From a time when General Motors ruled the world: This newsreel presents the fabulous 1954 GM Motorama at the Waldorf Astoria in New York. 

​ There really are no modern parallels to the annual GM Motorama spectaculars of the American mid-century. As we’ve often referenced here at Mac’s Motor City Garage, the Motoramas were elaborate multimedia extravaganzas that used theater, music, even interpretive dance to present the corporation’s advanced products, from the latest Cadillac dream cars to the kitchens of tomorrow.

More than 1.9 million visitors took in the show in the 1954 season, which opened on January 26 at the Waldorf Astoria in New York. In this two-minute newsreel on the ’54 show, we see a number of Motorama dream cars that would soon become famous, including:

+   The Chevrolet Nomad, which showcased the division’s sports wagon concept, on a Corvette theme in its original form.

+   The Buick Wildcat II, a radical sports roadster that still exists today at the Sloan Museum in Flint, Michigan.

+   The Cadillac El Camino, a close-coupled coupe that introduced GM customers to the El Camino name, later used on a series of Chevy passenger car-based pickups.

+   The turbine-powered GM Firebird I, which even six decades later looks more like a jet fighter than an automobile.

+   The Pontiac Bonneville, the Pontiac division’s take on the two-seat sports car category as exemplified by the Chevrolet Corvette.

See all these wonders and more in the video below.

I have to thank BangShift tipster Tony Hoffer for the lead on this amazing video of what is probably the craziest automotive engine ever actually running. This is an Adams-Farwell rotating cylinder engine. Produced for about 10 years starting in the early 1900s, the engines were powerful, efficient, and actually pretty brilliant. The company was gonzo by 1913 and there is only one functioning Adams-Farwell car left on Earth. Thankfully that car is in good care and this video is proof of that. Displacing 490ci and made up of five cylinders, we’re pretty sure this thing was rated at either 50 or 75hp. The performance of Adams-Farwell cars was as good or superior than anything else on the market back in those days. Like today though, it was a tough sell to take an idea as wild as this one and make a go of it.
As you will see in the video below, the crank is solid mounted to the frame and the engine spins around it. It seems like the whole thing would be impossible but when you see it working, the engine is almost beyond words in tis cool factor. The Adams-Farwell slogan to describe the engine was, “It spins like a top!” The man in the video does a far better job explaining the car than we ever could and we’re going to let him do it.
Along with all of the other stuff happening in the early 1900s, the range of options for people (who had the money) in the automotive world was completely insane. From engines that spun around their cranks to cars with toilets installed in them, the sky was the limit during this time in motoring life. Yes, these were basically hay wagons with engines in them but we’re sure glad that this single car survived all these years and can still fire up and show us all how wild those days really were.
PRESS PLAY BELOW TO SEE THE AMAZING ADAMS-FARWELL ROTATING CYLINDER ENGINE RUNNING

Photos courtesy The Henry Ford.
One of Henry Ford’s odder inventions—and one that certainly challenges the notion he only ever wanted to build Model Ts into perpetuity—will get its moment in the spotlight next year as the subject of a talk in the Gilmore Museum lecture series, which for 2018 will include more automotive topics than in years past.
Ford’s interests in the X-shape engine, which essentially uses two 90-degree V-4s turned on their side and mated on a common crankshaft, dated to about 1920, when he filed for his first patent on the design, noting its compactness, relatively high power-to-weight ratio, and suitability for air-cooling as its advantages. Indeed, according to The Henry Ford’s page on the X-8 in its collections, pictured above, it measures just 17-inches wide, 17-inches tall, and 14-inches deep.
The L-head example above, however, is far from the only X-8 engine configuration Ford experimented with. As pointed out in a 1973 Special Interest Autos article, it was one of seven experimental X-8 engines—and 58 experimental engines total—once left to sit in a sugar beet mill building on the Greenfield Village campus. While records for the experimental engines were incomplete, the seven X-8 engines include both air-cooled and water-cooled L-heads as well as at least one aluminum air-cooled overhead-camshaft version.

