When we last checked in with the Dodge Boys, it was 1965, and the success of the Ford Mustang had Dodge dealers up in arms, calling for their own entry into the booming 'specialty car' market. Plymouth had the Barracuda, a fastback version of the compact Valiant, but Dodge had nothing. Bowing to pressure from dealers and division managers, Chrysler president Lynn Townsend had authorized the creation of a new, sporty Dodge, but told Dodge Division chief engineer and product planner Burt Bouwkamp not to base it on the Barracuda. The result of Bouwkamp's efforts, as we have seen, was the mid-size, Coronet-based Dodge Charger of 1966-1967, which proved to be something of a flop.

Not long after the second-generation Barracuda bowed in November 1966, Chrysler's Advanced Styling studio began design work on the third-generation car, which was slated to bow for the 1970 model year. It was an important project, because the sporty car market was continuing to heat up. The Chevrolet Camaro had just gone on sale, as had the Mercury Cougar, a plusher version of the Mustang. Pontiac's Firebird was only a few months away, and even AMC was planning to get into the act with its sporty Javelin. These "pony cars" would ultimately account for about 13% of all U.S. car sales for the 1967 model year. With numbers like that, Dodge definitely wanted a piece of the action, and so it was decided that the third-generation Barracuda would be joined by a Dodge version, called Challenger.


The Challenger's nose looks very similar to its Barracuda sibling in general theme, although the Barracuda is distinguished by single headlamps and a different grille treatment (Barracudas have a divided horizontal slot, painted argent). Chrysler stylists had wanted to use a body-colored, deformable urethane nose, à la the contemporary Pontiac GTO, which is why the bumpers are sunken into the front and rear fenders. Unfortunately, the technology was beyond the E-body's development budget, although "Elastometric" urethane bumper covers, painted body color, were optional.

When several divisions of a car company offer vehicles in the same class, it's almost inevitable that the resulting cars will be variations of the same design, a strategy known as platform sharing. At GM in those days, the individual divisions shared body shells, but had unique chassis, engines, and sometimes transmissions. At Ford and Chrysler, which lacked the depth of GM's resources, the different divisions shared chassis and powertrains, as well as bodies and other hardware. It was no surprise, then, that the third-generation Barracuda and its new Dodge sibling shared the same basic unit body, as well as the same engines, transmissions, brakes, and suspension layout.

The new cars would be bigger than the outgoing Barracuda, sharing a new, bulkier "E-body" shell. The earlier Barracudas had been based on the A-body of the compact Plymouth Valiant. The A-body had enjoyed a reputation for nimble handling, but its engine compartment had been designed for smaller engines: Chrysler's "slant six" and small-block, LA-series V8s. When the competition began offering big-block engines in the Mustang and Camaro, Plymouth managed to cram the big B-series 383 (6.3 L) engine into the Barracuda, but it was such a tight fit that power steering and air conditioning were out of the question. To ensure that the E-body would have room for any Chrysler engine, the Barracuda and Challenger shared the cowl dimensions (the body cross-section just forward of the windshield) of the B-body Charger and Coronet. That provided plenty of room and made the E-body somewhat more economical to build, but made it substantially wider and heavier than the A-body Barracuda.


Since the Challenger shares its body shell with the contemporary Plymouth Barracuda, it's difficult to tell them apart at a distance unless you know what you're looking for. Their proportions are very similar and their roof lines almost identical, but the Challenger is larger than its Plymouth sibling, both in wheelbase (110 inches (2,794 mm) versus 108 (2,743 mm)) and overall length (191.3 inches (4,859 mm) versus 186.7 (4,742 mm)). R/Ts came with stronger body reinforcements and a heavy-duty "Rallye" suspension; this one also has front disc brakes. Styled wheels were optional, although this car's great-looking Cragar alloys are aftermarket additions.

With shared body shells and running gear, differentiating the Challenger from the Barracuda presented a challenge for Chrysler stylists. The two cars were styled separately -- the Challenger was primarily the work of stylist Carl Cameron, who also penned the first-generation Charger, while the Barracuda was drawn by John Herlitz of the Plymouth studio -- and they shared no common sheet metal. The Challenger was somewhat longer than the Barracuda and about 1.5 inches (38 mm) wider, although they had the same front and rear track dimensions. Still, with slightly different skins stretched over the same body and the same roof, there was no way they were going to look significantly different. At a distance it was difficult to tell them apart.

