EPA: Race cars have always required factory emissions equipment; SEMA: shenanigans

Posted on Feb 15, 2022 in Featured | 2 comments

In response to an outcry over the Environmental Protection Agency’s proposal to require intact factory emission control devices on race cars, the EPA maintained that has always been the rule, prompting the automotive aftermarket to call foul and take action to block the proposal. Included in a 629-page EPA/NHTSA proposal to regulate CO2 emissions and fuel...

10+ parts and task management list tips to help with your project

Posted on Jan 25, 2022 in Featured | 2 comments

Here is an example of my Microsoft Excel engine compartment worksheet for my Buick shown on the desktop along with a couple of in-process car restoration photos just to make it more interesting to look at for the blog. My columns are broken down by “Work Type,” “Task,” “Parts Location” at my house and/or box number, “Status or Completion Date,” “Notes” and...

Fifty years later, there’s still no racing like the original Can Am series

Posted on Dec 1, 2021 in Featured | 2 comments

Peter Revson’s 1972 McLaren M20 Can-Am car. In 1966, the SCCA’s U.S. Road Racing Championship spun off a new series, created in cooperation with the Canadian Automobile Sports Club (CASC). Officially called the Canadian-American Challenge Cup, or Can-Am for short, the series would go on to become, arguably, the greatest form of motor racing the world has ever...

Postwar-styled Deuce roadster named America’s Most Beautiful Roadster

Posted on Nov 20, 2021 in Featured | 2 comments

If there was any doubt that the vintage look has arrived in the modified-car world, one needs to look no further than the last few winners of the America’s Most Beautiful Roadster award, which have all featured a period appearance combined with the extraordinary fit and finish that it takes to compete at such a high level. This year’s winner is no exception....

Forgotten fastback: Oldsmobile’s striking Delmont 88 Holiday Coupe

Posted on Oct 23, 2021 in Featured | 2 comments

If you like the aggressive lines of the fastback body style as well as the spacious luxury of a full-size automobile, think Delmont. If you’ve never heard of a Delmont, you’re not alone. It’s one of those forgotten models from the Sixties, thanks, in part, because Oldsmobile only built it for two short years – 1967 and ’68. Its full name was the Delmont 88, and...

Quick question: Is filming yourself hooning on public roads okay?

Posted on Sep 8, 2021 in Featured | 2 comments

So the last week or so, the autoblogosphere – not to mention the citizens of San Diego – have worked themselves into an uproar over the video from which the still above was taken. It features some bro tearing around San Diego sans permits in his jacked-up off-road buggy in an attempt to get his sponsors some attention. Coincidentally, we had just run the...

New York Model A club proves that some kids are still interested in old cars

Posted on Aug 24, 2021 in Featured | 2 comments

1931 Model A Roadster, the group’s latest youth restoration project. Those who insist that today’s youth don’t care about cars (and care even less about old cars) could learn something from the Adirondack A’s Model A Ford Club. Since 2012, the Clifton Park, New York, group has completed three Model A Ford builds with the help of 13- to 16-year-olds from local...

Who says you can’t race in winter?

Posted on Jul 24, 2021 in Featured | 2 comments

A Ford GT40 Mk I battles a Cobra Daytona Coupe. In the interest of full disclosure, I’ve been holding out on you. I’ve never discussed my collection of historically significant racing cars, nor have I revealed that I have access to my own year-round testing, development and racing facility. Jim Clark’s 1968 Lotus Type 49. The cars under my stewardship include a...

How many vintage cars are enough?

Posted on Jun 11, 2021 in Featured | 2 comments

Sure, I want all of them… but would that be sensible? When I was a teenager, I thought there was no such thing as owning too many vintage cars. They looked great, were easy to work on and were considerably cheaper and usually quicker than a new car. Over the next 30 years, however, I came to grips with the realities of such a desire. Since owning multiple...

Detroit didn’t kill the Tucker 48

Posted on May 11, 2021 in Featured | 2 comments

Earliest proposal by ex-GM designer George Lawson was called the Tin Goose, had pivoting, skirted front fenders. Tin Goose sketches appeared in early ads (below), but later ads showed Alex Tremulis’s updated Tucker drawing. Forget the movie. Forget the legend. Detroit did not put Preston Tucker out of business. What killed Tucker in 1948 was a simple lack of...

Where the muscle car meets the American West: a road-trip story

Posted on Apr 11, 2021 in Featured | 2 comments

It could be argued that the muscle car era drew much of its inspiration and style from the American West. Try this on for size: The cowboy hat exudes the same freedom and power and, well, American-ness that a “Z/28” badge on a Camaro does. Feel that? And to take that theory a step further, think of some of the classic names exclusive to the Muscle Car Era:...

Where wood meets magnificence: Chrysler’s Town and Country nameplate turns 75

Posted on Mar 17, 2021 in Featured | 2 comments

1947 Chrysler Town and Country. Appropriately, and unlike pretty much every other car, one of the most celebrated nameplates in Chrysler’s history, the Town and Country, originated not with a sketch or a design brief, but with a name that eventually became a car. That nameplate has also proved one of Chrysler’s most versatile and longest lasting, with its 75th...