Dodge Dart Swinger Road Test Video Comparison
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 10 พ.ค. 2024
- @MuscleCarJr Muscle Car Jr Inc Vintage Video of the day Friday Flashback. 1969 Dodge Swinger 340 in 4 speed & auto versions and Uncle Buds team beats the living daylights out of them. I want the blue one and its worth waiting for the handling loop with that car!
#Mopar #oldschool #moparornocar #dodgeswinger #dodgedart #ClassicCars #musclecars - ยานยนต์และพาหนะ
In July of 1969 I bought a Dodge Dart 340 Swinger. It was basically a stripped down car, but the price tag was only $2,600. I had read many car magazines and found the Dart to be about the best value for the buck with respect to straight line performance. My car was an automatic, but the 4-speed cars came with a slightly hotter cam (5 degrees more duration). While the 340 was rated at 275 HP at 5,000 RPM, the American Hot Rod Association refactored that rating to 325 HP (probably at 6,000 RPM). The 340 Dart had a good power-to-weight ratio.
only in '68 did the 340 4 spd get the hotter camshaft. it was dropped in '69, probably due to emissions. It's a VERY good cam for a small block and been sold out for decades.
@@robertstout6980 I wasn't aware the slightly hotter cam was dropped in '69, I just knew I read the 4-spd. 340 had a slightly hotter cam as I had been contemplating since '67 (reading the car magazines) what car I could afford to buy. The first thing I did when I bought my 340 swinger was to yank the leaned down Carter 4-bbl and replaced it with a 780 Holly. The Holly took all the high RPM miss.
This guy has the best road test voice in the busines. Sorry, Motorweek!
I wish I could walk around talking like this. Imagine like at the grocery store, "These bananas are pushing 99 shiny Abe Lincolns per pound, and they peel off in a hurry!"
The looks you'd get, it wiuld be great.
My dad bought one identical to the blue car (except it was an automatic) in '69. It was our family car for 10 years.
Having owned a 69 Swinger in 76 I'll tell you that its 340 was putting out more than 275HP. Never had it dyno'd but it was definitely over 300HP in factory trim.
Had a 69 340_4 Swinger in 1973 .Dyno tuned in Ontario Canada 265hp at rear wheels .50 k miles on odometer.
No--it was 275 GROSS horsepower with bare engine but only 235 net stock.....
The '72 340 was rated at 240 hp net.
Watching this video brought back memories for sure. A friend had a regular Dart which we dropped a 340 into and it was a fun car no question, but it handled just about as well as these ones in the video did.... like a sofa on casters! Straight line, no problem. The curvies, hang on and pray!
I had a 70 Swinger 340 as a high schooler in the mid 1980s. It was dark green with white bumblebee stripe.
It was T-Boned by a semi running a red light and I was in intensive care along with 2 passengers for weeks. A friend died.
I think about getting one again some day soon.
I remember in 1966 my friend bought a new GTO with try power and 4 sp and other goodies, sales price was $3600 bucks. Sounds funny now of course folks made a fraction of the income
Drive it like you stole it back then
That 340 Dart Swinger was a very BRUTAL, ONE NASTY, SON OF A BITCH, I do believe the 340 had more than 275 horses!!! I have five 340's 1968- 1973, looking for either a 70 Dart Swinger body to put one of them motors in, with a 4spd!!! Mopar Nate Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Wrong.....gross rating was 275....which like all cars back then a fake over rated number. Real NET horsepower was only 235. 440-4 was only 305 hp.
@@chadhaire1711Yeah we get it. It was in a 2900lb car.
@@grantr5417 actually 3177 base weight with 340
My 383 Dart was 3150
There was an orange 71' with a Thermoquad on my paper route, when these were new. That guy was always under hood tuning it or making it faster. He used to back out and get on it, taking it up to 100mph and back down, by the time he had to stop to turn onto Division Street. There were all kinds of 340 equipped A-bodies all over that town(a lot of them modified), scaring the crap out of the fatter, heavier 400 cube GM intermediates. Maybe they were cheap or maybe they just liked going quick. Fantastic motors, giant killers, with way more than their advertised power and torque.
They were nice, Especially in a lightweight car like this one. My dad always told me this story about a couple of guys being caught being real " swingers" from the design department, and that is why they named the car that.
@@bighank796 Didn't know that. I do remember how controversial that name and the Demon name was back then. I also remember half the base parking lots were A-bodies, predominantly with /6s or 318s, but there were plenty of 340s too. All of them were a heck of a good deal and allowed a lot of families to afford a second car. As time went on, many, many friends had A-bodies. I remember the space saver, flip down back seats and moonroofs and rotted out, fallen torsion bar cross frames. Also stuffing perfectly good running 360s, from bigger cars into them. Always weighing less than the competition.
@@bighank796 Interestingly, the flower that dotted the "i" in swinger was added for 1970 - 1975 and deleted for the final year, 1976.
@@Flussig1 ok, I'm going to look into that, thanks
I had a 69 Dart GTS 340 automatic with ac ps disc brakes and a rear window defroster, of all the Mopar muscle cars I had back in the day it’s the one I wish I still had
Too bad radial tires weren’t standard.
Remember road tests back then cars had no traction...they never tried to get the cars best performance time,more so it seemed they tried to make them slower and seem to make them handle worse for tv ratings..Furthermore,tracks had no prep like today they were the same as a wal mart parking lot for traction..
Remember 0-60 1/4 mile were done with 185/70 series 14 inch tires bias ply that is..they never hooked nor had a chance at hooking up...340 darts are easy low 13 second cars right from the factory,12's if you had better tires or a real good driver..aka modern tires..Upper 4 second range 0-60 even with 1985 radial tires that were 225/60/14's..Dart 340 was bone stock even the auto and 3.23 gears,it ran 13.40's in the 1/4 with 109,000 miles on the car! 100% stock! Car even stumbled a little at 40-50 mph we only took it down one time then it rained..Carb needed rebuild it progressively got worse.Was my sisters car!
Remember even slicks back then were not even 225 wide and still never hooked..
He said the 4 speed was quicker well,thats because probably had a lower rear gear ratio as the automatic shifted quicker than the 4 speed..Chrysler was the first company to make the automatic shift quicker than the 4 speed manual...Yes the 4 speed has a lower 1 st gear ratio but automatic makes up for its firm quick shifting you get a nose each time the same car,same axle ratio shifts,even power shifting! After 1971 the 727 and 904 got softer shifting as engines were de tuned,low compression and power dropped way down(want just net hp cam/crank/heads/compression/carb were all changed in 72).
needed larger tires all the way around and anti sway bars
NET horsepower was only 235
yes but back then they wanted more they bolted on and geared them up and used cheater slicks
Yikes! I bought a 69 Dart very much like the blue one in this video. It was fast. That's the only good thing I can say about it. It was the worst car I've ever owned. The dealer experience was horrible. I vowed to never buy another Chrysler product and I never have. I still have nightmares about that car. What a pos.