What the E-bodies actually ended up resembling, more than anything else, were the contemporary Camaro and Firebird. It's not clear how intentional that resemblance may have been; neither Carl Cameron nor Dodge Division styling chief Bill Brownlie have ever indicated any conscious intent to ape their GM rivals. Nonetheless, the Chrysler and GM pony cars all shared some common themes: long hood and short deck, a wedge-shape in profile, bulging and muscular in detail. Ironically, shortly after the Barracuda and Challenger debuted GM launched the restyled 1970½ Camaro and Firebird, which had a softer, more curvaceous, almost Italianate style that immediately made the E-bodies look somewhat dated. Nonetheless, if the Challenger and Barracuda were not the most au courant of pony cars, they were certainly the most aggressive looking.


The radioactive green paint is called SubLime, Dodge paint code FJ5; the color of the car in the photos has NOT been retouched or enhanced. SubLime was one of five optional "high-impact" colors, costing around $15 extra. The Challenger's body sides are different than the Barracuda's, with flared character lines extending into the fenders that make it about an inch and a half wider overall than the Plymouth. They're accentuated by the side stripes, which were optional.

That aggressive styling could be backed up with some of Detroit's most formidable engines. The base Challenger came with the 225 cu. in. (3.7 L) slant six, but there were eight optional engines, including the 426 (7.0 L) Hemi, which made a nominal 425 gross horsepower (317 kW). With three different available transmissions (three- and four-speed manuals and the TorqueFlite automatic), there were more than 20 powertrain combinations on offer, with performance ranging from adequate to excessive. The choices didn't stop with the powertrain; Chrysler was determined to beat all comers when it came to optional equipment. Beyond the usual array of power accessories, radios, tape players, and air conditioning, there were five different hoods; two different styles of racing stripes; a choice of cloth, vinyl, or leather upholstery; and 18 paint colors, including five extra-cost "high-impact" colors like the gaudy nuclear green of the photo car. There were so many options that few truly identical cars left the assembly line.

When the Challenger went on sale at the end of August 1969 there was great excitement at the Dodge Division. The Challenger was fashionably late, to be sure, but with bold looks, copious power, and a blizzard of options -- everything sporty car buyers seemed to want -- how could it miss? The corporation confidently projected annual E-body sales of 200,000 units.


This "Power Bulge" hood was optional on base Challengers, standard on R/Ts. The scoops don't do anything except collect debris; if you wanted a functional scoop on your Challenger, you needed to order the optional ($97) "shaker" hood, which was actually a raised air cleaner on the engine that protruded through a hole in the hood. The matte-black paint treatment was another option. The engine call-outs indicate the presence of Dodge's second most formidable engine, the 440 with three two-barrel carburetors and a nominal 390 gross horsepower (291 kW).

Unfortunately, the Challenger and revamped Barracuda met with a lukewarm reception. With the bigger engines, they had no shortage of power, although their muscle was somewhat blunted by the E-body's considerable weight. In November 1969, Car and Driver's early Challenger R/T, with the 426 (7.0 L) Hemi and TorqueFlite, ran from 0 to 60 mph (0 to 97 kph) in less than six seconds, with the quarter mile (402 meters) coming up in a tick over 14 seconds, highly respectable for the time. The Hemi was naturally the performance leader of the line, but it was very expensive, and came with a shorter, more restrictive warranty; our photo car's optional 440 (7.2 L) Six Pack, with three two-barrel Holleys and a nominal rating of 390 gross horsepower (291 kW), provided comparable performance for less than half the cost of the Hemi. Driveability of the triple-carburetor 440, however, could be problematic, as the vacuum-operated linkage engaged the front and rear carbs at the engine's whim, not the driver's. The most sensible engine for normal driving was the small-block 340 cu. in. (5.6 L), which offered either 275 gross horsepower (205 kW) or, in the limited-production Challenger T/A, 290 (216 kW). The 340 was nearly as quick as the big-block engines on the street, and it was substantially lighter, offering better weight distribution.