Ford might have conceived the X-8 concept, but he trusted development of the engine to Eugene Farkas, who worked on it for the next six or seven years, until it became evident to those surrounding Ford—and eventually to Ford himself—that the X-8 would never replace the Model T’s four-cylinder engine (due in no small part to reports that the lower spark plugs fouled often). Ford instead turned his attention to developing an inexpensive V-8 and abandoned the X-8 altogether.
Auto historian Don LaCombe will expand on the X-8’s history late next month as part of the 2018 Gilmore lecture series. Other lectures in the series will focus on the Can-Am racing series; art, architecture, and the automobile; Jaguar, slot cars, dune buggies, and abandoned gas stations.
The 2018 Gilmore lecture series will run from January 7 to April 29. For more information, visit GilmoreCarMuseum.org.

Article courtesy of Hemmings Daily, written by Daniel Strohl.

​If there is one reoccurring theme within the automotive hobby, it’s that all car guys have the same problem, they acquire several cars, or a lot of stuff to build cars, and then they have to take a serious look at how to store all of their treasures. Thanks to his recent profession of buying and selling real estate, Chevrolet enthusiast, Rick Treworgy’s storage options have fortuitously grown at the same rate as his collection. And wow, what a collection it is!

​Rick’s storage dilemma was resolved when he acquired an old Wal-Mart building and began renovating it to house his collection. But while he was at it, he also tapped into his other interests of having an on-site diner, speed shop, and the ability to buy and sell a few cars. The 99,000 square-foot building houses all these entities and gives visitors the option to ogle cars, peruse items from the gift shop, or purchase speed goodies for their rides.

Early car enthusiasts will be greeted by a 1914 Royal Mail Chevrolet as they walk in the collection. Those seeking heavy haulers will find plenty of pickups from the 1930s to the most modern in either two or four-wheel drive variants. You will also find several El Caminos from back in the day. And, if you’re into ’50s and ’60s GM cars, hold on to your hats.

​Launched in 1965, the Shelby G.T. 350R – the competition version of the Shelby G.T. 350 – went on to capture SCCA B Production Championships in 1965, 1966 and 1967. As good as it was, those building the original car – the Original Venice Crew (OVC), as they’ve come to call themselves – believed it could be better. Now, a limited production run of 1965 Shelby G.T. 350Rs, designed by the OVC with all the upgrades meant for the original car, stands poised to improve on the original.

​The OVC, consisting of Peter Brock, Jim Marietta and Ted Sutton, reconvened in 2015 to build a pair of “new” Shelby G.T.350Rs, one incorporating an experimental independent rear suspension (IRS) originally designed for the 1965 car. The cars also received a new front valance designed to improve engine cooling, Plexiglas rear and quarter windows designed by Brock to improve aerodynamics and ventilation, and improved brake ducts. The project was intended to honor the 50th Anniversary of the G.T.350R’s first win, at Texas’s Green Valley Raceway on February 14, 1965, but afterward, those involved with the project continued to refine and develop the tribute cars.

​As Sutton explains, “During track testing, people began to ask if the car was for sale. After a landslide of inquiries we decided to see if there was a good case for offering a limited run of them.” The answer was yes, and Marietta stepped in to head up the new venture.

​One of the first steps required to put the car into production was obtaining permission, via licensing agreements, from both Carroll Shelby International and the Ford Motor Company. These in place, the 36 G.T. 350Rs to be produced by OVC (matching the original production run of G.T. 350R models) will be badged in the same way as the originals and will be given a Shelby serial number. Papers on each car sold will be sent to both the Shelby American Automobile Club Registry and the Shelby American Registry.

​Production of the 36 cars, which will be road-legal, begins this fall, and each will carry a base price of $250,000 before any extras are added. That’s not an insubstantial sum, but where else, at any price, can one buy a new 1965 Shelby G.T. 350R, designed by the original project team and incorporating features the original car was meant to have, had development time and money not run out? The new version is a race-proven, too; in 2016, Shelby American test driver Vince LaViolette qualified one of the prototypes third on the grid in a vintage race at the Hallet Motor Racing Circuit in Oklahoma, driving the Shelby to a win in the event.