Dodge Coronet 1969 images

This 1969 Dodge Coronet Super Bee carries the rare A12 package, a 463-dollar option that swapped in a 440-cubic-inch V8 wearing three two-barrel carburetors for one strange mid-year run. Only 1,907 were built before Dodge moved on. Stock, these cars ran mid-13-second quarter miles, embarrassing plenty of pricier machinery on the strip.

Dodge Coronet “Super-Bee” for 1969 is on the Chrysler B-body platform, along withÂ the Charger, and both models also share the same rear fascia and the Rallye instrument cluster. The A12 package was introduced mid-year 1969 which gives the Coronet a 440 engine mounted with the six pack-three two barrel Holly carburetors on an aluminium in-take manifold with a lift off fiberglass hood and secured with metal pins. Heavy duty suspension, 15 inch wheels and a host of other performance goodies are included, but for this one year only.

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Our thanks to Gateway Classic Cars for these images

When Plymouth’s Road Runner started outselling everything else in Dodge’s showroom, division boss Robert McCurry wanted an answer of his own. What his stylists came back with was the Super Bee, and for one strange half-season in 1969, it hid a secret most Road Runner buyers could not touch. Order the A12 package and 463 dollars bought a 440-cubic-inch V8 wearing three two-barrel Holley carburetors, a setup that split the difference between Dodge’s standard engine and the vastly more expensive 426 Hemi. Only 1,907 cars ever left the factory with it. Was it worth choosing something that rare over the car everyone already knew?

Half the Price of a Hemi, Almost All the Punch

The A12 package was rated at 390 horsepower and 490 lb-ft of torque, enough for mid-13-second quarter miles right off the showroom floor. Along with the triple-carb 440, buyers got a Dana 60 rear axle with 4.10 gears, heavy duty suspension, G70x15 tires on black steel wheels, and 11-inch drum brakes, all wrapped under the lift-off fiberglass hood secured with hood pins that this car still wears.

A Name Born From a Boardroom Contest

The Super Bee name itself came out of an internal Dodge styling contest, won by designer Harvey J. Winn, who built it around the Scat Pack bee medallion already used across Dodge performance models. Built on the Coronet two-door coupe from 1968 through 1970, the Super Bee was Dodge’s answer to the Road Runner at a lower price point than the Charger. Of the 1,907 A12 Super Bees built, 1,487 were hardtops, and only 661 of those came with the TorqueFlite automatic rather than the 4-speed manual.

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