I had a ‘68 Coronet R/T back in the day. It was a stunning car with a dark wine red exterior, a white vinyl top, and a white interior. It had a 440 cubic inch 4 speed in it. Boy, those were the days!
The Coronet is often overlooked in favor of the Charger and Challenger, but it's definitely a respectable muscle car in its own right. Thanks for covering it OldCarMemories!
You are correct as far as the base model Coronet, but the Super Bee is the exception and have always been very popular. My first car was a 68 Charger and one of my friends that we ran with, had a 68 Bee
@@lovethesmellofracefuelinth7374 The Coronet had 4 door options where as the Charger didn't therefore Dodge went and muddied up the Charger name by putting that name on a modern 4 door platform. When will the automanufacturers learn to do things correctly.
An absolute bygone classic, without a doubt. They just don't make them anymore like they used to! Thanks to all involved for making this Coronet feature!!
The "quality" of Mopars "back in the day" was even worse than it is today. The drive trains were GREAT, but the fit & finish was ATROCIOUS and rustproofing was non-existant! I owned several 6-cyl Valiants and a 318 Duster, EVERYONE of them became a rust bucket within 4-5 years. Bought em all used, the huge depreciation of these cars made them VERY CHEAP beaters. I never did and NEVER will buy a NEW MOPAR!!
My dad in 1977 hauled us kids around in a 69 Dodge Polara with a 383 until he sold it a couple yrs later. I remember watching the new owner driving it away.
Loved the "cartoon colors" on the 1970 Super Bee's ... at only 15, I dreamed of owning one , saving my busboy/dishwasher money for when I turned 16 !!! ... wanted an orange Super Bee R/T , 4-speed with a hemi engine !!!
I love this guy’s voice. It so suits the era of these classic cars. His knowledge of options and engines is fantastic and really captures the thought processes of what the manufacturers were thinking and how they matched the lucky customers of that golden era.❤
We had growing up a 1968 Dodge Coronet 440 wagon. But, it was the police version. 383 big block under the hood, HD auto trans mission, no radio, no A/C, metallic body painted tire rims with Dodge moon hubcaps. Also had those smooth bench seats in it too. My dad was a part time police officer and was able to order it new from Chrysler back then.
My favourite years for the Coronet are the 1965 through 67, 1969 and 70 Coronet. The 500, the R/T, and Super Bee are sweet looking cars, but I've always liked 4 door sedans and wagons. :)
You skipped from 65 to the 68,you jumped right over the 66 and 67 Coronets,which was newly styled over the 65 run. Maybe in another episode you can do the history of the 66-7 runs,i wouldn't skip or miss this important run, considering the fact that the 66 was the first run of the street Hemi cars! Plus i had a 66 Coronet so I'm a little biased,lol. But also the styling of the 66-7 was on its own and wasn't a 65 hold over with a complete new styling, along with the debut of the venerable 66 Charger!!! Thanks again for sharing this with us, it brings me back to the great old days when these were in my neighborhood and driveway!!!
Thanks for the memories!! My friend's Mom had a Coronet 440 4 door in metallic light green. Rode to school in it every day for years!!! I remember the "headrest" part of the door being metal matching the exterior color. I also thought the dash looked kind of cheap with those big chrome plated plastic levers and knobs. I also got to experience a Coronet R/T of that era - my boss had one. 1st time I got a ride in it there were 6 other teens in the car. My boss got it up to 90 and back to 0 in 0.6 miles!!!! I got to drive that car in 1975. Hardest gas pedal to press I ever set my foot on!!!! And when the pedal finally moved, I was slammed back into the seat as it rocketed away!!!! Thanks for the story!!!!!
I’d argue 1970 was hands down the best year for classic cars. At the very least, it was the best for Chrysler Corp. They never had a better styled and equipped lineup across the board than they did in 1970. Ranging from the luxurious imperial, 300, fury gt and the rest of the full size fuselage cars to the performance cars like the coronet R/T, GTX and their new e-body offerings, it was beautiful no matter what car from which Chrysler subsidiary you looked at. Its a shame that all of these great designs only stuck around for 1 year, with them restyling all of their b and e-body cars for 71. While the 71 cars (especially the charger and gtx) are beautiful in their own right, I will always personally believe 70 was the hight of Chrysler performance and design.
AK02 -‘70 was I believe the apex of what was out there but only the beginning of what could have been some seriously powerful automobiles and a few were for a couple years afterward although detuned from what Detroit was planning to produce.
I've always said the same thing. The 1970 Mopar body styles should've been used for more than just 1 year, especially the 70 GTX, Road Runner, & Satellite body style
1969 was my favorite year. My Uncle used to have a B5 Blue 1969 Cornet R/T 440 and 727 automatic and black vinyl top, 8 3/4 rear with 3.91 rear gears. I miss that car.
