(EXPANDED 8/3/2022)
The 1969-71 Chrysler was an unfortunate example of a promising design that went sideways because of a few bad decisions.
The Chrysler was exceptionally clean and purposeful for an American premium-priced car of that time period. Chrysler designers deserve credit for eschewing radiator grilles, retro-brougham rooflines and exaggerated side sculpting.
Instead, they came up with a forward-looking design that showcased what the Chrysler Corporation called “fuselage” styling. That referred to body side curvature which seamlessly arched from the turn under into the sail panel, which hinted at the look of an aircraft.
This approach contrasted with the straight-edged, two-box look of previous Chryslers — and a goodly portion of other American cars. At that point only General Motors had started to experiment with fuselage-type styling with its redesigned intermediates in 1968.
Chrysler updated Virgil Exner’s fuselage styling
In a way the fuselage Chryslers represented a vindication of Virgil Exner. As head of the automaker’s fledgling design department in the 1950s, he pioneered the basic look. Fuselage-type styling — sans the label — mainly showed up in concept cars, but the first-generation Plymouth Valiant’s side sheetmetal curved seamlessly into the greenhouse. That didn’t work as well as it could have because the car lacked curved side glass. A proposed line of 1962 full-sized cars did — indeed, the glass curved so dramatically that the cars’s tumblehome would have still looked contemporary in the 1970s (Samsen, 2019).
Also see ‘David Burrell’s take on the downsized 1962 Dodge and Plymouth gets partway there’
The main problem with the proposed 1962s — which were ultimately abandoned in favor of downsizing the big Plymouth and Dodge — was that Exner tacked on quirky stylistic doodads. Awkward fender blisters and weird headlight arrangements would likely have given the big cars a bad name if they had reached production. Some of those stylistic flourishes were translated onto the downsized Plymouth and Dodge, where they arguably contributed to weak sales (go here for further discussion).
Exner was soon canned. His replacement, Elwood Engel, gravitated toward safe, derivative designs (go here for a quote about his philosophy).
As a case in point. the 1968-70 Dodge Charger may very well be the most iconic car of his tenure. Even so, it was essentially a 1966 Pontiac GTO with more of a wedge shape. Beautifully executed but not terribly original.
Elwood Engel hedged his bets with big-car redesign
Given Engel’s conservatism, it is surprising that he took the risk of bringing Exner’s big idea back from the dead when the automaker redesigned its full-sized cars for 1969. That said, the resulting cars were more cautious than Exner might have made them if he had still been in charge.
As a case in point, Engel played follow-the-leader when it came to front and rear styling. The front was given a “donut” bumper, which was an idea pioneered by Pontiac that each of the Big Three rushed to copy beginning in 1969. Meanwhile, the upturned look of the rear end was clearly inspired by the Ford Mustang.
The fuselage look was first introduced on the full-sized C-body but also showed up on the pony car E-body and intermediate (mid-sized) B-body during the next two years. One could argue that this design approach represented Engel’s biggest gamble during his time at Chrysler.
However, Engel appeared to hedge his bets. Only the Chrysler brand (and its companion line, the Imperial) fully integrated the body sides with the sail panel. The Plymouth Fury and Dodge Polara/Monaco shared a more traditional look that included “shoulders” at the beltline and an inset C-pillar.
A high beltline gave the Chrysler a bulky look
The biggest decision that undercut the Chrysler’s design was the C-body’s high beltline and fenders. That gave all of the automaker’s full-sized cars a bulky look, but it was a particular problem for the Chrysler. The lack of a beltline shoulder resulted in an exceptionally large expanse of body side sheetmetal in the rear quarter. The unusually slab-sided and plain front and rear ends accentuated the car’s bulk.
The high beltline also did not mix well with the two-door hardtop. Even though overall height was slightly greater than the previous-generation’s two-door body style, the greenhouse looked turret-topped.
Chrysler didn’t do the hunchback look as well as GM
To make matters worse, the semi-fastback roofline of the two-door hardtop gave the fuselage Chrysler a hunchbacked quality. Ironically, the four-door hardtop shown above has better proportions. This was not a good thing given that the two door was supposed to be the style leader.
In partial defense of Engel, the C-pillar on Chrysler’s two-door models was somewhat similar in shape to that of General Motors’ redesigned 1971 full-sized cars. GM appeared to be influenced by the fuselage look because its cars adopted heavily curved side glass, smaller — or nonexistent — beltline shoulders and a semi-fastback roofline for lower-priced, two-door hardtops. However, GM also gave its cars a lower beltline and more glass area. As a result, they did not look nearly as bulky as their competitors at Chrysler.
Meanwhile, Ford doubled down on boxy when its full-sized cars were reskinned in 1971. The Mercury Marquis’ two-door hardtop was actually two inches lower than Chrysler’s but better proportioned. More traditional side sculpting, including a prominent beltline shoulder, looked less ponderous. In addition, the more upright C-pillar avoided the hunchback look.
The 1971 Mercury was hardly a stylistic masterpiece — particularly compared to its iconic 1969-70 predecessor — but showed how a more traditional look could work better on a full-sized car.
