Cool Amphibious Manufacturers International LLC has developed the Hydra Spyder – an amphibious vehicle that can travel on both the water or on the road. Promoted as “unsinkable,” this vehicle contains positive floatation foam approved by the United States Coast Guard. The convertible Hydra Spyder can seat four people for comfortable drives on land, and can easily pull a water skier on your favorite lake. Hydra Spyder is equipped with power rack and pinion steering, four-wheel disk brakes and 5052 alloy aluminum plate lower hull construction. The upper body is light-weight fiberglass and the vehicle weighs about 3,300 lbs. It’s powered by a Corvette LS2 6.0L, 400 horsepower V8 engine with a 5-speed manual high performance close ratio transmission. Build time is about six months, and the Hydra Spyder has a base price of $155,000. For more information, visit www.camillc.com or www.hydraspyder.com.

Full Throttle The Life and Fast Times of Curtis Turner
Curtis Turner’s life embodied everything that makes NASCAR the biggest spectator sport in American history: the adrenaline rush of the races, the potential for danger at every turn, and the charismatic, outrageous personality of a winner. Turner created drama at the racetrack and in his personal life, living the American Dream several times over before he died a violent and mysterious death at the age of 46.

In gripping prose, and with full access to the files of Turner’s widow, biographer Robert Edelstein, the exclusive motor sports writer for TV Guide and the author of NASCAR Generations, thrillingly recreates the life of this American legend. Full Throttle is the first-ever full-scale chronicle of Turner’s legendary life, from his days as a teenage moonshine runner in Virginia, through millions earned (and just as quickly spent) in fearless finance deals, to his incredible comeback after four years of being banned from the NASCAR circuit.

Motor racing and mayhem, the non-stop pursuit of outrageous dreams, high-speed thrills and a really good time…these are the raw materials of Full Throttle: The Life and Fast Times of Curtis Turner.

This book should be a part of any NASCAR enthusiast’s library or anyone who enjoys reading about (racing) legends. It’s also a perfect book to keep in the break room of any repair shop.

“If there’s a $10 million Ferrari and a $5 million Bugatti, there’s no reason you can’t have a $1 million muscle car,” said Thomas L. duPont, publisher of the duPont Registry, a glossy monthly magazine that includes hundreds of sales listings for luxury, collectible and exotic cars. “One of the things that drove up the price of the Duesenberg was the same thing at work with muscle cars – nostalgia.” While in the sizzling ’60s, these rude, crude muscle cars snarled, burned rubber and spewed raw horsepower, today some of those rough old outlaws – Chevelle Super Sports, GTOs, Mustangs, Camaros and Road Runners – grace museum floors. Moreover, they’ve become the unlikely new stars of classic car auctions as wealthy middle-aged baby boomers hotly pursue a dwindling supply of the vehicles of their youth. In fact, muscle car values are going up 25% or more a year.
Source: Dallas Morning News

Legendary Woodpecker Celebrates 40 Years
According to wildbirds.com, the life expectancy of a “Hairy Woodpecker” is less than 10 years. The experts obviously haven’t heard of the legendary Thrush “Woodpecker” brand that manufactured red hot glasspack and turbo-style performance mufflers since 1966. The Thrush brand, still a popular choice among muscle car enthusiasts, will celebrate its 40th anniversary this year with a variety of consumer activities targeted at vehicle owners of all ages. Thrush mufflers and accessories are manufactured and marketed by Tenneco. The Thrush brand gained prominence in the late 1960s thanks to the deep, throaty sound of its canister-shaped “Glasspack” mufflers, which enthusiasts by the thousands mounted beneath Mustangs, GTOs, Chevelles, Corvairs and other performance models. But the Thrush experience transcended mufflers – thanks to “Woody,” the hot pink-and-yellow woodpecker displayed in profile above the brand’s ’50s-style script typeface – to encompass the friendly competition of hot rodding. Not surprisingly, the Thrush “Woodpecker” remains a common sight on vehicle bumpers and windows from coast to coast. “Woody” even made a cameo appearance in the Hollywood feature film Raising Arizona. For more information on Thrush mufflers and accessories, visit www.dynomax.com/thrush.stm.