Innholdsfortegnelse for November 2011 i Hot Rod

GROWING UP I LUSTED AFTER THE CARS I SAW ON THE BIG AND LITTLE SCREENS, watching every dreadful TV show and movie that used one as a focal point. This issue’s cover story is about the two most famous examples, the General Lee ’69 Charger from Dukes of Hazzard and the ’77 Trans Am that made Smokey & the Bandit the best movie ever, but there have been a ton of other hot rods used in Hollywood. Having dinner with James Smith and Mark Osborne (the builder and owner, respectively, of the General Lee in our story) was a lesson in Dukes trivia. These guys are 1,000-percent geeked about all things Dukes. Photographer Wes Allison wanted to strangle me halfway through dinner for subjecting him to such automotive nerdishness, but…

You know how dorks walk around all smug about their hybrids? In the days of road-draft tubes, it was that way with V8 power—even when such mechanisms of horsepower were pretty much a given and an inline-six was the only other choice—and the guys carried a swagger rather than a swish. Likewise, Midwestern American stylists sat at their drawing boards smoking cigarettes and penning ever more bold layouts of chrome and trim for their showroom jewels. There was hardly a carmaker big or small that did not generate a library of different V8 badges over the years. The cool result is that those emblems give us a window to the design aesthetic of the ’30s through the ’70s—before anyone knew what a liter was—and that those bits of scrappy pot…

There’s something about this multipurpose hot rod you just have to l0Ve—whether it’s the ultra-flat tractor paint, the obnoxious hoodscoop, the tube chassis, or the fact that it has all that in a ’59 Jag Mark 1 four-door sedan. Bet the Brits never saw this coming. This isn’t just a street car, it isn’t just a drag car, it isn’t only a land speed record holder — it’s all three at the same time. The Mark 1 is far from the most collectible Jag. “ E-Types to me are the sexiest, most awesome bodies Jaguar ever made, ahead of their time. This one isn’t worth anything. It’s the most undesirable piece of junk,” says Kris Henderson, who found the Jag with a 235ci Chevy straight-six in the Oklahoma Auto Trader…

Admit it, somewhere deep inside you’re either a Smokey mid the Bandit guy or a Dukes of Hazzard guy. A Trans Am lover or a Charger fan. You had a crush on either Daisy or Frog. OK, both. But when it comes down to it, you’ve got to choose sides. We forced people to do just that, putting up the top two pop icons of gearhead entertainment for the vote with readers worldwide. Big-screen action comedy with Burt Reynolds, or little-screen Duking it out Friday nights on CBS? Here’s what you said. If you want more, check out HazzardNet.com for all things Dukes-related and FunTrivia.com for loads of trivia on both Dukes and Bandit. BO DARVILLE VS. BO AND LUKE DUKE What, you didn’t know Burt Reynolds’ character’s name was…

Rubber splattered off the tires like guts from a shotgunned gopher. With the TKO five-speed in Second and the 454 at 5,000, the Mickey Thompsons were making the ultimate sacrifice. This was the moment we’d been waiting for but one we didn’t really deserve. The HOT ROD Roaster ’32 Ford project kicked off way back in 2004, getting ink in the February through May issues that year, including an April paint-and-body cover. The claim back then: “We’re gonna roast tires and get skin cancer. We’re gonna be simple, be fast, drive it everywhere, laughing like fools, and we’re going to look good doing it.” Man, that seemed like a plan! At this distance, it took a moment to recall our excuse for why it never happened, but here it is:…

THE PREMISE We saw this new intake and instantly had to have one. It looks awesome, but does it run hard? Unique in the market, the new Holley Hi-Ram for GM LS3/L92 rectangular-port engines is like an old-school tunnel-ram with a removable lid that allows the manifold to be configured to run either carbureted or fuel injected. For EFI, tops are offered for either a front-mount throttle-body (92mm or 102mm) or dual top-mount units. For carbs, choose from 4150 or 4500 dual quads. Holley offers blank tops that can be configured to accept whatever wild induction system you can come up with. Fuel rails are also available, and a cathedral-port base is coming. THE STUFF The intake package we tested is PN 300117. The EFI package with fuel rails and…

