(first posted 2/18/2016) When Paul recently came across the 1970 Plymouth Sport Fury GT in the parking lot of a Northern California flea/antique market, he had indeed found a very rare car. Only 8,018 Sport Fury 2-door hardtops were built, with no breakout on how many of those were GTs. But it couldn’t have been many… Even back in the day, the car didn’t get that much attention, but there was an exception: Road Test Magazine conducted a full review in their March 1970 issue. Read on to see what they thought of the very full sized “sporty” car from Plymouth at the start of the seventies, equipped with a rare option for these, the 440 Six Pack.
I love it. However, this looks like one of the cars at the lower end of the famous Mopar quality bell curve. Power windows that won’t work and a quart of oil every 300 miles or so – not the way these were supposed to be.
You also have to wonder if there was something amiss with the engine since the testers seemed underwhelmed by the performance. And to offer a performance car with no stick shift or choice in axle ratios? That never would have flown at Pontiac under JohnZ.
Speaking of excessive new-car oil consumption, it is still a problem in Subarus & many German models, & is material for class-action lawyers (who surely get way better compensation than the plaintiffs):
http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/magazine/2015/06/excessive-oil-consumption/index.html
Factory rep: “BMW engines … may consume up to one quart of engine oil per 750 miles under certain driving conditions.”
You’d expect it from Audi with their *Zweitakter* heritage but not BMW which started in cars by building Austin Sevens under license. They’re supposed to *leak* oil, not burn it.
Interesting that the car is both a GT and a brougham. Seems both at cross purposes and may show that Plymouth was serious about neither. Since there seems to be a sort of lag in the acceleration that I have read about in other 440s, I wonder if a simpler, lighter 340 four barrel might have been a better choice for most Fury buyers. In the Impala test, the Fury seemed to make some sense has a budget choice, but not this strangely optioned test car.
The 383 was a very common option on these. The 340 back then was a high-revving hi-po engine, and would have been much less suited to this tank than the 440.
My college dorm buddy had a ’69 Sport Fury, 383 4-BBL V8 engine, Torqueflite automatic, 3.23 gearing, power steering, power front disc brakes, factory air conditioning.
I never could get a stop watch time on it; but it “felt” quite peppy-bordering-on-quick when I drove it (which was as often as he would let me.)
There is so much wrong with this car that it ends up being right. I’m guessing that in the summer of 1974 you could have purchased and excellent condition used example of this car for next to nothing. While I have no idea what a top example would command today, my guess is quite a lot.
I mentioned my driver’s test car, a ’70 Fury III 2-door in the comments of Paul’s original article.
This was my brother ‘s car, purchased used in 1975 for all of $400. Talk about depreciation!
The car was in pretty good shape, too. The 383 2-bbl had plenty of hustle. The power 4-wheel drum brakes were kinda twitchy and the steering a little vague, though.
The reviewers praised their Fury for it’s handling. The wide 70 series tired probably had a lot to do with that. My brother’s car had the standard size 78 series — probably no wider than a G. (And definitely bias ply!)
A little Hocus Pocus Compare to original upload seen above.
thank you Eddy.
Certainly a Grand tourer not a performance car it seem odd they think it being so quiet the driver is in danger of falling asleep when exactly the opposite is true noisy vehicles are tiring when driven for long periods, could be just lack of real experience. I like it but I’m not so sure about the oil consumption once broken in a new car shouldnt burn oil unless its something from Rover, RR or Skoda that are designed to burn oil from new back in the day I’d be taking it back and talking warranty over that and the window controls especially on a new car, Ive had experience of Australian cars where the power windows simply dont work after a few years and it was an option to avoid when shopping for used Falcons. But for those two items this Fury sounds like a well sorted car.
I was intrigued by that comment about the quietness too. These days cars have so many gadgets to play with to keep you awake – or distract you. Interesting that the only mention of a sound system of any sort is a passing remark about the location of the radio – how different to 2016!
Great read. That last part, “a pleasant compromise between an all out performance car and luxury transportation. . .but it doesn’t really fit in neatly into any category of the automobile market”- sums up the sad outlook of Chrysler’s fuselage C-body cars in general- at least when equipped with a Mopar big block RB powerplant. Too bad the mix of luxury and muscle didn’t gain broader appeal, although with quality control issues, discontented line workers, and tightening emissions/ safety regulations, the times didn’t help any. Guess the golden days of this kind of vehicle were already over by then.
You’ve heard of cab forward, and occasionally cab backward, behold cab stupid. This has to be one of the most ill proportioned body to cab ratios ever. I think someone once called them pimple top cars because of the terrible ratios. I do still prefer the styling over the lumpy Fords of the era though, but the GM cars looked so much better.
