1957 Plymouth vs Chevrolet Belair Dealer Promo Film Mopar is a registered trademark of Chrysler Group LLC. Master Tech series training materials are the property of Chrysler Group LLC and are used with permission. MyMopar.com
Parents had '57 two door Belvidere. It had rust issues, but all cars in the rust belt did. They liked it, lots of style. My Dad said the brakes were very good.
I'll take the Plymouth any day. I was never a 57 Chevy guy - I always preferred the top selling 57 Ford followed by the Plymouth. There are lots of technical advantages to the Plymouth but the 57 Chevy has captured the hearts of car collectors.
No, I would disagree, torsion bars did a great job in the 60s. They did their job well and lasted forever. I have a 1966 Dodge Coronet with original torsion bars in fine shape today.
@@KingHarvestHSC My dad worked at the local Chrysler dealership. The first year they came out they broke while the customer was waiting to get the things fixed.
My dad always had a 57 Chevy, from the one he bought brand new as a teen-ager until the one he had 3 months ago when he died. I love those Plymouths too, though. Some of the color combo's were beautiful.
@@1983jblack "I'm sorry, a vendor stocks the diecast toy cars so if it's not on the rack we don't have it. We do have a new Lamborghini Urus at the same price as a mid-'00s Toyota Corolla, all the 1/32 scale ones are $3.99.
Chevy must have done something right with that 57. Cause to this day, everybody wants one! As for the 57 - 58 Plymouths, it took "Christine" to make people remember them!
The Chevy didn’t dissolve into a pile of corrosion like the Plymouth did after a few winters. The Plymouth’s engineering was good; the workmanship blew goats.
As long as there is automotive history, it will remain a tragedy how Chrysler managed to run there forward look for 1957 with poor quality control And likelihood to rest prematurely. I had no problem seeing this compromised filmstrip. I appreciate your effort in sharing it with us!
i was watching a video on you tube on a junk yard in central calif. full of mopars. 1940s thru 1960s , they had i would say they had at least 20 57 and 58 plymouths not wrecked but complete one had the dual 4bbl set up, the only time you see a tri5 chevy is if its wrecked. my dad bought a 57 plymouth new, i remember one time on the hwy. he had it going 115mph, it sounded like it was going to fall apart, i loved that car. ive had a 57 chevy 2 door wagon and a 55 bel air 2 door hardtop, now a 61 vette.
I was born in 1957, my father was a Chevy salesman. The Chevrolet’s were hard to sell and the mopars kicked ass selling as fast as they could build them. In the sixties I heard all this and asked my father if this was true, why do we see 57 chevys everywhere and no Dodge’s or Plymouth’s?. He told me on quiet winter nights you could HEAR them rust.
Yes, but the cars were so poorly built, that people only remembered how bad they were. The 58s were better, but still far short of 51 and older Chrysler products.
I'm mostly a Chrysler enthusiast, but while the 57 Plymouth has a lot of features that probably makes it a better car, who doesn't love a '57 Chevrolet, way better looking than the Plymouth IMO. It's interesting that Plymouth had a 2 four barrel version of the 318 poly , I've been told that there was also a 3 two barrel setup on some 318 poly's, but I havent been able to find anything on the internet to confirm it.
‘57 was a banner year for Ford, Chevy and Plymouth in the looks department. For me, Plymouth was the winner. Ford was still using that raggedy all-popping-and-cracking Y-block junk in ‘57, so that basically eliminated them as my favorite.
I've heard that Ford's vastly outsold Chevrolet in '57 , I cant understand that ,apart from the Chevs having a better engine, the Ford is not as pretty IMO , the '58 Ford is an improvement.
@@barrycuda3769 - Yeah, I was surprised that Ford sold so many cars in ‘57. My main issue with them was that Y-block engine - by ‘56, I already considered them junk. When the valve trains crapped out, which many of them did very quickly, they would pop, crack and hiss - they made a very distinctive sound. You could hear them clattering their way up the street from a quarter mile away, and you knew exactly what was coming …
@@Clyde-2055 They probably would have been ok if they didnt have the insufficient oiling of the valve train ? ? The later FE's are a vast improvement. The 290HP out of the Plymouths 318 is quite impressive.
@@barrycuda3769 - In one way, the Y-block was good for Ford - it was SO BAD, that it forced them to get on the stick and design a better engine. And that was the FE, which was a good engine for Ford. If Ford had stayed with that Y-block, it would have ruined them.
GOLLY Wally,I wonder why there aint no Plymouths runin round NOW.After all that runing of gums ya'd think we'd see tons of em.We do see lots of those swell 57 Chevy's tho,and thats neato!!!
my dad said he had a 57 Bel-Air once 3 on the tree manual trans the 55-57 Chevy were like a concept to the Muscle Car ERA before the 64 GTO became the Market Muscle Car and the 49 Olds were the Prototype Muscle Car with the Rocket 88 V8 engine. Now the Plymouth from the 50s never had the Gen 1 Hemi engine cause Plymouth had it own V8 engine like the Poly 318 A-Series from 1957, Belvedere and Savoy were sedans, Surburban were wagons, and Fury were performance and Sport Fury were hot performance either hardtop and Convertible with duel rear antenna on the tailfins. 1958 is the first year all U.S cars and trucks equip with duel headlamps the 2 on each side.