Cooper Lighting • 770/486-4800 • CooperLighting.com At first glance we thought this Might D Light Mini was just another one of those gimmicky, useless tools—until we took it into the garage. It bends 270 degrees and has three magnets on the back, two bright LED lights on the front, four big holes for hooks, and two built-in bungee cords with hooks. The light will stick to almost any flat metal surface, and you can lay it flat on the ground and aim it or hang it from almost anywhere. The straps could be a little bit longer, but you could always use your own on the four separate slots. The magnets work so well we didn’t use the straps much, anyway. When you’re finished, fold it over to hide the…

No other interaction better displays the chasm between the personalities of two car guys. As a player in the game of buying high and selling low, I see this all the time. Cutting straight to the most ludicrous negotiation tactic ever, a potential buyer of my ’77 Bronco reminded me repeatedly that he could sue me for just trying to sell him a vehicle with a cracked windshield, since cracked glass was illegal. “Not that I’m going to do that,” he said, “but you should know that when you consider the price.” Please, mister, take the Bronco for free and don’t sue me. Actually, gifting it to that loser might have been less painful than the next looky-loo, who came with a lab coat and a slide rule and spent…

HOT ROD’s former video guy Jason Lewis has been building this Viper-powered Maverick for a few years now, and we’re dying to drive it when he finally finishes it. It’s a ’70 model that’s been “slightly” modified to accommodate an all-aluminum, 505ci Viper V10 engine backed by a T56 six-speed transmission and cooled through a Ron Davis radiator. The front suspension uses Alston’s Chassisworks’ tubular A-arms, coilovers, and rack-and-pinion steering. The narrowed 9-inch rear carries a Detroit Truetrac and 3.70 gears and is located by a custom four-link with an adjustable anti-sway bar. All of that goodness is attached to a full frame Jason made himself. The tires are 245/45R17 front and 315/35R17 rear, and the stance is dead-nuts perfect. The body remains mostly stock except for shaved driprails, moldings,…

STEVE AND TREVOR DEWITT • MUSKEGON, MICHIGAN We were cruising the Muskegon stop of this year’s Power Tour® and came across this ’30 Model A and ’27 International roadster pickup parked next to each other. It turned out they belong to father and son Steve and Trevor, a pair of hot rodders who have been building this Model A sedan for seven years. The all-steel body got a 3 ½-inch chop and power windows, while the chassis was fitted with IFS and a 396 Chevy big-block. We wouldn’t exactly say Trevor rebelled from his dad’s choice of hot rod, but when it came time to build his own ride, he picked one with no windows, that rides on a solid axle, and is powered by a small-block.…

To get a photo like this, usually we have to sit in a tree all week or poke a telephoto lens through a chain-link fence. However, we copped this shot of a Camaro ZL1 test mule simply by hanging out at Baker’s, the world-famous cruise-in venue in Milford, Michigan, not far from the GM Proving Grounds. Camaro Chief Engineer Al Oppenheiser and his crew were nice enough to stop by one Saturday with the prototype, wowing a local F-body club gathering. The guys even opened the hood so the crowd could have an unrestricted look at the 550hp supercharged LS motor. Of course, it’s not like the ZL1 is really a secret anymore. Chevrolet has already announced that the car will appear in showrooms in early 2012 with a sticker…

There’s nothing particularly right about this hot rod, but we defy you to find anything wrong with it—unless, of course, you’re married to paint, polish, period-perfection, pulchritude, and all those other fun-killing pains in the patoot. None of that stuff has Jason Barringer’s name on it, but his map does have his scrawl all over it. Every blue road in that sucker has seen the tread prints of this ’24 Ford Model T Phaeton, which gets driven more than any retro rod we’ve seen in many moons. And that’s the point. Jason threw this together about four years ago for around $6,500—a number that seems very realistic given all the nuts and bolts that end up going into even a car this simple. It’s based on a real steel body…

