What is your definition of 'muscle car'?

[joesregalproject]

My definition is as follows-

A mid-sized RWD American car with a full-size car motor, that is sold to the general public for a relatively low cost, and the base model was not designed with sports racing in mind.

I think it has to come with the motor from the factory to be defined as a muscle car. Otherwise, it's a "street rod". Therefore 80s A/G Bodys technically aren't muscle cars because they came with engines designed for mid size vehicles. As for the GNX, it was really too pricy to be considered a muscle car, and is more in the "sports car" category with the Corvette.

 

[pontiacgp]

The Mexican 84 Monte SS had a 350 with a stick 4 speed so that is the only "factory" G body muscle car I guess...

 

[lilbowtie]

The muscle car was an era (60's to the early 70's) when manufactures were cramming big HP engines into light cheap car bodies that were considered
factory hot rods - Why! because that's what the people wanted. There was a lot of factory sponsorship in racing at this time because they wanted to win races.
The saying "A win on Sunday sold cars on Monday" This lasted till the early 70's when the government mandated emission regulations and the fall began. The
oil embargo a few years later was the icing on the cake. People question a muscle car but I believe the insurance companies are the ones that tagged them
muscle cars - that was a way to charge outrageous rates for the HP they had. I had the pleasure of growing up in the 60's and wouldn't change that for anything.

Take some time and look this up - it's is a good read

THE CLASSIC MUSCLE CAR ERA A Thesis Presented (google it)

 

[pencero]

You have only had 1 beer after a hard day's work and you are just getting into an interesting conversation with a female patron when some guy won't stfu at the bar so you end up having to knock him out because suddenly his dirty hands are all up on your shirt. You really don't remember knocking him out until after you finish blacking out but you don't regret it because you can still smell his nasty breath hanging in the air. You tip your hat and apologize to the women at the bar and leave. They blush and say 'goodbye' in sexy voices mildly annoyed that you are making an early departure. After you leave they all tiptoe over to the window to hear you start up your car.
Three cops pull up sirens blazing but you're already pulling out of the lot. You take a left and dip into the backroads. It's on. That guy shaking on the bar floor was a wimp and will probably press charges. You've got places to be tomorrow. Screw that guy. How many people would show up to his funeral if he was dead anyway? You smash the accelerator down and struggle to maintain control over the uneven pavement - but never doubting the fact that you are definitely going to get away. Fifteen minutes later you're in the garage with your heart pounding trying to stifle your adrenaline with a beer. You suddenly realize your tongue is dipping into the beer because you are so alert you have accidentally finished the beer in under 10 seconds. Or maybe it was on purpose though. You grab another but your heart is still going 140 mph - which is still a bit slower than you were just going in the car a minute ago and the throttle was only about 3/4 of the way down.
You hear a helicopter flying somewhere in the distance but who cares. The bar didn't have cameras anyway and you've got work tomorrow. You hit the bed with complete confidence that you will most likely never hear about this incident again - but you flip on the tv and fire up an action movie because you are most definitely not going to sleep for at least an hour or two until the crash from the adrenaline rush. You turn the sound way down to only 3 bars because even the slightest noise seems to be amplified 100s of times. If a cat started taking a piss on the side of your house you would hear it. You wonder if you'll have enough gas, oil, and coolant in the car before work tomorrow. You don't worry about it too much because you keep a stash of all 3 on deck since this type of thing seems to happen all the time since people hate you because they could never hope to beat your car in a race. They are probably just jealous because they only time they seem to see you driving in town is as you are passing them. You're not sure why the car is so fast or why people hate you for owning it so much since if they worked half as hard as you do they would be able to go out and afford to buy one for themselves anyway. You can't recall changing a damn thing about the car except several tires spark plugs and filters.
You find yourself on the phone with a girl you recently started talking to but the adrenaline is doing the talking for you. After a ride like the one you just went on not even Vin Diesel can hold your attention for more than about 30 seconds at a time and you eventually forget that you were even vaguely interested in watching an action movie earlier as dialogue with your friend gets interesting. She can hear the excitement in your voice and wants to know more, but you're not even talking about that whole thing that just went down. You do however keep finding yourself having flashbacks to being in the car and ridiculous stunt driving that you just pulled off moments ago. You find yourself saying out loud "I feel kind of distracted talking on the phone. Why don't I just come over so we can finish the conversation in person?" She agrees immediately just as you were about to bite your tongue. You definitely don't regret saying it now.
As you awake to the beating rays of the morning sun you realize that not only did you drive to her house, but she got into the car and you both never made it inside. You wake her up, borrow a shirt you left the last time you were here, head to work, and remove a few hundred pounds worth of tools that were in the trunk the whole time.

Muscle car ^

Arguably they don't make these any more, and if they do less than 1% of cars qualify.