Engel’s team apparently learned from its mistakes when redesigning Chrysler’s intermediates in 1971. The Plymouth Satellite and Dodge Coronet/Charger were better-proportioned partly because they were quite a bit shorter, so the cars’ visual mass was less overwhelming, particularly around the sail panel. However, they also benefitted from less slab-sided side styling. In addition, the front fender tops were lower and more curved than on Chrysler’s big cars.
For 1969 Chrysler edged upmarket in size and price
The 1969 Chrysler didn’t just look bigger — it actually was. Compared to the previous year, length increased 5.5 inches, width grew half an inch and weight went up from 90 to 150 pounds, depending upon the model and body style.
Also see ‘1968 Chrysler New Yorker: The peak of ‘peak Chrysler?’‘
All Chryslers, which had been the size of a Buick LeSabre, were now as large as an Electra 225. They were also priced a bit higher than many Buick models. The Encyclopedia of American Cars (auto editors of Consumer Guide (1993, 2006) lists the price of an entry-level 1969 Newport four-door sedan as $3,414. This was almost $200 higher than a LeSabre. A 300 four-door hardtop was almost $150 more than a Wildcat Custom. Only the New Yorkers were closely matched with the Electra 225 Custom models.
The Newport continued to compete directly against Dodge’s top-of-line Monaco, whose price range includes wagons in the above graph). However, the Monaco typically represented a relatively small portion of full-sized Dodge output.
Chrysler and Imperial once again shared sheetmetal
The Chrysler’s size may have also been influenced by the Imperial’s downgrading in 1969. For the first time since 1956, the automaker’s luxury brand would share most of its sheetmetal with Chrysler.
The Imperial was given a unique front end with three inches more wheelbase ahead of the cowl. The rear end was distinguished from the Chrysler with its unusual vertical bumpers.
Also see ‘1964 Imperial could have been a better Lincoln Continental’
Despite the shared sheetmetal, the Imperial increased in length by more than five inches from 1968 models. At almost 230 inches long, the car was now roughly five inches longer than a Cadillac or Lincoln. The Chrysler Corporation was apparently trying to corner the “mine’s-bigger-than-yours” market.
All of these changes collectively added up to a meaningful repositioning of the Chrysler and Imperial brands. How well did it work?
Fuselage C-body started off sort-of okay but faltered
If you look at raw production figures, 1969 was a pretty good year. The Chrysler brand generated the third-highest volume in its history — and was less than 5,000 units shy of the all-time record of 264,848, which was achieved in 1966.
However, achieving that level of volume was a much tougher slog than in previous years. Corporate-wide inventories soared to a then-record 102-day supply primarily because the C-body cars were selling well below expectations, according to Fortune magazine (1970). This led to a $4-million loss for 1969, down from a $122-million profit the previous year (Encyclopedia.com, 2020).
To make matters worse, whittling down that inventory with unusually high dealer rebates cast a shadow over the 1970 model year, when production plunged almost 31 percent. C-body sales didn’t begin to recover until 1972, when the platform was given a reskinning that toned down the fuselage look.
Imperial displayed a similar pattern. After having its third best year in 1969 — more than 22,000 units — production slid by almost half in 1970. The following year the Imperial was downgraded to a series within the Chrysler line.
Oh, the indignity of a luxury car being advertised in the back of a cheesy Chrysler-Plymouth brochure.
Market share for Chrysler and Dodge fell off
The Chrysler brand’s drop-off in sales at least partly reflected the onset of a recession. However, the premium-priced, full-sized market shrunk almost half as much as Chrysler’s output. In 1970 this market saw volume fall almost 17 percent from its peak of 1.75 million units in 1969.
Dodge’s output fell by 13 percent in 1969 and another 33 percent in 1970. Less than 84,000 big Dodges were produced 1970.
All this translated into the Chrysler Corporation’s market share of the premium-priced, full-sized field falling from 25 percent in 1968 to only 18 percent in 1970.
The full-sized Plymouth’s experience was more similar to the Chrysler brand’s. Plymouth production fell 29 percent in 1970, but that was coming off of its highest volume of the 1960s.
Also see ‘1969-77 Plymouth: Fuselage wasn’t so bad compared to anti-fuselage’
Something was problematic about the fuselage C-body. If it was merely styling, then presumably Chrysler and Plymouth wouldn’t have sold quite so well in their first year.
That said, the 1969 Dodge’s drop in sales may have partly reflected a less successful look. The Dodge’s front end was unusually plain for a premium-priced car and the deck was too long relative to the front. The car was given quick changes for 1970, but sales didn’t rebound until 1971.
Shaky quality may have hurt C-body sales
A bigger problem may have been that the C-body gained a reputation for quality issues. Consumer Reports (1970) complained that the 1969 Chrysler had suffered from weaker high-speed handling, more noise and a “much worse than average” frequency-of-repair record. The latter was heavily weighed down by “body integrity” issues.
Meanwhile, Road Test magazine reported numerous manufacturing defects in its test car as well as doors that gave “a less than $3500 clunk when they close” (1969, p. 27; posted in GN, 2018).
Fortune (1970) magazine noted that inadequate pre-production vetting resulted in cars that “were coming off the assembly lines with the wrong types, sizes, and numbers of parts, and often there were not enough of the correct parts available to make changes.”