Up to this point we’ve got Smokey and the Bandit in the lead, but now we’re down to the meat of it: the cars. The Bandit ’77 Pontiac Trans Am versus the General Lee ’69 Dodge Charger. First, the cult following. The Bandit was responsible for selling Trans Ams by the semi-load, with Pontiac F-Bodies outselling Camaros for the first time and owning the end of the second-gen era. The fever continues today as ’77 to ’81 Trans Ams carry more value than the same-year Z28s, no doubt a result of the Bandit connection. There’s even a Bandit Run event, held since 2007. But that’s tiny in the face of the rabid General Lee fans who have attended DukesFest events and General Lee jumps over the years. And who hasn’t…

EFI is huge, but the carburetor is still global, viable, and the center of an ongoing, industry-wide fuel-system war. Demon Carburetors is coming back, and Quick Fuel and Pro Systems have gone ballistic with a slew of new air/fuel metering devices and features. Holley had to respond, and it did. Big time. Why do we care? Because Holley carbs have been at the center of the hot rod universe forever, and a release as significant as this one is a big deal. In 2004, Holley unleashed the HP-series carburetor, featuring unheard of adjustability in a mass-produced carb. ’The 650- to 1,050-cfm four-barrels benefited from billet baseplates and metering blocks and clear sight glasses, and even the 4150-series HPs have dual-feed bowls drilled on both sides (4500 Dominator-style) to facilitate plumbing…

THE PREMISE Not since the late ’80s, with the debut of the “good” version of the 5.0 Mustang, has there been so much interest in the new pony. That’s because the ’11-and-later GT’s new 5.0L, DOHC moneymaker makes the car a blast to drive. The engine is rated at 412 hp, but many tuners have seen chassis dyno numbers that suggest it makes more than Ford admits. And more is always better, so Ford Racing responded with a supercharger package that really revs up the giggle gauge. THE PARTS Ford Racing offers two supercharger packages with two different power ratings—both built around a Whipple twin-screw blower — and the only difference between them is the blower pulley. The base package makes about 7 pounds of boost and is rated at…

MOPAR BUILDUP What happens when paint and coating company Rust-Oleum wants to build a promotional vehicle and puts its collective head together with a well-known car builder and a bunch of ham-fisted automotive journalists? We end up building a very cool ’69 Road Runner and finish the story off by beating on it for the duration of the HOT ROD Power Tour®. We even let our HOT ROD hive radio guy drive it. See the complete buildup and driving impressions in the Dec. ’11 issue of HOT ROD. SEE THIS AND MUCH MORE IN THE DECEMBER ’11 ISSUE OF HOT ROD MAGAZINE On sale October 18, 2011 HOTROD.com Facebook.com/HotRodMag YouTube.com/HotRodMagazine HOT ROD (ISSN 0018-6031), November 2011; Vol. 64, No. 11. Copyright 2011 by Source Interlink Magazines, LLC. All Rights…

This issue features the world’s most famous ’69 Charger and ’77 Trans Am, leading us to us wonder what our predecessors thought of the cars when they were brand new. Turns out they loved the Charger and were so-so on the T/A. In the Feb. ’69 issue, HOT ROD tested the Charger 500, what then Feature Editor Steve Kelly termed the “NASCAR stocker” with a flush grille and rear window (no sail fins). There were two tested—both were Hemis, but one had a four-speed and the other a TorqueFlite. The automatic ran a best of 13.80 at 105 mph at Orange County International Raceway with 3.23 gears and the stock tune, while the four-speed model, which had steeper 4.10 gears and a recurved distributor, hit 13.48 at 109. Not bad…

This is the ’31 Ford-based rod of Winchester, California’s Steve Hooper. It’s being built in his home garage with swap meet and garage sale parts and his own sweat. Steve built the chassis hisowndamnself, and even made a body out of cardboard as a reference to where to cut the rusty hulk of a steel body. The engine is “a weak old 283” and a three-speed he bought for $85. The 9-inch rearend cost him $10, and he bought an old utility trailer for $25 and robbed it of its Model A front axle, brake drums, wheels, and wishbone. The car hasn’t run yet, since he’s still wiring it. The neatest part? He only has about $2,500 in the whole thing. “I’m not sure all your readers would appreciate all…

