SEMA Car Show - Our Favorite Muscle Car Engines Feast your eyes on a little on cubes 4.6L DOHC Ford modular motor that's long on horsepower. The valve covers read "720 HP". What looks like a Kenne Bell supercharger rests on top of another super clean, not-a-wire-outa-place layout that totally makes the engine bay for me. That's the detail you'll find at the SEMA Las Vegas Car Show. Outside the convention halls, I spotted this slick custom Mustang Fastback. Maybe some can say if it's a 1967 or 1968 Mustang. It's got the 68 side scoops, but doesn't have the side marker lights of 68. I could see those shaved off for this car, but I'd also say the 67 side scoops aren't as attractive as the 68's. So in the best of both worlds custom car scenario, let's call this a 1967.5 Mustang Fastback! I'd like to tell you more about this car, but unlike most cars at the SEMA show, there was no show card and I didn't notice any sponsor stickers. Clean execution all the way! (too clean?)  Too busy trying to get the best coverage...

SEMA Car Show - Our Favorite Engines This is the kind of engine that stops you in your tracks at SEMA. Among all the great rides making the SEMA car show, standing out is tough, so hats off to the "Be Cool" Bomber project 1972 Chevelle. From their show card, this is an LS1 motor punched to 388 cubic inches and built by Terry Rosebush Performance for owner Kiet Pham. Pictured right up front you'll see the ProCharger blower force feeding the custom made Hilborn fuel injection setup. It's said, "Injection is nice but I'd rather be blown."  Why not have both?! Next two photos courtesy of the Be Cool Chevelle Facebook Page The beautiful Genevieve Chappell So this is how it started. Hilborn supplied the fuel injection setup, but from there, it was all custom. The guys from the facebook page said, "The mandrel bender will be hot on Monday!" No sweat! Eight tubes all merged to one inlet, then moving backwards, you'll go through the throttle body, to the intercooler, around to the ProCharger blower and to the air cleaner. All that fits neatly under the hood....

SEMA Car Show - Our Favorite Muscle Car Engines Steve Strope from Pure Vision built this subtle but nasty 1969 Mustang Fastback with a Boss 502 stretched to 521 cubes and a mind blowing 805 ponies on pump gas. The motor is an all aluminum Boss 9 built by Jon Kaase Racing Engines. Kaase took the original Boss 429 head design and improved on it. Bolt it to a Ford 460 and have some fun! Couple the unmistakable Ford Boss looks with the ultra-clean under hood layout that's sitting completely under the Mustang's hood and it's no wonder it's a favorite engine at MyRideisMe.com. Learn more about the Boss 9 head design from the Kaase "Boss 9" page. Built for Anvil, makers of Camaro and Mustang carbon fiber body panels, this new Boss Mustang Fastback should be as fast as it is beautiful. Congratulations to the Pure Vision Crew and Anvil on a great new ride! The crew at Pure Vision did a great job documenting the build of the Anvil Mustang.  I'll start with the video of the the engine, then step back to the intro of the...

SEMA is over and that means its time for racing! I'm out at Spring Mountain Motorsports Ranch in Pahrump, NV and there are fifty amazing vehicles competing! The competition began before this morning though - it started yesterday evening as SEMA convention saw its close. At that time all available vehicles met up and left the convention center to head down the strip. I was lucky enough to grab shotgun in a 2009 Mercedes C63 AMG. If you think Mercedes are no big deal in the race world, think again. This car tore up the road!! I've never had so much fun in Vegas! More details on the road rally portion of the race later... but this picture is just one of the many adventures we got that Mercedes into last night. Out here on the road course and motocross are all sorts of cars! From classic style hot rods, to muscle cars, to modern stuff - it's all here! I've got to get back to the racing... so much excitement and they haven't even began the 0-60-0 brake challenge! You think that Mercedes has a chance of...

SEMA Automotive Conference 2010 in Las Vegas Racing & Performance, Hot Rod Alley, Restoration Marketplace, Tools & Equipment... These are just a few of my favorite sections of the 2010 SEMA show in Las Vegas. What's a girl to do in a sea of very cool car stuff??? What every guy does of course - run around like its Christmas morning! So while I finish hitting the pavement on the showroom floor to bring ya'll more info on some very cool stuff, I wanted to at least show you a few of the reasons why people get so excited about SEMA. First of all, there's some very fun things going on in displays. I'll never tire seeing an engine put together or taken apart. Especially when that engine is a Corvette LS7 engine as seen in the top picture - as is being demonstrated all week in the Chevy booth. Ya think if I hang around enough they'll let me turn a wrench?!? Speaking of turning wrenches, the high schoolers in the Hot Rodders of Tomorrow Engine Challenge National Championship are getting an arm up on wrenching experience. These...

SEMA Car Show - Custom Cars that Rocked Las Vegas Troy Ladd from Hollywood Hot Rods showed strong up in the massive Ford display at SEMA. Ford has the best booth in the central hall overlooking the rest of Hot Rod Alley every year and always has great, new and old. That must be why they featured the vintage 427 SOHC motor in this Brookville bodied 32 Roadster Pickup. Fooled you too! That's not a cammer motor, that's Ford racing's 5.0L "Coyote" motor dressed up and cleaned up to look like my favorite vintage powerplant. Troy's a wizard at having the cleanest engines showing only minimal signs of the high-tech equipment on board. It's no show piece either! Look for more pictures of this Raybestos roadster at the Optima Ultimate Street Car Invitational. Straying as far away from the hot rod above as we can, dig this custom Lexus. What's old is new and there's no mistaking the hot rod or kustom car influence on this suede painted Lexus. Also note the ground scrapping airride assisted stance and the door handles shaved for the back doors, but not the...