1972 reskinning offered more derivative styling
The Chrysler Corporation apparently decided that the fuselage look was part of the problem. When the C-body was reskinned in 1972 it reverted to more conservative styling. The Chrysler was given broughamy lines that looked like a mash up of a Mercury and an Oldsmobile.
Sales improved somewhat. In 1973 output for the Newport and its higher-trimmed Custom series topped 150,000 units for the first time since 1969 — but below the peak of 182,000 units in 1968. A similar pattern played out with more expensive Chryslers, which now consisted of the New Yorker, New Yorker Brougham and Town & Country series.
Also see ‘The 1969-73 Chrysler wasn’t a disaster, but it wasn’t a success’
The Chrysler brand survived the fuselage but it didn’t maintain the sales momentum of the previous-generation C-body. Nor did moving the Chrysler upmarket improve sales of the struggling full-sized Dodge and Imperial.
The fuselage wasn’t a failure, but it could hardly be described as a success. Indeed, one could argue that the introduction of the fuselage C-body represented the beginning of the automaker’s near-death experience a decade later.
Fake design has lower beltline and squared-off roof
Let’s step into our parallel universe machine and imagine how the fuselage could have turned out better. As GM showed with its much better-looking full-sized cars, a lower beltline and more glass area could do wonders for a fuselage-like body. Our fake Chrysler’s beltline is thus lowered by roughly two inches.
The roofline is also lowered a bit in order to even out its downward slope. The resulting shape is more of a traditional notchback. This tones down the hunchback look.
If you look closely you will also see detail improvements, such as a less massive donut bumper. But perhaps the most insidious changes involve shrinking the car a bit.
The Chrysler’s bloated body was ripe for pruning
Trimming the fat from American big cars was ridiculously easy to do in the late-60s. The external dimensions of Chrysler’s C-body could have been meaningfully cut without any reduction in passenger room or trunk space if the automaker had been willing to rethink a few assumptions.
Road Test magazine noted that the fuselage shape “has a lean look” but is “an illusion which becomes apparent when you check the thickness of the doors or sit behind the wheel and view the frighteningly broad expanse of hood. There is, in short, a considerable amount of waste space between the outer and inner structure of these bodies” (1969, p. 24; posted in GN, 2018).
The doors of the C-body could have been much thinner without compromising safety. By the same token, front and rear overhangs were typically much longer than they needed to be for functional reasons.
All that said, our fake 1970 Chrysler takes a fairly modest approach to downsizing. The wheelbase has been reduced by roughly three inches, the length by seven and the width by two. This puts our fake Chrysler in the vicinity of the downsized 1977 Buick Electra and 1979 New Yorker.
Of course, downsizing was an exotic idea back then
Downsizing a big car was very much against industry groupthink during the late-60s. Even though the Big Three was preparing a new wave of smaller cars to compete against a rising tide of imports, full-sized cars kept on getting larger. Chrysler may have been particularly risk-averse to shrinking its “standard-sized” cars after its traumatic previous experience.
I suggested here that dismal sales of the downsized 1962 Plymouth and Dodge were primarily a product of bad styling and marketing. Offering a more efficiently packaged big car could have given the automaker a helpful functional advantage over its Big Two competition.
Just as importantly, consolidating full-sized and intermediate cars on one platform could have increased economies of scale. I would argue that a key reason for Chrysler’s financial collapse in the late-70s was that it vainly tried to compete model-for-model against GM and Ford.
Chrysler management didn’t cop to its key mistake
Ironically, once Chrysler’s finances had declined to such a degree that it sought federal assistance, management argued that the automaker’s smaller size put it at a significant disadvantage from an economies-of-scale standpoint. However, CEO John Riccardo didn’t blame its prior bad decisions, but rather the cost of government regulations.
“Inexorable government regulations, requiring Chrysler to spend hundreds of millions to meet fixed deadlines for emission and safety standards, had to be amortized over relatively few cars compared to GM and Ford,” Richard M. Langworth and Jan P. Norbye wrote in explaining Riccardo’s position (1985, pp. 311-12). “Studies indicated that the firm’s costs for governmental regulations were $200 to $300 more per car than GM’s and that average unit interest costs were $125 against GM’s $10.”
Also see ‘1970 Plymouth Barracuda should have been like an Australian Charger’
Even if the above figures are inflated, they still reflect a core reality: Scale matters. It took a brush with death for Chrysler management to learn that they had the greatest chance to level the playing field with GM and Ford if they maximized their own economies of scale. That could be accomplished through a variety of steps, such as eliminating brands, dealer networks and platforms.
GM’s John Z. DeLorean was on the right track
Integrating Chrysler’s C- and B-bodies would have inevitably required slimming its big cars at least somewhat. If downsizing sounds like a hopelessly exotic idea for the late-60s, John Z. DeLorean proposed that Pontiac’s big cars move onto a longer — and fancier — version of GM’s intermediate platform.
“It was not difficult to lengthen the intermediate body and chassis a little to keep the full-sized cars distinctively bigger, while preserving the lighter-weight and overall smaller-size characteristics of the smaller car,” DeLorean argued. “Such a car would enable the corporation to cut its production costs without lowering its prices” (Wright, 1979; p. 179).
