Strange 70 HEMI 'Cuda ragtop

[copo9566aa]

One of the 14 ???

[gemleeus]

i think they were one of 14. whats so strange?

[copo9566aa]

Flat Hood

[gemleeus]

does appear to be flat. probably just an advertising mistake

[442w30]

It's not an advertising mistake. It's a Chrysler mistake - here's why.

The wheelcovers are not correct for the car, I believe. The car has a flat hood, which is not correct for a 'Cuda. And the car does not have the rockers of the 'Cuda.

My guess is that car was a base Barracuda with some 'Cuda elements airbrushed in. Or maybe the reverse.

[njsteve]

If I recall correctly this was a F6 green, trim mockup for advertising purposes only. It was not a real BS27R0B car. It just had the hockey stick stripes. You can even see the non-cuda steering wheel and the 14x6 wire wheel covers. (Hemi Cudas had mandatory 15x7 wheels). The closest one to this trim combination would be the F8 green one that Kevin S. has in his collection. I too have a copy of this old photo from an old Popular Mechanics issue, as well as a sideview next to a station wagon, in which you can see it really does have a flat hood.

[copo9566aa]

Wow great analyze
This is from Popular Science Oct 1969

I have a problem for named this car

This is a factory original fake HEMI 'Cuda
or a factory original clone HEMI 'Cuda ragtop
made before a real HEMI 'Cuda ragtop...

This is probably not an all number match car.

I'am just curious about the data plate and
the engine inside.

[njsteve]

Chrysler did that a lot back in the 60's and 70's. If you have an old parts book (like I do) you'll see a lot of bizarre combinations that were actual cars mocked up for illustrative purposes. The neat thing is that these cars pop up now and again in the real world. One example is the 1970 426 Hemi Charger 500. In 70 you could only get the hemi in a Charger R/T or R/T-SE. But if you look in the parts book in the body and trim section there is a photo of a 1970 Charger 500 with "HEMI" emblems on the front fender. (The 70 Charger 500 was not a special model like the 69 Nascar version - it was just a midlevel trim model between the base car and the R/T) Nevertheless, I recalled seeing the actual car for sale years ago at the Mopar Nationals. The drivetrain was long gone but it still had all its Vin and fender tags intact. The neat thing was the VIN number was something like 100002, and said "JOB 2" on the fender tag. (That wasn't the exact number but it was close) This meant that this car was a preproduction pilot car built just to see if the assmembly line had it's parts and sequences in order. It was also then used for photos for the parts catalog.

[442w30]

Steve's right. To add to this, there's a car, similar to the green ragtop, that may prove to be a combo to the two examples in this discussion.

If you look at some of the '70 'Cuda stuff, there's a red Hemi hardtop. It doesn't have the rocker trim, it has funky wheels, and the hockey stick stripe is slightly different from production. It also has a Gran Coupe rear panel. I believe there are other pics of the car where it wasn't dressed up as a 'Cuda, although I am not sure about this.

[HoosierDaddy]

About 12 years ago I took my car to a local car show and a guy had a 70 Hemi Challenger. It's been along time and my memory isn't as good as it once was but we got talking and his car was a "mule". The first Challenger ever built. It was an "SE" but I think it didn't have the smaller rear window and some other things about it weren't correct. The interior was leather but not the same pattern used on other "SE" cars. He wrote a letter to Dodge and they confirmed that it was a "mule" He had a magazine that tested a 70 Hemi Challenger. The car that they tested was his car. Red with a black vinyl top.
Later, Chris