QUEEN WITH TATTERED ELEGANCE My Dad, Bill Horton, was a racer in his youth and has been through a lot in his life. He has overcome many ailments common to others his age, including a heart transplant and the loss of a child. Now, just before he turns 83, he has rebuilt his car. Lord help us all! Jezebelle is a Chrysler-powered ’40 Ford Coupe that won B-Gas in 1956 and got a photo and mention in the Nov. ’56 issue of HOT ROD, when it was owned by Herman L. Davis. In 1959, Dad garaged the car, only to pull it out for one washing in 1970. “Kids needed to eat more than I needed a toy” was his reason. He’s just restored the car back to its 1959…

Some projects come together over the course of a year or more, and some happen almost overnight. The Suburban seen here is an example of the latter. As the ’11 HOT ROD Power Tour® was looming, GM Performance Division kicked it into high gear on its new project vehicle for a Power Tour® debut. This year marks the 100th anniversary for Chevy, and the Suburban turned 75 in 2010, so the choice of what to build was pretty obvious. But what model year Suburban? The HOT ROD staff lobbied for a ’68 to ’72 model, since that’s our favorite body style for the big family and parts haulers. But GMPD wanted something a little more classic and went with a ’53. We then had the idea of putting a Duramax…

Among gearheads, Pratt & Miller requires no introduction, so we’ll settle for a recap. One of the leading race shops and R&D facilities in the USA, Pratt & Miller is home to the factory Corvette Racing team. This outfit has collected eight consecutive ALMS titles, five LeMans class wins, and 72 race victories, so it’s the best of the best. But like many enthusiasts who work in the upper-est echelons of the motorsports world, the guys at P&M have never lost track of their hot rod and muscle car roots. One wing of the New Hudson, Michigan, facility, known as Pratt & Miller Collector Car Restorations, is devoted to customer rod builds—including the ’62 Plymouth Valiant featured here. Who even builds a first-generation Valiant? Fair question. The oddball yet oddly…

With the creation of YouTube, everyone and his brother is now a Spielberg in training, and crazy in-car or on-car videos are as thick as ticks on a horse. It’s just so easy to take dramatic video now, thanks to a handful of tiny video cameras that you can mount nearly anywhere, all for a couple hundred bucks. Even if you’ve never shot video before, it’s super easy to do. In this story, we’ll give you an overview of the four most popular cameras and our experiences with them. There’s info here for first-timers and for more advanced users. THE BASICS These cameras are small and designed so you can hang them on a car in a position that catches an interesting view. This can be done with commonly available…

There are twisted individuals out there who don’t want to put a Chevy in a Chevy and others who think the factory engine location doesn’t always cut it when striving for improved engine fitment and the ideal front-to-rear weight bias. Either scenario leads to a place many of us never want to go when working with an oddball engine and chassis combination—the realm of the custom header build. Time-consuming, frustrating, and ultimately very expensive, custom pipes are the bane of every hot rodder’s existence, unless he owns a tube bender and has a knack for geometry. Even then, every header-building artist still has a scrap pile of tube sections that didn’t quite fit the project they were intended for. Wasteful. That nonsense ends today. Go ahead, stuff a BMW V12…

THE PREMISE Many late-model vehicles have plastic headlights that turn yellow and cloudy with age and heat. That makes them look like crap and also lessens the amount of light they put out at night. We found several kits to rejuvenate them and decided to see which one worked best. THE STUFF We tested three kits: Mothers PowerBall 4Lights (PN 07250), Meguiar’s Heavy Duty Headlight Restoration Kit (PN G3000Kit; the company also offers the One-Step Headlight Restoration Kit, PN G1900, not tested here), and light manufacturer Sylvania’s Headlight Restoration Kit (PN 38771). THE TEST Freiburger’s Dodge pickup and Jeep Grand Cherokee both had yellowed headlights (the Dodge lights were so bad that he regularly drove with the brights on), so we used them as our lab mice. We used the…