Wayne Hardy still have my 70 500 same body as RT. Most 500 were stripped for parts and u don’t see many 500. There are more RT than new most are clones or fakes. I have a ram air hood on mine. The 70 USA 1 year only model. Glad I saved all those parts
I still remember as a kid a friend of my dads had a 69 super bee dark green with a white tailband, cool car😎 My first bite from the Mopar bug I love my Challenger
These American cars of the sixties to mid seventies had some of the coolest and original styling to ever come out of the Automotive world. Especially a lot of GM stuff like 65 Pontiac GTO, Oldsmobile 442, 65 Buick Riviera and Chevy Impala/Nova. All cars today have converged to the same basic template through regulation and engineering. This era of Automobile is the best, when stylists still had a free hand. I live in the UK, so this era of Americana styling is quite exotic and cool. After the oil crisis and into the Eighties American cars were severely beaten by the ugly stick. Although a lot of Euro cars had amazing performance and styling of the 60's like the E type jag, you had to have a big fat wallet. And that was some of the appeal with cars like the everyday Dodge Corronet, they had the styling and the power plant if specifies to back it up. Your average American back then could specify a V8 in an average sedan. Your average European got what he could afford or was on offer, which would be a wheezy 4 cylinder gutless tinny shite box like an Austin A30 or a Renault Dauphine, which almost had the power to pull the skin off a rice pudding. Nice video.
Growing up in Fremont Mi. (home of (Gerber baby food) in the 60's. There was lots of money, and lots of badass cars cruising around town. On Friday and Saturday nights you'd hear them in the distance racing on rural roads..... miss the good ol days!
@@metalmopars To me it looks like a BEE EYES or like the SUPER BEE DECAL WITH SUNGLASSES I ALWAYS ASSOCIATED AND OF COURSE THE QUARTER PANEL WITH THE PINCH crease on top before the C pillar
In 68 my parents had a cornet station wagon. It had a great engine and the station mechanics were always trying to get my dad to sell it to them because they wanted the motor. It was a pretty reliable car but a total rust bucket. After only 10 years there were rust holes in it as big as my head.
From the "one that got away" desk. In the late 80's a coworker's father game him a Hemi GTX that he bought new. I believe it was a 4sp, with low miles & kept in a garage. He promptly sold it for 25K saw it in the paper a couple months later for 42K. The money was soon gone and the car too.
Another one of your great videos. Well done! This one makes me want to go out and invest in some old Coronet preferably an R/T. Funny I used to street race a lot back then but never against any Dodge Coronets. Just remembered getting my doors blown off by some chick AMX 390. Gawd I was so embarrassed.
My dad's friend in 1984 wanted to trade a 1969 440 magnum R/T ram air for my 1971 Volkswagen Bug, but I was not 18 yet and they said that I would kill myself. I had a lot of rides in that beast and I still miss the chance to this day. Love you channel.
While back I had a customer with a Hemi 4 Door Coronet, that car was amazing. Often people make a joke about a car that will pass anything but a gas station. With this sucker it is was more true then any other I've ever driven, it was fast, but wow it guzzled fuel. On a side note I really think FCA needs to bring back the Coronet badge. It's clear FCA is done with Chrysler as a badge, they need to rebadge the current 300 as the new Dodge Coronet. Then they can give it all the options and goodies currently available on the Charger.
Way back I had managed to get a very plain Jane cornet in perfect condition used for like maybe 400 bucks. Spartan interior with a bench front seat and column shift. It had the 318 and was as smooth and impressive as anything Chrysler ever built.
When I was a little kid in the mid-1980s my mom bought a 1974 Dodge Dart for $600 with less than 40K miles on the odometer. The car was purchased in the US then shipped to Canada where it underwent serious undercoating before making its way down to South Florida. Is ugly is the car was the body and paint was in perfect condition. It was emerald green with a black vinyl roof. My mother drove the car for about three years before selling it to an eager salesman at the Mitsubishi dealership 4 $1,800. Not a bad investment however we often joked that the old Dodge Dart with the bulletproof Slant six was probably still on the road long after that crappy brand new Hyundai built Mitsubishi Precis she bought to replace it with headlong died.
My family had three Coronets throughout the 1970's. A cream colored 1967 Dodge Coronet 440 Sedan, a green metallic 1970 Dodge Coronet Deluxe station wagon, and a powder blue 1970 Dodge Coronet 440 station wagon. We actually had both wagons at the same time. The AM radio used to get receptions from other parts of the country, and believe it or not, my father drove it to work during the second Blizzard of 1978, got detoured down NY 110, and got a picture of himself leaving it there in Newsday, while a Suffolk County cop directed him to some office building nearby.
@OldCarMemories, well researched, well though out and excellent delivery. OldCarMemories would be a good addition to let's say,,,the History Channel. Really good historic content, no drama, no historic revisionism. We all know the pitiful state of modern broadcasting. Anyway, keep up the good work.