Also see ‘1973 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme: Monument to a fading dream’
DeLorean’s overall plan was rejected by GM management even though the Grand Prix sold much better once moved down a size to the automaker’s intermediate platform in 1969. Just as importantly, DeLorean noted, the car’s profit margin increased because “we had taken about 360 pounds out of the car between 1968 and 1969” (Wright, 1979; p. 180).
Who is to blame for the fuselage Chrysler?
A fuselage Chrysler on an extended mid-sized platform could have looked better than the beached whale that was the 1969-71. And by developing one modular platform instead of two, that might have saved enough money so management didn’t cut back in ways that led to quality-control issues.
The fuselage hints at how the Chrysler Corporation’s financial troubles in the late-70s were at least partly self-inflicted. President Jimmy Carter was right in arguing that the automaker’s management needed to be “reconstituted” to focus on making more efficient cars (Langworth and Norbye, 1985; p. 312).
Also see ‘Ford did better than Chrysler in differentiating its 1970s mid-sized coupes‘
The excessive size of 1969-71 Chrysler models presumably belongs more to product planners than Engel’s design team. Nor can quality lapses be blamed directly on him, although Engel didn’t help matters if he had championed a complete C-body redesign for 1969. A reskinning of the 1968 models could have resulted in better build quality and a more conventional design. That’s what GM did for 1969-70 — with good results.
All that said, if we assume Engel was merely playing the hand that he was dealt by upper management, he deserves credit for coming up with a refreshingly clean design. It’s too bad that he undercut it with quirky execution, such as the high beltline. Despite his greater cautiousness, Engel still ended up making an Exner-sized mistake.
NOTES:
This is an expanded version of a story first posted Sept. 1, 2019. Dimensions, prices and other product specifications were from the Automobile Catalog (2018), the auto editors of Consumer Guide (1993, 2006) and John Gunnell (2002). Production figures were calculated from the latter two sources; data was mixed and matched to address discrepancies. The dimensions table includes two-door hardtops except for the 1971 Coronet and 1979 New Yorker, which were four-door body styles.
Share your reactions to this post with a comment below or a note to the editor.
RE:SOURCES
- Auto editors of Consumer Guide; 1993, 2006. Encyclopedia of American Cars. Publications International, Lincolnwood, IL.
- Automobile Catalog; 2018. “Full detailed specifications listing and photo gallery.” Accessed March 29.
- Consumer Reports; 1970. “Auto Buying Guide.” Published April.
- Encyclopedia.com; 2020. “Chrysler Motors Corporation.” Accessed May 12.
- Fortune magazine; 1970. “Chrysler’s Private Hard Times.” Published April; reposted in forcbodiesonly.com.
- Gunnell, John; 2002. Standard Catalog of American Cars, 1946-1975. Revised Fourth Ed. Krause Publications, Iola, WI.
- GN, 2018. “Vintage Review: 1969 Chrysler Newport – “Quite A Lot Of Car.” Curbside Classic. Posted June 5; accessed March 29, 2019.
- Langworth, Richard M. and Jan P. Norbye; 1985. The Complete History of Chrysler Corporation 1924-1985. Publications International, Skokie, IL.
- Samsen, John; 2019. “Chrysler Corporation 1962: The right cars for the wrong time.” allpar.com. Accessed March 29.
- Wright, J. Patrick; 1979. On A Clear Day You Can See General Motors. Wright Enterprises, Grosse Pointe, MI.
ADVERTISING & BROCHURES:
- oldcaradvertising.com: Chrysler (1969, 1970); Imperial (1969); Plymouth Satellite (1972)
- oldcarbrochures.org: Buick (1969, 1971); Chrysler (1968, 1970, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1974, 1979); Dodge (1962, 1969, 1970); Dodge Coronet (1971); Mercury (1969, 1971); Oldsmobile (1971); Plymouth (1969); Plymouth Valiant (1961); Pontiac Grand Prix (1969)
PHOTOGRAPHY & PHOTOSHOPS:
Author’s photoshop: “Fake 1970 Chrysler New Yorker: A less fatty fuselage”
This is an interesting analysis, but Chrysler Corporation’s big-car quality issues were present with the 1967-1968 Chryslers and only kept getting worse with the cars built for 1969 and later. I personally thought the four-door 1969 through 1971 Chrysler hardtops were exciting cars, although the coupes looked ungainly compared to the Oldsmobile and Buick two-door hardtops built between 1971 and 1973. General Motor’s styling gave Pontiac’s big cars terrible styling between 1971 and 1976.
I owned a 1973 Plymouth Fury. The car was too big and was only comfortable cruising down an interstate highway. The quality was okay, and was typical for the cars built in the 1970s after 1973. If only Chrysler had concentrated its efforts on fewer core models, rather than building similar big cars for Plymouth, Dodge and Chrysler. The big Fords of that period were ghastly in terms of handling and quality, and the G.M full-size cars after 1973 were barely better.
Oh, and John DeLorean’s template for a downsized series of Pontiacs and other G.M. big cars did not last going into the Colonade-era cars, as only the Oldsmobile Cutlass was the big winner. Too many similar models over too many brands with over-weight, emissions-strangled engined behemoths that did not begin the straighten things out until the trend of downsizing, unit construction and front-wheel-drive took hold.
