<VV> Representative times ot 60 mph back in the 60s?
Tony Underwood
tonyu at roava.net
Wed Nov 23 21:33:51 EST 2005
At 01:16 hours 11/23/2005, BBRT wrote:
>Anyone remember or have old mags and can give some representative
>0-60 mph times for muscle cars or high performance cars back in the
>60s and 70s?
More than a few... but they're almost meaningless. The cars were
run in dealer lot condition and tires of the day were almost useless
for launching a genuine musclecar and hoping to exploit all the power
these cars were capable of generating. Most tires simply went up in
smoke.
Those same cars today with modern rubber can oft times knock off as
much as two or even three seconds from their "golden age"
quarter-mile times. One example is the venerable Dodge Challenger
with the 440x6 engine option. In 1970 this car had trouble running
a solid 14 second quarter mile. It could not hook up and launches
were almost impossible, with time-to-60-foot figures being no better
than what would be expected from a non-muscular 4-door sedan that dad
was driving. Today, a tech'ed "NHRA certified" bone stock Dodge
Challenger with the 440 "six-pak" option will turn mid-12 second
quarter mile times, got documentation to show for it.
I know a fellow with a teched "stock" 440 powered Challenger that he
races in Street Stock class dragracing, single 4xbbl carb on a stone
factory stock 440 with the rest of the car in street trim except for
headers and slicks and his car turns consistent low 12 second quarter
mile times. He says that he's also run the car with an
aftermarket camshaft with more aggressive lift and duration and it
turns 11.90s but he can't run this cam in Street Stock. If his car
was running 1970 vintage tires they would be hopelessly fried.
By the way, most car magazines also timed the typical Dodge Charger
with the 426 Hemi option (that's 425 "rated" hp) at around 14.2
seconds at around 103 mph. Today, ANY bone stock Roadrunner with
the factory 383 engine and GOOD tires can easily beat
that. Likewise the 396 Chevelle, which was turning times in the
mid-14s, easily able to dip into the low 13s with no problem if the
car has tires to work with.
In 1971, Motor Trend tested a 426 Hemi-Cuda with some good tires on
it, actually "cheater" slicks, and the car was turning low 12s (with
tire spin), with a 0-60 time of 4.2 seconds. Motor Trend later
mentioned that the two quickest 0-60 time cars they had ever tested
up until that time were the Hemi-Cuda and the DeTomaso Pantera, both
of which turned in the same 4.2 seconds time.
I also recall the '69 302 powered Z-28 Camaro in street trim as
turning a quarter-mile in around 14.5 seconds at around 98 mph, also
with tire issues off the line. Bigblock Mustangs were not worth
considering without slicks and other traction aids.
I drove a '67 427 Mustang fastback a few times Back When... that car
was just plain scarey if you got frisky with the gas
pedal. Traction was a distant foggy fantasy but one got the feeling
that if it ever hooked up it would yank the sheet metal out from
under its own paint. I also had the distinctive privilege to drive
a 1970 W-30 Olds 442, yellow with black interior, 455/4-sp and just
three years old at the time and looked like brand new, traction was a
distant dream and the car had wheel-hop from Hell, but once it hooked
up it would really haul, genuine contender as a real factory
musclecar. I felt twitchy about pressing the car hard, scared to
death I'd splatter a bug against the windshield or something... the
car was THAT nice, absolutely beautiful.
They were asking 2500 dollars for it. Today, a W-30 in that
condition would likely bring about 50,000 bucks, maybe more. Heavy
but powerful, and it was hard to not love the way it looked sitting
there in the late summer sunshine... with all that yellow splashed
everywhere and the cop-bait black stripe down the sides... I'll
never forget how that car looked. But I bought that '66 Plymouth
Satellite instead... cheaper and it was a Mopar after all. And
faster... ;) On its best day, my Plymouth would do low 12s but it
was hard to keep it there... drive it two days like you had sense
and then if you ran through the gears it would misfire or sputter or
likewise do something bad on top end unless I replaced plugs and
tweaked it yet again... there's something to be said for modern
engine ignition and fuel metering control systems, that's a fact.
But when it was right, it was righteous. Not stock, so the times
mean nothing in this instance.
My brother's '69 Roadrunner was stock and it ran consistent 14 second
quarters with the obligatory wheel spin and tire smoke. My buddy
"Peewee" Owens had a '67 Z-28 that would run 14 flat typically, and
high 13s on a good day (and he never let anybody forget it either) IF
he let air out of the back tires, which tended to make for a
squirrelly ride on top. He also had 4.56 gears in back, not stock,
so the car behaved a bit differently than it did when new.
Obviously any of these older musclecars were capable of much better
performance if their capabilities were exploited via good tuning and
if they were wearing good tires. They certainly would give today's
high tech neomuscle a run for its money in any heads-up competition
if given the same advantages in tires and tuning.
It is also difficult to find a decent standard from which to judge
stock performance of these vintage musclecars. I don't think any
car magazine or independent road test organization ever managed to
get times/speeds of the same car to match up between them. Everyone
was always getting different results from what was supposedly
identical cars. The only way to find out for yourself what the cars
would do was to... find out for yourself.
On the Blue Ridge Parkway at the Roanoke River overpass, is a bridge
which coincidentally is almost exactly 1/4 mile in length (and is
known locally among some street racers as "the quartermile
bridge"). It has been the site of many a road test involving
contests of acceleration for a very long time... and I've run a few
cars across it myself. No dragracing on the bridge for the likes of
me; I'd rather not have some squirrel beside me 200 feet off the line
at 60 mph and miss a gear and get sideways. The guard rail is only
3 feet high and it's 400 feet to the river below. But there's some
impressive black marks on each end of the bridge to be seen fairly
often, even now. Yes, I've run my Corsa ragtop and the Spyder
across the bridge as well... for funzies, didn't time the runs.
Sometime, when I feel inspired, I might go run the quartermile bridge
and take a stopwatch with me, see what a Corvair would do. I
should have timed the Spyder; it ran pretty well, likely could have
made a good showing for itself. Or not. The quartermile bridge
is also a good place to get a ticket if you don't have "road guards"
at each end keeping watch.
tony..
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