You gotta love the old episodes of MotorWeek:
Best Factory Muscle Car 1985...
1971-Chevelle
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You gotta love the old episodes of MotorWeek:
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This is exactly when and why I let my subscriptions to Motor Trend and Car and Driver lapse.
These cars were not muscle cars. To call them that is just wrong. Those of us old enough to have driven and worked on real muscle cars cringe when some nimrod writes stuff like that.
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These cars were not muscle cars. To call them that is just wrong. Those of us old enough to have driven and worked on real muscle cars cringe when some nimrod writes stuff like that.
Sent from my SM-N910V using Tapatalk
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Those were muscle cars? all of them needed an HP injection, not much was fast in the 80's. I worked at GM during that time period and the Z's and T/A's were junk rattle traps. I remember the 1st Firebird we got in the early 80's with the "Iron Duke" 4 cyl engine and how the sales staff though it was pretty peppy. Made me want to gag.
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Muscle cars by definition is a mid size car that has a four door counter part with avalible bigger engine from a full size car. F body’s and Mustangs are pony cars.
Off the rails a bit: I stopped subscribing to guitar mags in the 90's when grunge took over. When the magazines started worshipping Kirk Cobain and his gear over Eddie Van Halen and the numerous talented 80's players, they became all ads and no lessons or techniques worth learning.
My friend got to borrow his mom's car for cruising on weekends. It was a brand new 85' 442 she ordered. It was elegant, cool, mature, but slow. He would pull up next to my 66' Chevelle and from a roll, he would gun it. I would let him pull away a length, then down shift and blow by. I would also scare the crap out of him with the sound of Doug headers and bolt on Thrush glasspacks. My car had 327 .30 over, Power Pak heads, some Corvette cam, Holley 650, TH350, 2.73 non-posi. A pretty tough customer on the street for the 80's. No plastic IROCs or TAs stood a chance against me.
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Iroc z would eat you alive in corners.
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Who gives a damn about corners??? Muscle cars were designed for nothing but stoplight to stoplight racing...no BS canam road racing bullshit.
I think the mph in the low 90s mph kind of says it all. What I think the cars had here was better traction because of less power than the 1960s muscle cars so their ET was closer to the muscles cars which spun their tires but usually were able to get over 100 mph ( barely). Also tire technology was better by mid 1980s and they started having some decent tire size.
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Only good thing about the 80's was when it was over.
Yes, the cars were poor on hp/torque but the sporty cars started looking like fighter jets; complete with cockpits. My wife had an 80's 300ZX before we met. Got totaled by a guy friend who took it for a spin.. literally. She also had an Escort GT. Now THAT 80's car makes you ask WHY?!?
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Definition of 'muscle car'
Definition of muscle car
Webster’s New World College Dictionary, 4th Edition. Copyright © 2010 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. All rights reserved.
an automobile, esp. in the 1960s, made to look and perform like a racing car, as in being able to accelerate quickly to high speeds, but designed for use on regular roads
any of a group of American-made 2-door sports coupes with powerful engines designed for high-performance driving
Definition of muscle car
Webster’s New World College Dictionary, 4th Edition. Copyright © 2010 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. All rights reserved.
an automobile, esp. in the 1960s, made to look and perform like a racing car, as in being able to accelerate quickly to high speeds, but designed for use on regular roads
any of a group of American-made 2-door sports coupes with powerful engines designed for high-performance driving
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Realistically, out of the box, muscle cars were turds.
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8,274 Posts
and that is what pony cars where made for. muscle cars where straight line only, and who cared how they stopped
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529 Posts
But so were the Iroc Z's. I wouldn't have one if you gave it to me... Give me my Nova and my Chevelle in a straight line race all day long...
I owned a 86 IRoc Z and it had to be the best car I had for taking curves.
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I like the gm cars of the mid 80s. We have a stock 87ss monte that looks new. Grand national's were pretty fast. I like the 82 to 92 Camaro. To everyone who says they are slow you know the engines do unbolt and come out dont You
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529 Posts
But also the quickest cars in their days...what cars back in the days were quicker???? NONE!!!
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