Rippin' It!

A month or so ago my hometown had a “cruise night” sponsored by one of the local business organizations.  The evening was a resounding success.  So much so one of the organizers that I spoke to later said they had no idea so many people would show up.

The night included a photographer taking pictures of cars and providing prints (mine is shown at left) and a host of festivities.

T-shirts were being sold proclaiming the “1st annual” cruise but they had sold out before the event even started.

The “2nd annual” is going to take place next year and is going to also include (maybe) a rolling car show.

While searching around I found this free calendar of car show events that can be searched by state.  I have already found a few shows that I didn’t know were going to happen even though they are close to my home.

Cleaned Up 2010 R/T

Finally the weather has cleared up enough to get some decent pictures of the Challenger after the graphics were added.  Many thanks to Eric Strickland and Superior Signs for his input and skill in adding the ‘Track Pak’ graphic to the sides.

So far the mods include the Blastin’ Bob’s Resonator removal kit, hood struts, window tint, Mopar splash guards and the skip shift eliminator.

More pictures can be found in the photo album located here.

February (2010) sales figures were just released so naturally I looked at the Challenger, Camaro and Mustang to see how the pony cars were fairing for the big three.

And the winner is…Chevrolet, pretty much going away.

Chevrolet clearly has a hit on its hands with the Camaro having outpaced even the Ford Mustang in sales over the last 8 months.  Based on sales reports since April, 2009 the Camaro sales have outpaced Mustang sales by some 6,000 units.

Currently Camaro sales have been reported at 73,051 units although this Camaro blog is reporting the 100,000th Camaro VIN has been assigned to a 2SS Inferno Orange Camaro now rolling down the assembly line.

So how does this relate to the Challenger?

Well sales wise the Mustang and Camaro are both kicking the crap out of the Challenger… at least on the sales floor.

In the first seven months of production Camaro sales topped the total sales for all the Gen III Challengers.   Likewise the Mustang was just under 9 months there were more Mustangs sold than Gen III Challengers.  It now appears the Chevrolet Camaro is going to replace the Ford Mustang as the “every other car you meet” car.

Since the Challenger sales began being reported (May, 2008) the reported sales have been 47,132 units compared to the Mustangs 132,827 (a 3:1 ratio) and the Camaro’s 73,051 (1.5:1 ratio) units.   Over the last 10 months the average unit sales has been:  Challengers @ 1,866; Mustangs @ 5,894; and Camaro’s @7,244.

Kudo’s to Chevrolet for not only making the Camaro but for promoting and selling them with success.  If they beat out the Mustang in overall annual sales, and it looks like they will, they have certainly done something few would have thought possible.

For me, I’m glad I’m driving something a little more unique.

Welcome to Rippin’ It.com. This is a new site (as of February 19, 2010) dedicated to the Dodge Challenger. I am a Challenger owner (on the 2nd one), a muscle car enthusiast and have enough experience to build a useful Challenger site (hopefully). I currently own a 2010 Dodge Challenger R/T with the Track Pak option.

This is my second Challenger.  I bought a 2009 Inferno Red S/E Challenger on June 30, 2009.  At that time I needed a car to use for my job and the 6 cylinder S/E was perfect.  However, three months later things changed when my agency began providing vehicles (hallelujah!)

Since I had a work car issued to me I was free to choose the car of my dreams which was an R/T with a manual transmission and preferably a “Track Pak” optioned car.  For the $10,000.00 difference between the R/T and the SRT I can buy a really nice blower should the horsepower and torque thing really get to bothering me.  I’ll wait until I feel like I don’t want Dodge to honor the warranty anymore.

I have a lot of plans for this site, including a cgi-database of Challengers, a Challenger Owner’s Gallery and, maybe one day, a forum.  There are forums already, a couple of which are good forums, loaded with advertisements and “memberships”.  My motto is, and always has been, free is better.

Stick around, you never know what you might find.