JO-HAN RMX Drag On Lady

70Mach1, I love it. That is a 1969 SS AMX (Super Stock - American Motors Experimental). The 69 was the second year fot the AMX and AMC built 53 of the factory race cars (SS AMX). Three were kept by AMC and they are currently owned by Chrysler. The other 50 are not yet all accounted for, but Shrley Shahan's is still in exsistance. Her husband owns a speed shop in California and was her main sponsor, along with the AMC Dalers Assn. of the area as well as AMC. She did really well with the car.  The car did not have an exaust system, other than the headers, and came from the factory with slicks. Needless to say it was NOT streetable (legally). The 390 had a special set of heads and a special intake manifold set up for two 4bbl carbs. The AMX was the prototype that eventually became the Javalin, but AMC decided to make a limited number of the true AMX (two seater) in 68, 69, and 70.

A new 1969 AMX was painted pink and given to the 1968 Playboy Bunny of the year. Each AMX is numbered and her car has her measurments as its number. She still owns the car (as of last known survey), but she had it painted black soon after she received it. 

Your model is outstanding. Did you use the kit decals, or are aftermarket decals available? I know some of the old JOHan kits are being made by someone who bought the molds. Do you know if this kit is being reproduced? I seem to recall a copy of the kit being sold by Testors. Did they buy the molds? Once again that is an outstanding job on a very interesting and rare subject. 

     Thanks for the compliment,I did use the kit decals,but you need to seperate the words Drag-on lady, the whole decal is about a 1/4" too long.The rest of the sheet was fine a bit yellowed but useable.

great job

one of my brothers has a blk 68   

over 20yrs ago b-4 most avg people had fancy sound systems in their cars  he put in a huge amp and cut holes in the bulkhead inbtween the int and the trunk for a bunch of spkers 

still has the car  but right now it's gathering dust n' rust

rangerj wrote:

70Mach1, I love it. That is a 1969 SS AMX (Super Stock - American Motors Experimental). The 69 was the second year fot the AMX and AMC built 53 of the factory race cars (SS AMX). Three were kept by AMC and they are currently owned by Chrysler. The other 50 are not yet all accounted for, but Shrley Shahan's is still in exsistance. Her husband owns a speed shop in California and was her main sponsor, along with the AMC Dalers Assn. of the area as well as AMC. She did really well with the car.  The car did not have an exaust system, other than the headers, and came from the factory with slicks. Needless to say it was NOT streetable (legally). The 390 had a special set of heads and a special intake manifold set up for two 4bbl carbs. The AMX was the prototype that eventually became the Javalin, but AMC decided to make a limited number of the true AMX (two seater) in 68, 69, and 70. A new 1969 AMX was painted pink and given to the 1968 Playboy Bunny of the year. Each AMX is numbered and her car has her measurments as its number. She still owns the car (as of last known survey), but she had it painted black soon after she received it.  Your model is outstanding. Did you use the kit decals, or are aftermarket decals available? I know some of the old JOHan kits are being made by someone who bought the molds. Do you know if this kit is being reproduced? I seem to recall a copy of the kit being sold by Testors. Did they buy the molds? Once again that is an outstanding job on a very interesting and rare subject.

Shirley Shahan used to run a 343 hp 62 Plymouth that was second only to Dave Kempton's car (this was the first leagle super stocker to ever do a wheel stand by the way). Later she was put into a 1965 Plymouth, and was one of the few who used the column shift wand to shift the reverse valve body hemi automatic. The car ran right on the national record from day one (which isn't say alot when just about everyone of them would go a half second under the record). Later she was put in a Super Stock AMX, but never actually was all that competetive with the other AMX's. But she did start out with the car when it was still in SS/E (NHRA hated them almost as much them as they hated late model hemis). The SS/AMX actually started out in SS/H, and about a month later was moved up to SS/E to give the guys driving certain other branded cars a break (NHRA even bragged about doing this). But when they moved them up to SS/E they promptly blew the national record into oblivion. So they once again tried to kill the car by moving them into SS/D running against 1970 Hemi Cudas which at the time were virtually unbeatable in that class. They then slashed the national record by three or four tenths of a second! So the finally get rid of them they put them in SS/C so that they'd run against L-88 Corvettes and Ford Thunderbolts. They killed that class as well, and last time I heard they were running in the extremely low nine second range.

     Why was the car so fast? It's really pretty simple when you look at it. The motor made lots of power, and the car hooked up like it was glued to the pavement. They had sixty foot times better than a 68 hemi Dart!! Few cars in super stock could run with them in first eighth of a mile. Glidden actually built a white Thunderbolt to compete in SS/D, but at best was three tenths of a second slower than the AMX.

     The SS/AMX came from the factory with an Edelbrock cross ram, and a pair of Crane ported heads. Transmission was a Borgwarner T-10 and the rear end was a specially modded factory rear with Henrys Axles. Cars were all steel, but at one time there was going to be some built with fiberglass frontends and doors. Last SS/AMX i've seen was setting in a guy's front yard just outside of Michigan City Indiana (wasn't for sale and he had three of them setting there). I used to own #235.

gary

Man, that's gorgeous! The finish is so deep! Amazing what that urethane stuff can do!

Very interesting, squeak, I love that stuff. I used to go to Martin Dragway in Martin Mich allmost every weekend. Allways had good match races and wheelstanders. I've seen her AMX back in the day and your knowladge of these are very interesting. Great read.Thanks.

zgator wrote:

Very interesting, squeak, I love that stuff. I used to go to Martin Dragway in Martin Mich allmost every weekend. Allways had good match races and wheelstanders. I've seen her AMX back in the day and your knowladge of these are very interesting. Great read.Thanks.

I remember the first time I saw a super stock AMX just like it was yesterday afternoon. It was the old Beachy Brothers car, and it was in the staging lanes at Raceway Park. It had this huge set of slicks on it, and kinda laughed to myself. They fired the thing up, and rolled up past my brother and I, and did a burn out throwing rubber all over the place!! Then they staged and promptly did a two foot wheel stand comming off the line, and bounced the front wheels again going into second and third gear! He shut off about three quarters of the way down the track, but still went three tenths under the national record in SS/G (this was also the very first pass on the car) Right behind them were three guys running Chevys in the same class, and they actually turned around and put their cars on the trailer. Later they made a second pass running a 10.39 (about seven tenths under). Two weeks later the car was refactored (NHRA's of making certain cars winners) to SS/E, and three months later they were running against 1970 Hemi Cudas. Later they they were moved up again to run against 427 Thunderbolts and L88 Corvettes in SS/C. Last time I heard they held both ends of the national record in SS/C. This makes the super stock AMX the third fastest super stocker ever right behind a 1968 Hemi Cuda and a 1965 Hemi (somewhere you gotta put the 1964 light weight hemi car in there). In my book there were really about a dozen or so really fast super stock cars ever (for what they were in the class), and you just gotta put the super stock AMX right in the middle

gary