Here are some pics of my Uncle Bobs car. Its a 1969 Dodge Charger 500. It was Chryslers 1st "Aero" car. It was designed 100% for NASCAR racing. But anything back then that had vame with a decent V8 was used in drag racing. The Ranchargers did lots of drag racing and they made those MOPARS run really well. As mentioned, win on Sunday, sell on Monday was teh thinking. Not sure if I know of a drag only car that didn't have a look alike that was doing daily driving duties in a more tame version. The newer GM COPO Camaros and Ford Mustang Cobra Jets Chrysler Drag Pack cars come close, but they also have tamer versions that the more civilized driver/owner can buy as well.
The front grill drops the recessed fishmouth grill and instead uses a flush mount grill from the 1968 Coronet R/T.Dodge also covered the A-pillars with a stainless steel flush mount covers. These are the same covers used on the Superbird and Dodge Daytona "winged Aero cars".
Standard R/T grill (fishmouth) and standard A-pillars
Charger 500 flush mount grill from 1968 Coronet and the stainless A pillar covers
Charger 500 side view
vs "normal" Charger side view
On the rear, instead of the normal Charger R/T rear window(aka flying buttress rear, which created a vacuum, there is a flush fastback rear window area created.
"Normal"Charger" flying buttress rear window
Charger 500 flush mount
By the time that Dodge had realized that the cars didn't do as great in the Super Speedways that they had hoped, there were over 330 1969 Charger 500's already built, well on the way to the magical 500 cars required to legally race in NASCAR at the time.
Chrysler then concentrated on bettering the car, so along came the 1969 Dodge Charger "Daytona". The Daytona was MOPARS 1st "winged" car. It was pretty much a Dodge Charger 500 with a huge wing on the back and a front nose extension. Then in 1970 the 2nd "winged" MOPAR came along, the 1970 Plymouth Superbird.
The FOMOCO has their 69 Ford Torino Talladega and their 69 Mercury Cyclone Spoiler II.
One last interesting note: the 1969 Charger 500 is the ONLY Charger 500 that has the special rear window plug and flush front end. The 1970 Charger 500 was just a standard Charger body.
This car is has the 426 Hemi and all its typical goodies(crossram dual 4bbl carbs) 4 speed manual trans and the Dana 60 rear with a Surgrip spinning 4.10 gears. The pictured car is 1 of 26 Hemi/4 speed cars ever built. Some of these cam with the 440(single 4bbl carb) and some with automatics. My Uncle did a frame off restoration. Same guy that painted this car, also painted my Dad's 57 Chev. With the 4.10s we didn't get on the throttle too much in 1st and 3md, but once into 3rd, on came WOT and that thing pulled just great, then into 4th still pulling great. I couldn't belive the induction noise, it sounded like it was ingesting all the air in the world once all 8 butterflys were opened up. The car had its 2 stock mufflers which also had 2 stock resonators just in front of the mufflers. From what I remember I couldn't hear the exhaust over the intake noise. Quite the experience, in quite the piece of American automotive history.
This site shows just how these 5 "Aero cars" did on the racing circuit back in the late 60's.
Aero Warriors - What <I>Really</I> Happened During The NASCAR Aero Wars
I just found this gem, a video advertising the 1969 Dodge Charger 500. They do acceleration, braking and cornering tests. The test driver does a nice "neutral drop" for us as well. This should give you and of exactly what we are talking about in regards to the handling of a brand new 60's car with a big engine and an aggressive driver. You are steering with your right foot.
Great video!
peace
Hog