Classic Chevy Muscle Cars Readers Rides - In The Spotlight

Hug Me
'69 Camaro RS
Roque Manzaranes
Cottonwood Heights, UT
Roque rescued his RS. It had been held as an unwilling captive on a small farm in Hooper, just east of the Great Salt Lake. Needless to say, the car was in pretty bad shape. Nonetheless, he drove it carefully home, camouflaging I-15 in a layer of oil smoke. He stripped it to bare nothing on a homemade spit so he could rotate the body for some floorpan replacements, cleaning, and painting. He welded in new rear quarter-panels and inner fenderwells. All the parts that were beyond hope he replaced from the usual aftermarket suspects. He painted the RS in his garage and applied the vinyl top, aided by his eldest son. Roque applied the Hugger Orange over non-original DX1 hood and nose stripes, and lowered in the Ramjet 350 that his six kids gave him to celebrate "retirement." He backed it with a Tremec five-speed, put Right Stuff power discs all around, added larger antisway bars, and 235 front and 255 rear BFGs on 7-inch Rally hoops.

New Shoes For An Old Box
'55 210 Club Coupe
Larry Leyba
Liberty Hill, TX
Retirement kills some people but as is more often the case, it lifts monstrous weight from the shoulders and energizes the mind to contemplate more pleasant, personal things, releasing them from some dark closet. Voltage flows through the body and sparks the physical man. Larry freely admits, "The paint and body, upholstery, drivetrain, and exhaust were professionally done, but I did the assembly." Love this modern power scheme, too. An LS1 with upgrades and modifications from Street & Performance, SLP, and The Detail Zone is joined by a 4L60E transmission and narrowed 9-inch. The interior features '62 Corvair buckets, Haneline gauges, an ididit tilt column with a 15-inch Impala wheel, charcoal/gunmetal upholstery, and Vintage Air HVAC. The paint is black mica base/clear and, as you can see, is very deep indeed. Larry bumped up the suspension, upgraded to four-wheel discs, and rolls on 18x7 and 18x10 Torq-Thrust IIs spinning Nittos. "Driving and showing the car is a hobby that has given me a great deal of pleasure and new friendships."

Real Stormtrooper
'66 Chevelle SS
Jim Savalle
Ray, MI
Some people's idea of a street car is vastly opposed to those of others. Savalle's take is decidedly a one percenter. It's more than most guys could handle, at least in the psychic perspective. Undoubtedly noisy and rambunctious it might turn normally sane people into quivering bags of flesh because the SS must surely provokes an insistent urge to go! Yet here we have Jim "This is my street car" Savalle urged by a poked and stroked 454 that dyno-proofed at 700 hp and 650 lb-ft. It wields a solid roller Comp cam pushing on a Jesel valvetrain atop Dart aluminum heads. Companion to them is a Dart intake manifold and a 1050-cfm Dominator. The anxious drivetrain begins with TCI 5,000-rpm stall converter passing grunt to a Turbo 400 transmission affixed with a transbrake. It all winds up at a 12-bolt bolstered by Strange Engineering axles and a 4.11:1 gearset. Puffs Jim, "I drive my car on the street, and it is a blast! It is an all-steel original SS 138 car that runs mid 10's on pump gas!"

Big Bullet, Bad Bullet!
'69 RS Camaro
Jason Pratt
Massillon, OH
Just when you think "good gracious, I'm so sick of '69 Camaros," up pops an evil, undeniable entity such as this. Some of our readers are car builders by profession. Yes, Jason is one such doer. You can't get much more involved with a hot rod than building it from scratch. He materialized this wraith at his J&E Pro Streets in the heart of the old-days gasser country. It's underwritten by a round-tube chassis much like you'd find in a current 10-wide Extreme racer. Although it has roll-up windows, working lights and turn signals, a real exhaust system, and wields 33x22-inch street tires on Weld Pro Magnums, we'd stop short of calling it an all-around street pedaller. Nonetheless, it's licensed and legal by Ohio DOT standards. How'd you like to crank up that all-aluminum BDS 16-71-honked Big Chief 557 on a chilly fall morn? Right. On the other hand, the chilling effect of that twin-bottle fogger system would be a godsend on a humid summer day.

Rookie's Reacher
'69 Camaros SS
Tom McConnell
Grovetown, GA
When he got his piece of joy, Tom McConnell wasted no time at all. "I started by replacing worn out leaf springs with new ones from Rick's Camaro and checking body movement with QA1 adjustable shocks," Tom said. An M21 four-gear passes torque to a 12-bolt upgraded with 3.73s, an Eaton carrier, and Superior axles. Braking power was increased big time by Wilwood four-piston discs on all corners. Framing those discs are 18x8 and 18x9 Budnik Ice rims. Tom bolted on the Hooker Super Comps and hung a Flowmaster American Muscle 2 1/2-inch exhaust interrupted only slightly by 40-series mufflers "which woke the engine up." Next, he pulled the weak-suck 402 Rat and punched it out 0.030, filling the case with TRW forgings and a steel crankshaft. A Comp Extreme 284 cam went in the middle of it. Then he torqued down Edelbrock RPM Performer oval-port 110cc heads and capped 'em with an RPM Performer dual-plane intake manifold and a 750 Demon double-pumper. Fuel flow is managed by a Holley 125 pump. In keeping with the old-school theme, he chose an MSD Pro Billet (HEI) distributor and MSD wires. The package cranked out 425 hp. Tom's interior includes a flat DSE instrument panel filled with Auto Meter Comp gauges and the seats have been redone in black/white houndstooth.

Collector Corvette
'67 Corvette Coupe
Peter Koretz
Valencia, CA
Pete's had lots of muscle cars over the years; flat ran the gamut in fact: Mopars, Fords, including countless Mustangs, but mostly Chevrolets. His latest hot-body is a triple-carb 427/390 coupe. He had a '65 Vette during his high school years and had been yearning to replace that vision of teenage testosterone with something of a like nature. As his earning ability increased, so did the market for these cars. With the economy the way it is, he had the opportunity to realize that dream once more. He found it, of all places, on eBay Motors. After speaking with the owner at length, seeing lots of revealing images, and verifying its documentation (original window sticker, tank sticker, original bill of sale, and Protect-O-Plate), he bought the vanguard sight unseen. The car has maintained the original Marlboro Maroon paint as well as the nicely broken-in black interior. It has a numbers matching everything. The car has since become his daily driver and in the few months that he's owned it has taken it to countless cruise-ins, including the past two Van Nuys Blvd. Reunions. He says both were the most fun he's ever had at any car show.