RT says:
When we consider the true high-volume family cars out there and their overpowered variants, we come up with a pretty short list. There's the Accord V6, the Camry V6, the Altima V6, and the Ford Fusion Sport. Everybody else uses a small-bore turbocharged four-cylinder engine for their upmarket models.
Imagine, for a moment, that you are back in the year 1964, driving to your local Pontiac dealer to order a GTO. On the way there, you get into a car crash and you spend the next fifty-three years in a coma, only to wake up and go muscle car shopping again. You know exactly what you want: a two-door sedan with a four-on-the-floor and the biggest engine you can get. That is a muscle car.
As painful as it may be to do so, therefore, I'm going to disqualify the Fusion Sport because it has four doors, all-wheel-drive, and a mandatory automatic transmission. Conceptually, the fast Ford is far closer to "budget Audi S4" than "modern Torino Cobra Jet."
That leaves us with three American-made contenders. Two of them are only available as four-door automatics, which of course is also antithetical to the original GTO formula of two doors and four-on-the-floor transmission.
And that is how we get to the rather insane idea that the last American muscle car is, in fact, a Honda Accord.
Dyno testing of a brand-new unit suggests that its rated output of 270hp is conservative by thirty ponies or so. It's common for owners to break into the thirteens in the quarter-mile and trap well over 100mph, numbers that would have been perfectly respectable in the muscle car heyday of the late Sixties.
It will "chirp third" with reckless abandon; that was once considered to be the sign of an authentic muscle car. Much of the interior is disturbingly cheap and fragile; I believe the same thing was true of every Plymouth Road Runner that ever left the line.
http://www.roadandtrack.com/car-culture/a33313/honda-accord-v6-coupe-muscle-car/
That's why I don't read Road and Track magazine folks. The author of this idiotic idea is, of course, a Honda Accord owner
When we consider the true high-volume family cars out there and their overpowered variants, we come up with a pretty short list. There's the Accord V6, the Camry V6, the Altima V6, and the Ford Fusion Sport. Everybody else uses a small-bore turbocharged four-cylinder engine for their upmarket models.
Imagine, for a moment, that you are back in the year 1964, driving to your local Pontiac dealer to order a GTO. On the way there, you get into a car crash and you spend the next fifty-three years in a coma, only to wake up and go muscle car shopping again. You know exactly what you want: a two-door sedan with a four-on-the-floor and the biggest engine you can get. That is a muscle car.
As painful as it may be to do so, therefore, I'm going to disqualify the Fusion Sport because it has four doors, all-wheel-drive, and a mandatory automatic transmission. Conceptually, the fast Ford is far closer to "budget Audi S4" than "modern Torino Cobra Jet."
That leaves us with three American-made contenders. Two of them are only available as four-door automatics, which of course is also antithetical to the original GTO formula of two doors and four-on-the-floor transmission.
And that is how we get to the rather insane idea that the last American muscle car is, in fact, a Honda Accord.
Dyno testing of a brand-new unit suggests that its rated output of 270hp is conservative by thirty ponies or so. It's common for owners to break into the thirteens in the quarter-mile and trap well over 100mph, numbers that would have been perfectly respectable in the muscle car heyday of the late Sixties.
It will "chirp third" with reckless abandon; that was once considered to be the sign of an authentic muscle car. Much of the interior is disturbingly cheap and fragile; I believe the same thing was true of every Plymouth Road Runner that ever left the line.
http://www.roadandtrack.com/car-culture/a33313/honda-accord-v6-coupe-muscle-car/
That's why I don't read Road and Track magazine folks. The author of this idiotic idea is, of course, a Honda Accord owner
So... an idiot with an ego and since he's a writer for RT, a overabundance of ego about his car expertise.
Guess hes never heard of the current Mustang, Camaro, or Challenger. and I think some Cadillac is available in a 2 door with a manual trans,
ReplyDelete2 door cars are hard to sell, and manual transmissions are hard to find.
but its still sad, and strange that you can buy a Cadillac station wagon, and a Cadillac with a manual transmission, but you can no longer buy a chevy or Ford 1/2 ton pickup with a manual transmission.
Holy eff, Cadillac has a stick shift? But the Ford truck doesn't? Jumpin Jehoshaphat. Oh, I guess I have to disagree on the 2 dr being hard to sell... and so does history. The Mustang, Camaro, VW Bug, every sports car ever, and almost all micro cars prove that they sell incredibly well. If the car is a hit, well designed, and nails the market. You probably can't give away a new 2 dr car, no one wants the overweight, underpowered, hard to see out of bulky bastards.
DeleteThey are also badly overpriced.
But the world outside of Australia loves a 2 door.
Also, I read the article I linked to, and he dismisses the Camaro and Mustang for some reason I don't recall, but he dismisses the Challenger for having been made outside the USA.
Now, why the hell don't I have a link to the article? forehead smack!
"Right away this excludes the Mustang, Camaro, and Challenger, the holy trinity of modern "muscle cars", because all three of these vehicles have traditionally been specialty cars, not family cars." So he dismisses them just to avoid logically defending his baloney
Delete