by Rex Roy

To our great delight, Detroit is back in the muscle car business. General Motors is readying their Camaro. Across town, Chrysler is busy prepping the Challenger. Unlike its rivals, Ford never stopped producing the Mustang, although some would argue the Mustang II wasn't a real muscle car - but the Interceptor concept certainly is.

Detroit 's muscle-car homecoming has been huge news because these cars, more than any other type of vehicle, evoke vast quantities of emotion. People who never knew the originals get just as excited as those who did.

But what triggers this universal visceral reaction to muscle cars? Some would argue the muscle. But the electricity grows in crowds ogling stationary muscle cars at an auto show. At auto shows, one can observe grandmothers and children reacting to cool designs without any notion of what 400+ horsepower will do to a fresh pair of radials. It ain't the power that excites them.

So what gives muscle cars this special power over people? Their design. At the recent Detroit auto show, we talked to the gurus responsible for modern-day muscle from Ford, Chrysler, and General Motors to find out what cues make muscle cars so unique and exciting. MORE --