I agree that the four-door hardtops looked pretty good. I remember back in the day thinking that the wagons also came off pretty well, although now their rear overhang looks absurdly long.
The tragedy of Lynn Townsend is that he tried too hard to turn Chrysler into a mini-GM. So the idea of trimming back its lineup presumably would have been fighting words to him. As a case in point, he wasted a boatload of money trying to keep the big Dodge afloat (I have a graph that shows 1955-68 Dodge production by model here).
Yup, the early-70s weren’t exactly Detroit’s finest hour when it came to roadworthiness and assembly quality. The focus seemed to be on broughamtastic styling. Here Ford really did steal the show, particularly in the low-priced field. Its LTD did a great job of trumping the Impala — and forcing both GM and Chrysler’s low- and premium-priced brands to compete against each other (go here for further discussion).
The irony here is that, during the 1970s, the Mercedes, with its boxy styling and relatively tall greenhouse, became the design target for Detroit. Chrysler’s 1965-68 full-size cars featured those attributes. A heavily facelifted and better-built version of the 1965-68 C-body probably would have sold at least as well as the 1969 and later C-bodies.
Quality control – or, more accurately, a lack thereof – was a big problem here. By the early 1970s, the full-size and intermediate Chrysler Corporation vehicles had a reputation for poor build quality and numerous, annoying mechanical “bugs” – far worse than their GM and Ford competitors. They also felt much less refined than their GM and Ford counterparts. (As a kid, I remember riding in our neighbor’s 1971 Dodge Coronet Custom, and being surprised at how noisy it was. It was almost as bad as our 1973 AMC Gremlin in that regard.)
Unpopular styling, a “cheap” overall feel, sloppy build quality and a reputation for mechanical problems really hampered Chrysler’s prospects in the intermediate and full-size fields during the early 1970s.
the downsizing idea was, I think, a good one. Always thought Imperial’s big opportunity to save itself was to offer a smaller 1971 car based on the new Coronet, design of which I think was one of Exner’s great triumphs though it needed skirts. I like the ’70 Imperial’s headlight/grill design best, so that would have been my pick for the look up front.
The car’s content and pricing strategy could have gone in one of two directions. Either as an entry Imperial South Hampton to replace the retired full-sized South Hampton of a year earlier, and equipped with Imperial’s traditional, somewhat more luxurious interior than Chrysler. Or, go after Mercedes-Benz by offering an independent rear suspension and firm but composed ride with excellent handling, fuel-injection, a very upscale interior and exceptional build quality. This car would have been priced above the full-sized Imperials. A 2-door coupe with Sebring’s roof could have been added too, following either strategy.
https://content.invisioncic.com/r277599/monthly_2019_11/501288863_1972CrownImperialvsMercedes-Benz450SE.jpg.ead6ed18f9f5aa254b9f91e0058d696c.jpg
And speaking of great Exner fuselage design with skirts:
https://www.carstyling.ru/en/car/1970_chrysler_cordoba_de_oro/
Paul, that’s an interesting photoshop. Thank you for sharing it. All we can do is wildly speculate, but I suspect that a downsized Imperial would have sold better even if it didn’t offer a full range of Mercedes-type features. The two-door body style could have functioned as a personal coupe of sorts. I think the biggest question would have been how the cars would have been priced. If Chrysler didn’t boost manufacturing quality and add advanced features such as independent rear suspension, then it might have been better to shift the Imperial a bit downmarket toward Thunderbird territory.
I’ve always thought that a broughamed up de Oro would have been a better direction for the production Cordoba than what Chrysler ended up doing, which was to slavishly copy the Monte Carlo. At least to my eyes, the de Oro concept actually looked like a Chrysler.
“A reskinning of the 1968 models could have resulted in better build quality and a more conventional design.”
“A fuselage Chrysler on an extended mid-sized platform could have looked better than the beached whale that was the 1969-71. And by developing one modular platform instead of two, that might have saved enough money so management didn’t cut back in ways that led to quality-control issues.”
Steve, your suggestion to reskin the large cars for ’69-70, then to make a major shift to the mid-sized fuselage for 1971 might have greatly helped Chrysler Corp. rebalance its portfolio to better align with its smaller size. I have updated the earlier shown Imperial work-up and have matched it with the Dodge Coronet for comparison. The Imperial now has a 3-inch longer rear door and a 2-inch longer axle-dash. The design still holds up well despite the longer rear door glass and 747-capable hood.
https://content.invisioncic.com/r277599/monthly_2022_08/1389837862_1971DodgeCoronet118WBand1971Imperial123wB.jpg.57a5a2547863409be19e06441c961c1a.jpg
I wonder if shifting Plymouth and Dodge down to the compact cars to let Chrysler and Imperial have the mid-sized cars exclusively might have also helped. The 118-inch wheelbase Dodge Coronet shown in the image could have easily become the base Chrysler Newport sedan and priced not much higher if spec’s with Newport interior. A New Yorker sedan could have used Imperial’s longer rear doors and roof (and fender skirts?) but kept Newport’s axle-dash and hood, giving it a 121-inch wheelbase. Imperial sedan would rest on the 123-inch wheelbase shown.
