THE CRATE CAMARO
Since it appeared as our cover story in the October '04 issue, theall-new Camaro bodies have been a huge deal. If you were at the 2005SEMA Show in Las Vegas, you got a chance to see the very first completebody built into HOT ROD 1, a running, driving, Rally Green '69 Camaroconvertible. Daily we get e-mails and phone calls asking what happenedto the bodies and where people can buy them, but we couldn't give thewhole scoop until now. The bad news is it took a year of paying lawyersto get us to this point, but the good news is that all-new Camaroconvertible bodies are in stock, you can finally buy one (for less thanyou'd think), and a hardtop version is coming soon. We put together thishuge special section to show the whole story behind the creation of thebodies, and the genesis of HOT ROD 1, the very first brand-new '69Camaro in 26 years.
 The Bodies
Behind the scenes on the revolutionary complete bodies and the right to call them Camaros. The coupe is next.
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 Power!
The all-aluminum ZL1 454 in our car is serial-number 000, meaning it wasthe test mule used to develop the 200 ZL1 crate engines.
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 Bang Gears
A Keisler swap kit made sliding a Tremec five-speed into the Camaro apiece of cake.
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 Brain-Draining Cornering
Detroit Speed throws its full suspension catalog at HOT ROD 1. Here'swhat it takes to install it.
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 Build It Yourself
Watch the highlights as CARS does the mad thrash to build HOT ROD 1 andfinish it in time for SEMA.
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 Parts List
Once you have a body and drivetrain, you still need thousands of littleparts. Here's the huge list of stuff we needed from Classic Industries.
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 Beat On It
It did 2,000 miles on Power Tour(TM) and suffered through three clutchesfor our burnout photos, then we got behind the wheel and beat the pissout of it on the dragstrip. Here's the finished product and the numbers.
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