1969 Mustang - The Ultimate Street, Drift, Track Car Our friends at Speedhunters.com just released the first photo of the finished 1969 Mustang RTR-X!  It is debuting or just debuted at SEMA 2010 an hour or so ago.  Much info has been shared about the design process that Team Need For Speed at EA Games on Speedhunters.com. Check out Build Progress and pictures. The quick rundown of this ride can be found in the Drifting + Pro-Touring story here.  Thank you Vaughn Gittin Jr (2010 Formula Drift Champion) and Andy Blackmore (Speedhunters.com graphic artist) for dreaming up this...

2010 SEMA Car Show - Las Vegas, Nevada It's that time of year again. SEMA. If you're reading this, you already know SEMA's the place where every car-ANYTHING meets once per year to show off what's new, what's hot and what new rides will set the trends for 2011. For fellow gear heads, could that get any better? Well yea! It's in Las Vegas, Nevada! The SEMA website says, "the SEMA Show attracts more than 100,000 industry leaders from more than 100 countries for unlimited profit opportunities in the automotive, truck and SUV, and RV markets." If you dig cars of any kind: old school hot rods, chrome and billet street rods, twin turbo tuners, 100 point restored muscle cars or trucks lifted to the sky or slammed on the ground... SEMA is your car show! The only trouble is, it's not open to the public. That's why you'll have to come back to MyRideisMe.com for our coverage. Here one of our faves from SEMA 2009. What will the Ring Brother show at SEMA 2010? MyRideisMe.com will try to cover all of SEMA, but it's almost too big to show it...

From SEMA Car Show to the Race Track SEMA is starting and I can hardly wait for all the fun! Since most of you can’t make it to Vegas for the biggest aftermarket automotive event of the year, you can rely on catching all the coverage here at MyRideisMe.com! Not only will you see some of the baddest cars, new products and tools from the showroom floor… at the end of the week we'll serve up an extra treat of street racing – the Optima Batteries Street Car Invitational. The spirit of the OPTIMA Invitational is unite the performance automotive aftermarket industry while exhibiting the true potential of the vehicles showcased at SEMA, proving they are built for speed and performance, not just for looking good on the show floor. Last year, there were 51 cars competing for the title of "Ultimate Street Car" out at the Spring Mountain Motorsports Ranch in Pahrump, NV. Everything from a 1927 Tucci Roadster, 1966 Cobra, 1969 Camaro, and even a modern Bentley were seen on the course! This year will be no different. All 50 racing entries must be street legal cars. Some...

Drag Racing Legends Maybe before cats and dogs started their bitter rivalry, there was Snake vs Mongoose. I'm not talking about Rikki-Tikki-Tavi, I mean two of the best known drag racers ever to lay it all on the starting line: Don Prudhomme and Tom McEwen. Back before corporate sponsorship made some racers professionals, drag racers were innovators and possibly daredevils who no doubt, did it for love and a heaping dose of quarter mile glory. Why else would Snake and Mongoose travel the country for "grudge matches" that paid not much more than gas and beer money? It wasn't until McEwen convinced Mattel (the first non-automotive drag racing sponsor) that "Wildlife Racing" and this "bitter" rivalry (actually between friends) would sell scores of Hot Wheels that drag racing became both lucrative and a common household discussion. But that's just part of the story!  Head down to the Peterson Automotive Museum for their NHRA: Sixty Years of Thunder where Don "The Snake" Prudhomme will be joined by Tom "The Mongoose" McEwen, Roland Leong (Hawaiian funny car fame), "TV" Tommy Ivo (Actor and racer of some nasty multi-engined hot rods), Carroll...

Kustom D'Elegance Winner at 2010 Motorama Custom Car Show If you're into customs, then the Long Beach Motorama is not to be missed! Although there are plenty of beautiful cars (like the ones I featured in my Motorama - First Look article) the highlight of the show is the Kustom D'Elegance award. Each of the dozen-plus contenders impressed in their own way... just being in the room sets these cars apart from the pack. However, just one could win the $20,000 cash prize along with a place on the perpetual trophy! As soon as you walk on into the Long Beach Arena, the red carpet leads you on past each of the skillful and innovative kustoms. Each one was fantastic... This roof- hammered 1959 Cadillac came all the way from Australia and was, I'm sure, one of the most customized cars present. Gene Winfield's old 1935 Ford Pickup shop truck , which had disappeared in 1965, was found in 2008 and resurrected to beautiful completion by Hatfield Restorations. This 1936 Auburn Roadster had some nice appeal. Voodoo Larry's newly completed 1946 Ford was in the running also. Those of you who...

Hot Rods and Customs With a Twist of Strange I took the opportunity to sit down for a while with Tim Strange of Strange Motion Rod & Custom Construction, and threw the book at him, question-wise. I've been a fan of his for years and have enjoyed the good fortune of not only creating design work for him at Problem Child Kustoms Studio, but also becoming fast friends. Tim's created some of the most memorable cars in recent history and has won a number of accolades, including the Goodguys Trendsetter, numerous ISCA and KKOA top finishes and best in class picks, not to mention hundreds of magazine features. Tim's no doubt one of the elite hot rod and custom car builders out there and is a down-to-Earth, talented guy who "gets it"... It not the sort of career where you take everything seriously. You need to be able to laugh at the goofy stuff, and make the most of every situation, and Tim is definitely able to do both, and with a style that's unmatched. To understand Tim's secrets and have a little fun, we sat down to discuss...