Dodge Charger 1970 – brutal V8 and exhaust sound!

A 1970 Dodge Charger can hide anything from a mild 318 to a snarling 440 Six Pack under that Coke-bottle sheet metal, and the difference shows the instant the throttle opens. Here is what separated the base R/T 440 Magnum from the Six Pack and the Hemi, why the 1970 car was the last and most refined of the second generation, and why collectors still chase the numbers-matching examples. Read on to find out what is really making that exhaust note.

Pop the hood on a 1970 Dodge Charger and you never know what you are going to find, and that uncertainty is half the fun of this generation. Some cars from this era hid a mild 318 under that unmistakable Coke-bottle sheet metal, built for buyers who just wanted the look. Others, like the one that inspired this post, were built to make grown adults flinch the second the throttle opens. The second-generation Charger already had one of the meanest silhouettes Detroit ever drew. Back it with the right engine, and it stops being a car and starts being a warning. So what is actually making that exhaust note, and why does it hit differently than a small-block ever could?

The Charger That Redefined Menace

Dodge completely reskinned the Charger for 1968, and by 1970 the formula was fully dialed in: long hood, flying-buttress rear window, and a full-width grille that looked like it was drawn by someone who wanted to intimidate Camaros at stoplights. For 1970 that grille gained a chrome loop bumper wrapping the whole front, and the taillights were reworked into a full-width panel. The R/T package was the one to have if you wanted the car to back up its looks, adding heavy-duty suspension, dual exhaust, and a standard 440 Magnum V8 as the base engine. That alone tells you what kind of buyer Dodge was chasing with this body style.

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440 Magnum vs. Six Pack: Two Kinds of Angry

The standard R/T engine was the 440 Magnum, a single four-barrel setup factory-rated at 375 horsepower. Order the 440 Six Pack option and Dodge handed you three two-barrel Holley carburetors on an aluminum intake, bumping the rating to 390 horsepower and 490 lb-ft of torque, a number that still sounds enormous on paper today. Cars with the Six Pack were running the quarter-mile in the high 13s, which for a full-size muscle coupe in 1970 was legitimately quick. The exhaust note tells the two apart, too: the Six Pack’s outboard carburetors snap open under hard throttle and the intake roar joins the exhaust in a way the single four-barrel never quite matches.

The Hemi Sat Above Them Both

At the top of the order sheet sat the 426 Hemi, rated at 425 horsepower with 490 lb-ft, and priced high enough that very few 1970 Charger buyers checked the box. The Hemi was a race engine tamed for the street, with hemispherical combustion chambers, dual four-barrel carburetors, and a solid-lifter camshaft that made it lumpy at idle and ferocious above 4,000 rpm. A Hemi Charger sounds different again from a 440, with a sharper, more mechanical edge to the exhaust. Whether a given car carries a Magnum, a Six Pack, or a Hemi is the first question any Mopar fan asks when a 1970 R/T rolls into a show.

The Exhaust Note Explained

What makes a big-block Mopar sound the way it does comes down to displacement and cam timing. A 440 turns over slowly at idle with a deep, loping beat because each cylinder is moving a large volume of air, and the factory dual exhaust with its low-restriction mufflers lets that pulse through with little filtering. Add a performance camshaft with more overlap and the idle becomes choppy, the sound Mopar people describe as brutal. Under load, the note climbs into a hard, flat bark that a small-block cannot produce because its smaller cylinders simply do not move as much air per stroke.

1970: The Last Year of the Second Generation

The 1970 model year was the swan song for the 1968 through 1970 body. For 1971 Dodge introduced a completely new fuselage-styled Charger on a shorter wheelbase, and while that car had its fans, it never captured the raw menace of the second generation. That makes 1970 the most developed version of the shape, with three years of refinement behind it and a few unique touches: the loop bumper, the new taillight panel, a fresh interior with high-back bucket seats, and the availability of a longitudinal R/T stripe along the doors in place of the bumblebee tail stripe.

Rarity by the Numbers

Charger sales fell sharply in 1970 as insurance surcharges and rising prices cooled the market. Dodge sold roughly 10,000 R/T models that year, a fraction of the totals from 1968 and 1969, and only a small slice of those carried the Six Pack or the Hemi. Because so many were driven hard, raced, and crashed in the decades that followed, the number of surviving numbers-matching R/Ts is far smaller than the production totals suggest. That is why documented cars with their original drivetrain and a broadcast sheet in the seat springs draw such attention when they surface.

Reading the Fender Tag

Verifying a 1970 Charger is a matter of decoding the fender tag and the VIN. The fifth character of the VIN identifies the engine, and the fender tag lists the paint code, trim, options, and build date. A car that started life as a 318 coupe can be dressed up to look like an R/T with a few emblems and a hood, so buyers rely on those codes and, ideally, the original broadcast sheet. A documented 440 Six Pack car commands a substantial premium over a clone, and a Hemi car sits in a different price bracket entirely, so the paperwork matters as much as the sheet metal.

What to Watch for on a Driver

Second-generation Chargers rust in the trunk floor, the rear window channel behind those flying buttresses, the lower quarters, and the front frame rails near the torsion bar crossmember. The vinyl top, if fitted, hides roof rust that only shows up when it is peeled back. On the mechanical side, the torsion-bar front suspension is durable but wears its bushings and ball joints, and the big-block cars can run warm in traffic if the radiator is tired. None of this is a deal breaker, and the aftermarket supports the body well, but it is worth a close look before buying.

Why These Numbers Still Matter to Collectors

Decades later, the gap between a garden-variety 1970 Charger and a documented R/T with the 440 Six Pack is the difference between a nice driver and a six-figure auction result. Numbers-matching Six Pack cars in good condition are some of the most sought-after B-body Mopars on the market, and for good reason: Dodge only built so many, and fewer still survive with their original drivetrain intact. Hemi cars sit at the very top. Whether this particular car is running the Magnum, the Six Pack, or the Hemi, that exhaust note is doing exactly what Dodge engineers designed it to do more than fifty years ago.

The Warning Still Works

The reason a 1970 Charger still stops people in a parking lot is that the car communicates before it moves. The long hood, the hidden headlights, the tucked-in rear glass, and the low stance say something serious is about to happen, and the moment a big-block fires, the sound confirms it. Few cars from any era pair looks and voice so completely. That is why enthusiasts still argue about which engine a given car carries, why clones are built by the hundreds, and why an original R/T with the right numbers remains one of the most desirable Mopars ever built.

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