The most recent Texas Metal episode challenged the Ekstensive Metal Works team to go small with an iconic Pontiac ’68 GTO build.
Texas Metal, MotorTrend’s biggest, loudest and most over-the-top car restoration show, has officially returned for its seventh season on the air.
Over the course of the past seven years, Bill Carlton and his dedicated Ekstensive Metal Works team have modified, tricked out and souped-up virtually any kind of big truck you can imagine.
And whether it be Ford, Chevrolet, or GMC, there is nothing that the Ekstensive Metal Works team has not been able to transform into the Texas-sized trucks of their owners’ dreams.
All about the new Texas Metal episode
However, now that the Ekstensive Metal Works team has pretty much tackled every truck build in the books – it seems like they have decided to shift gears.
The most recent Texas Metal episode, titled “52 Wrecker Complete”, sees the team venture outside of their bigger-is-better comfort zone to tackle a true classic muscle car.
Every gearhead will understand the sense of nostalgia that comes from specific models that you remember from your childhood.
And it seems that it was exactly this nostalgia that prompted Carlton to challenge the Ekstensive Metal Works team to transform a 1968 Pontiac GTO in this episode.
But just because the ’68 GTO is a tad smaller than the Texas Metal builds that we are used to seeing, it does not mean that the team holds back on any of their signature Ekstensive Metal Works flair.
Texas Metal season 7
The much-awaited seventh season of Texas Metal officially hit the air at the end of January 2024. And while the team has already showed off a showroom full of new builds, only a handful of new episodes have aired so far.
This season, new episodes air Wednesdays at 9 p.m. ET and 8 p.m. CT on MotorTrend TV (these new episodes are also available on the MotorTrend+ streaming platform).
The episodes that have aired thus far can be outlined as follows:
| Episode | Title | Initial air date |
| Episode 1 | “Ram Tow, ’49 Ford Show” | January 31, 2024 |
| Episode 2 | “’89 Bronco on Blast” | February 7, 2024 |
| Episode 3 | “’52 Wrecker Complete” | February 14, 2024 |
Everything you need to know about the ’68 GTO
Carlton is not the only self-confessed gearhead who has an affinity for the Pontiac ’68 GTO model, as this vehicle is widely considered one of the first “supercars” ever developed.
The very first GTO, which was introduced by Pontiac all the way back in 1964 featured a powerful 325 horsepower V-8 engine and for all intents and purposes – was the car that kick-started what we now know to be the muscle car genre.
Not only did the ’68 GTO improve on this original design with a boost in horsepower in engine availability, but it also boasted several other finer details, such as a shorter chassis and a wider stance to improve the stability and handling.
Through the years, the ’68 GTO’s iconic shell has remained a firm favorite among classic car aficionados, and we just cannot wait to see what the Ekstensive Metal Works team does to make it their own, unique design.
The ’68 GTO is not this episode’s only big swing
The ’68 GTO build is definitely something out of the box, even for the creative Ekstensive Metal Works team.
But the team also took on one of their biggest builds in the history of Texas Metal throughout the course of this episode just to even things out.
It turns out that while the Ekstensive Metal Works team was figuring out how to put their own spin on the widely-appreciated GTO design, they were also busy working on a brand new ’52 tow truck.
And while this truck rolled into the shop in the form of a rusted hunk of junk, it left at the shop at the end of the episode with a new, sleek blue look and a signature Texas Metal dropped body.
What you can expect to see on next week’s episode
It is already very evident that the Texas Metal team has decided to kick things up a notch with this new season.
And while the GTO build (which will carry over to episode four) is certainly one of Carlton’s bucket list builds, this season’s next episode will take things one step further.
Season seven’s fourth episode, which is titled “Custom Cut F430 Ferrari” will premiere on MotorTrend TV on February 21, 2024.
In this episode, will see Carlton the Ekstensive Metal Works team push their skills to the limits with a high-stakes Italian sports car build.
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