Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire 20 Top Muscle Cars

Oldest brother had an early 70’s Nova with a 350 and 4-speed. I was only 15 at the time when I got to drive it. Holy crap that thing was hard on tires.

I love the 66-67 Chevelles but any of em’ will do up through 72.
67’s are my favorite though.

It is dark blue, stock color in 1965 called “Nightwatch Blue” with 1100 total CFM tri-power…

The 63 1/2 Galaxy 500 fastback 406" 4 speed, and the 63 1/2 Falcon Sprint fastback 289 4 speed were some other of my favorites.

How about a '68?

Closest thing to a muscle car that I had, being born and raised in South Africa. I owned it for a short time, as it ate me out of house and home, given the cost of fuel, and that I was but a lowly apprentice aircraft mechanic at the time.

http://www.speedhunters.com/2020/08/perana-the-ford-capri-with-v8-bite/

Came to the US in 1986 and immediately bought a Camaro Z28 HO ('84 model). Biggest disappointment ever. Mediocre performance, and constant problems. Poor handling, had understeer for days. I corded a brand new pair of front tires in one day of spirited driving on the Blue Ridge Pkwy. Sold it after a year.

I bought new in 67 . A Fairlane 390 GT. Mine had a close ratio 3 speed with a 4:11 rear end. Hasbeen

Over the years, I've been very fortunate with some of the cars I've had, some are even on this list! Lol! Chevelle's, Camaro's, 442's, Vettes... even a couple high performance Audi's (maintenance pain in the neck). They were fun, loud and fast, no doubt! But honestly, aside from the nostalgia and great memories, I honestly don't think any of them come close to some of the new stuff out there now. My current car is a 2015 Camaro SS LS3 6.2L, 6 speed manual, 1LE suspension that is probably the fastest car I've ever owned. The handling, the braking are so much better. Remember the bias belted tires! Ha! My 442 would get stuck on wet grass! Lol! I'm very glad for the cars I've had and very glad for the one I have now. Thanks for this post!

I bought this back in 1982. Don't drive it in the winter, just out for the pic. Isn't a true 'muscle car' HP wise but being a '72 it's from the end of that era.

Glad to see it has already been mentioned, my first car was Dad's hand-me-down 1968 Olds 442 with the Hurst 4 speed, wish I still had a picture of it. Probably not the best first car for a 17 year old with raging hormones, but I lived through it.....

makes my nipples hard.................

My first car was grandpa's hand me down. A 65 Buick Electra 225 4 door! Lol! But it had a 445 Wildcat motor in it and it was a car! By the way, my girlfriend's dad hated that car! Lol!

Nice Chevelle!

No 72 Monte carlo...wtf...

Beautiful Chevelle! Thanks for sharing. I see you like the Cragar S/S wheels also.

Here is my '72 SS, numbers matching 402, automatic, 2.73 Posi, build sheet to confirm it all.

1st "factory authorized" muscle car. John DeLorean snuck a few '64 Tempests out the back door with the 389. Those had the horizontal headlights. Some car guys consider the '64 Tempests as "The" 1st muscle car. ( I can't remember if the 389 was stuffed in the LeMans, too.) Chevy had the 409 for a few years by then.

Is the motor still dead stock?

That's a beautiful '72. Back in the day, a buddy of mine had a '71 like that except it had gold stripes and American aluminum slots.

Haa, mine doesn't have a single number matching anything, but I love Cregars. It had '69 rally wheels on it, so I replaced them with the Cregars. The VIN says that it was in fact an SS. Whoever put it together, used a lot of '69 parts (which I've replaced) and the block was evidently out of a '67 Impala SS. We ran the numbers off of the block. We think it's still a 396 and runs like a stock engine. No smoke. They obviously rebuilt it, but to what extent, I have no idea. It's got an Edelbrock aluminum intake and carburetor with headers. It had chrome valve covers that leaked like crazy and I replaced them with some cast aluminum Chevy valve covers. Matter of fact, it leaked fluid from every place imaginable. It doesn't leak a drop now. It was originally Crimson Red, but they painted it Hugger Orange which is a '69 color. If you look closely in a couple of spots, you can see the red paint. It originally had a Power Glide 2 speed automatic on the tree with a bench seat, but it has a Turbo 400 in it now. I ended up putting in buckets with the stock center console for a 3 speed automatic. The bench seat had good vinyl, but the padding was shot. I kept the seat for the hell of it. I had the entire suspension replaced, as well as the exhaust and everything under the hood except the engine itself. We put in a Flow Master Exhaust. It has an independent rear (one wheel tire fire). I haven't driven it in probably 2 months, it seems to rain every weekend. Need to charge up the battery.

So many of these lists are simply personal preferences and have no reflection on what a muscle car was actually supposed to represent at the time. True muscle cars were big cars with a huge motor stuffed in them that handled like crap but would run the quarter mile in impressive times (for the period) and seat four to six people in most cases.

Including the Corvette and Cobra in the list just doesn't sit right as these were truly considered sports cars then and now - although the Vette was pretty much build on a passenger car frame for a very long time and didn't handle worth a darn until at least the C6s came out. On the list the Cobra was about the only one designed to handle on road courses from the beginning and I love taking mine on winding roads for a spirited romp when the weather is nice.

Of all the ones mentioned I would take a 70 Chevelle SS in a heartbeat but I'm pretty sure my next project car will be either a 68 Camaro or a 66/67 Nova SS restomod conversion.

An old friend of mine I hadn't seen in a long time recently contacted me. He's finishing up the restoration of a car he got almost 40 years ago. It was pretty rough when he drove it even back then.

It's a 1970 1/2 Z-28. One thing I found particularly pleasing was the motor we built 40 years ago when we were in high school still runs great today.