Tagged with 'Camaro'

I was only 7 years old in 1975 when my uncle, Kevin Green, wheeled this car into the back corner of the garage. It wouldn’t see the light of day again until 2007. He had paid $400. I would later learn the car had been traded to the dealership where my uncle worked in exchange for a Datsun 280Z by its second owner, a friend of George Alderman (who was using the car for autocross racing). The first owner (identified by the Protect-O-Plate), Olive Hicks, has eluded us for years, despite our best efforts to find her. What we know for sure is that she purchased the car at Van’s Chevrolet in New Castle, DE, just a stone’s throw from my home today, and that the car had never really traveled more than a few miles from there.

My relationship with Camaros began in November 1966. My uncle, Bob McKeown, walked into Spielman Chevrolet in Brooklyn, NY, and drove out of the showroom with a new 1967 Camaro– one of the first ones built. At the time, this car was nothing special; just an inline 250 cubic-inch six-cylinder with a 3-speed manual transmission on the column. Not long afterward, he paid me and a neighbor five dollars to wash and wax his new Camaro. We were thrilled, not just because we got $2.50 each (a lot of money for teenagers in 1967) but also because we actually got to go over, under, and around a real Camaro! It didn’t matter to us that it wasn’t an SS, it was a Camaro– and nobody else we knew even had one.

The red car was a 1967 Chevy Camaro SS Convertible, and was owned by the now ex-executive producer of the show. In the early days of production, they drove the car. Now it's transported by trailer between the cities Guy visits, and it's only driven between restaurants in the same town. “Newer” episodes (8/11 to present) have been shot with a 1968 Camaro. The '67 was sold.

Guy is a car nut and owns nine at last count, including an '04 GMC Sierra pickup, a ’65 Cobra, a ’96 Impala Super Sport, an '07 Corvette, a '71 Chevelle, a '68 Pontiac Firebird, and a '76 CJ-5 Jeep. Other purchases include a 2008 Lamborghini Gallardo (infamously stolen in March 2011), a yellow Chevy 4500 monster semi truck (as seen in this RITZ Cracker commercial) and a black-on-yellow 2011 Chevy Camaro.

The mid-sixties saw Camaro competing against Mustang for street and track bragging rights; while at the same time GM and Ford were competing for showroom sales. This era has been etched in history as the “Pony Car” Wars. This being a special Camaro issue; we thought it might be fun to run down the timeline for the Camaro. We’ll also be taking a look at things that were happening in the World of Camaro at that time. Along the way we’ll throw in a few weird or rare Camaro options, just for fun.

You may have heard about General Motors engineer Mark Stielow’s 1969 Camaro “Red Devil” before. It’s a fully custom Pro Touring Camaro packing a 7.0-liter LS7 under its hood which is garnished with the cylinder heads, valvetrain and supercharger from a Corvette ZR1. Underneath, it’s equipped with a 3.25:1 nine-inch axle, a limited-slip differential and a full Detroit Speed suspension system. He’s since sold the car, but back in 2012 when it was still around, him and Hot Rod magazine pitted it against a brand new Camaro ZL1 in a time-attack style race.

The Chevrolet models that came out of Don Yenko's shop were all spectacular. This '68 Camaro may be a little more so...

In the late 1960s, General Motors had a corporate edict which barred any engine larger than 400 cubic inches from finding its way under the hood of their recently released Ford Mustang fighter, the Camaro. To bypass this minor hurdle, the now famous Don Yenko ordered SS Camaros equipped with the L-78 Big Block engine to his father’s dealership and swapped it out with the 7.0-liter L-72 from the Corvette. The result was the now very rare and sought after Yenko Camaro.  Only 64 Yenko’s were built in 1968, one of which will cross the auction block at Mecum’s Original Spring Classic auction next month.

All love stories have a beginning, and this one is no different. As is the case with most ladies, she belonged to another man. And for sixteen years, George Hedrick of Lyles, TN made many offers to make her his, promising to restore and love only (not to sell). In early 2000, George’s friend (who had made the purchase from the original owner) passed away and the car went to auction where George was able to purchase her for the high bid of $1200.

The first thing George did after making her his was to properly store her, where she remained until 2009. During those 9 years, George finished his career as an independent contractor, the whole time never forgetting his love that waited. The plans were to restore her to original specs, but as the pictures show, many things changed– and as Elvis said, “I did it my way”. With a little help from friends Richard Dunn and Rod Lyonhurst, they restored a lot of metal and changed the original color from Deepwater Blue to 2008 Corvette Atomic Orange.

There was a bit of a surprise at the GM Renaissance Center today. As you can see from the photos, there were multiple custom Chevrolet Camaros surrounded by a film crew in GM’s circular showroom.

Just what is the occasion? Are they New York International Auto Show surprises? Chevy did catch everyone off guard with the Z/28 announcement last year, after all. Though they could just as well be movie cars from Transformers 4. But as it turns out, the Camaros seen here are neither official Chevrolet concepts, nor are they Autobots (or Decepticons).

If you're Jeremy Clarkson or anyone involved with one of the Cannonball Run movies, driving a car into a swimming pool is hilarious. If you're not, it really isn't.

Anyone looking to go for a swim at a certain Harris County, Texas, community pool was--to say the least--inconvenienced when a brand-new 2014 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 was driven into it. This moment of schadenfreude is brought to you by txGarage.

We're in a Barber Motorsports Park garage in Birmingham, Ala., on a brisk morning with pro race-car driver Andy Pilgrim -- along with the Chevrolet Camaro Z/28 and Porsche 911 GT3, the latest, road course-focused street cars for 2014. Cadillac Racing pays Pilgrim to pilot a CTS-V coupe in the Pirelli World Challenge series, but today he is our hired gun to give us top-level feedback around the challenging 2.38-mile circuit.

Pilgrim's résumé boasts wins at the 12 Hours of Sebring, Petit Le Mans and the Rolex 24 at Daytona, in addition to numerous Le Mans podium finishes. And while he has bagged five professional sports-car championships, it's his articulate, detailed feedback about a car's behavior at the limit that's more valuable to us on this day.