Plymouth Barracuda 1970 and 1971

In 1970, Plymouth gave the Barracuda an entirely new body just to make room for the 426 Hemi — something the old Valiant-based platform could never have handled. The two model years that followed brought colors named “Moulin Rouge” and “Sassy Grass Green,” a four-headlight styling change found in no other year, and a Hemi-powered racing chapter that oddly plays out better in France than in America. Read on to find out what made this brief window so collectible.

For most of the 1960s, if you wanted a Plymouth Barracuda, you were really buying a dressed-up Valiant with a fastback roof — an economy car wearing a sportier hat. That changed completely in 1970, when Plymouth tore up the formula and built an entirely new body specifically to make room for something the old Barracuda could never have handled: a 426 Hemi. What followed was a two-year window, gone almost as fast as it arrived, that produced some of the most collectible muscle cars Detroit ever built — and at least one racing story that ends in France, of all places.

A New Body Built Around a Bigger Engine

The single most important change for 1970 wasn’t cosmetic — it was structural. Plymouth moved the Barracuda onto Chrysler’s new “E-body” platform, engineered from the outset with a larger engine bay specifically to accommodate the 426-cubic-inch Hemi. That single decision severed the Barracuda’s remaining ties to the Valiant and let Plymouth market the high-performance versions under their own identity: the ‘Cuda. For the first time, the nameplate wasn’t compromising engine bay space for economy-car packaging; it was designed around the possibility of the biggest engine Chrysler built.

⚑ Featured Gear

Start Car Conversations →

← Prev Next →

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Vitamin C, Moulin Rouge, and the Loudest Color Palette in Detroit

Plymouth matched the new body’s ambitions with an equally aggressive color lineup, offering shades like “Vitamin C,” “In Violet,” “Sassy Grass Green,” and “Moulin Rouge” — names as bold as the paint itself. Buyers who wanted an even more aggressive look could add factory decal packages on top. The lineup split into three trims: the base Barracuda, a more luxurious Gran Coupe, and a sport-oriented model, with the highest-performance versions across the range marketed under the ‘Cuda badge. A convertible remained available across the range, and every configuration shared the same dimensions — a 108-inch wheelbase, 186.6 inches of overall length, 74.9 inches of width, and a curb weight around 3,395 pounds.

Six Engines, From Economy Six to Street Hemi

The 1970-1971 Barracuda’s engine sheet ran the full spectrum of what Chrysler built. Entry-level buyers got a choice of two inline-sixes, a 198-cubic-inch or a 225-cubic-inch “slant six.” Stepping up brought four V8 options: a 318, a 340 four-barrel rated at 275 horsepower, a two-barrel 383 with single exhaust, and a four-barrel 383 with dual exhaust rated at 330 horsepower. At the top of the sheet sat the serious performance hardware: a 440-cubic-inch Wedge rated at 375 horsepower, a 440 six-barrel running its distinctive trio of two-barrel carburetors and rated at 390 horsepower, and the 426 Hemi.

The Trade-Off That Came With All That Engine

Ordering any of the three top-tier engines — the 440 six-pack, the Hemi, or the 440 Wedge — brought upgraded suspension and additional structural reinforcement as standard equipment, since the extra weight over the front axle demanded it. That heavy front end came with a real handling penalty: contemporary reports and later owners consistently noted that the big-block and Hemi ‘Cudas were genuinely difficult to manage through curves and turns, a direct consequence of stuffing so much iron ahead of the front wheels on a relatively compact platform. Transmission choices ran from a base three-speed manual through the three-speed TorqueFlite automatic, with a four-speed manual available as an option.

1971: One Year, Four Headlights, and a Simplified Engine Sheet

The 1971 model year brought cosmetic revisions to the grille, taillights, and trim details, but two changes stand out as genuinely unique to that single year: 1971 is the only year the Barracuda used a four-headlight system, and the only year it featured distinctive fender “gills.” Under the hood, the options carried over almost unchanged from 1970, with one notable exception — the 440 four-barrel disappeared from the order sheet entirely, meaning every 440-equipped 1971 ‘Cuda came exclusively with the six-barrel carburetor setup.

The Shaker Hood and the Axle Built to Survive It

Across both model years, the “shaker hood” — a scoop that poked through the hood and visibly shook with the engine’s movement — remained one of the most popular options buyers could check. Underneath, the heavy-duty Dana 60 rear axle came standard on most of the higher-output engine options and was mandatory with the four-speed manual transmission, a pairing built to handle the torque of the Hemi and 440 without breaking under hard launches.

A Quiet Run at Trans-Am Glory

The 1970 Barracuda also had a genuine, if largely unheralded, racing chapter. Two American drivers qualified for three pole positions in the 1970 Trans-Am Series behind the wheel of a ‘Cuda, though neither converted that speed into a win or a podium finish that season. The car came closer to real results in a different form: a street-legal ‘Cuda running the 340 engine with a six-pack carburetor setup finished second at Road America, proving the platform could compete even without the Hemi’s extra displacement.

The Hemi ‘Cudas That Went Racing in France

The more surprising racing story belongs to a small batch of four 1970 Hemi-powered ‘Cudas that were sent overseas to compete in France. Away from the American Trans-Am circuit, these cars fared considerably better than their domestic counterparts — one of the four went on to win three track races and a hill-climbing event over the course of its two-year competition life, a genuinely unusual footnote for a car built and sold as an American street machine. It’s a small detail that underscores just how capable the 1970-1971 ‘Cuda platform actually was, on either side of the Atlantic. That international detour is easy to overlook next to the more heavily documented American Trans-Am campaigns, but it’s a reminder that the E-body ‘Cuda wasn’t just built to look fast in a showroom — it was engineered with enough underlying capability that privateers on a different continent, running a different set of rules, could put it on top of the podium. Between the styling that only lasted a single model year, the engine options that ranged from a economy slant six all the way to the 426 Hemi, and a genuinely global racing footprint, the 1970 and 1971 ‘Cuda represent a two-year snapshot of Chrysler at its most ambitious — a window that closed almost as quickly as it opened.

Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Republished by Blog Post Promoter

Related posts:

1970 Plymouth Hemi Barracuda Dodge Super-Bee 1968 to 1970 Early Muscle to the 1970 Plymouth Superbird Plymouth Barracuda 1970 and 1971 Big Muscle Dodge Dart 1968 426 Hurst-Hemi Chrysler Hemi Power- Hemispherical by design-1 of 5 Chrysler Hemi Power 2 of 5 Chrysler Hemi from 2003—The Third Generation—part 5 of 5 Dodge Charger & Charger R/T 1968-1970 Ford Mustang 1969-`70-The Boss 429