Wow, we have come a long way since 1970. I suppose the modern equivalent of this would be something like a Charger/Challenger, which produces more power, probably has more room inside, is certainly more reliable and better equipped (no AIR CONDITIONING? Absurd) and gets fuel economy which will not make OPEC celebrate every time one rolls off the line.
Had I been a buyer in 1970, I would have definitely gone with a Cutlass convertible, which I still think is one of the most beautiful cars GM ever produced.
The list of what’s included/not included does seem rather odd.
Right. This is the top of the line car and it doesn’t even have a clock?
All those things were options in those years. Clocks, radios, PS, PB and the like.
AC was not available with the 440 6bbl in any Mopar. AC was not available with the HEMI either. If you wanted AC you had to get the 440 4bbl.
“Cab stupid” – CC win! LOL I guess I must be in the minority that actually likes the basic lines and proportions of this car. I especially like the front, with what I think is a really tasteful grille-and-hidden-headlight ensemble.
Agreed, regarding the beauty and desirability of the ’70 Olds Cutlass convertible. To me, its proportions and luxury seems remind me of a larger, upscale ’65 Ford Mustang for grownups.
That’s why the Cutlass became so popular in the early 1970s. It was a stylish, youthful coupe that was big enough to carry a driver and passenger and, if necessary, two small children, in reasonable comfort.
Unlike this Fury, however, it didn’t make the driver feel like he or she was threading an aircraft carrier through traffic.
I also quite like the proportions overall and the hidden-lamp, loop bumper front in particular. I’d prefer it without the whitewalls, though–redlines might look good. Or, they might be an anachronism, not sure when they were actually popular.
“Cab stupid”. Well done. I love a good bon mot… And that is a great 1. I am in agreement with you regarding the abysmal Space utilization of this monster. But I also find the fuselage cars absolutely charming. Well I should clarify they can’t be covered in Chrome rubstripsand vinyl roofs Do them no favors. These cars just have a agreeable heft that reminds me of a henchman in a suit. Like a ex heavyweight boxer who’s about 25 pounds above his fighting weight. He’s not gonna do parkour But he can move fast when needed and you do not want to mess with him. Back to the car again there’s something charming and ridiculous about the tiny passenger space in the middle of those overhangs. I have a lot of drawings from when I was very young and I swear some of my cars look like that. Among the many many many cars I could love to have, A440 4 barrel torque flight slab that can me Moderately hustled would certainly be on the list. Happy motoring
The fuselages come off a little better as four door hardtops. Still too much whalish body to greenhouse ratio, but better. This one is a slightly facelifted 1971.
I think one has to keep in mind that this car was in fact a bit of an odd-ball. Considering that the 4-speed transmission and optional axle ratios were not available, the availability of a 3-carburetor manifold seems strange. One would think that a single 4-barrel carb would do the job that this car was meant for well enough. Perhaps the marketing people felt it was necessary to distinguish the car from the Sport Fury 2-door hardtop and the Fury III 2-door hardtop. To me, what makes the car an oddity is that I don’t see what it gave the buyer that one of the other cars I mentioned did not.
I would almost guarantee this car was a parts bin special, screwed together by a group of engineers, in a back room just to impress magazine hacks. 440 six pack in a Fury?? I have seen more 427 Fords in the wild
I just looked this up in The Encyclopedia of American Cars and you are correct in that the 440 with 3 2 barrel carburetors was NOT offered in the 70 Fury….only in ‘Cudas, Road Runners, and GTXs. 440s with a 4 barrel were offered as options on 69 and 71 Furys as well, but never a “6 pack” unless it was a one off.
There were 11 440+6 Sport Furys built in 1970 and it was indeed a factory option
There were actually 64 Sport Fury GT’s produced with the 440+6 option; 61 for the US and 3 for Canada. There are currently 11 documented examples left of those 64.
As for full production numbers, 666 Sport Fury GT’s were produced for 1970, followed by 375 for 1971. Rare cars indeed.
I knew there was an 11 in there somewhere, lol
The Encyclopedia is not always right, as I’ve come to find out.
Here’s the 1970 Rapid Transit System spec sheet from the brochure. Fury 440 – 6 pack was optional.
Dealer installed option?
No. The 440 -6 was a factory engine available in a certain cars. It also had a different distributor, etc.
Pontiac offered tri-power for years. It’s really not that big a deal. It just wasn’t a very commonly-chosen option on the Fury, for obvious reasons.
