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The first car ever to wear the Dodge Charger name was built to introduce America to the 426 Hemi, but the engine slated for it got pulled at the last minute to save a race team’s season. What actually powered this showcar for years was a secret hiding in plain sight. Decades later, a full restoration finally gave it the Hemi it was always supposed to have, and turned it into a seven-figure piece of Mopar history.
This 1963 Plymouth Sport Fury doesn’t look like a race car — and that’s the point. Under a conservative full-size body sits Chrysler’s factory 426 Max Wedge, a 415-horsepower dual-quad engine serious enough to have impressed drag racing legend Don Garlits himself. One commenter called it “the Hellcat of its time,” a sleeper built a full year before Pontiac’s GTO popularized the muscle car formula. Watch to see what’s hiding under that Sport Fury badge.
No scoops, no stripes, just dog-dish wheels and a stripped interior, this 1963 Plymouth Sport Fury looks like nothing special until you learn what is under the hood: a 426 Max Wedge Super Stock V8 making an advertised 415 horsepower. One commenter says with modern tires and race gas, it would run 10-second quarter miles today. See why Mopar collectors call these early B-bodies brutes.