Table of contents for Volume 4, Issue 45 - September 2024 in All Chevy Performance

How often do you daydream of what you will do during your first few days of retirement? It’s a comforting thought, isn’t it? Leaving long days and micromanagement behind is a vision that gets us through more days than we’d probably like to admit. While a great deal of us can imagine spending our endless off days fishing or golfing as much as possible, there are newfound retirees like John Lambert of San Juan Capistrano, California, who chooses to enjoy most of his free time in the garage wrenching the hours away. John isn’t exactly new to throwing himself underneath an old car. He was raised with cars and trucks all around him from a very early age, so working on older vehicles has become second nature. “I grew up…

We know. We know. Horsepower is the sexy member of the family. Horsepower gets all the attention and is all anyone wants to talk about at parties. But hear us out: Torque is where it’s at. Few things in life are more fun than a great car with gobs of torque on demand every time you touch the throttle. Torque is what mashes you back in the seat. Torque is what makes the car squat on acceleration. Torque is what allows that most magical thing known as “burnouts.” And that’s the goal for this build. We’re at the shops of Prestige Motorsports in Concord, North Carolina, where they are building a competition-level LS for a drifter. Top-level drifting is a pretty demanding—and unique—sport. But no matter if you are a…

When Chevrolet introduced the Vega at the end of 1970, it was another attempt at a compact and economical car. The Corvair had fizzled out and the Nova had graduated to a more civilized offering, leaving a void in the compact space. The Vega was not originally destined for performance, although options like the GT package and eventually the Cosworth Twin Cam Vega gave it some much needed pep in its step. While Chevrolet toyed with various ways to increase sales on the rather boring compact car, the dragstrips buzzed with excitement around this lightweight combination. It was an instant hit when Bill “Grumpy” Jenkins hit the track in his Pro Stock–prepared Vega, which inspired thousands of high-performance Vega street cars and drag cars throughout the ’70s and ’80s. Although…

For more than 20 years, the NHRA Motorsports Museum has poured its heart and soul into honoring drag racing history with nostalgia drag racing events. These events were once called Hot Rod Reunion, but the Bowling Green, Kentucky, event was officially renamed to the Wally Parks NHRA Nostalgia Nationals. The rebranding of the event was not a departure from its roots, as it still features intense nostalgia drag racing action, a huge show-and-shine area, a swap meet packed with vintage speed parts, and more. The Wally Parks NHRA Nostalgia Nationals is always held on Father’s Day weekend, and you can count on toasty temperatures and a heavy dose of humidity in Bowling Green. The property at Beech Bend Raceway is perfect for an event of this nature, as it features…

1. SHINE ON All American Billet is proud to announce they will be offering all of their front drive systems in a chrome finish. They are made with 6061-T6 billet aluminum and the same high-quality accessories that come with all their serpentine kits. All American Billet parts are made in the United States, and are also available in machined, polished, or Silverline finishes. For more information, contact All American Billet by calling (844) 245-5381 or visit allamericanbillet.com. 2. RACE SERIES CARBS Summit Racing Race Series carburetors are ideal for drag or street/strip racing applications. They feature a smooth milled choke, adjustable screw-in air bleeds, high-performance down-leg boosters, jet extensions, vent whistles, four-corner idle, secondary adjustable idle screw, and Nitrophyl floats. They also have stainless linkage components and are fully machined…

Back in the early days of hot rodding, necessity was the mother of invention, as crafty gearheads would fabricate their own speed parts due to a lack of aftermarket support. Now, we have a tremendous offering of components at our fingertips, but even then, the aftermarket doesn’t support every build and every application. When this is the case, custom fabrication steps back into the fold, allowing for handcrafted fitment and custom design. While some fabrication projects can be tackled by a beginner, others get a little more complicated. We’d classify custom long-tube stainless steel headers as a pro-level task, but with the proper tools, skills, and patience, it can be done. We recently had the opportunity to follow along as Old Anvil Speed Shop in Orange, California, built a set…