For the 2-door versions, what would have been the 115-inch wheelbase Satellite could have become the Chrysler Newport and New Yorker coupes, marrying Satellite’s greenhouse to Chrysler’s front and rear styling. Imperial would use Satellite in similar fashion, netting a 117-inch wheelbase coupe. Rounding out the line-ups, wagons for the Chryslers and a convertible for Imperial.
For the 1971 Plymouth and Dodge compacts, Duster styling could have been expanded to include the sedans, and the Dodges might have gotten a longer axle-dash. A new top-of-line Coronet series could have been marketed as a baby Imperial. A Google search of the definition of Coronet yielded: “a small or relatively simple crown, especially as worn by lesser royalty and peers or peeresses.”
By transitioning from three major body programs to two, the company would have had that much more money available to get those vehicles right. As to the fate of Barracuda and Challenger, am not sure. If they had never been approved it would have been that much more money to spend on the other programs or put in the bank.
Perhaps it would have been best to use the 3-inch longer body for all three vehicles. I kept Newport’s cheap wheels on the New Yorker only to associate it in this work-up as a Chrysler. Newport and New Yorker could have used 14-inch wheels while Imperial used 15-inch. The Chryslers would have used exposed headlights, the Imperial’s hidden. Importantly, Imperial would have remained its own brand with its own brochures.
https://content.invisioncic.com/r277599/monthly_2022_08/1187390052_1971121NewportandNewYorkerand123Imperial.jpg.3724b7e2aa6fce27a6af89e0dcf4227b.jpg
Another way for Chrysler to have developed these vehicles would have been to follow what had become standard practice for GM and later Ford’s large and luxury cars. They added three inches to rear door width for the 98, Electra, SdV and Continental, all to provide three more inches of rear legroom. Roofs were also lengthened.
Lets do that here except because three inches have already been added to Coronet’s rear doors, to maintain good proportion and make the front feel roomier lets add three to the front doors for the Imperial, making its rear legroom more on par with the other big cars mentioned. Mercury and Lincoln appear to have shared the same axle-dash (Ford probably shared it too) along with hoods and possibly the top part of the front fenders, so lets make those things common for Chrysler and Imperial. Headlights would still be hidden on the Imperial, and the planners would have done well to tool anew or modify the I/P for uniqueness. The ’70 Lincoln Continental really nailed it on this score. (Old Car Brochures, AACA Forum).
https://content.invisioncic.com/r277599/monthly_2022_08/301593604_1971121NewportandNewYorkerand124Imperial.jpg.d7c0ed841a16f745aaf52f68350e43ad.jpg
Had all vehicles shared the same front fenders, hood and bumper (each model with a unique grill and Imperial with hidden headlights), to more fully differentiate the Chryslers from Imperial the planners could have included new rear door outers for the Chryslers. This fairly low investment action would have allowed the Chryslers to have completely differentiated body sides from the front door rearward, because both marques were going to need their own unique front door outers, rear quarter panels and rear bumper/taillights. (Old Car Brochures, AACA Forum)
https://content.invisioncic.com/r277599/monthly_2022_08/181207386_1971121NewportandNewYorkerand124ImperialV2.jpg.3d11d4287dfce8751308c60242c408dd.jpg
Having Imperial get the more expressive, artistic body sides would have been in keeping with the vision that Exner had originally championed. While smaller than Cadillac and Lincoln, the new Imperials would have been every bit the equal in curb appeal and road presence, and easier to park and maneuver. But quality needed to be best-in-class, and they needed to adopt a new mindset on that. Looking back, the mid-Sixties might have been their last best chance to rethink, rationalize and reprioritize what it was they did everyday, and they needed to find new areas of the market where they could lead.
Strong resemblance to the Jordan Playboy component of the “Revival” series of model cars offered by Renwal. The series consisted of versions of classic cars with styling based on what they would look like as 1966 models. The updated cars consisted of: Mercer, Bugatti, Stutz, Duesenberg, Jordan, Packard, Pierce-Arrow. Designers = Virgil Exner & son.
Steve, no question the suggested Imperial would have sold better had it been of Imperial content and quality of those years.
Alas, would better sales have really been better? Or would the actions of a small group within the company, striving to catch Mercedes-Benz in content and quality, and generating fewer sales but greater margins, and paving a new path for the rest of the company, been better.
The idea of an American response to Europe in the Seventies that established a middle ground between the two, has long intrigued me. As does early-to-mid Seventies American styling, which at its best was, imho, better than the Sixties and right up there with the best of the Thirties.
Steve,
With the benefit of hindsight, I agree with everything you say in this piece. But in fairness to the Chrysler personnel who made the decisions they did, I think it’s important to recognize some unmentioned factors at play:
As to the high beltline and extended length, from what I’ve read elsewhere these styling elements were introduced to compensate for the high roofline, which had been dictated by corporate managment as a means to differentiate the corporation’s full-size offerings from the competition by offering materially larger interior volume. The approach of Engel’s team at least had the benefit of avoiding repeating Chrysler’s styling problems of 1949-1952, the product of a similar corporate decision to go with a higher roofline than the competition.
