Dodge Super Bee 1969 images

Dodge built the Super Bee as a stripped-price alternative to its own Road Runner, but partway through 1969 it quietly added the 440 Six Pack — three two-barrel Holleys good for 390 horsepower — and only 1,907 cars ever left the factory with that combination. That makes the Six Pack Super Bee rarer than most people assume for a car built around the idea of cheap speed. Whether you got the common 383 Magnum, the scarce Six Pack, or the legendary Hemi, every ’69 Super Bee proves Dodge’s budget muscle car was never actually a budget performer.

The Super Bee is a bare bones Dodge CoronetÂ – made to go fast and made without any frills to keep the lowest price possible, but maximum power and performance is the goal. The Super Bee does have the Hurst Competition-Plus shift stick, a four speed and the dashboard instrument cluster is identical to the Charger. TheÂ optional hemi engine did kick the price price up more than 30 percent over the base price, which explains why the 1970 Hemi version is rare today-there were only 128 of them sold. Â The base engine is the 383 magnum for 335 hp ((249 kW), add the “six pack” for a boost or theÂ 426 Hemi which is rated at 425 hp (317 kW). The 440 engine could only be ordered with the more uptown Coronet R/T.

⚑ Featured Gear

Start Car Conversations →

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Our thanks to Gateway Classic cars for the images displayed here of a 1969 SuperBee

Everybody talks about the Hemi cars, but the real story of the ’69 Super Bee is what Dodge did partway through the model year to give budget-minded street racers a shot at serious performance without Hemi money down. A mid-year running change quietly turned one specific engine option into one of the rarest combinations in the entire Super Bee lineup — rarer, in raw numbers, than most people assume. Fewer than two thousand cars ever got it, buried inside a car that most enthusiasts think of as Dodge’s cheap, no-frills muscle special. What was Dodge trying to prove by building a stripped-down bargain car this serious?

The Six Pack Nobody Expected on a Budget Car

Midway through 1969, Dodge added the A12-code 440 Six Pack option to the Super Bee lineup — three two-barrel Holley carburetors feeding the 440, rated at 390 horsepower and 490 lb-ft of torque, with the fifth digit of the VIN switching to an M to mark it. Only 1,907 of these cars were built, which makes the Six Pack Super Bee genuinely rare for a car that was conceived as Dodge’s stripped-price alternative to its own Road Runner.

A Bargain Car With a Serious Engine Bay

Stack that against the base 383 Magnum — 335 horsepower and by far the most common engine in the lineup at roughly 25,727 built — and you start to see what made the Super Bee such a sleeper. Dodge built it with a Hurst shifter and the same dashboard instrument cluster as the Charger, then let buyers option their way into a car that could run with almost anything on the strip if they checked the right boxes. That’s the appeal of a “no-frills” muscle car: it never actually felt cheap once the tach needle started climbing.

Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Republished by Blog Post Promoter