There’s something about car guys that makes them want to take a perfectly good muscle car in for a do-over–a “mulligan” in golf terms. And not because the first hit was a bad shot, but because it’s possible the car was built at a time just prior to the muscle car world being turned upside down at a time when the aftermarket completely stepped up its game and introduced a new level of highly engineered performance parts, making one-time excellent components somewhat obsolete—a case of natural performance progression. For most of us that’s all fine and dandy, as the ride we were driving got the job done just fine. Well, that’s not exactly how Chad Farischon’s brain works. Chad is the kind of guy who wants the best of everything…

The small-block Chevy has now come full circle. When the GM LS Gen III small-block debuted just before the start of the 21st century, pundits immediately began foreshadowing the death of the Gen I small-block. But as Mark Twain once observed, “The rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated.” So it is with the small-block Chevy. It is way too popular to rust its way into obscurity. The demand for this ubiquitous V-8 is so great that the clamor for usable engine blocks has now reached a critical point. Are they still out there? Of course. Does your brother-in-law have six, four-bolt main, standard bore, 350 blocks sitting in the corner of his shop pining for a new home? Probably not, unless he’s a hoarder. The point is that good…

In a sea of subtle restomods this ’70 Chevelle is a sure standout. With a bird-catcher scoop and part of a roots-style supercharger poking through the hood you’re going to take notice quickly. That blower isn’t feeding an LS, either. There’s a big-block Chevy in the detailed engine bay. The exterior gets finished off in a slick manner with custom grille inserts that have much more depth than the stock appearance. A handmade lower valance piece integrates with the tucked bumper up front. Big Brixton Forged wheels finish off the look. @TavisHighlander TavisHighlander.com Builder: Vintage Fabrication, Independence, Missouri…

In 1962, Mr. Stock Eliminator, “Dyno” Don Nicholson, moved from Southern California to Atlanta, to set up and run a Dyno Shop at Naley Chevrolet. Chevrolet had officially pulled out of racing and this was the ad hoc operation for Southern Engineering and Development Company (aka SEDCO), the front for Chevrolet’s secret racing operation. Hubert Platt was a local racer, along with his brother Houston, who was running a ’38 Chevrolet Gas class car. He and Nicholson hit it off and Nicholson hired both to work in the Naley-Nicholson Dyno operations; Hubert did cylinder head prep, Houston assembled the engines, and Nicholson built engines and did the tuning while running the dyno. Nicholson had received a new ’62 Bel Air dual-quad, four-speed, Positraction, 409 direct from Chevrolet as a race…

After years of overdrive-transmission swaps, we don’t need to waste words on extolling their highway-cruising virtues, but when it comes to adapting the popular TREMEC five- and six-speed transmissions, there have been compromises. For five speeds, the TKO500 and TKO600 work well with old-school small-blocks but aren’t well-suited for the higher-revving capabilities of LS and LT engines. When it comes to six-speeds, there are basically two choices: the production-based T-56 and aftermarket-intended and T-56–based Magnum. Used T-56 units are getting scarce and for most vintage Chevys the shifter replacement typically requires modifying the trans tunnel. The relatively bulky Magnum also requires modifying the tunnel—and usually it’s to create room for the Magnum’s wide case and not just the shifter. To address those fitment challenges, TREMEC introduced the TKX about four…

These days it’s practically impossible to find a vintage muscle car built over a half-century ago wearing the original paint and trim that it came with off the assembly line. One has to wonder how something like this could still exist. Michael Coil, owner of this rare-find ’68 Chevelle explains how it went down: “I came across the car in Cleveland, Ohio. The gentleman who sold me the car bought it from the original owner’s estate sale after he had [died]. The car had been in storage since 1974 and for some reason was partially disassembled.” So, if we do a little math, that means the car was only on the road for about six years before being torn apart and stored. Got it! Now, that also explains how this…