Who likes '69 Charger 500s?

[hemi68charger]

I love the C500's...... 

[PocketThunder]

 

[Brock Samson]

 welp,.. the way i feel about it is,.. 

The Charger was allready the best looking car out there, then or since,.. Smoothing the rear window and flushing out the grill could hardly harm such a masterpiece,.. even the extra bright work on the A pillars just added a little gleam to a Car that allready had little,..
So, to my way of thinking, the '69 was a Maureen O'hara while the '69 Charger 500 a Scarlett Johansson and there ya' have it!
I wouldn't kick either outta the garage for leakin' steering fluid!


                                        1969 Charger




                                       1969 Charger 500

[Dans 68]

Geez, Dave, have you ever answered a thread, or started one, that didn't have a photo or two? 

I like 'em both. And the Daytona. And the 'bird. And the ....

A honest answer from yet another '68 owner. 

Dan

[Brock Samson]

Hummm?..    what actress is the DAYTONA then?.. 

[Dans 68]

Hummm?..    what actress is the DAYTONA then?.. 

Catherine Zeta-Jones. 

Dan

[Back N Black]

Hummm?..    what actress is the DAYTONA then?.. 

Here is the actress for the Daytona! 

[Brock Samson]

 Oh, no you didn't!..    good thing the wing guys never come over here...   

[TylerCharger69]

Ewwww....that doesn't even look like a Mopar.....more like an old Ford Pinto with lots of bondo

[Back N Black]

Oh, no you didn't!..    good thing the wing guys never come over here...   

Here is a pic of the first Daytona prototype.

[WINGR]

Actually I think that might be one of them Monster Trucks.

Back to the topic, I love the regular 69 Charger but like the C500 more. I think it has alot to do with the Nascar racing heritage as well as it's race car look. As other members mentioned, I even like it's looks better than the Daytona, although I like them alot also.

WINGR

[moparstuart]

Hummm?..    what actress is the DAYTONA then?.. 

Here is the actress for the Daytona! 

NOT !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


more like this  she's got a big nose but still a beauty

[Paul 500]

I've got a 68 R/T & a 69 500, i just love chargers

[Aero426]

Tell me this isn't an aggressive look...

[Mike DC]

Sue me, but I think Mopar took all the aero cars too far.  Particularly the Daytonas.  


If I had been running Dodge at the time, I would have looked at the Daytona rough sketch and said "Are you on drugs?!?  We could build it but NASCAR won't let us actually use that thing very long."  

They're badass cars for enthusiasts like us, but I think they were a dumb decision at the corporate level.  They incurred most of the conversion costs & appearance changes for just a small portion of the total aero gains.  IMHO the Ford versions were smarter executions of the concept when you take all the off-track factors into account.  

[hemi68charger]

Tell me this isn't an aggressive look...

That's one version I might entertain when I eventually repaint my future C500.....

[maxwellwedge]

Oh, no you didn't!..    good thing the wing guys never come over here...   

Yeah!

[69_500]

Personally I like the C500's but then again I might be biased. Granted I do have one, but I think everyone here knows that I'd drop it in a heartbeat for a Daytona. Hands down the 1969 Dodge Daytona is the greatest looking automobile ever assembled.

I do like going to local shows in the 500 though because out of the 500 people that walk around maybe 1-2 of them will actually notice that it isn't a 69 R/T.

[maxwellwedge]

I love all Mopars but my faves are the "Package Cars". Cars that were built to serve a purpose in some form of racing.

The Max Wedge
The 426 Hemi
The A990
The 68 Hemi A-Bodies
The M-Code A-Bodies
The A12's
The C500
The Daytona
The Superbird
The T/A and AAR

Mopar did what it needed to win and in doing so created some of the coolest, wildest street cars ever and that is one of the reasons I love Mopars over the others.

All Chargers are cool. What makes one better than the other is strictly personal taste.

[WINGMAN]

  I like my 69 500 because it is different and only about 231 people on this planet have one, the down side to owning one is almost no one knows what it is  , so almost every time i go to a car cruse with it you spend lotts of time explaining the different things about a 500 over a regular 69 Charger. O well  The price of having one.  Jay.

[C500]

I like the 500 car better as a whole because of the Nascar history and the rarity.

Now, IMO the 69 grill is cooler and more menacing looking than a 500 grill. If the regular 69 had the exposed headlights, and the 500 had the grill the regular 69 has, I reckon the value and desirability of the 500 would be way more than it is now.  Imagine only 392 cars with the hidden headlight grille. 

