The phrase The grass is always greener on the other side is definitely a cliche that is by and large overused way too much. But the reason it's overused is because it holds true in almost any scenario, and we as humans identify with it because it tends to be our nature to want something that we don't have, and just because we don't have it that makes it somehow better. It's no different in the car world, whether we are always admiring other people's cars because we think they're better than ours, or because we want that new ride that we can't really afford. It also applies to cars that come from other countries. Here in America, a lot of gearheads wish they could have any number of European or Japanese cars that aren't sold in the American market. Me included.
The same goes for people in Asia, and the same is especially true for gearheads, or piston heads, as they refer to themselves in the United Kingdom. Many British people have a coy love affair with American Muscle and the American car industry, cars that scream Red White And Blue, cars that you just can't buy in Britain, and cars that just don't make sense from a practical standpoint. Many British people wish they could own a little bit of that Yankee horsepower, so here are 20 domestic cars every Brit wishes they could own.
20 Dodge Challenger Hellcat
Nothing shouts America like this reimagined muscle car. It's wide, it's big, it's brash, and it screams, loaded with an insane amount of power. Underneath that hood lies a monster, a hellcat just waiting to be unleashed.
A 6.2 Liter Supercharged Hemi V8 that cranks out a staggering 707 horsepower.
The Challenger comes with options for either an eight or six-speed transmission, automatic and manual respectively. Talk about an icon of American muscle. This car is not available in the UK, not in any model, especially not the Hellcat. The British are missing out!
19 Dodge SRT Viper
There really isn't a car much more suited to be called insane than the Dodge Viper. Our American equivalent to the British TVR's, the SRT Viper is an unhinged lunatic of a car, the kind of car you should be scared to drive. Genuinely scared. Of course, you still want to get behind the wheel of this thing.
Under the hood we've got a truly outrageous 8.4 L V10 engine that spills out 645 horsepower. Rear wheel drive, built to race, light, mean, this Viper is the kind of American insanity British car lovers drool over. Unfortunately, you can't buy it in the UK, you'll have to have it shipped over!
18 Cadillac ATS-V Coupe
Look at that slick, chrome-trimmed, sexy sedan slicing through the summer evening sunlight on one of the many truly superior American roads. Cadillac has been an icon for many many decades for being the standard of luxury and class in American cars. Over the years they've made road going cars that are more comfortable and regal than any others. It's only been in recent years have they truly stepped up their game in the sports car department.
This Cadillac ATS-V Coupe is a great example of that, with a 3.6 Liter V6 that boasts 464 horsepower.
This car can't be bought in Britain, so unfortunately that leaves them drooling!
17 Shelby Mustang GT350R
Definitely one of the most famous cars in the world, the Mustang, has only recently been available right hand drive and for sale in Britain. Although this version, the Shelby Mustang GT 350 R, is most definitely not available in the UK, or anywhere in Europe.
With a 5.2 L V8 with flat plane crank and a rear wheel drive system barely harnessing 526 horsepower, this Shelby Mustang is a force to be reckoned with, a loud, aggressive, entirely American muscle car.
16 Camaro ZL1 1LE
This is one of the most hardcore cars Chevy has ever made. With a supercharged 6.2 L V8, this car puts out an astounding 650 horsepower.
Added to it, this model has a carbon fiber spoiler that adds 300 pounds of downforce at 150 mph, plus those mean looking front splitter and dive panes to give it even more grip.
This Camaro is fitted with the widest wheels ever on a Camaro, which all adds up to an incredible, all-American made machine that will outperform (with an impressive seven minute sixteen second lap time at the Nurburgring) many European sports cars, and it'll do it for half the price. How's that for a slice of Red White and Blue?
15 Ford F-150 Raptor
This truck is a serious beast. It's got the performance to go well beyond what any pick up truck could need for simple towing and hauling. This Ford F-150 Raptor will take you anywhere, on or off-road, and especially off-road, that you could possibly imagine.
With four-wheel drive, 3.5 Liter turbocharged V6 with 450 horsepower, and a stunning 510 lb-ft torque to drive those beefy wheels, there's not really anything that can stand in the way of this American behemoth. Except, of course, puny British roads.
14 Hennessey Venom GT
There's a pretty cool story behind this stunning American machine. First off, it has a killer engine, sporting a very special 90 degree V8 that burns out a blistering, mind-bending 1,244 horsepower. Right, I'll say it again, and spell it out: One thousand two hundred and forty four brake horsepower. All in your control with a six-speed manual.
This car is truly unhinged, it's jumped off the cliff long ago. What's great about this car is it's that insane Viper engine Americans should be extremely proud of, put inside of a Lotus Exige. The result is absolutely jaw-dropping.
13 Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat
Another big-time American heavyweight, this is the Dodge Charger. 2018 SRT Hellcat, to be specific about the model. That hood hides a 6.2 L supercharged V8 with a supremely impressive 707 horsepower.
It's the most powerful production sedan on Earth, according to Car And Driver.
That's pretty impressive, if you ask me. Americans have a lot to be proud of when it comes to the caliber of cars that they produce. Not for everyone, but many people in England wish they could have that kind of raw power from a car.
12 Corvette Z06
No list of cars Brits wish they could have from us would be complete without the iconic Corvette. The Corvette Z06 no less. This American grown machine traces its roots back a long way in American history, one of the few muscle cars that stayed in production since it's genesis.
This Z06 comes with the good ol' supercharged 6.2 Liter V8 engine, and it produces 650 horsepower, giving it enough power to set a raging 0-60 time of just under 3 seconds. That's a fast car, and an impressive reincarnation of the classic 'Vette. A lot of people in England dream about being able to drive this car on the right side, and in their home country.
