Hemmings Muscle Machines January 2018

“ …without the existence of an online option, I was left to books and consulting with local experts, and I can recall being sorely disappointed by both on a number of occasions ”. I was trying to figure out some issue with one of the late-model daily drivers recently, and almost instinctively jumped online to poke around in search of answers. Soon, I was weighing input from a variety of sources, filtering out some of the bad data, and, before long, the problem was handled. If you were born from about 1980 on, you truly might not know any other way of living. But those of us who’ve been around longer are also right there with you, because we don’t really remember what living without the internet was like, either.…

FIRST IN, LAST OUT GM’s Australian-built full-size rear-drive performance sedan (and cop car) is gone for good With the final rear-drive Holden Commodore sedan (a red six-speed Commodore VFII Redline V8) rolling out of the Elizabeth plant last October, Australia is officially out of the car-building business. Holden built a total of 7,687,675 cars in Australia between 1948 and 2017. According to Holden boss Mike Deveraux, “Australia’s automotive industry is up against a perfect storm of negative influences, including the sustained strength of the Aussie dollar against almost all major trading currencies, the relatively high cost of production, and the relatively small scale of the local domestic market.” In the last 15 years, Australia built some of the most interesting GM cars sold on American soil: the underrated 2004-’06 Pontiac…

NATIONAL CORVETTE HOMECOMING FOR SALE BY CURRENT OWNER Founded in 1981 — the same year Corvette production moved from St. Louis to Bowling Green — the National Corvette Homecoming (NCH) is an annual celebration centered around Chevrolet’s premier sports car. Held in Bowling Green, Kentucky, the three-day event features car shows, a road tour, guest speakers, seminars, vendors, and exhibits, but, unless current owners Joe and Vera Pruitt can find a new buyer for the show, NCH may be no more. NCH has had several owners over the years, beginning with founders Tom Hill and Sam Hall. The Pruitts, along with a trio of partners, purchased the NCH in December of 2001, but as Joe explained, the other partners stepped down by 2004. Since then, putting on the annual show…

50TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE PONTIAC FIREBIRD ColaizziDesign • www.colaizzidesign.com 937-477-5530 • $90 (signed paper proof print)/ $275 (signed limited-edition giclée print), plus s&h Officially unveiled during the 2017 Cincinnati Concours, this incredibly realistic portrait of a first-year Firebird convertible represents the latest piece of mixed-media automotive artwork to emerge from the studio of Bob Colaizzi. His tribute to a very special Firebird was commissioned by the owner of that very car, who maintains a soft spot for it after driving it to college. In his typical fashion, Colaizzi drew the car—along with a couple taking in a sleek Staggerwing Beechcraft—by hand, before scanning his illustration into Photoshop, where he rendered the Pontiac in colors that gave the finished product the polish and tone of watercolors and opaque acrylic paints. Like…

Let’s get one thing straight right out of the gate: This car exists because of “the movie.” Yes, that movie. Were it not for Smokey and the Bandit, it never would have been ordered by a car guy 50 miles or so outside of Pittsburgh. And, it wouldn’t still be in such great, original condition were it not for that owner and the kid who admired it, and even helped care for it, for decades before it finally became his own. It’s even got Hal Needham’s signature on it, the stuntman extraordinaire turned director who penned and helmed the iconic movie. Could there be a better endorsement? Okay, we’ll admit that Burt or Sally’s John Hancock on the car would make a nice touch, too, but it was Needham who…

“The following items,” says the original invoice on this 1967 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme Sports Coupe, equipped with the 4-4-2 Performance Package, “options or accessories on some other models, are standard equipment on this model vehicle: Wall-to-wall floor carpeting, foam-padded front seat cushion, foam-padded rear seat cushion, chrome roof drip mouldings, chrome side window frame mouldings, Jetfire Rocket V-8 H.C. engine 4bbl, deluxe steering wheel, ash tray lamp, [and] deluxe interior equipment.” For a utilitarian document, the dealer invoice sure reflects a lot of pride, and rightly so. In its fourth year of production, the Oldsmobile 4-4-2 had grown from a mild performer in the shadow of the Pontiac GTO to both a respectable muscle car and a contender in the personal-luxury class. While earlier 4-4-2s could be ordered based on…