Magnaflow NationalsMagnaFlow Performance Exhaust recently threw open its doors for its "MagnaFlow Nationals," a semiannual, one-day event that includes manufacturers seminars, plant tours, aftermarket equipment custom vehicle installations, dyno tests, celebrity autograph signings, and a car show.
Guest celebrities included Mario Andretti, Ivan "Iron Man" Stewart, off-road great Rod Millen as well as Chip Foose, who displayed his custom late-model Thunderbird while promoting his own TV show, "Overhaulin'." MagnaFlow's "Redline TV" was also filming Mario Andretti and other industry greats for an upcoming segment of their show.
Inside MagnaFlow's huge Tech Center, a series of demonstrations were taking place, including the testing of a 387hp Panoz Escalante GT-S race car, a 391hp Honda Del Sol, a 372hp Z06 Corvette, and finally, a 241hp MagnaFlow-equipped Chevrolet SSR. While all of this was going on, spectators and participants were able to check out over 184 custom musclecars, trucks, hot rods, imports, 4x4s and monster trucks, plus other assorted four-wheel exotica. For more on the show as well as Magnaflow products, check their Web site at www.magnaflow.com.
Cobra Replica Gets Pikes Peak RecordJim Pettengill reports that when Randy Schranz takes his Shell Valley Cobra replica to the track, it's not for a lapping day or runs through the quarter-mile. His track is the highway to the summit of the 14,110-foot Pikes Peak, and the event is the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb, the most famous hill climb in the world.
Following in the tracks of the legendary Ak Miller, who dominated the Peak's sports car division in the 1960s driving a Cobra and a Devin-Ford, Schranz set a new record in the exhibition division this year. Despite a wet, tacky course and the threat of a violent rain and snowstorm, his run of roughly 12 and a half minutes (12:32.28) was the fastest run ever for a propane-fueled vehicle. Randy's roadster is powered by a 500hp, 350ci aluminum-block Chevy running on the clean-burning alternative fuel that was pioneered on the Peak by Ak Miller. Miller would certainly be proud of Randy's accomplishment.
Rhode Island & Missouri Enact Custom Vehicle Registration BillCar hobbyists and related businesses scored a major victory when SEMA (Specialty Equipment Manufacturing Association) model legislation helped create titling and registration classes for certain custom vehicles passed into law in Rhode Island and Missouri. A similar bill was previously enacted in Illinois in 2002, and the new law provides for special license plates and exempts certain cars from periodic inspections and emissions tests. It also allows for the use of non-original materials and creates titling criteria that assign these vehicles the same model-year designation as the production vehicle it most closely resembles.
Both the Rhode Island and Missouri laws stipulate that vehicles titled and registered as custom vehicles may only be used for occasional transportation, exhibitions, club activities, parades, tours, so on, and not for general daily transportation. Street-modified vehicles are, by definition, at least 25 years old but manufactured after 1948 or vehicles built to resemble one from that era. The Missouri measure also provides for a 26-year rolling-emissions-test exemption that replaces the current law that only exempts vehicles manufactured prior to the 1971 model year.