Hot Rod June 2022

@john.mcgann Three weeks ago, I stopped at Whole Foods for groceries on my way home from work. Upon returning to my car, some dude commented on my C10, saying, “I’m sure that’s not good for the environment, but I do like your truck,” or something similar. He said that to me as he was boarding his behemoth soccer-mom-spec SUV with a smirk on his face. Windows up and A/C on, he was backing out of his parking spot before I could inform him that just maybe keeping a 55-year-old vehicle on the road is actually not a bad thing for the environment. Certainly, no one labored for slave wages in precious metal strip mines for any component in my car. More importantly, everything in my C10 can be recycled. Everything. Not…

20 Years Ago June 2002: 124 pages, $3.99 You’d have had to be brain-dead or in a coma if you didn’t instantly grab this issue and start flipping through it just from looking at the cover. Huge power? Pump gas? Sign me up! Tech Editor Steve Magnante chronicled the build of this 565-inch big-block Chevy. Dave Ebbert of DNE Motorsports Development in Fountain Valley, California, was the particular genius behind this madness. He started with a tall-deck Dart Big M block, added 4.600-inch pistons in 6.635-inch forged H-beam rods. The cam spun on roller bearings in the block. Dave was cagey about the cam specs, but Magneto pried duration specs of about 280 degrees and lift numbers of “more than 0.750 inch” from him. Big-wheel Jesel roller lifters actuated the valves, which…

Since much of Chrysler’s big-block Wedge program had evolved from work done on Hemi engine sizes in the 1950s, it was recognized early on that the path back to stardom in the racing world was most easily accomplished by bringing back the Hemi, rather than a slow, incremental evolution of the Max Wedge. In 1963, when Chrysler directed powertrain engineers Tom Hoover and Don Moore to develop an engine that could win Daytona, the A311 Indy program was dusted off and work began to reverse-engineer a Hemi-chambered cylinder head for the R/B-series big-block. Work was completed on the second-generation Hemi, a 426ci behemoth dubbed the Race Hemi, and it handily dominated the 1964 Daytona 500 with a 1-2-3 sweep. Furious that Chrysler could steal their thunder out from under them, Ford…

By day, Brendon Vetuskey gets to see toy cars come to life through the design and manufacturing process at his job as a designer for Hot Wheels. When he’s not on the job, Brendon is applying those same principles on objects of a much larger scale, 1 to 1. We met Brendon about five years ago at a local car show in Torrance, California, when he and his wife, Coco, showed up in his newly completed ’67 Firebird. That car made enough of an impression on your author at the time, that it ended up on the cover of the October 2018 issue of Car Craft. Recently, Brendon sent pictures of his latest creation, this ’55 Chevy, so I stopped by to check it out, knowing full well it was…

What are you looking at? If you are thinking this is a ’51 Ford Custom dragged from a barn, you are wrong. If you are now thinking this is a fake patina car that looks like a ’51 Ford Custom… also wrong. This car is the creation of John Moss, an industrial artist from Huntington Beach, California. He is deep into surf-town culture and outlaw choppers, best known locally for creating high-end spaces and architectural structures with raw and rustic finishes through Brass Junkie, his business located in the industrial side of town. He is also known to show up at the legendary Donut Derelicts in a thrown-together jalopy that steals the show. Great art is created by a convergence of circumstances that motivate the artist. A stock car with good…

Held together with hopes, dreams, and a whole lot of backyard engineering, this DIY 1970 Road Runner Superbird collected its Long Hauler plaque at the 2021 HOT ROD Power Tour Presented by HP Tuners and Driven by Continental Tire! Though it may look stitched together, this hot rod was built to be driven and proved it could be by traversing more than 1,000 miles over the course of a week, sometimes in pouring rain. This ride screams “fun,” and we loved it from the moment we spied it on Day 1 of Power Tour. What’s the story on this faux Superbird? Well, it was built by Shawn Jones, with the support of his wife, Sara, at Schweaty’s Speed Shop, their shop in Cleveland, Tennessee. “After meeting up with the guys at…