 

[pontiacgp]

You have only had 1 beer after a hard day's work and you are just getting into an interesting conversation with a female patron when some guy won't stfu at the bar so you end up having to knock him out because suddenly his dirty hands are all up on your shirt. You really don't remember knocking him out until after you finish blacking out but you don't regret it because you can still smell his nasty breath hanging in the air. You tip your hat and apologize to the women at the bar and leave. They blush and say 'goodbye' in sexy voices mildly annoyed that you are making an early departure. After you leave they all tiptoe over to the window to hear you start up your car.
Three cops pull up sirens blazing but you're already pulling out of the lot. You take a left and dip into the backroads. It's on. That guy shaking on the bar floor was a wimp and will probably press charges. You've got places to be tomorrow. Screw that guy. How many people would show up to his funeral if he was dead anyway? You smash the accelerator down and struggle to maintain control over the uneven pavement - but never doubting the fact that you are definitely going to get away. Fifteen minutes later you're in the garage with your heart pounding trying to stifle your adrenaline with a beer. You suddenly realize your tongue is dipping into the beer because you are so alert you have accidentally finished the beer in under 10 seconds. Or maybe it was on purpose though. You grab another but your heart is still going 140 mph - which is still a bit slower than you were just going in the car a minute ago and the throttle was only about 3/4 of the way down.
You hear a helicopter flying somewhere in the distance but who cares. The bar didn't have cameras anyway and you've got work tomorrow. You hit the bed with complete confidence that you will most likely never hear about this incident again - but you flip on the tv and fire up an action movie because you are most definitely not going to sleep for at least an hour or two until the crash from the adrenaline rush. You turn the sound way down to only 3 bars because even the slightest noise seems to be amplified 100s of times. If a cat started taking a piss on the side of your house you would hear it. You wonder if you'll have enough gas, oil, and coolant in the car before work tomorrow. You don't worry about it too much because you keep a stash of all 3 on deck since this type of thing seems to happen all the time since people hate you because they could never hope to beat your car in a race. They are probably just jealous because they only time they seem to see you driving in town is as you are passing them. You're not sure why the car is so fast or why people hate you for owning it so much since if they worked half as hard as you do they would be able to go out and afford to buy one for themselves anyway. You can't recall changing a damn thing about the car except several tires spark plugs and filters.
You find yourself on the phone with a girl you recently started talking to but the adrenaline is doing the talking for you. After a ride like the one you just went on not even Vin Diesel can hold your attention for more than about 30 seconds at a time and you eventually forget that you were even vaguely interested in watching an action movie earlier as dialogue with your friend gets interesting. She can hear the excitement in your voice and wants to know more, but you're not even talking about that whole thing that just went down. You do however keep finding yourself having flashbacks to being in the car and ridiculous stunt driving that you just pulled off moments ago. You find yourself saying out loud "I feel kind of distracted talking on the phone. Why don't I just come over so we can finish the conversation in person?" She agrees immediately just as you were about to bite your tongue. You definitely don't regret saying it now.
As you awake to the beating rays of the morning sun you realize that not only did you drive to her house, but she got into the car and you both never made it inside. You wake her up, borrow a shirt you left the last time you were here, head to work, and remove a few hundred pounds worth of tools that were in the trunk the whole time.

Muscle car ^

Arguably they don't make these any more, and if they do less than 1% of cars qualify.

did you borrow this from an very old penthouse magazine...

 

[Brother Al]

:lol: :lol: :lol:

 

[Clone TIE Pilot]

A midsize or large non luxury sedan or coupe meant to handle a overpowered engine and having a overpowered engine installed in it. G bodies are mid level, light duty, luxury coupes, some just have a little more powerful engines installed and turbo Buicks are early tuners. Only the GNX was retrofitted to properly handle alot of power stock unlike most G bodies.

I don't see G bodies not being called muscle cars as an insult or demeaning to our cars. IMHO, I think the term is overrated and leads to a elitist culture around those models of cars.

 

[Poncho61]

I view the term as outdated. Something made up in the early 60s to define a midsize car with more cubic inches than the car was originally offered with. Its a term that has stuck around. If I had to put MY definition on it as opposed to the original, Id say it is any model car equipped with a non standard higher output engine from the factory. Once a car left the factory, if you put the engine in, its a whole different definition despite it mimicing the exact combo the factory sold. At that point, you get to decide what term you like better. Hot Rod, Street Machine, etc. All of which imply that YOU or someone other than the factory modified the vehicle. Muscle car to me says factory. Thats just me tho. In my warped little world, I don't even consider the terms sports cars, pony cars, etc as defined by a body style and every one of those body styles is automatically one. A base 6 rustang or a low output V8 was a pony car in my book. A Shelby or GT, that had muscle. It became a muscle car to me. An OHC 6 Firebird. Pony. A 400 RA IV Firebird. Muscle. A 327 Vette, sports. A 427 Tripower Vette. Muscle.

I guess I view a lot of those "muscle cars" as factory offering where the engine overpowered the rest of the package. A 326 Tempest handled well, stopped OK and was a balanced offering for what its intended purpose was. A Ram Air GTO was fine for straight line acceleration. It sucked for cornering. It sucked for braking, as offered from the factory. It was muscle and nothing more.