80's car scene VS today's?

[Mikej89]

Hey guys, this is something I think about from time to time and thought it would be an interesting thing to discuss... I wish I experienced the 80's for several reasons but one of the biggest is the car scene, particularly for low/regular income individuals. Back then, I could have owned basically any muscle car I could find for 1-3 grand. Makes me sick to even think about it!

Since this is a G-body site, I'll stick with GM cars for my examples... Nowadays what's the fastest stock GM car you can get for 5 or 6 grand? LS1 Camaro or Firebird for sure. It's a fast, fun car but anyone with a newer LS3 Camaro or Corvette will beat you. You'd have to spend thousands on bolt-ons just to keep up with a stock LS3. Even faster than that is a LS7 car or an LS9 car with 550-600+ horsepower. So what's the trend here? Whoever has the most money and/or newest cars wins. It takes away from the cool factor of hot rodding for regular guys.

Lets rewind 30 years to 1984... What's the fastest GM car you could get for a few grand tops? If it were me, I'd try and find a '70 Olds 442 with a 455 of course. :wink: In 1984 all stock cars had plenty of power for their intended purpose but the average new car had 80-140hp. A '70 442 will run a 1/4 mile in 14.4@96mph when tested new with 1969 tires. So back then if I saved a little money, I could have been a lower income guy working at an auto shop and owned a car quicker than 90% of new cars with obsolete tires. With modern performance radials that same car would probably be in the 13.9@100mph range and quicker than 95% of new vehicles. You could beat most rich guys with new performance cars in a drag race. Basically the only new cars that could give you a run for your money in a street light war would be extremely high end super-exotics like a Porsche 911 Turbo, Ferrari Testarossa, Lamborghini Countach, De Tomaso Pantera, etc. A new Corvette, Camaro 305 HO, or Mustang 5.0 would be dead meat. With some basic performance upgrades like aluminum intake, headers, exhaust, mild cam, and traction bars you've got a 12 sec monster.

In the 80s you could even have a more ordinary smog era V8 car like a '74 Nova 350 4bbl and be quicker than 75% of new cars on the road

 

[axisg]

LOL you make me feel old !!

Being poor and wanting to go fast in the 80's ( having lived them ) the "hot ticket" was a SBC ( mostly high revving 327 or 350 if you could find one ) with the holy grail double hump heads and if you made 300hp you were doing fantastic. For a couple grand you would pick up a Disco Era Camaro, Monza, Vega, Nova, Gbody, ect and find a pre-smog motor to put in it. Even back then the 442 / SS / GS ect.. 2 door cars were getting good money and if they were cheap they'd be really beat up for the most part. If you wanted to go fast for cheap you had to learn to swing a motor. The A/B Body cars were still cheap esp the 4 doors & wagons. They were big, heavy, mostly rusty, and the brakes sucked but they made great donor cars for their drivetrain. You would be looking for a car optioned out with a 350/327 with double hump heads. Or switch over to BBC, Caddilac, Olds and Buick 455 motors. They were always a great source for finding more power instead of building / buying new. Most of the Olds / Buick / BBC came with a TH400. Rattle Can rebuild, add steep gears and maybe switch to a 4 speed and you would have great fun on the street for cheap

However the imports / small car scene were starting to make their mark as well. A friends 2.2 Turbo Rampage would stomp most of the cars around ( wrecked GLH transplant ) running mid 14's in the 1/4 and a blast to drive. The Mitsu Colt Turbo was not much slower. The "benchmark" 80's vette would run low 14's and the Camaro of the era would run low 15's and the Gbody high 15's. Even the mighty Countach and Ferrari of the Era were high 13 sec cars just for comparison. Otherwise your regular DD being sold " in the day" would be a 17- 20 sec 1/4 mi car. It was a pretty slow and un-inspiring times to be a gearhead wanting to go fast.

