Mark Fletcher - 1970 Maximum Muscle: The Pinnacle of Muscle Car Power
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- Book:1970 Maximum Muscle: The Pinnacle of Muscle Car Power
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1970 Maximum Muscle: The Pinnacle of Muscle Car Power: summary, description and annotation
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In 1970, the American muscle car was as fast and outrageous as it would ever get. But the end was nigh, and 1970 Maximum Muscle dives head-first into the storm before the calm.
Wherever you mark the beginning of the muscle car era--Oldsmobiles 1949 Rocket 88, Chryslers 1951 FirePower engines, the 1964 Pontiac GTO--one thing is certain: in 1970, the era that had witnessed a parade of gloriously powerful, stylish, and brawny cars apt to make the hearts of even the most dispassionate squares go pitter-patter was sucking fumes. Gasoline shortages, skyrocketing fuel prices, insurance-industry bean counters, rising ecological concerns, and new, more fuel-efficient imports all conspired to consign the American muscle car to an ugly and unseemly denouement. Yet 1970 saw the actual zenith of the cars themselves, the year manufacturers pulled out all the stops and produced the most powerful and stunning machines the automotive world had ever seen.
1970 Maximum Muscle not only explores the factors that led to the decline of the most exciting era in the American automotive industry , it details some of the new models and model options that arguably made 1970 the climax of the muscle car era from engineering, styling, and cultural standpoints. As the war among GM, Ford, Chrysler, and AMC played out at dealerships, dragstrips, and drive-ins, ready-and-willing gearheads drove off dealer lots in potent behemoths like the Buick GSX, Oldsmobile 4-4-2, and Ford Torino Cobra. Muscle car stalwarts like the SS Chevelle, Pontiac GTO, and Plymouth Cuda became available with optional LS-6, Stage 1, and Hemi engines, respectively. Manufacturers ratcheted up the advertising hyperbole at the same time, offering performance packages with names like Six-Pack, Ram Air, and Cobra Jet, while spoilers, scoops, hood tachometers, and decal packages were de rigueur. Meanwhile, on the popular SCCA Trans Am circuit, top drivers campaigned more nimble muscle off-the-rack cars like the Camaro Z/28 and Boss 302 Mustang.
1970 Maximum Muscle is an entertaining and rollicking look at the muscle cars peak year!
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Muscle
The
Pinnacle of
Muscle Car
Power
Mark Fletcher & Richard Truesdell
1969
Prelude to Mayhem
1970
Muscle Climax
A s the 1960s roared to a close, rapid changes were happening in popular culture. As one example, music created specifically for youthlegendary artists such as Elvis, Chubby Checker (The Twist), the Beach Boys (I Get Around), and the Beatlesmorphed into more aggressive hardrock sounds from bands such as Led Zeppelin and, in Detroit, the Stooges and the politically charged MC5.
When the space race reached its zenith with Neil Armstrongs first dusty footsteps on the Moons surface on July 21, 1969, the Vietnam War and draft lottery still loomed over the heads of young Americans. Youth rioted in the streets to protest the governments sacrifice of Americans in a war they argued had no possible honorable outcome, but also in reaction to worsening race relations. To many, the Woodstock festival in August 1969 stands as the ultimate symbol of the periods reactionary antiestablishment, with its open displays of sex, drugs, and rock and roll. Arguably, however, the Rolling Stones own disastrous music festival, at Altamont Speedway in northern Californiaduring the final month of the decade, no lesswas the real embodiment of the zeitgeist.
The younger generation had always been on a different page than that of its parents, but the chasm was widening noticeably. It was not uncommon to see young folks dressed in robes holding signs declaring, The End Is Near, but the question was, The end of what? The war? Our youth? The world? It seemed society was accelerating, but in what direction?
Commander Neil Armstrong took this photo of Buzz Aldrin as the two Americans walked on the Moon July 20th, 1969 fulfilling Kennedys challenge to accomplish the task by the end of the decade.
The fast-paced decade of the 1960s saw a rise in American civil unrest.
The 1964 Pontiac GTO is considered by many to be the first muscle car. The large-displacement 389-cubic-inch engine that was traditionally found in full-size cars was first offered in a midsize sedan and created a unique power-to-weight ratio advantage. This is the actual car tested by Car and Drivers infamous March 1964 issue when it was compared to a Ferrari GTO.
In Detroit, societys acceleration was paralleled by automotive engineers and their steady development of horsepower. What had started in the late 1950s as a war of chrome and fins had, by the late 1960s, escalated into a horsepower battle among the four domestic manufacturers. The 1957 full-size Chevrolet had been advertised with a sensational 1 horsepower per cubic inch. Although that meant the 283-cubic-inch V-8 with fuel injection produced an impressive 283 horsepower, it had to move around 3,283 pounds of iron and fell short of what would later be considered a benchmark: 10 pounds per horsepower. (The classic definition of what would later be considered a muscle car was the biggest engine possible installed in the engine bay of an intermediate- or smaller-sized car as best exemplified by Pontiacs 1964 Tempest GTO: a 3,106-pound car with 325 advertised horsepower, just under the magical 10 pounds per horsepower benchmark.)
Other GM divisions, as well as Chrysler and Ford, responded. And with the April 1964 introduction of the Mustang, it was just a matter of timeuntil 1967, to be exactbefore big-block engines would find their way under the hoods of what were essentially compact cars.
This books genesis was a discussion among a group of enthusiasts about what the ultimate muscle-car collection should include. The compiled list almost exclusively comprised cars manufactured during an eighteen-month period: most automotive aficionados will agree the best of the best were built from midyear 1969 to the final days of the 1970 model year.
You could accurately argue that rarer cars were built both before and after this brief timeframe, but history shows that the period saw the release of a frenzy of marketing specials and formidable street warriors while the situation was still favorable for sales.
Why did Detroit release so many midyear 1969 cars and then one-up themselves with the ultimate high-performance cars released for the strike-shortened 1970 model year? The origins of this vast assortment of power were also a large reason for its quick demise. Two significant factors developing completely separately of each other would combine in the fatal blow to the muscle car market.
The term smog was commonly used in California in the 1940s to describe a combination of smoke from industries and naturally occurring fog. By midcentury, smog was a daily occurrence in Los Angeles and was even occasionally mistaken for enemy gas attacks during World War II. By the early 1950s it was clear that the emissions from transportation sources were the leading culprits in the growing smog problem, not just in the greater Los Angeles area but in most major cities. The frequency and intensity of the smog prodded municipalities to form the South Coast Air Quality Management District in 1953, directed toward manufacturing emissions and the regions growing numbers of automobiles.
By 1959 the counties were having difficulty regulating air quality, and the state legislature developed the California Motor Vehicle Pollution Control Board (CMVPCB), giving it the authority to test and certify emission-control systems. One of the first requirements it established resulted in the addition of closed-crankcase ventilation systems. The positive crankcase ventilation (PCV) valve was ordered added to all new automobiles sold in California beginning in 1963. Manufacturers easily converted new models to this system, and the first emission-control devices were included with all new cars sold in North America.
According to Caltech professor Arie Haagen-Smit, who analyzed the composition of smog, one-third of airborne contaminates were created by automobiles in the form of hydrocarbons or unburnt gas. It wasnt long until the California board was asking for more stringent controls. In 1960 University of California Los Angeles engineers Richard Kopa and Hiroshi Kimura tested the first automotive catalytic converter device that cut nitrogen oxide tailpipe emissions by 50 percent. They tested it on a 1959 Ford wagon driven in and around the greater Los Angeles area a full fifteen years before catalytic converters would become standard equipment on all new US cars.
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