The '57 Chrysler products set the dimensional mold for the full-size American car that was the standard until the early '80s and didn't go away entirely until the last of the Panther-platform Fords left the line in 2011. A little too long, low and wide for most people - the dimensional profile of a '49 Ford through '57 Chevy analog reasserted itself in the first generation of midsize cars from 1962-4, a resurgence of by-then-traditional Detroit compacts (led by the Dart-Valiant) in the mid '70s when the midsizers got too big, and the present RAV4, CR-V, Escape etc are all remarkably close to that size including circa-1950 sedan height.
My father had a green '57 2-door Plymouth Savoy, which was a basically downsized Belvedere. I got into big trouble when, as an 8 year old, I fiddled with the pushbutton transmission while he was running an errand, and I was sitting in the passenger seat. Well, when he returned, he discovered the result of my fooling around, which is that one of the buttons (drive, perhaps?) was jammed. He had to get a screwdriver and release it. Well, he wasn't happy!
The 57 Plymouth is a great car. I own one. It's just a shame Plymouth engineers rushed the cars into production and as a result they we're rust buckets. Luckily for me I have a rust free original. But that being said the 57 Chev was also a rust bucket and they weren't rushed into production, they had a 3 year old body.
I understand the 57 plymouths were among the worst-built, most rust prone cars ever made. There was one put in a time capsule and when it was opened it was almost completely disintegrated from rust.
You are correct about the 57 Plymouths, but that time-capsule Plymouth was in much better shape that people thought it would be, considering that it was under water for many years.
did the plymouth win any nascar races in 57 or 58 ? the chevy won the most in nascar history for any one year also all three convertible titles 57 58 59 theres no comparrison
If only the 57 Chrysler products had been well built. Chrysler would have moved up ahead of Ford, and stayed there. Not widely known, those 57s were originally supposed to have been 58s, but somebody at Chrysler must have seen Ford's proposed 57s and rushed those 58 Chrysler cars into production for 57. The result? Mass-produced prototypes. Chrysler never truly recovered.
Because the 57 Plymouth, as great as it looks, was notoriously poorly built. The 57 Ford was OK, but the 57 Chevy, despite being rather old-fashioned, was and still is an excellent car in original un-restored trim.
The Fury was a lot more advanced and had a lot more features than the Chevy. The problem was that it was rushed to the market. The fit and finish was subpar with numerous issues that cropped up almost from day one. They also rusted horribly. Most were parked or sold in under 5 years. I like the styling but it doesn’t compare to a ‘57 Chevy in any way. There’s a reason why the tri-fives are the most popular cars ever.
Chevy Always Wins, American Women Love It, They Love Making Love Making Love In The Backseat Of The Chevrolet, Then They Can Tell They Have Been Chevrolaid
Chrysler ruined its cars with the overly stiff suspension known as "torsion-aire". Most people at the time wanted their cars to float down the road. G.M. and Ford offered such rides but, Chrysler did not. My mother owned a 1957 Dodge Coronet 500. It rode like a school bus compared to her 1958 Chevrolet Bel Air. We never owned another Chrysler product after that.
@retrocars5847 posted this exact film 5 years ago and doesn’t seem to have the “vinegar syndrome” issue that this one has. Just thought other enthusiasts should know.
57 Chevy obviously outclassed this car. That's why they're working so hard against it! But when it all comes down to it the 57 Ford bug I sold better than either one of these two. At least in 1957. But ever since then take a look at the 57 Chevy it's always reigned supreme
If only had they put better quality into the bodies and upholestry of the Plymouth,there would have been more of them around today.By 1960 you would be shovelling the Plymouth up off the driveway.
When these were new the 55-57 Chevies were running behind in the styling department. The catch up fins on the 58-61 Chevies got really ugly. Younger people don't realize it was over ten years later that the shoeboxes became popular with street machiners. Up until then the stovebolt straight six equipped shoeboxes were a dime a dozen on used car lots. They were plagued with tons of problems like frame and body to frame sheet metal fatigue cracks, etc. Fortunately nostalgic, misty eyed, balding baseball cap wearing boomers choking down apple pie made them popular much later in life.....that and the fact they were so cheap initially they made hundreds of thousands of them. Then as now, the power pack dual quad 283 was sucking hind tittie to a 392 dual quad Hemi.
58 Chevys didn't have fins. I have never been much of a Chevy freak, but I never heard of 57 Chevys being known for metal fatigue problems. I thought they were good cars.