The Challenger and Barracuda were fast, but not exactly nimble. Suspension followed Chrysler's customary layout, unequal-length control arms in front with torsion bar springs, a live axle on parallel leaf springs in the rear, but even in its stiffest form it produced mediocre handling. In November 1969, Sports Car Graphic ran a Challenger 440 on the skidpad and measured a maximum lateral acceleration that could be beaten by a number of modern full-sized SUVs. Obtaining even that modest result was made difficult by engine starvation in hard turns, accompanied by periodic clouds of blue smoke caused by poor oil circulation. The Challenger's substantial front weight bias led to considerable understeer, although with the more powerful engines, lurid power-on oversteer could be summoned fairly readily -- and not necessarily on purpose. The brakes were not up to the task, either, with even the optional front discs over-matched by the car's weight. Most reviewers found the Challenger cumbersome and clumsy, with none of the nimbleness expected of a sporty car.

Critics were similarly unenthusiastic about the Challenger's mediocre visibility, cramped interior, and dismal gas mileage, which barely edged into the double digits (more than 20 L/100 km). There were also unkind words about the car's build quality. By that time Chrysler had a decided checkered reputation for quality control, and the thousands of different possible combinations of options available on the E-bodies certainly didn't help.

Despite all of these shortcomings, the Challenger was not particularly cheap. A six-cylinder coupe started at $2,851, $130 more than the cheapest Mustang hardtop, while the R/T began at a hefty $3,226 (which did not include such sundries as radio, power steering, or automatic transmission). It was not difficult to option a Challenger to well above the $5,000 mark, which was beyond the means of many younger buyers -- exactly the kind Dodge expected to be interested in the Challenger.


Spoilers were just beginning to appear on sporty cars in 1970, driven by the need to homologate them for Trans Am and NASCAR. This Challenger has a two-piece, T/A-style spoiler under the nose, which might work a little, and this tail spoiler, which probably does nothing but look keen. Every little bit would help, since the E-body had an alarming amount of high-speed lift. Challenger T/A models had a different, duckbill spoiler like the Camaro Z/28.

Those buyers proved to be just as ambivalent as the magazine reviewers. Barracuda sales for 1970 were 55,499, an improvement over ‘69, but hardly impressive for an all-new model. The Challenger did better, selling over 80,000, but many of those sales appear to have been at the expense of the Dodge Charger, whose 1970 sales dropped significantly. (Perhaps buyers recognized that the Challenger was essentially a smaller, somewhat trimmer version of the Charger, and opted for the new car over its three-year-old brother.) In a 2006 interview with Allpar.com, Burt Bouwkamp, Dodge's Director of Product Planning in the early seventies, said the E-body program lost a massive amount of money. Just seeing an E-body, he recalled, would make Chrysler president John Riccardo lose his temper.


The inward slope of the roof is known as tumblehome, and Challenger has a lot of it, creating a pronounced wedge shape. It's very low -- a fraction under 51 inches (1,290 mm) -- and exceedingly wide, 76.1 inches (1,933 mm) overall. The impression of bulk is not misleading; a well-optioned 440 Challenger weighs over 3,800 pounds (1,730 kg). The 'floating' tail lamps echo the design of the '67-'69 Barracuda. The Dodge name in the backup lights caused some problems with Chrysler executives, who were afraid it might not pass state lightning regulations. Note the rectangular exhaust pipes, echoing the angular styling theme, standard on all V8 cars with dual exhausts.

The failure of the E-body was further underscored by the dramatic surge in the popularity of the A-body Plymouth Valiant and Dodge Dart during the same period, particularly the new Plymouth Valiant Duster, a hastily contrived, fastback version of the familiar compact. Chrysler almost couldn't give away the original fastback Barracuda, but the conceptually similar Duster outsold the muscular new Barracuda by more than four to one. In fact, sales of the 1970 Duster exceeded the combined sales of the Barracuda and Challenger by a significant margin. Something had clearly gone awry.

When the E-bodies were conceived in 1967, Dodge and Plymouth had evaluated the then current sporty-car market and taken dead aim at that target. In the intervening three years, though, the target had moved. Sales of both pony cars and intermediate Supercars were dying on the vine by 1970, as buyers turned their attention to compacts like the Valiant or Ford's Maverick, or to imports like the Datsun 510. Not only was the market for performance cars impacted by concerns about fuel economy, emissions, and safety, the insurance industry was doing its level best to make high-performance models extinct by levying prohibitive surcharges that could inflate a young buyer's annual premiums to more than a third of the car's purchase price.

