1970 Plymouth Superbird
What happens when you take a spicy production car and give it an extreme makeover? The answer is the Plymouth Superbird! The Superbird started life as a Plymouth Road Runner (can you see where the name came from?) and then was transformed into something that could work on super speedways across the country.
You had several options in engine, but the best was a 426 Hemi V8. They only produced 135 of these, however. They were expensive and they only needed to create a certain number so the engine would qualify for their racing program. These cars are unsurprisingly the most sought after now.
Taking Nascar By Storm
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The Superbird wasn’t designed with comfort as the first goal. It was designed to go out and make the rest of NASCAR jealous. The Superbird was going to be the Chrysler Corporation’s offering to NASCAR for the 1970 season and beyond. The design was replacing the Dodge Charger as their NASCAR design and needed to be impressive. Plymouth had originally had Richard Petty as their driver before he left for Ford. The Superbird was designed specifically for Petty to get him back. It worked and he won 8 races that year! Due to upcoming NASCAR regulations, this was the only year the Superbird would be valid in NASCAR and as such, it was the only year they produced it for the street as well.
Powerful Design
The design of the Superbird is all about length and size. The rear spoiler is simply immense. The front end is so long and the flip up lights added over another foot to the car. It provided some excellent aerodynamics. Or did it? The truth was that the aerodynamics and extra weight actually didn’t help the road version in sprints or quarter miles. The aerodynamics were tuned for high speed. This meant that at low speeds it was actually a bit slower than the Roadrunner it was based on. However get it up over 60 miles per hour and let the down force go to work. It was stable and frighteningly fast.
