You Can't Make This Stuff Up!

[Lee Stewart]

Before mercury, brandy was used to fill thermometers.

[Lee Stewart]

[Lee Stewart]

Oops! Wrong front grille. Should be Silver, not Black.

[Lee Stewart]

The United States Coast Guard (USCG) is the coastal defense, search & rescue, and maritime law enforcement branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the country's seven uniformed services. The Coast Guard is a maritime, military, multi-mission service unique among the U.S. military branches for having a maritime law enforcement mission (with jurisdiction in both domestic and international waters) and a federal regulatory agency mission as part of its mission set. It operates under the U.S. Department of Homeland Security during peacetime, and can be transferred to the U.S. Department of the Navy by the U.S. President at any time, or by the U.S. Congress during times of war. This has happened twice: in 1917, during World War I, and in 1941, during World War II.

[Lee Stewart]

[Lee Stewart]

[Lee Stewart]

[x44d80]

Originally Posted by Lee Stewart

Oops! Wrong front grille. Should be Silver, not Black.

Shouldn't the rockers be blacked out, the drip rails have chrome and the emergency brake cable attached to the lower shock mount plate?

[Lee Stewart]

Carroll Shelby was a true maverick. A man who could see the future and take advantage of that foresight. He was steadfast in what he wanted for his cars . . . unfortunately sometimes he became an obstacle in what he wanted versus what could be built. The 1967 GT 350 and GT 500 are perfect examples of this.



His front grille design included twin 7 inch "driving lights" AKA Hi-Beam Lights. He did no research into this design - he just liked it. Unfortunately it created a number of problems: First, not all states accepted this lighting design. Those that did not would not allow a Shelby GT to be registered. Second, the 1967 GTs were the first to be offered with factory A/C. By placing the lights in the middle of the grille, needed cooling air was blocked and cars easily overheated, especially the GT 500s.



So a second front grille design was used for those states with the lights placement issue and to retrofit those cars having overheating issues along with GT 500s with A/C



In his advertising, Shelby stressed not only performance but safe performance. His two callouts were the "competition approved overhead safety bar" and "eye level turn indicator and brake lights" . . . the famous "scoop lights."

The 1967 Shelby GTs were way behind schedule and way over budget. One of the real issues were all the fiberglass parts which made up a good portion of the 1967 Shelby GTs. The problem (which is very common to fiberglass parts being married up to metal parts) they didn't fit right and required a lot of hand massaging which was costly in time.

Ford sent one of their VPs to Shelby's LA airport offices to get the 1967 GTs back on track. When he arrived he saw the scoop lights. When asked to describe how they worked the VP looked at Shelby and demanded "who told you you could do that?" Shelby replied "no one. I thought of the idea myself." The VP then explained to Shelby that the lights he thought of were illegal in all 50 states. "Only emergency vehicles are allowed to have those kind of lights." So immediately, all those GTs that had the lights (approx. 200) would have to be modified so that they became "parking lights" - they came on when the lights were activated and were shut off when the lights were deactivated.

The 1967 Shelby GTs were taken out of Shelby's hands with Ford moving production to A O Smith in October of 1966 who quickly fixed the fiberglass parts issue. Then Ford terminated his LA airport facility in May of 1967.

[Lee Stewart]

Hertz has been putting their rental customers into hot performance cars since the 1960s, thanks to partnerships with Shelby. Their latest pairing will put 24 custom Camaro Zl1s and 200 tuned SS models into the company’s rental fleet, and into the hands of the vacationing and business-tripping alike.

The latest Hertz pairing is with Hendrick Motorsports, the team behind the #24 Camaro ZL1 sponsored by Hertz and driven by William Byron in the NASCAR Cup Series. To help celebrate the Hendrick/Hertz partnership, 24 Hertz-Hendrick Motorsports Camaro ZL1s will get Callaway supercharger upgrades and a smattering of adornment,s including sill plates, embroidered headrests, badging, and wheels, to set the 750-horsepower Camaros apart. Of course, they’ll also wear the signature black and yellow Hertz paint.

In addition to the ZL1s, the same cosmetic treatment will be applied to SS Camaros with the naturally-aspirated LT1 V-8, this time treated to Chevrolet Performance cold air intake and cat-back exhaust to up the output to 480 horsepower. There will be 200 Hertz-Hendrick Motorsports Camaro SS models distributed in major cities throughout the southern half of the country.

If you’re interested in driving one of the limited-edition Camaros, head to one of the sunny locations that will stock the V-8 pony cars starting this fall: Los Angeles, San Diego, Las Vegas, Phoenix, Dallas, Houston, Atlanta, Tampa, or Miami. If you prefer to pair your Camaro experience with chowder-filled sourdough bread bowls or live music, you can also find them in San Francisco and Nashville. Only some of those locations will stock the more limited ZL1, so check with Hertz if you’d like to claim a spot behind the wheel.