More significantly, the young Baby Boomers who had been buying the Mustang and its imitators were turning a jaundiced eye toward Detroit's longer-lower-wider formula. Buyers had liked the size of the original Mustang, which was big enough to be reasonably practical, but not so big as to be unwieldy. Slow to grasp that fact, the automakers had, as is Detroit's wont, immediately set about making the pony cars bigger, only to see sales decline in inverse proportion to their increasing size. It would be several more years before Ford and its rivals got the message.

In his 1990 book American Muscle: Muscle Cars From the Otis Chandler Collection, automotive writer Randy Leffingwell characterized the 1970 Challenger and Barracuda as "too much, too late." They had the most power, the most options, and arguably the most aggressive looks of any pony car; all they lacked were the qualities that buyers of the early seventies were actually looking for.

Ironically, both the Challenger and Barracuda are far more popular now than they ever were when they were new. Their mediocre sales and the bewildering number of options permutations mean that certain desirable combinations are very rare, making them prime collector's items. Barracudas and Challengers have become as iconic as dinosaurs, for essentially the same reasons: they were big, ponderous, over-muscled, and possessed of voracious appetites their environment could no longer support.

At this writing, Dodge is preparing to launch a new Challenger, which will bow as a mid-year 2008 model. Like Ford's current Mustang, it studiously recycles the styling cues of the original; if the new Challenger doesn't look exactly like its 1970 predecessor, the resemblance is nonetheless immediately obvious. Like the original, the new Challenger comes to market several years after its rival from Dearborn, and it bows at a time when Mustang sales are eroding. Like the original, the new Challenger is based on the Charger -- it rides a shortened version of the current Charger's LX platform -- making it bigger and bulkier than ideal; the new Challenger is more than 300 pounds (136 kg) heavier than a 1970 Hemi Challenger, contributing to dismal EPA fuel economy estimates. And, like the original, the new Challenger will offer formidable performance with a formidable price tag: the Challenger SRT-8 will start at a little under $40,000. With gas prices rising and higher Corporate Average Fuel Economy requirements in the offing, it may once again be too much, too late.

# # #

Our sources for this article included David Zatz, PhD, "Interview with Burton Bouwkamp, Chrysler Corporation" (2006, Allpar.com, http://www.allpar.com/corporate/bios/bouwkamp.html (transcript), accessed 29 December 2007); Arch Brown, "Pony Car or Race Horse? 1970 Dodge Challenger R/T - T/A," Special Interest Autos #134, March-April 1993, reprinted in Terry Ehrich and Richard A. Lentinello, eds., The Hemmings Motor News Book of Chrysler: Performance Cars (The Hemmings Motor News) (Bennington, VT: Hemmings Motor News, 2000), pp. 116-123; Randy Leffingwell, American Muscle: Muscle Cars From the Otis Chandler Collection (Osceola, WI: Motorbooks International, 1993, Second Edition); and Paul Zazarine, Barracuda and Challenger (Muscle Car Color History) (Osceola, WI: Motorbooks, International, 1991).

We also consulted the following period road tests: "Dodge Challenger 440 Magnum (SCG Road Test)," Sports Car Graphic, November 1969; "Dodge Challenger R/T Hemi: Lavish execution with little or no thought toward practical application," Car and Driver, November 1969; and "Dodge Challenger 6-Pack: Dodge delivers Muscle in a surprising package," Road Test, March 1970, all of which are reprinted in R.M. Clarke, ed., Dodge Muscle Cars 1967-1970 (Brooklands Books) (Cobham, Surrey: Brooklands Books Ltd., 1984); and "Hemi is Here to Go: We stuff one into a Challenger to show you," Road Test, June 1970, reprinted in R.M. Clarke, ed., Dodge 1964-1971: Muscle Portfolio (Cobham, Surrey: Brooklands Books Ltd., 2003). (The latter volume also reprints the November 1969 Sports Car Graphic test.)

Write comment

Your Contact Details:

Name:

Email:

Comment:

Title:

UBBCode:         -color-aquablackbluefuchsiagraygreenlimemaroonnavyolivepurpleredsilvertealwhiteyellow -size-tinysmallmediumlargehuge

Message:

Security

Please input the anti-spam code that you can read in the image.