 

[86 Grand prix]

Don't get me started. I could have bought a 1969 RS/SS 396 four speed Camaro years back at a local car show. Yellow with black SS striping. It looked new inside and out. $4500.00. Couldn't talk myself into it. What is that worth now? That was the in the 90'S. Never mind all of the muscle that I could buy in the 70'S and 80's cheap.

 

[Clone TIE Pilot]

I agree with you MikeJ, in some ways it was better back in the 80s. These days they rasied the bar of performance, but also rasied the price far above what most gear heads can spend. You see these magazine builds for old cars that cost as much as just buying a new car. LS swaps cost 5K for a pretty basic conversion, then this and that also needs to be upgraded too and it just ads up.

What I really dislike is how the gearheah market, GM, car mags, aftermarket, etc are pushing that older generation powertrains are so called junk and need to be replaced with LS swaps for your old car too be cool.

 

[pencero]

old chargers and challengers are about to become worthless. 1-3 grand should net you a bunch of junk parts to assemble and have you up and running for under 5-6 grand. Personally, I don't even look at the newer GM stuff and I wish I couldve been around to enjoy the older stuff in the 80s too but we've got to play the field how it lies. I don't like Chrysler, but if I was trying to build a cheap hotrod for 5-6 today it's the route I would go. Imagine stuffing an old 5.9 in what was supposed to be the v6 Challenger and completing the bodywork. Probably not as fast as an LS but definitely close to it!

 

[Bonnewagon]

Hmmmm...in the 80's I had a '68 Firebird with a 400 and four speed stick, 4 wheel disc brakes, lots of suspension work, primered, loud, fast. I'm pretty sure it could still run with the new cars, but I'd have to call it a Rat Rod. Oh yes, I was way ahead of my time!

 

[Kansas Bu Wagon]

You older guys should be glad you were around to see first gen camaro's and fire birds, chevelles,cutlass 442's, novas and all the other badass cars of that era.

All I get are slammed and cambered Hondas and mustangs. Cool newer gm muscle cars seem way out numbered compared to the others.

 

[Clone TIE Pilot]

You older guys should be glad you were around to see first gen camaro's and fire birds, chevelles,cutlass 442's, novas and all the other badass cars of that era.

All I get are slammed and cambered Hondas and mustangs. Cool newer gm muscle cars seem way out numbered compared to the others.

Mainly because they are priced for higher income brackets than their older generation versions were. About the only way to buy a V8 car without going into large debt is to buy a outdated V8 car. The other thing is back then sports cars didn't become outdated so fast like in recent years.

 

[lilbowtie]

Rewind another 20 years - what you really wanted was to live was the 60's. Performance competition has been there since day one. It wasn't until the auto industry found it could make money selling factory hot rods and people were buying. The 60's were fast and wild. The insurance companies started the demise with the high insurance rates for muscle cars followed by government regulations on emissions. Gas prices in the 60's were in the $0.30/gal range. The 70's saw emissions, gas rising, oil embargo's, and war which was the beginning of the end for muscle cars. Another thing to remember is the income of people then - I hired into GM fresh out of college in 1968 @ $600/mo. so that $3000 was a lot of money.

 

[Clone TIE Pilot]

Rewind another 20 years - what you really wanted was to live was the 60's. Performance competition has been there since day one. It wasn't until the auto industry found it could make money selling factory hot rods and people were buying. The 60's were fast and wild. The insurance companies started the demise with the high insurance rates for muscle cars followed by government regulations on emissions. Gas prices in the 60's were in the $0.30/gal range. The 70's saw emissions, gas rising, oil embargo's, and war which was the beginning of the end for muscle cars. Another thing to remember is the income of people then - I hired into GM fresh out of college in 1968 @ $600/mo. so that $3000 was a lot of money.

True, the wage gap in modern times is much greater than it was back then.

But what I hate is the modern car scene is all about pushing expensive LS swap conversions and poo pooing anything else.