The Muscle Car Holocaust of '73 - How Emissions Controls Nearly Killed the Muscle Car.

It’s 1972 and vehicle emission laws are getting tighter and tighter every year, manufacturers can’t make powerful cars anymore. The dark ages are coming, and muscle cars are taking a huge hit. Sales dropping, fuel prices rising and cars are becoming less and less convenient. What will America do? What will happen to the pony car scene that was only becoming better and better?

The muscle car scene was great before this. Big motors, big luxury and big performance, everything’s going great, The most powerful cars on the scene had up to 400HP, but that number dropped fast in the early seventies. Why could that be? Emissions.

The catalytic converter had arrived and leaded fuel had left. Sports cars could not meet minimum requirements and less fuel usage was the only choice, Cadillac’s 350 hp v8 was only making half of that in the seventies, and the Muscle car was watered down and were very sluggish.

The sportiest thing on the market was a pinto with a different badge, Any guesses? the “Mustang” II a 120 hp 4 cylinder was standard. Yay. Fans hated the car and petrolheads were crying. No fuel. No power. No fun. Then things got worse; there was an oil crisis.

A loophole in the law made a pickup truck the fastest thing you could buy. (Smokestacks came standard with a mad paintjob) Dodge had the title for the fastest automobile all thanks to a mistake by CT’s favorite people, the EPA.

It was the Dodge L’il Red Express, a pickup truck with no cats or restrictions and 225 hp and tons of torque from a tuned police car engine and the body and chassis from the Dodge Warlock - quite a name!
The truck was made until 1979.

It’s the eighties, and the U.S had found a solution: 4 cylinder turbo engines. The challenger had become a front-wheel drive, 4 cylinder coupe and sales dropped.

Hp number rose, engines got a bit bigger and the V8 made a comeback, it was 1990 and muscle cars came back! The Mustang came with a V6 or V8, Shelby made a crazy cool Foxbody Cobra and then a new mustang came out, dropping the 4-pot.

So, now you know the tough times muscle cars have had, and next time you see a Camaro or a Charger, Remember that they could’ve not been there if the Manufacturers gave up, but look what perseverance can bring, and remember - Perseverance can look pointless, but can be rewarding at the end.