rec.autos.simulators

We all know 1967 was a miracle year for F1, GPL tells us so.

But, how about street-legal cars in that year? I was a kid then, and I
remember the Pontiac GTO ("Gran Turismo Omologato"), 400+ HP in a 7 liter
V8 (IIRC).

F1 cars in 1967 had the same 400+ HP, although in 3 liters. I don't know of
any mass-produced car today that can rival an F1 in power. My question for
the experts is, which cars in 1967 had more than 400 HP directly out of the
dealer and could be licenced to drive in the street? Could you, for
example, buy a Shelby Cobra 427 and drive it legally in the street?

And, to put my question on topic, are there any simulations of those cars
available for GPL? Can I drive a GTO or Cobra 427 in GPL tracks?

Any of these cars could be driven on the street, of course.  The 427
SOHC motor would not have lasted very long though, it really was a
race engine.

My Dad had a 383 Road Runner.  He said it drank gas just sitting in
the driveway.

Gerald

Rather a ripoff from Ferrari 250 GTO name.

The problem with the muscle cars IMHO, especially when it comes to
simming, is that although they've got plenty of HP, the roadholding
sucked and the weight made the straight line performance suffer
anyway.

But then again we have Driver, don't we? :)

And you can test this in GPL: jack the car up to max on rideheight,
use the softest springs and disconnect the anti-roll bars... Pretty
close, eh? :-)

    Huh?  Have you ever had a ride in a true musclecar?  The weight of the
cars are often exaggerated.  A Chevelle weighs in the neighborhood of 3500 -
3600 pounds, only slightly more than say, a new Camaro or Mustang.  Now,
something like an Impala is another story, but that's not a musclecar.
Besides a Viper, ZO6 Vette, or other VERY expensive cars, show me a car that
is affordable and can run in the mid 13's or lower in the quarter mile from
the factory.  Musclecars might not be technical marvels, but they sure
aren't slow either.
    There are lots of aftermarket parts and swaps available that can make an
old musclecar handle very well.  A Chevelle special issue that I have from
Super Chevy (?) showed the buildup of a 1970 Chevelle "G" machine and it is
very impressive.  So a sim that would let you upgrade your muscle car would
be awesome, as long as the execution isn't as poor as MCO.

Ryan
Proud Owner of a 1970 El Camino

However...it is also widely held that many companies underrated their
highest engines then by a good amount for insurance purposes.

This seems to be held up by the fact that some magazines have, for the sake
of it, built up to original specifications, classic king-of-the-hill engines
like the 454 LS6...and dynoed them...and with SAE Net, (previous was SAE
Gross - they could run the engine with no engine-driven accessories
(external water pump even!), pull vacuum on the exhaust, etc etc...wasn't
very representative of what went in the car...SAE gross specifies it as
having to be exactly as it's installed in a car) the engines dynoed out to
very close to what numbers they were given in their day.

GM certainly pulled quite a few tricks on their truck line, given my
mostly-original but somewhat-hopped-up 1970 GMC with a 4bbl 350 was rated at
255hp, yet my fastest 1/4 mile shows a mere 191hp after some tweaking...and
I'm running a slightly better carb, more open intake and exhaust, and a
bigger cam than it came with back in '70. =P

Milhouse

industry changed to SAE
todays SAE ratings its quite a

--
Slot

Tweaks & Reviews
www.slottweak.com

You know the funny thing is, the "muscle cars" of today are much faster
than all but the very limited editions of the 60s (such as the ZL1
Camaro, Yenko cars, etc.) Most of the most revered muscle cars of that
era such as the 454 Chevelles, Z28s, 440 powered Mopars, etc ran the 1/4
mile in the low to mid 14 second range. Today, you can buy a Mustang
Cobra, Camaro Z28 or SS, Trans Am, and so on that will run low to mid
13s straight off the showroom floor (my 1998 Pontiac Formula ran a best

musclecars of yesteryear have over their modern counterparts is that it
is VERY easy and VERY cheap to make them VERY fast. Take a '67 Camaro
and add a Roots style blower (or NOS for even less money,) dual quad
carbs, fat exhaust system, and some 10 inch slicks and you can go to the
track and run 11s all day long for just a couple grand. To make the
current Mustang/Camaro run the same kind of times will cost you many
times more...

