(Submitted to the CC Cohort by Tim Finn)
Look at that face. If ever a car possessed a look of clenched jaw and gritted teeth determination, this is it. This particular example is all business, too, with no fancy wheel covers, no vinyl roof, and minimal chrome.
It doesn’t have time for any stupid stuff as it’s focused on what needs to be done while doing it as effectively as possible. No wonder I like this car.
As one who was born in the early 1970s, it’s refreshing to see a Fury of this vintage. Once upon a time these were a frequent sighting in movies and television, generally wearing a light bar on the roof and somehow always meeting its demise is some spectacular fashion.
While funny at the time it no doubt took its toll on the general population. Well, those in California at least. This Fury lives in Oregon.
While there has never been an award for a car that looks good when airborne, these would be contenders if there were such a contest. Seeing any car airborne gives one opportunity to see it from angles otherwise not generally possible. This Fury looks great from any angle, an admittedly biased statement.
We all know what landings do, so let’s not dwell on unpleasantries. What is pleasant is seeing this green Fury, a Plymouth that is a visual update of the new B-body that was introduced in 1971. Some would argue the updates weren’t successful. I would argue they were; few are the cars that look bad with stacked headlights, another admittedly biased statement.
The B-bodies were also unique at Chrysler in 1977 and 1978; they were the only cars in which one could order an example with each rear-drive intended engine Chrysler had available. These came with a 225 slant six, a 318 (5.2 liter), a 360 (5.9 liter), a 400 (6.6 liter), and the cops could get a 440 (7.2 liter). While similar had happened a few times earlier in the 1970s, these and the twin Dodge Monaco were the last practitioners of this smorgasbord of Chrysler engine options.
Seeing this Fury has been a joy. Now, to channel its determination and find one in the metal…
Note: a rerun of an older post.
Related reading:
1978 Fury by PN
1971 Satellite by JS
1978 Monaco by PN
1974 Coronet by JS
1974 Satellite by JPC
My sisters “in law’s”, got a “78 Fury”. May gave been a custom or “Gran”, model. was pretty optioned out.
Yellow, yellow-gold, top, interior.
Served them well, far as I now till “1985ish”.
Was a nice looking car; was never a passenger in it.
Sad that these are almost all gone in So. Cal.
-Nate
I also was born in the early 1970s. Plymouth, Dodge, Oldsmobile and Pontiac vehicles were all over the place. Even quite a few Mercurys too. I never would’ve believed that it wouldn’t be very long before they would cease to exist. But, just like people, even car companies have an expiration date. Still sad though.
I’m gonna get them Dukes!
I think it’s a generational thing, but these strike me as the Studebaker Larks of the 1970s. There was lots to love if you loved the kinds of things these did well. But they were not-very-successful attempts to modernize cars whose styling had gone way, way out of style.
I’ll make you a deal: I’ll send you every one of these sedans I find if you’ll do the same for me but with pre-1971 models.
That’s a deal!
I’m gonna start by saying I really liked the Chrysler Corp mid-sizers of the ‘70s. I never realized they were so far behind Ford and GM in sales numbers at the time.
Being born in 1963, and being a car kid who rode his bicycle to all the car lots in the ‘70s, I can say I’m pretty much an expert on these.
Let’s start by saying while this particular unit didn’t have a vinyl roof, it was decently equipped, what with the full wheel covers and virtually every garnish of chrome molding available. That front suspension is worn the slap out, or could it benefit from having the torsion bars adjusted?
Some cars look good with stacked headlights, these do not. IMHO. The single headlight ‘75-‘76 models looked so much better. I will say the dual headlight ‘71-‘74 models looked the best, as I felt the hood looked too long on the ‘75-‘78 models. Not really sure if it was just a trick of the eye, but I do think they extended the front clip, same way Ford did when they transitioned the Torino to the LTD II in ‘77. That hood was cartoonishly too long, but I think they were trying to carry on the success of the Elite.
Additionally, the ‘75-‘78 Fury and Coronet (Charger?) coupes, also the Cordoba, looked great to me. Better than anything from Ford or the GM Colonades.
This is just my opinion, I was (am) more of a styling nerd than anything else, and styling is largely subjective.
Seeing this car made me look at my C Body forum and do a search under “For Sale” for any Fury’s of this era. If a C Body is for sale it almost always shows up here as their are eyes all over North America. The last time a for sale driveable 78 Fury showed up was 2020.
Except this is a B Body, which dated back to 1962. The Gran Fury of ’74 to 77 was the C Body.
I really don’t want to do a hatchet job on this Plymouth, but…..
To me, these suffer from an ailment that plagued many Detroit cars from the mid-seventies – an attempt to graft rectangular headlights into what was essentially a curvy shape, and in this case it’s a shape that wasn’t exactly a great looker when new. It seems to say ‘low-budget refresh’, with a dash of ‘we gotta use those new lights they just approved!’. Virtue-signalling, the stacked-rectangular way: ‘Look, we’re up to date!’.
The grille is generic-looking, only memorable for the heavy chrome mustache which sorta fitted in with a lot of the facial hair I saw back then.
Now if they’d arranged the lights horizontally, and swept the hoodline down, perhaps to about line up with that side molding, narrow the grille opening but put cutouts in the bumper for airflow to the radiator…..
Agree about cut outs in the bumper, they would have lightened the front visually.
This is a sad looking example of one of these, especially so at the rear with it’s butt in the air stance, horrible exhaust tip and ugly wheel covers. And what is going on with those rear bumper guards, they are in the wrong place. also no points given for the offensively cheap side markers.
But I still think they were good looking cars, given the job so many of them had to do. And there is no other car on the planet that wears dog dishes better, and the cop ones had ventilation holes punched in because Chrysler engineering.
When I got my first real job in the summer of 1979 I was assigned a light blue 1978 Plymouth Fury sedan with a 318-4 barrel and a torque flite from the provincial government’s Central Vehicle Agency. It was pure government spec, but it did have an AM radio along with power steering and brakes and cloth seats. Over the next three summers I averaged about 2000 km a month in the Fury mostly over gravel roads in northern Saskatchewan where these days an SUV would fear to tread.
For style, the 1971 Satellite and Coronet sedans and their descendants always were third place behind GM and Ford midsizers. They looked utilitarian while the competition was glamorous. If you cared about style, you bought a two door Chrysler midsize–or more likely GM or Ford. Most of the retail buyers probably were Chrysler diehards which means it depended on capturing sales from the smallest owner body of the big three.
I remember cops in Phoenix saying they preferred these to the contemporary Fords and Chevies. Don’t recall why, but they were plentiful enough that they got your attention when in the rearview mirror.
Edit to add: Wow, posts show up much faster with the new system!