I didn’t realize you could ever get a Six-Barrel in a Fury. Neat. I wonder how much of the oil consumption was a result of being a 9,000 mile magazine test car. 9,000 test miles is probably equivalent to 900,000 regular miles.
I wonder myself – I suspect that it may not have been broken in properly.
My grandfather purchased brand new a 1973 Chevrolet C20 with the 454 engine (my dad still owns it). It drinks oil and always has – the sedate way that my grandfather drove it (it had a whopping 20K miles put on it over 20 years), I suspect that the rings never seated properly.
Full size muscle cars were never the big sellers the factories hoped for. Interesting but when it comes to full size muscle make mine a Mercury Marauder X100
“The 120-inch wheelbase is not overly long….”
How times have changed!
Here is that very car from the road test today. The owner wants an obscene amount of money for it which is why its been for sale for probably 10 years or more
Wow! That is so cool. I’d imagined that this particular car had been junked years ago. Between its odd option load and the fact that it was used and abused early on as a magazine test car, I would have never dreamed the car would have made it much past the first oil shock.
It is interesting how big-engined rarity still doesn’t automatically equate with value. If I’m reading the posted statistics above correctly, only 64 Sport Fury GTs with the 440 six-pack were built, of which 11 remain (assuming this car is one of the 11?). I guess the challenge is that, even if you dropped an absolute fortune restoring it, you’d just wind up with the same car as tested in 1970, which really wasn’t all that compelling even when new…
Might run a bit better though. But still an oddity.
Definitely cool that it still exists, even in rough shape. Real shame about that missing back window though–the interior must be absolutely trashed.
WOW! it sure looks like it lived a hard life!
Not really. It is a 46-47 year old car that still exists. That indicates a life less hard than average.
On the subject of Plymouth, look what I found today, among other things.
A trove of NOS mopar and desoto parts, including new fenders in primer.
That powertrain would have been perfect for a Facel-Vega.
The American full-size musclecar coupes were never my cup of tea – I prefer the intermediates – but I think I’d prefer the LTD or X100 over this.
The timing is a bit off on that one–the Facel II (the last of the “big” Facels) went out of production in ’64, and I don’t think the 440 was around yet. The 383 they did use was no slouch, but I bet one would *really* move with a 440 6-pack. Such beautiful cars, it’s a shame they didn’t last longer, but the ill-conceived decision to make the Facellia “all French” and use the failure-prone Pont-a-Mousson engine ended up killing the automotive division.
This was kind of an oddball combination, a full size car with a muscles car’s motor, but not a/c, which would have been necessary in a Middle aged Gentleman’s GT. A 440 four barrel, or even a 383 would have been a better choice, but the cost of the six pack upgrade seemed pretty reasonable. The freeway fuel economy is outstanding for the time, most big engines cars would only hit 12 mpg. at best. It seems like the throttle linkage was biased towards single two barrel running. I guess that the appeal of the engine was the bragging rights, which always appeal to some buyers. When I saw this car previewed in Motor Trend back in ’70 I thought that it was a handsome vehicle. I still do.
Indeed, I’ve read before that guys who had the 440-6v engine would actually disconnect the linkage for the first and third carbs and run it on the middle 2-bbl for routine daily driving. So, yeah, a run-of-the-mill 440-4v would be a much better choice for this type of car. It’s worth noting that Dodge did not have an equivalent version of the Sport Fury GT. Even Chrysler had the 300 (and the special 300 Hurst, too!).
As mentioned in the other CC on the Sport Fury GT, the next year’s car would actually have been a better choice all-around as the seldom purchased 440-6v was dropped, and the 440-4v was upped to the same higher horsepower version that the GTX and ‘Cuda got.
I could see the test car’s strange option list (mainly the engine) as Chrysler’s PR department providing a specific Fury that was loaded with every possible option, maybe even a pre-production car. I suspect they knew this member of The Plymouth Rapid Transit System was going to be a hard sell, so they hoped magazine tests would help get it more noticed.
In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised, at all, if this was a car for dealer inventory that no one actually wanted. So, off to the magazines it went.
No A/C option must have limited sales in the warmer states and having to tick the box for power brakes!.
Exactly. No A/C in a brougham-oriented car and an engine that sucked gas unnecessarily would have made this one a hard sell. No wonder the Six-Pack was only available in the SFGT for one year. My guess is it was mainly something marketing dreamed up to round out a performance car for every Plymouth model line in the RTS.
Last stand for big [standard] size performance car. Impala SS was gone for 1970, so Plymouth was trying to stay put. Ford still had XL in ’70, but was on the way out.