As far as waiting until 1971 to re-body the full-size line, remember that Ford also re-bodied in 1969. Both corporations were probably caught off guard by GM’s decision to switch to a six year cycle. In fairness it is also important to remember that Chrysler’s 1965-1968 boxy and rectilinear C body styling was more in line with GM’s 1961-1964 forms, rather than the more organic design language it introduced in 1965. Chrysler couldn’t know that boxier styling would come back into vogue in the mid-70s when it made the decision to re-body in ’69, and sticking with the ’65 body for another two years would have seemed risky given it was already perceived as out of date.
As far as a modular B-C platform is concerned, there would have been compromises required that could well have introduced competitive disadvantages at a product level. Settling on a common width for one had already been proven problematic with Ford’s attempt to put the Falcon and Fairlane on a common platform. And with larger family sizes in the 1960s, greater seat width really was a selling feature of larger cars. NVH expectations would also have been higher in a full-size car than in an intermediate, an area in which Chrysler was already challenged because of its use of unibodies.
So while you are right that investing in plant and eqiupment instead of a rebody in ’69 and then pursuing a common platform in ’71 would ultimately have been proven wiser choices, they would have seemed very risky to the people who decided as they did.
Regarding the use of the modular platform for the intermediate and full-size cars – it was risky, but ultimately Chrysler needed to take more risks, and think “outside of the box,” as it simply didn’t have the resources of the Big Two. Townsend’s ego prevented him from recognizing this – there is a quote from the 1960s where he allegedly said that the Big Three consisted of “GM, Ford and me.” That says it all…
As for Ford using a common platform for its compacts and intermediates – I would argue that the problem was with the faulty execution of the plan. The post-1966 Falcons were dull and and looked awkward with their long-hood, short-deck design. People who wanted that look simply bought a Mustang, which was much better looking and had a more youthful image. With a six, the Mustang could even be a credible “economy compact.” Ford would have been better served if the 1966 and later Falcons had been an evolution of the 1964-65 design, which emphasized practicality and room.
In the intermediate class, the problem was that the Mercury Comet was not distinctive enough from its Fairlane counterpart. GM successfully gave each of its A-bodies a distinctive personality…the Comet came across as a Fairlane with a different grille and taillights. At a minimum, Mercury should have offered a series along the lines of the Cutlass Supreme to entice Fairlane buyers to “step up.”
It has been written in “Collectible Automobile” on the 1969-1971 Chryslers that the wavy panels on the sides of the 1967 and 1968 were big problems, especially on darker color Chryslers. I believe that the 1969-1971 Chryslers were great cars, but depending on the color combinations, the two-doors could look oddly proportioned. My differential equations professor at Rose Polytechnic Institute of Technology, the late, great Dr. Al Schmidt, bought a 1970 300 Sport fully optioned to approximate letter-car specifications. Even though the two-door hardtop had the big rear deck, the dark metallic color combination made the car appear smaller than it was. Obviously, the 1969-1971 Chrysler and Imperial four door hardtops looked right.
My graduation present from my parents was a factory-ordered metallic red 1973 Chevrolet Nova Custom two-door sedan with a 350-cu.-in. V-8 (purchased through my father’s G.M. Employee Discount) with full-power, air, Powerglide, front disc-brakes, but following the graduation ceremony, leaving town, with my parents and grand-parents two cars back, I was rear-ended by a driver whom did not see that the cars in front of her were stopping for a break-down ahead. She hit me at about 35-m.p.h., which “shortened the Nova’s rear-deck by about a foot. So, for about three-months, State Farm, which did not total the Nova, deciding to repair it by replacing all of the sheet metal from the front-doors back and straightening the “platform”, loaned me a 1973 Plymouth Fury two-door hardtop, fully optioned. It was powered by a 383, but was a huge car to drive. I wish I had been given a Plymouth Satellite two-door instead as a loaner. The Plymouth was impressive on the highways, but around town was a bloated boat, and just awful to parallel park on a city street. Thank God, I got the Nova back before the Arabs cut the oil production in October, 1973, even though it was not as nearly as nice after the repairs, so I traded it on a 1974 Nova.
My point is that G.M. (the 14th Floor and Fisher Body / G.M.A.D.), Ford (Dearborn) and Chrysler (Highland Park) senior management apparently did not drive their intermediates and / or personal luxury coupe, preferring the land-yachts of the 121-inch and longer wheelbase cars. I do not understand why DeLorean did not go to Knudsen earlier while he was still at G.M. to build support for the downsized full-size and intermediate cars. The 1968 Mercedes-Benz sedans (and the B.M.W. 3.0-liter sedans) had not achieved the critical mass that they would when the Cadillac Seville program began after 1973, but surely somebody in and around the automobile industry besides John R. Bond, David E. Davis and Leon Mandel forsaw what was coming, as inflation, government regulations on emissions and safety, the abysmal mileage delivered by full-size and some intermediate cars and quality issues began to accelerate as the 1971 cars grew bigger and heavier than ever before.