[Brock Samson]

 that's an interesting thought... 

I sure don't like the 500 grill as much they even look a lot like a Ford or Merc, but over the years I associate them now with efficiency and exclusivity, the rear window just looks slick there's no other word for it...
  The Daytona looks Sick - especially in stock form, they need to be lowered and raked with the front wheels tucked up and really fat tires... and wild paint combos. I pretty damn bored with all the stock ones nowadays...
  There I said it. 

[Aero426]

If I had been running Dodge at the time, I would have looked at the Daytona rough sketch and said "Are you on drugs?!?  

I am quite sure those words were uttered by more than one person within the company, including the styling people.   There were people within the company concerned over how the cars would affect Chrysler's image five years down the road as a beat up used car.   Thankfully, Bob McCurry was there to push the cars through.  

I don't think there was a lot of concern over how long the cars would run.    They got over a full season out of them, and the next step would have been to make the 1971 aero cars competitive.    We forget now, that at the time, styling and design was still year to year.

They're badass cars for enthusiasts like us, but I think they were a dumb decision at the corporate level.  They incurred most of the conversion costs & appearance changes for just a small portion of the total aero gains.  IMHO the Ford versions were smarter executions of the concept when you take all the off-track factors into account.  

How is producing a car that gave you measurable advertising and promotional value a dumb thing?   It got Dodge mentioned in every enthusiast publication and more, over and over.

Keep in mind that Ford had their own "Nuclear Option" on the table.  Had Bunkie Knudsen not been fired,  it probably would have happened.    Chrysler would then have had to up the ante with trying to make the '71 wing cars competitive.  

As to what Chrysler's true costs were?    I am sure they lost money on the cars themselves.    But they got a ton of free advertising and publicity.   It got people talking.  

[Mike DC]

I don't think there was a lot of concern over how long the cars would run.    They got over a full season out of them, and the next step would have been to make the 1971 aero cars competitive.    We forget now, that at the time, styling and design was still year to year.

Yes, but to be honest I'm surprised that Bill France ever allowed the first wing/nosecone car into a race.  NASCAR was/is a total dictatorship.  The Frances have made a family tradition out of rewriting the rules, completely on the fly, to just to shove one guy or one modification off the track.  

The series was selling the image of nearly "stock" cars.  Then Dodge wants to show up with a few hundred Chargers that literally looked like Navy jets next to almost 100,000 stockers selling every year?  

How is producing a car that gave you measurable advertising and promotional value a dumb thing?   It got Dodge mentioned in every enthusiast publication and more, over and over.

Keep in mind that Ford had their own "Nuclear Option" on the table.  Had Bunkie Knudsen not been fired,  it probably would have happened.    Chrysler would then have had to up the ante with trying to make the '71 wing cars competitive.  

I wasn't trying to argue against the whole concept of aero-mod cars, just the way that Mopar did some things on them.  


The rear window plug incurred most of the expense & inconvenience when they broke through the trunklid opening and had to redo the weatherseal, shorten the trunklid & recap the end of it, move the hinges, etc.  They could have just made the bottom few inches of the plug be a separate piece that went onto the top of the (stock) trunklid rather than reducing size of the lid so much.

The Mopar nosecone is more aerodynamic than the Talladega/Cyclone front ends, but the Ford/Merc solution was acres more practical.  It didn't look ridiculous & non-stock, it preserved a real bumper, the grille opening was large enough to keep the car cool, it didn't require a whole flip-up headlight assembly, etc.  

The rocker panel thing that Ford did was a stroke of genius too.  Another case of big on-track gains for very small appearance & cost compromises.  

I don't see why the Mopar rear wings weren't just fastened to the trunklids instead of being 2 feet off the deck for the trunklid to open under it.  The street cars didn't really need the wings mounted that strongly.  The racers could have easily just fabbed up some bracing inside the trunk to rest against the underside of the trunklid below the wing supports.

---------------------------------------------


It's not that I don't like the Mopar wing cars.  They were still very badass uncompromised vehicles.  

I just have grown to admire how much more practical the Ford stuff was.  They were thinking like a company that was planning to be working another aero-model under NASCAR's nose every year,and then having to build enough of them to satisfy NASCAR that they actually were stock vehicles.


                     

[Highbanked Hauler]

  I like my 69 500 because it is different and only about 231 people on this planet have one, the down side to owning one is almost no one knows what it is  , so almost every time i go to a car cruse with it you spend lotts of time explaining the different things about a 500 over a regular 69 Charger. O well  The price of having one.  Jay.

231, that's the number of 500S that exist??