That Sleeper Chrysler Cordoba You’ve Been Dreaming About Is Only Some Mods Away: COTD

Malaise Era cars get a bad rap from many car enthusiasts. Indeed, a lot of it was deserved, from some uninspired designs to laughable quality. Oh, and don’t forget V8s that made power easily eclipsed by even some of the cheapest crossovers today. But there’s a thing about old Malaise Era cars: they make great sleepers.

On Friday, Jason wrote a Glorious Garbage about the 1975 Plymouth Road Runner, a car that rode on a high of 335 HP, just to get smacked down to 145 HP in the Malaise Era. Now, in fairness to the Road Runner, that 335 HP number was gross horsepower, which was measured with the engine on a stand and not connected to anything. SAE net horsepower, which made its debut in 1971, is more accurate, measuring output after the engine gets loaded down with the accessories it needs to operate in a car. Net horsepower isn’t what you’ll get at the wheels, but it’s closer to reality than gross HP was.

Anyway, accounting for the change from gross HP to net HP, the Road Runner was downgraded to 250 HP. That’s a huge hit, but it could have been worse. So, the fact that the 1975 model made just 145 lethargic ponies with its 318 cubic inch V8 couldn’t be blamed entirely on gross-to-net ratings.

A 1970s piece of American iron making just 145 coughing horsepower sounds like a bleak experience, but Cam.man67 says hold on, there’s potential there:

My favorite thing about malaise-era cars, particularly Mopars, is that, while yes, they were slow, inefficient, and ill-handling stock, it really didn’t take much to wake ‘em up. Yeah, that 318 maybe made 145hp from the factory, but those engines had (and have) an astronomical aftermarket for speed parts. It’s really not difficult to double or even triple the engine output for (even in modern dollars) not much more than a grand. Suspension-wise, there were good options then for handling upgrades, and now whole pro-touring drop-in suspensions are available. In some ways, Malaise Mopars make better bases for hot rodding because they’ll never reach the collectibility status of, say, a big-block ‘69 Charger.

To back Cam.man67 up here, for an example of what you can do with choked-out V8s, look no further than the one-off Duntov GT we wrote about early this year.

That lovely unit started life as a Cadillac Brougham with a 5.0-liter V8 making a casual 140 horses. Jim Jones of then Traco Engineering took another lazy engine, the 205 HP 5.7-liter V8 from a Corvette, and turned the taps up to 370 HP. That engine then found a home in the Brougham, turning it into a Malaise Hot Rod.

So, don’t discount those Malaise Era cars, there’s potential in them! TriangleRAD has the right idea:

Now you’ve got me thinking about a sleeper Cordoba or Mirada….

For one more COTD nom today, let’s look at the street legal Maserati MC12 Matt wrote about earlier. That car participated in this year’s Gold Rush Rally with Team Loan Sharks. I’m giving a nod to SquareTaillight2002 for making me laugh so hard I erupted into a coughing fit:

When I saw the name Team Loan Sharks, I assumed that Scott Tucker was out of prison.

For some context, in 2017, Tucker was sentenced to 16 years behind bars on racketeering, wire fraud, and money laundering charges. As I wrote in 2021, Tucker’s AMG Capital Management targeted people with low credit ratings to get into predatory loans with illegally-high interest rates. The gains from the business were used to fund a racing team and to compete at Le Mans.

Deep cut, SquareTaillight2002! Have a great evening, everyone!