In Chrysler’s defense, I think the unibody was a great engineering concept. I have read, studied and viewed Chrysler’s technical and dealer sales presentations from the 1950s forward until the 1980s. I have also looked at G.M.’s and Ford’s material. (Thank God for YouTube !) On paper, Chrysler had perhaps the best engineering, but obviously, after the 1956 model year, management took their eye off the ball. The 1957 cars should have been developed and tested further, holding off production perhaps to early 1957 or the fall of 1957. The 1960 Chrysler line-up was compromised by Exner’s styling across the line: Only the Dodge Dart looked right, although I do think the 1960 Chrysler 300-F was a hugely exciting car. For 1961, the bottom fell out as the details on the entire Chrysler line-up were over-wrought and baroque. The failure of the 1962 down-size Plymouth and Dodges in the marketplace were well-known, although the Chryslers and the Dodge 880s were more acceptable to buyers. Chrysler had the best engines, with the exception of the Chevolet small-block V-8, and Torque-
Flight was the superior transmission. Chrysler’s torsion-bar front suspension was usually superior to most competitive cars, with the exception of the Corvettes after 1963. Chrysler should have been increasing in market-share consistently, especially after the 1965 cars, but I have to believe that three factors kept Chrysler from consistent success: Terrible assembly quality, an inferior dealer network after 1956, and the fact that when inflation, gasoline shortages and government mandates for emissions and safety hit, Chrysler (like A.M.C.) had overall fewer vehicle sales after 1968 to absorb in the increased development costs of engineering and manufacturing
to pay for them, while public perception was that the Chrysler Corporation was going the way of Packard, Studebaker, and even A.M.C. What is sad is that some Chrysler cars after 1968 were good cars, especially the Darts and Valiants. Although I never drove a Plymouth or Dodge intermediate, I understand from the few owners of these cars that I knew, they were dependable family cars. When I was program director at WHBQ-AM in Memphis, TN in 1980, my boss did a trade-out with Chrysler for large amounts of run-of-schedule airtime. So I was kicked out of my 1978 Oldsmobile 88 (350) sedan and was given as my company car a fully loaded black T-Top 1979 Chrysler Cordoba (383) with a opulent saddle rich Corinthian-leather interior. I loved that car, although the gas-mileage ranged from 8 (city)-to-13-m.p.g. (highway). Praise the Lord that my general manager gave me a gasoline trade-out. If I had the money, I would find a mint-condition Cordoba. Imagine what would have happened if Chrysler had taken their intermediate platform and in addition to the Charger and Road Runner, introduced Chrysler’s Thunderbird, the ultimate 300 and the luxury Cordoba for 1968. Timing is everything, and somewhere, Lynn Townsend did not see what was right before his eyes.
I was one year old when the fuselage Chryslers arrived so I couldn’t do my part to prop up sales. Those of us who like the fuselage era really like the fuselage era. There are individual models I don’t care for as much but in general I find them attractive beasts. Had I been an adult with the means, a Chrysler or Imperial would have been in my garage.
The fuselage Chryslers were definitely huge-lage but your suggestions, Steve, for downsizing them, lowering the beltine and reshaping the Chrysler coupe roof, make them look much more appealing. The turret-roof design of the coupe roof made those models look ponderous, especially the Imperial, which IMO, should never have adopted the fuselage look. The ’67-68 Imperial should have been carried over an additional year, or even 2, with the 1974 Imperial redesign being introduced for 1971 or ’72. Furys, Polaras and Monacos, which suffered from blandness in 1969, might have benefited from a 1970 redesign taking them away from the fuselage look, which by 1972 had rather ballooned into caricatures of that design language. GM’s concurrent full-size cars were, as you noted, much sleeker and lighter looking because they were lower and had superior greenhouse styling. Even the Colonade-era GM midsize cars faired better than Chrysler’s midsize fuselagers because the overall proportions were better and more adaptable to the federal bumper laws. Chrysler could only afford a 1975 redesign of the Plymouth and Dodge midsize “coupes” leaving the sedans and wagons to languish as fleet specials. Even Ford managed to contemporize it’s Torino/LTD II, Montego/Cougar with full facelifts for all body styles. Chrysler just seemed lost in the mid-70s.
I can say that in 1978 Chrysler was in/seriously on its way to a bad financial shape. This was pre the arrival of Iacocca. These fools kept posting the sales charts in the Design cafeteria as the showed an obvious severe downward trend. Everyone saw it and knew this was not good.
By this time Chrysler had already cut a number of platforms from their program. What money there was went to finishing the 1979 full size, the Cordoba/Mirada, the Omni/Horizon and their coupe spin-offs.
The 1979 full size Chrysler was a turd while it was still a clay in the Design wing. I was there and the group finishing it up already knew. The 1977 line of GM downsized B & C bodies were on the road and killing the market. Yet, the Chrysler was continuing an old school aesthetic that was passe. Got to see the studio photos of the clay iterations that led to the turd. Amazingly, at every opportunity to select the better design that would be current for the car’s introduction, Chrysler management whiffed each and every time. Some of this could have been the result of Hal Sperlich’s arrival and wanting to follow whatever Ford had been doing when he left them or if this path had already been set prior to his arrival.
Sperlich was most assuredly making Chrysler follow Ford during that time. During the Cordoba and Mirada development Sperlich had a Continental Mark V regularly brought into the studio to use as a design guide. A truck instrument panel under development was directed by him to be an iteration of the then current Thunderbird despite the preference of Dick Macadam, VP Design.