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This vintage road test captures a 1971 Dodge Challenger 383 exactly as period buyers would have experienced it, with no idea yet that the model would go on to become a genuine collector icon. The 383 sat as the attainable middle option below the 440 and Hemi, the version most real buyers actually drove home. Watching it judged on its own contemporary terms reveals something modern reviews cannot. See what the era actually thought of it.
Arizona’s Concours in the Hills pulled in more than 1,000 cars this year, and the American muscle parked among the exotics proved it still owns the crowd. Here’s what went down at Fountain Hills’ biggest annual car show — and why the Fords, Dodges, and Chevys held their own against six-figure supercars.
The Dodge Dart GTS took Chrysler’s compact and turned it into a giant-killer, cramming big-block muscle into a lightweight body most rivals underestimated. This episode of American Muscle Car digs into how a humble economy platform became one of the era’s sleeper legends. It is the story of Mopar engineers refusing to leave well enough alone.
Dodge’s Super Bee ran a full four-year spread of engine options, from a stout 383 all the way up to the legendary 426 Hemi, but the rarest combination of them all was the mid-1969 A12 Six-Pack. Only 1,907 of those 440 Six-Pack cars were built, and the Hemi option was even scarcer at just 125 units. It’s a lineup that proves not every muscle car icon needed a household name to earn its reputation.
Nobody warned the other muscle cars. Dodge showed up with 707 horsepower, a supercharger whine that resets your heartbeat, and one simple question for every rival on the road: are you still sure you want to race? More than 1.4 million people have watched Autotrader put the Challenger SRT Hellcat through its paces — and almost none of them expected the real question that comes next: is this actually the last great American muscle car?
The Dodge Challenger, revving into the scene in 1970, was Chrysler’s late entry into the pony car race, sporting a design inspired by the Charger. Despite muscle car sales tanking by ’71, the Challenger made a valiant effort with options ranging from a humble six-cylinder to a monstrous 426 Hemi. As the years rolled on, it shifted from R/T to Rallye, losing its shaker hood but keeping its cool. With 165,437 units cruising off the line by ’74, the Challenger’s first-gen was a wild ride!
Dodge didn’t just one-up its own 707-horsepower Hellcat, it built a Challenger so quick that NHRA’s own rulebook technically has a problem with it. The Demon’s 840 horsepower, 9.65-second quarter mile, and Guinness-certified wheelstand all come from a Hemi V8 that shares its bones with the Hellcat but carries 25 real engineering changes underneath. This is what happens when a factory stops holding back.
Did Google just spill the beans on the 2017 Ford Mustang Shelby GT500? It seems like the cat might be out of the bag, as Ford enthusiasts have been spotting camouflaged prototypes zipping around for a while now. Most folks thought this beast would roar into 2018, but surprise—2017 might be the year! Is Google playing Santa with this muscle car secret, or are we all just jumping the gun? Either way, it looks like Ford’s gearing up to unleash something wild pretty soon!
Dodge set out to build a Challenger that beat its own 707-horsepower Hellcat and back it up with more onboard technology than any SRT before it. The Demon’s New York Auto Show debut delivered both: an 840-horsepower Hemi and drag-strip-specific tech most manufacturers reserve for actual race cars. It’s proof that fast and sophisticated don’t have to be mutually exclusive in Detroit.
This 1968 lineup photo puts three very different Dodges side by side: the lightweight Dart GTS, the full-size Coronet R/T, and the radically styled Charger R/T. Each one represented a different bet on what muscle car buyers wanted that year, light weight and agility, big-block brute force, or head-turning design. The Coronet R/T’s Hemi option was built in numbers so small that survivors are among the rarest Mopars around today. Which one would you have driven off the lot in 1968?
Rumors chasing the Dodge Challenger SRT Demon”s horsepower figure climbed past 900 before SRT”s engineers ever finished their own testing. When the official SAE-certified number finally landed, it told a different story — one backed by an NHRA-certified quarter-mile run instead of internet speculation. Here is what the real number turned out to be, and why it did not need any exaggeration to make history.
Mr. Norm’s Grand Spaulding Dodge did not just sell Mopars, the legendary Chicago dealership modified, tuned, and raced them under its own name, building a reputation that still adds weight to any car proven to have come from its lot. This triple-black 1971 Challenger R/T packs a genuine 426 Hemi, pistol-grip 4-speed, and Super Track Pak, backed by an original Grand Spaulding bill of sale. It is Mopar history with the paperwork to prove it.
The Dodge Challenger SRT Demon hogs every headline in the Mopar world, but Dodge never stopped building a 707-horsepower muscle car that most buyers can actually walk into a dealership and drive home. Here is what the Hellcat brings to the table when it steps out of its more extreme sibling”s shadow, and why dismissing it as the consolation prize misses the point entirely.
A dyno room strips away every distraction and lets an engine speak for itself, and this classic blue 1968 Dodge Charger 383 had plenty to say at a Mopar show in Avondale, Arizona. Hosted by Mopars Unlimited of Arizona at a UTI Phoenix car show, the pull turned a routine dyno session into a genuine crowd moment. Turn the volume up before you watch this one.
Behind the muscle cars rolling through the South East Moparty Picnic is a Hollywood footnote almost nobody knows — the 1971 Hemi ‘Cuda convertible Don Johnson drove in Nash Bridges wasn’t really a ’71 at all, because Plymouth only ever built eleven of the real thing. Here’s how three modified 1970 convertibles became one of TV’s most famous muscle cars, and why Mopar loyalists still argue about it today.