Not only did american cars get a bad name by having unreliable cars for a period of time (not sure if that's been true for the last couple years or not), but the way they LOOK has a lot to do with it and I never hear anyone talking about that. Their hideous looking, boxy cars are completely out of the realm of what mainstream society wants. Yes, we want fuel economy, of course. But we want cool- looking cars too. Gone are the years of the 70's where they had such incredible cars (ah, those were the days!). They need to do both: fuel economy AND aesthetics.
If you think the bland 70's Econo boxes had style, look here for real style
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The '80's were very bland, but in the 90's, some of the boxiness was going away and the past five years are at least respectable, but still much too much sameness.
I'd like to have a 50's or 60's body on a new chassis and running gear. The older care had pure muscle, but could be a PITA to keep running compared to
100,000 mile sparkplug changes, electronic ignition and fuel injection. Not to mention radial tires and disk brakes.
You can get a whole new body for a '55 Chevy. In fact I believe that there is at least one company that is making a modern slide-under frame as well. Same deal with first-series Camaros, you can pretty much build one from a catalog. Nice thing about Chevys is that swapping in a modern drivetrain or at least engine-management system is fairly simple... the SBC was the same darn block from '55 up until maybe 10 years ago or so.
My personal pick, though, would be a fiberglass '53 Stude coupe on an Art Morrison chassis. Yes, you can buy both. Let your fingers do the walking... (and give your credit card a workout, too...) But it would be a shame to put anything but a Stude engine in a Stude (even fake) body (unless it's an old Cadillac or Hemi motor you prefer.) Maybe update it with an aluminum intake and a Megasquirt based FI system? Mallory is making an optical-trigger distributor for Stude V-8s now... and I know a guy that could point you to sources for stuff like roller rockers etc. (don't lose the solid lifter cam though, real engines tick a little.) I also know guys that have adapted TKO transmissions to a Stude engine...
Oh, yes, I have a dream. And you can help make this dream a reality. Paypal donations are gratefully accepted :)
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