everything well. In our case, we needed an engine for our 1968 Camaro project called Track Rat. We wanted gobs of low-end grunt to pull us out of tight corners and around cones at lower speeds. Sure, we wanted top-end power for the straights, but we couldn’t sacrifice street manners since this wasn’t going to be a trailer…

Among hardcore brand stalwarts, Stan Johnson is about as blue-blooded as they come. His first Ford was a 1957 Ford Custom 300 with a 272 engine and a three-speed he had when he was 16. He’s also owned a ’70 Mustang Boss 302, several K-code Mustangs, every year vintage Shelby, a Pantera, a Tiger, Cougar Eliminators and GTEs, and a few Starliners. Today, the tradition continues with this 1963½ Ford Galaxie 500. Keep in mind that Stan is a hard-working Regular Joe, and that most of these cars came and went at a time when muscle cars didn’t cost a small fortune. Currently, his garage holds the Boss 302 he bought in ’71 and this R-code Galaxie he acquired 20 years ago. In 1984, Stan opened Ford Powertrain Applications…

Our ongoing project, the Drift Rod, a Factory Five Racing 1935 Ford Pickup needed a fuel system to support the 1,200 hp the twin-turbo Coyote engine makes. Running a 1,200hp engine on E85 requires a lot of fuel. So much that you can almost count the dollars as they disappear into the engine. You need big diameter fuel lines and high-volume pumps to keep up with the amount of fuel consumption needed to keep this engine running safely. When doing so in a street car, you also need to factor in issues of excessive heating of the fuel, and excessive heat in the pump. For this project, we turned to Aeromotive, which recently introduced its Trifekta triple fuel-pump system for big horsepower and/or alcohol-burning applications. Trifekta fuels the vehicle…

Do you have a problem with the 60-year-old gauges in your classic muscle car? After over a half-century of faithful service, they may have finally bitten the dust. But it might be that new high-output alternator you installed is just too much for the old ammeter. Or that old factory tachometer that worked with a stock points ignition can’t cut it with an electronic ignition system, especially if driven by a CD or multispark ignition box that always needs a full 12 volts. Then there’s that late-model transmission that has no provisions for hooking up a cable-driven speedometer. All too often legacy factory instrumentation just doesn’t play well with modern upgrades. Replacing them with aftermarket instrumentation is one possible solution, but some hot rodders want to preserve the…