Seems odd now, but it was only 5 years earlier, 1965, was when Impala SS sold it’s highest number. Mid size and compact/pony segment versions took the performance market
Big cars were for older buyers by the 70’s, and ‘low cost luxury’ was the deal.
I think this car is gorgeous, I can even tolerate the vinyl roof, it looks good with the white paint, but as others have said, a 4 barrel would make more sense, or even “just’ a 383.
The 1970 Plymouth Fury, the Finest Fuselage.
Used to covet the “paisley print” vinyl topped Fury’s back then. Remember three/four “tooling round” our (then still rather alive) western PA town.
Gotta say I both like the fuselage Fury styling and fully agree with the “cab stupid” take. Unlike a lot of midsize and compact cars from this era where the 2 door hardtop got all the design love and the 4-doors crammed in however would work, here I’ve always gotten the sense the fuselage C-body Mopars were born to be 4-door sedans, look great as station wagons, but the coupe is clearly an afterthought.
Yes! Fuselage cars are the best looking station wagons ever! They look very athletic and solid, whereas the rest of the model line always look a bit out of proportion.
An oddly optioned car.
Was the Mopar “Sales Bank” responsible?
I own one of these Sport Fury’s … mine is a GT with the 440 and the Holly 4-bbl. It hasn’t run in several years and is currently wrapped up with several old tarps that we used in our trucking business.
I bought my car in 1980 for 550 dollars from a combination salvage yard/car lot … the day after I bought it I was turning wrenches on it. But I loved those Sport Fury’s when they were new in 1970 and I still love them today. And I still think that front grill is pretty cool.
It goes without saying that I plan to keep my car. It hasn’t run in five years, but now that I have the extra time, it’s time to put the wrenches back in operation. My plan is to get it running and then tackle the body work, which will be the major portion of its restoration; the rotten floor pans and trunk pans are no problem, but the rotted A-pillar is another story.
Concerning the vintage Motor Trend review … I’ll take it with a grain of salt. The authors of these “reviews, ” whether they are reviews of vintage or contemporary cars always accentuate the negatives and eliminate the positives on the cars they review.
This 1970 Plymouth Sport Fury GT is what it is. … a classic car from a by-gone era. The GT was simply a beefed up version of the Sport Fury, equipped with the 440 or 426 and heavy-duty suspension and a few more options. I’m glad I was around back in ’70 to admire these cars when they were sitting on a dealer’s lot, but as a 16-year-old kid, they were way out of my price range. Minimum wage was 1.35 back then and my transportation was a 1962 Chrysler Newport. My personal choice for a car was a two-year-old ’68 Roadrunner, which I couldn’t afford. When my dad gave me his car, I was on “cloud nine” … I had a set of wheels! I drove it for several years, and I wish I still owned that one.
I’ll do a little “review” of my own for these Sport Fury’s … as far as the 426 Hemi, it was definitely overkill, especially if it was equipped with the “six-pack.” Three carburetors are two carburetors too many. It was hard enough to keep one in tune, much less three! IMHO, the best engine/carburetor combination for this car was Chrysler’s best engine … the 383 with a Carter BBD two-barrel.
It was certainly no slouch… it provided adequate power with pretty good gas mileage … a winning combination in any automotive era.
I am going to try and send a picture of my Sport Fury. This picture was made about five years ago.
The writer was a bit behind the times in 1970, suggesting that “most cars now included seatbelts and shoulder belts in the base price”. Well, of course! Two front shoulder belts and lap belts for all seating positions were required by law as of January 1, 1968. I do recall that GM (and maybe some others) often had a “deluxe seatbelt” option that cost a little money, but yes, belts were included in the base price of all cars sold in the US in 1970.
Meh.. Motor Trend. Nice car though..
As a guide to prices, $1 in 1970 = $7.24 in 2022. The $5100 list price is about $36,000. The seats do seem pricey to me, but maybe not so bad. The weight at 4200 lbs does not seem especially high compared to many of the SUVs of now. The crash safety we enjoy now would have been thought as amazing then. Lots of people died in these cars.
From what I see, the 6 pack added 40 more hp (390) with gas mileage being somewhat similar, 9.3/7.8 vs 10.5/8.7 for the 4 barrel (350). 1/4 mile drag time was 14.7 seconds vs 15.3. Sounds like a pretty good tradeoff to me. The best 383 had 330 hp, 12.6/10.5 gas mileage and 1/4 mile time was 15.8. This data is according to automobile-catalog.com. It seems the only problem mentioned here this information doesn’t address was that sometimes the 6 pack doesn’t stay in tune. Possibly. But would it really be that hard to adjust? If it were me, I’d take the 6 pack over the others and even replace the 4 barrel carburetor on a 440 with one.