I went to the NMCA finals in indy last fall. mopar put on a gen 3 hemi shoot out with a 10.00 index. I watched a bunch of challengers run 9.90's and these cars were drove in. makes me fell like some old guy working on flathead fords. for old muscle cars the game is over.
That's the exact message Mopar is sending:
"Sell all that old garbage...we don't sell hardly any parts for them anyway, and go drop 60 grand on our
latest awesome new plastic computerized thing."
It's really not over, it's just put into perspective and now there are more choices (as long as you have a giant pile of money to spend or are willing to go into debt).
The only limit being interest of people, and available funds of whoever works on this stuff in the future.
Does a person want a fun and relatively quick old hobby vehicle with character, authentic old musclecar vibe including a few of the primitive aspects,
or does a person want a touch screen, air conditioned, much more comfortable computerized thing that looks and feels like every other
modern vehicle and admittedly runs faster in many cases?
The old Buick GS Stage 1 didn't become obsolete when Grand Nationals started showing what they can do...."9 second driven to the track" is quite common with those....
The old GS was already obsolete well before that, and the cars still have a pretty strong following. There must be a reason why.
The car hobby is wrapped up with emotions...It's not just about the ET, it's about how you got there and how the thing makes you feel.
I drove the GTX to the strip recently, raced/tested and drove back home... and the number of people who just came up to talk, was pretty amazing.
My youngest boy asked "Where do you know all these people from?". I had to explain that's just normal, but moreso when you've got something
that isn't quite a cookie cutter...
I love the modern vehicles! I drive a 5.7 hemi equipped vehicle every day, and was involved with early Drag Pak sales and development.
But Heritage still counts for something. Even though Fiat has chosen to only trot it out when they can make a profit from it (can't blame them)
it runs a little bit deeper than they know.
