Anyone trying to find their way in the muscle car culture already knows about the most famous muscle cars of all time, the Camaro and the Mustang. Most people today are unfamiliar with Plymouth as a company, let alone its products. Plymouth was Chrysler's division dedicated to making low-priced models. During the Great Depression, this company hit its greatest stride as people didn't have enough money and wanted cheap cars.
After the 1950s, the people at Plymouth saw that the existing muscle cars and the pony cars were deviant from the original core values of V8s, simplicity, and affordability of muscle cars. During this time, Plymouth decided to bring the muscle car back to its roots with the first Plymouth Road Runner. Let's celebrate this instant classic by looking at ten facts only the most ardent muscle car fans know about the Plymouth Road Runner.
10 Name Has Animated Origins
You can't talk about the Plymouth Road Runner without talking about the name, the graphics, and the bird itself. The Roadrunner is a bird that prefers to run on the ground, although it can fly. Warner Bros adopted it as a funny cartoon character that everyone loved. Later, Plymouth would name its car after this popular cartoon.
Back in the mid-1960s, Plymouth had to pay Warner Brothers around $50,000 to have the right to call their car The Road Runner. That was quite a chunk of change in the good old days.
9 Signature Sound From The Cartoon
Whenever Road Runner the cartoon had to speed past Wile E. Coyote, he made a "meep-meep" sound. Part of the package when Plymouth purchased the right to the Road Runner brand was this iconic sound.
Plymouth fitted a special horn on all Road runners, allowing you to make the same "meep-meep" sound as you sped past Camaros and Mustangs.
8 Has Its Roots From A Belvedere
The first generation of The Road Runner went on from 1968 to 1970. Little known to many gearheads, it had its roots in a Belvedere. Once Plymouth decided to bring back muscle cars to their roots, they stripped down their then-successful Belvedere.
All you got was one long vinyl bench that would be delightful to ancient people. The result was a simplistic and lightweight muscle car that still housed the massive 6.3-liter V8 that made 338 horsepower.
7 Its Success Exceeded Expectations
Even though Plymouth targeted the Road Runner affordably for the daily working man, they didn't expect it to get the reception that it did. They projected to sell only 20,000 Road Runners in the first year but sold more than double with 45,000 units in sales. Even in its debut year, the Road Runner outsold other muscle cars.
Only the Chevy Chevelle SS 396 and Pontiac GTO had better sales. Note that the Mustang wasn't in the top three, thanks to Plymouth knowing what people wanted in a muscle car.
6 Crowned MotorTrend's Car Of The Year IN 1969
One of the most prestigious awards in the auto industry is the annual MotorTrend car of the year award. Shortly after its debut in 1969, the Hemi Road Runner gained a lot of love from all over America and consequently increased its market shares.
It was full of performance at a reasonable price, making it surpass the initial sales expectations. These achievements earned it the 1969 MotorTrend car of the year.
5 Love And A .45 Moviestar
Love and a .45 is a fairly forgettable movie rated 6.1 on IMDb that stars pre-fame Renee Zellweger and play disappearance Gil Bellows. The plot is your typical boy-meets-girl, and together they rob a convenience store, then get cops and a bunch of crooks hot in their pursuit, but they finally drive off into the sunset.
The movie is somewhat of a prolonged commercial for the 1972 Plymouth Road Runner, as much of the chasing happens in this car.
4 And Boy Was That Hemi Legendary
When the Road Runner came out, it was more affordable than the competition by a considerable amount. People fell in love with the performance that it put out. Plymouth knew to include an optional, more intimidating Hemi engine version for $720 - $1000 to keep the car affordable.
Since only a few people were ready to spend on that luxury, Plymouth didn't make many 426 Hemis. These bad boys made 494 horses, an impressive number even by today's standards.
3 The 1969-70 Plymouth Road Runner Superbird
Dodge modified their Charger into the Dodge Charger Daytona for the NASCAR aero wars, prompting Plymouth to do the same thing. Plymouth brought massive aerodynamic changes to the nose and added a huge rear wing to make the Superbird. This ridiculous thing was unstoppable on track.
There were various trims of the Superbird, but the rarest is a 7.0-liter 426 Hemi. Spotting these versions is super rare, and they auction for an arm and a leg.
2 Inspired A Smaller Cousin, The Dodge SuperBee
When Dodge GM heard about the success of the Plymouth Road Runner in sales, he devised a similar approach from Dodge. Dodge stripped out their Coronet, giving birth to the Dodge Super Bee in 1968. In the end, the Super Bee was not much different from the early Road Runner, with a few quirks, such as the trademark bumblebee wings at the front.
However, the Super Bee didn't match the success of the Road Runner and therefore had a limited production run.
1 The 1972 Power Nerf
1971 saw the introduction of the second generation of the Plymouth Road Runner. Everything stayed pretty much the same from the first generation, save for a few changes in the styling to make it more aerodynamic. But in 1972, new emission regulations forced manufacturers to significantly cut their power plants.
By 1973 Plymouth used the Chrysler 318 cu engine as the standard for the Road Runner. From here, things went downhill as this engine only made a measly 170 horsepower.