11 Mustang GT500
Another American icon that will forever embody what the United States is all about is the Mustang. A true legend of American sports cars. Of course, they're not called sports cars in America, rather "muscle cars." And let's talk about the muscle underneath this mean machine.
Still not released, this car will have upwards of 700 horsepower, designed to be mean and loud, a brute set on one thing: going fast.
This heavyweight is designed to be fast on the drag strip, like every great American muscle car, and everyone is going nuts about the new one. Unfortunately, the past models have not been sold in Britain, and this one won't be, either.
10 Dodge Ram Runner
Okay so this is Ram's take on the whole F-150 Raptor concept, and does it sure look mean and brutal. This fuming beast has 390 horsepower and over 400 lbs of torque. It's got a dual exhaust system and it's been fitted with Fox racing suspension.
The MOPAR Performance Division makes this kit for the standard Ram 1500, and it's really an incredible kit, giving you Baja rally inspired capabilities in your pickup truck. This is the kind of truck that you want to take anywhere, and absolutely can. Everywhere except England, that is. Kidding, of course, you can get it shipped over third party, but it will still be left hand drive.
9 Thunderbird
Time to bring back a true American classic. The Thunderbird. Definitely one of the legends of American cars, a true and timeless icon for what American made cars were and should always be. This is the kind of dreamy ideal, that fantasy that every car person in Britain has about the American Motor Industry.
The Thunderbird kind of just epitomizes all of it. Condensed down into one beautiful car.
The Thunderbird was never sold in Britain or Europe, it stuck to it's own soil. Although there's no doubt a large number of piston heads in the UK who just had to have one of these beautiful works of art shipped over there, regardless of the cost.
8 Mercury Sable
The Mercury brand was one that never made its way over the Atlantic Ocean to land on the shores of Great Britain. None of their cars were ever sold in the UK, and because of that many Brits idealize them as a cool American car they wish they could have.
While maybe in its glory days that would be a good thing to desire, the fact of the matter is that Mercury went downhill, and downhill quickly.
Unfortunately for those Brits who always wanted a right hand drive Mercury, that will no longer be possible, because Mercury has officially gone under as a car company.
7 Ford Taurus SHO
The aggressively powerful American sports sedan is a bit underrated here in America, but in Britain, they don't really have anything quite as American-ly beefy and practical like this Ford Taurus SHO.
The car is fitted with a 3.5 Liter twin turbo Eco-Boost V6 that cranks out an impressive 365 horsepower. It may not seem like much on the outside and it may look way too practical to be any kind of fun, but now you can see the Taurus through a different lens: a powerfully American sports sedan that every Brit wants.
6 Lincoln Continental
The Lincoln Continental has become quite a classy sedan in recent years. Since the demise of Mercury, Lincoln has been stepping up and adding more to their lineup.
This one you can get with a twin turbo v6 400 horsepower engine, quite impressive, actually. It comes with an all-wheel-drive powertrain, which means it can go a lot of beautiful places in America.
Plus the inside of this car is decked to the nines with the most luxurious finishes and materials you could ever hope to enjoy. Almost European in it's classy luxury. . . But you can't get it there!
5 Ford Flex
The surprising thing about this rather bland and overly practical-looking Ford Flex is that it has a V6 EcoBoost engine that garners 365 horsepower while still maintaining a respectable gas mileage rating average of 20 miles per gallon.
For a big, American sized SUV that's doing pretty good. It's got enough room for camping on weekends, and enough style to cruise the city and look good doing it. There's plenty of British people who wish they could have something along the lines of an American Range Rover Sport. Well, maybe less than plenty, but a few.
4 Lincoln MKZ
The MKZ is another classic example of a luxury sedan that's American through and through. This car built is to look good driving the many wide highways and city streets of The United States of America, recently completely redesigned.
It comes with tons of options, models available with up to four hundred turbo charged horsepower, an average of thirty one miles per gallon on the highway and twenty one miles per gallon in the city, and much more. A classic example of an American car, the kind of car that won't be sold in the car market of Great Britain.
3 Dodge Caliber SRT4
The Dodge Caliber is what I would call the American take on the hot hatchback. It's bigger, meaner, has an angry looking face with a bold grill and roof scoop. This is the SRT4 model, which, like all Dodge SRT models, means this has a really big engine, and a lot of power, kick and bite.
The Dodge Caliber SRT4 has a 2.4 Liter 285 horsepower turbo boosted engine.
Hot hatchbacks are all the rage in Britain, especially at the time this Dodge Caliber came out, so the idea of having a hot hatchback that also had a ton of full-blooded American power underneath was pretty desirable.
2 Lincoln MKX
A luxury crossover from the purebred American company of Lincoln, we have the Lincoln MKX, the kind of SUV that British people have different incarnations of, from Land Rover to Audi to BMW, etc, etc, but not from America, not from Lincoln.
Which makes this crossover special to a lot of the people who like America's cars, their style and ideals, what they represent. This MKX comes with, at the top end of the models, three hundred and thirty five horsepower, and a towing capacity of two thousand pounds. Too bad it's not sold in European markets!
1 AMC Gremlin
To be honest, I'm not sure if anyone in Britain actually wishes they could have bought this car. But it's a retro car from America that was never sold in the UK, so I'm sure there are actually a number of British people who think this car is cool.
Retro Americans are quite desirable in the UK, at least for a number of people, and this car fits those parameters.
I know that if I was raised in England and fancied retro American cars, the AMC Gremlin would definitely appeal to me, if not the most, then top of the list.
Sources: evo.co.uk, pistonheads.com, carkeys.co.uk, city-data.com, caranddriver.com