Since the 60’s and 70’s, in the era of the muscle car, the red blooded American male has had a true blue love affair with the big block engine. Gasoline & soda’s was cheap and the times were good! The innate desire by most males for more horsepower under the hood was at an all time high! Powerful big block engines in the muscle cars was enough to turn a boy into a man, almost a first crank. It was like being handed the keys to manhood.

Now I am not going to stand here and say that you should drive a muscle car everywhere you go. Even the most zealous muscle car fan can’t say that driving a vintage muscle car very far is worth it. These days, fuel prices are at an all time high and climbing. People have to save money. It just so happens that even this muscle-head drives a Toyota Prius to work every day. That little dandy car gets over 60 miles per gallon, and a muscle car can’t hold a light up to that. My bank account rejoices!

Saving money is the ticket during the every day commute, but when the weekend arrives… I want to have fun! On weekends, my favorite thing to do is to jump in my 1968 Chevy Camaro with its powerful big block motor and go wherever I want. To be behind the wheel of such a high performance motor, and the incredible horsepower it produces… you know now why I say it makes a man out of a boy!

It is a fact of nature… I am like the majority of men. I LOVE classic cars with big block engines. Especially Chevrolet big blocks! Heck, I even love big block Fords! But give me a haul tail Chevy 454 big block any day and watch me cry from the sheer ecstasy of the automotive (almost outer-body) experience! It is unreal. In fact, I am in love. I am in love with the roar of the engine and the sheer horsepower that it can put out. Unabashedly, I’ll confess, I am all man in this respect. Give me that growl of that big block Chevy engine of mine at full throttle any day over a symphony! Literally the big block engine roar is like music to my ears.

When the tire burn rubber and squeal (like teenage girls at an Elvis or Beetles concert back in the day), and my muscle car tears up the strip at breakneck speed it gives me a natural high like nothing else. I absolutely love big block engines, but what I like most is the way they take me back in time. Back when cokes were a quarter, and chicks were all over me. When I really think about it, a man’s love affair with the big block motor is like our fascination with certain parts of womans anatomy.. we do like them bigger!

Looking at my fascination closer, I really like the fact that it is so much easier for the shade tree mechanic like myself to work on these big blocks over te new-fangled computerized engines of today. Today’s trend is geared toward the high-tech computer controlled engines. It is nearly to the point that cars are so dependent on their computer boards that it it is nearly impossible to work on them much without professional training. It is heading in that direction anyway.

That, of course, is the exact reason why I love my old big block engine cars. I love to crawl under the hood and be able to do what I want to the motor. If I want to bore out the engine and add custom aftermarket parts, like the classic car grease-monkey I am, then it is very doable. Tweaking your classic muscle car to drive and sound just you want is very doable for the DIY mechanic like me.

Working on big block engines is not real expensive or very hard to do. Heck, you learn how to customize your own big block engine; you will be amazed at what all you can do. It gives you a sense of self confidence, and brings out a bit of teenage passion that makes the custom ride with a big block engine all the more enjoyable.

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