1967 was the year the Plymouth Satellite got quietly outranked by its own family. The new Belvedere GTX arrived that year with a 440 wedgehead V8 and the 426 Hemi, an engine Plymouth had already been selling in the Satellite since 1966. The Satellite carried on as Plymouth’s value performance pick, powered by a 383 available with either a two-barrel or four-barrel carburetor. Here’s how the B-body pecking order shifted in a single model year.
The Satellite is on the Chrysler “B”platform and is the premium trim level for the Belvedere for the first two years of production. In ’67 it is the mid-priced offering, with the new GTX version taking top spot. More changes for ’67 include a new grill and a revised rear clip with new look taillights, but the Satellite is only available as a 2-door hard top or the convertible. The 383 is the standard engine and it would be mounted with a 2-barrel carburetor or a 4-barrel is also on the option sheet.
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For two years, the Satellite was as good as it got if you wanted the sportiest Plymouth money could buy — then 1967 happened, and it got bumped down a rung on its own family tree. A new performance flagship arrived that year wearing a 440-cubic-inch wedgehead V8 and, for the first time, a genuine Hemi option, instantly making the Satellite look like the sensible choice by comparison. It didn’t disappear or get diminished under the hood, though; if anything, this was still a car with real engine options while the lineup reshuffled around it. What exactly changed for the car that used to be Plymouth’s top dog?
Dethroned by Its Own Sibling
The new arrival was the Belvedere GTX, and it landed above the Satellite in Chrysler’s B-body hierarchy with a silver-and-black grille and rear deck panel, simulated hood air intakes, sport striping, and big dual exhausts to match the attitude. The Hemi came along with it, though it was hardly new to the B-body. Chrysler had made the 426 Street Hemi a regular Satellite and Belvedere II option back in 1966; what changed for ’67 was that it now sat at the top of the GTX order sheet, alongside a 440-cid wedgehead “Super Commando” V8 rated at 375 horsepower. The Satellite carried on as a two-door hardtop or convertible, still V8-only across the board, but no longer the flashiest thing wearing a Plymouth badge.
What You Could Still Order
Across the Belvedere/Satellite/GTX family, Chrysler’s 1967 B-body engine sheet ran from a 225 slant six in the stripper Belvedere, up through a 180-horsepower 273 V8, all the way to the 426 Hemi and 440 Super Commando reserved for the range-topping GTX. The Satellite itself carried on as the volume performance choice, with its 383 doing the heavy lifting — a two-barrel version for buyers who wanted looks more than launches, and an optional four-barrel for those who didn’t.
Why the 383 Satellite Still Made Sense
It was a formula that worked precisely because it undercut the GTX on price without asking much in everyday drivability, which is exactly why so many surviving Satellites, like the hardtop and convertible pictured here, still turn up in good original condition today.
The B-Body Platform Underneath It All
The Satellite, Belvedere, and GTX all rode on Chrysler’s B-body platform, a chassis that also underpinned the Charger and Coronet, giving Mopar a single structural architecture flexible enough to support everything from a fleet-spec six-cylinder sedan to a 426 Hemi drag weapon wearing an entirely different badge.
1967’s Restyle Was More Than Skin Deep
Beyond the new grille and taillights, 1967 brought a genuine sheet-metal update to the B-body cars, part of Chrysler’s habit of refreshing its intermediate lineup every two to three years to keep pace with GM and Ford’s own mid-size redesigns during the most competitive stretch of the muscle car era.
The Satellite’s Place in Plymouth’s Broader Lineup
Plymouth positioned the Satellite between the workaday Belvedere I and II and the performance-first GTX, giving buyers who wanted bucket seats, extra brightwork, and a V8 as standard equipment a genuine step up without committing to the GTX’s image or insurance premium.
Why 383 Cars Are the Ones Still Around
Because the 383 was the volume engine across Chrysler’s B-body lineup in the late 1960s, it remains one of the most common finds in surviving Satellites and Belvederes today, whereas genuine 440- and Hemi-powered GTX survivors are exponentially rarer and priced accordingly on today’s collector market.
A Two-Year Window Before the Next Redesign
The Satellite’s mid-1960s B-body styling carried through 1967 and one more model year before Chrysler redesigned the platform again for 1968, meaning cars like this one represent a specific, relatively short-lived styling generation within Mopar’s intermediate history.
Bucket Seats and a Console: Standard Equipment That Mattered
Unlike the base Belvedere, the Satellite came standard with front bucket seats and a center console, giving it a sportier cockpit feel that buyers of the era genuinely valued even before considering engine output — a detail that separated it from cheaper Chrysler intermediates on the same showroom floor.
How the GTX Changed Without Killing the Satellite’s Appeal
Rather than discontinuing the Satellite once the GTX arrived, Plymouth kept both in the lineup side by side through the rest of the 1960s, a strategy that let the brand cover both the value-performance buyer and the full-tilt muscle car buyer from a single dealer showroom.
How Chrysler Marketed the Satellite Against Detroit’s Best
Plymouth’s advertising for the Satellite in the late 1960s leaned heavily on value, positioning it as a genuine performance car available to buyers who couldn’t or wouldn’t stretch for a GTO, an SS 396, or the brand’s own GTX. That value-first pitch worked well enough that the Satellite name outlived most of its direct rivals, continuing into the 1970s even as the broader muscle car market began contracting under the weight of insurance surcharges and tightening federal emissions rules.
A Two-Door-Only Formula That Worked
Restricting the Satellite to hardtop and convertible body styles, rather than also offering a four-door sedan as Chrysler did with the base Belvedere, kept the nameplate’s image squarely sporty rather than diluted by a family-hauler variant wearing the same badge.
One Detail Worth Remembering
For all the attention the GTX and Hemi got in 1967, it was mid-tier cars like this Satellite that actually kept Plymouth’s intermediate lineup profitable in dealer showrooms across the country.
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