@@michaelbenardo5695 FWIU they were, the '57 Chevy was a "Good Used Car" where that years Mopars never outlived their initial build quality issues and the '57 Ford showed its' rustbuckety ways a couple years in.
maybe so but the 1957 rambler rebel was the fastest sedan in the usa and only about a half a second slower that the 57 FI corvette. nothing could touch it not even the hemi. the first muscle car.
@@LeopoldoNotarianni-rk9vv It is. Its a face-lifted 55. All of the 57 GM cars suffered this way, except for the 57 Cad. The 57 Buick looks like a warmed over 55 with 54 grille teeth, the 57 Olds looks like a warmed over 56 with 54 side trim and new taillights. The 57 Pontiac is just OK, but compared to a 57 Dodge or 57 Merc, looks rather old fashioned. Of course, I would gladly take one over any of today's ugly tin cans. They are GORGEOUS by comparison, and they are probably the best quality 57s out there.
I bought a used '58 Plymouth in 1964. Worst car I've ever owned, and I've owned quite a few. It was a 2 door hardtop but not the most expensive--I think it was a Savoy. In the first couple of weeks it blew a head gasket, putting water in the old. Build quality was substandard. The paint was all faded flat and nothing I could do would make it shine again. The interior headliner was made of pressed material, not cloth, and it had dried out and flaked little pieces down onto the seats. Again, no way to fix it. Same with the aluminum side molding that faded to spotted and dull and nothing would bring it back. I could pull a tail light lens off with my bare hands due to shoddy workmanship. Do you wonder why today a '57 Chevy is worth twice what a 57 Plymouth is? Cause it's worth it, that's why. Does it sound like I'm a dedicated GM guy? Well, I'm not. After dumping the turkey Plymouth I bought a 4 cylinder Pontiac Tempest from 1963. Second worst car ever owned.
Lol there's a lot of Chevy guys be like it's the greatest car of the fifties, king of the classic cars, well, by all means they did sell a hole lot better, but they always did, still do, why? Because in almost all cases they are cheaper, most people are gonna go for the less expensive product which is understandable money has always been tight for most, but then you have people running around telling everyone stuff ( not just car related) that even though it cost less it's a better product all together, well in 95% of any product that's just not true at all. Kinda like the harbor freight vs snap on war, anyway the very next year the gm line in a hole started styling there cars very similarly to this Plymouth, or Like the proformance, always Heard about how fast those where in the late fifties, well yes the where quick for the time, but a lot of people don't know of forget that the baddest setup the chevy had in 57, was a 283 making between 180-220hp, that's cool, and maybe some of these guys never got the chance to race one on one back in the day they were very rare, but the power Chrysler offered in those years was far superior, i mean Chrysler itself being the most powerful and again rare as blue chickens, but they offered a dang 375hp duel 4bbl carb setup vie the options available on the 392 v8 first gen Hemi. So don't confuse fact with fiction lady's and gens, yes one sold better than the other but that being said there is a lot more people going hell than heaven too, just a thought.
I was a kid in the 1960s and these cars were common. I was interested in cars as a pre-teen and everyone in neighborhood worked on cars so I would peek into the engine bays. I thought the Mopars were very well engineered. The engine compartment and wiring were very neat and organized. Many early advances like breakaway rear view mirrors. But the late 1950s and early 1960s Mopar body styling was horrible. Big ugly fins and ugly front ends. The Chevys 1955-1957 were beautiful. No comparison. Plymouth in late 1950s were hideous and laughable to me as a kid. The first truly attractive Mopar to me was the early 1970s Challengers and Cudas. The 1967 Satellite wasn't bad but could not compare to same period Chevelle or Camaro for looks. I appreciate the Mopars like the Charger, Roadrunner, GTX they were powerful muscle cars. But for beauty they do not match the Chevy Nova / Chevelle / Impala / Camaros of the day. And they cost a lot more at the time so they sold a lot less. Mopar people were a special breed who were willing to pay more for all out performance versus looks. Not until the 1970s did they get both in my opinion.
Unfortunately from an era when it was considered normal to need a new car at around 4 years. Especially in the salty areas. All those styling points didn't help by trapping water and road sludge. You had to keep on top of body maintenance if you wanted to keep it together.
@@christopherconard2831 According to historians, FoMoCo and Mopar were the worst rusters of the 50s and 60s (and I've been a Ford guy most of my life), GMs rusted also, but not as bad, according to the historians.
@@christopherconard2831 Still, even the rather rust-prone 57 Fords were better. WAY better. The 57 ChryCo cars were originally supposed to have come out for 58, so they were mass-produced prototypes.
If the movie “Christine” had been released in 1960, perhaps those Plymouths would have been classics … Look what The Bandit and Michael Knight did for the Firebird - and keep in mind those Firebirds were so choked up with emissions equipment that their performance was downright pitiful. As for the Chevys, it’s my opinion that we liked them so much because of that engine. They were deep-breathers (powerful), LIGHT, compact, easy to work on, and that made them a rodder’s favorite. And those box-Chevys were all over the place, cheap, and that was all it took. (And 1957 was the first year for the 283.)