I was 17 yr old when these cars prowled the streets including the REAL hemicuda w/440 six pack, mustang 2+2, camaro R/T 396, Chevelle as 396, and, other notables, I can remember a time the streets ROARED! !! Doc Mike USN
Chrysler’s best muscle cars 68-70 plym and dodges, chargers GTX cudas challengers , birds and Bees, dual quad hemis, 440six packs and six barrels 383 runners, best muscle cars ever
@mark rylander My 2014 Challenger hits 155 mph top speed, get some facts on cars today. I had two 1970 Challenger's, one a 440 R/T car & two '69 Charger's, one a 440 RT/SE & that's only 4 of the 90 fantastic cars I've owned, many classic muscle from every American manufacturer, yes I'm patting myself on the back as a big time car guy.
Haha what I miss is being a kid in the 70s and walking across a strip mall parking lot with Mom and it never fails , you would hear that sound..... yup, a Chrysler starter motor👍 I was a young pup , didn't know anything but I knew that was a Chrysler starting up.
When you look at the 4 door sedan offerings from most auto makers at the time, they were quite homely compared to their 2 door counterparts---not so with the Coronet. The 4 door sedan looked like it could be a musclecar in it's own right with it's bold, sporty styling...and even the wagon was very distinctive. Great episode on a great car
Back in '79-'80 I bought a 67 Coronet R/T basket case for $200. It had a 383 in it so it must have been swapped in. The car was a 4 speed and had the Dana 60 rear under it with 3.54 gears. I sold it for $200 shortly before I got married as I had no place to keep it (at the time it was in my parent's driveway) and my daily driver was a '69 383 4 speed road runner coupe. My new wife and I moved to Florida in '81 and I had to sell the road runner a couple of years in '83 later due to rust and rot issues. I found another '69 383 4 speed road runner (a hardtop) but sold it 5 years later, then re-bought it again in 2000. I had it until March of this year and sold it for a nice profit (sure do miss it though). In May I found a '67 Coronet R/T clone (with a 1970 383, automatic, originally a Coronet 500). Whoever built it did a really good job with it (except no 440). It needs a new front suspension, which will be going in soon. Can't wait to cruise with the guy who bought my road runner. He lives 5 miles from my place and we keep in contact. Small world.
Wow Fremont Dodge, I remember that Dealership well back in 1987...When I moved from Roseburg, Oregon to the Bay Area in California. I was 15 years old as my mother have been relocated to another HP Corp plant in both Palo Alto and Cupertino, Ca. We lived in Fremont for about 4 years till moving to San Carlos, Ca. Dodge well I own one right now a 2020 Dodge Grand Caravan GT. Had great time with this Van no problems with it at all. Also Have 2019 Ford Fusion Titanium and 2018 Ford F-150. We are really Ford People here at home, but the Dodge Grand Caravan GT was new and had a great price I could not pass up so I went in a bought it that same hour brought it home and the kids loved it.
As an Aussie, the first time I saw a 4-door 1970 Coronet was as a taxi in the movie _Shaft_ when I watched it in '03 - until then I had assumed that the angry looking nosecone was reserved for the Super Bee (which I had seen in books as a kid.)
Great research? Really? At 0:47 he says the 65 Coronet was all new. No. It was a restyle of the 62 - 64 Dodge. At 7:13 he says ten years later (making it 1980) Chrysler went bankrupt. Nope. Wrong again.
My favorite thing about these cars are the B pillars on the 2 door hardtop. They give the car a very muscular appearance. I am not a fan of the 1970 front end design. I used to know someone who had a 1968 Super Bee, orange with a black interior, and a black hood with the Six Pack scoop. It was a 440/automatic. One of the best looking cars I've ever seen.
Mopar had some of the best body styles in the mid 60s thru the early 70s. A few of my hotrod friends have said the 440 motor was the hot setup as the hemi was more difficult to keep in proper tune. Big motors and bench seats...gotta love it!
@@gray_space_alien newer is better.....why spend $100K on an old clunker when a new Hellcat is 100000% better in every way...and 800+ horsepower at 21 mph highway vs 426 Hemi at 6 mpg and only net horsepower of 350 (not the 425 hp advertised).
I was never a fan of the 70 Coronet front end but liked the styling of that gen overall. Certainly wouldn’t mind a well equipped 69 R/T coupe with a 440. My father had a 65 Coronet wagon just like your opening but he traded up to Monaco’s and Chryslers later.
Well, you may think that I am crazy, but I prefer the 1970 Coronet Super Bee over a 1970 Charger R/T anytime. Now I am a bit of a Charger guy, but the 1970 Chargers had a real cheap look about them, that's if you compare them from the previous and to the later models of the Chargers of 1966-1974, but everybody has their own opinions and taste. But! my favorite, the Dodge of 1970, of course was the all-new Challenger, this car was not your common muscle car or Mopar. Great stuff! thanks OldCarMemories. Hail-hail to the 1970 Dodge Coronet! MOPAR ON brother!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