Todd
http://twalker.d2g.com

Didn't mean to step on someone's toes, hehe. Actually, I wouldn't mind
laying my hands on a Charger myself... But the point I was at least
trying to make was that 400hp in a musclecar isn't the same as 400hp
in hmm, most other (race-ish)cars, especially a 600kg single seater.

Another thing was that the simming aspect would be somewhat limited.
And as you said it's about 1/4-mile times. I'm about lap-times. ;-)

Even still, I played a game on the Amiga that was something similar to
what you suggested above, where you started out with an automatic Ford
Falcon(ugh), and raced for cash to buy bigger and better. The name
escapes me, though.

300 hp Yenko Corvair

Mangusta/Pantera

Chevy Cheetah

Sumbeam Tiger

Lamborgini Miura

Would that be Street Rod/Street Rod 2?

AFAIK it was available on Amiga, C64 and PC.  Quite good fun, if not
exactly a simulator....

There's a project about to resurrect the game with rendered visuals,
semi-3D tracks and so on, although it's only in an alpha stage.

http://www.streetrod3.com/main.shtml
(For those interested)

Regards,
        Matt

I used to buy and restore GTO's in the late 70's, when I was an Auto
Mechanic, before becomming a Geek (thanks, US Navy :)  ).

My favorite was the last one I owned, the one I sold before joining the
Navy, and the one I WISH I could still have and never had sold.

A near mint-condition 1967 GTO in Aqua Blue with black interior.  A/C, Power
Windows, Hurst Dual-Gate... All the nice options.

It was also very rare in that it was one of the few (252 total, I've been
told) that had factory 4-piston Disc Brakes on the front.

I still dream about this car from time to time :)

-Larry

Wow Larry, good taste. The '67 is most definitely THE GTO in my opinion.
My first experience in a musclecar was in a '70 GTO convertible. The car
was gold with a black top and silver honeycomb mags. It was the fastest
car that I had ever ridden in (I was 14 at the time -- 1985.) From that
point on, I was a die hard muscle car nut. A friend of mine in high
school had a '69 Chevelle and he and I would swap cars on Saturday
nights (I drove an '85 RX7) just to get a different experience in each
other's cars. His car handled like a boat compared to mine but it was a
hell of a lot faster too. Good times... :-)

Todd

There were faster GTO's than the 67, but there were NO years that had the
clean, distinctive lines of the 67.  The 66 came close, but it didn't have
the clean tail-light panel that the 67 did.  The 67 simply looked great from
any angle you looked at it.

And you weren't stuck with the 2-speed PowerGlide Auto in 67.  That was
definetely a good thing.  Mine had the factory Turbo-400 Auto with the Hurst
Dual-Gate.  I did  managed to win some trophies at the Old Dominion Speedway
in ***ia with it :)  It was totally stock except for a free flowing
exhaust, a better fuel pump and a Holly double-pumper.  The latter two were
replaced out of necessity.  Even on a 1/8 mile track like Old Dominion
Speedway, I had a problem with the factory pump and QuadraJet running dry on
me before the finish line.

I didn't race it much.  Probably about 6 weekends, simply as a hobby thing.
I kept the car stock because I felt it was balanced good enough as is.  That
car had over 90,000 miles on it when I sold it, and you could never tell it.
It showed very little wear anywhere.

-Larry

Don't know what BHP I had in my tail though...

Ruud van Gaal
Free car sim  : http://www.marketgraph.nl/gallery/racer/
Pencil art    : http://www.marketgraph.nl/gallery/