As it turned out, I only owned my first car, the 1961 Ford, for about nine months, roughly coinciding with my senior year in high school. Its replacement was a 1963 Plymouth Belvedere four door sedan, a much better car in almost every possible way. For one thing the Plymouth’s rear fenders did not have 20 pounds of Bondo trying to deal with serious rust. For another the interior of the Plymouth was in excellent condition, I’m not sure that anyone had ever ridden in the back seat. Per the dealer, the Plymouth had been purchased new by the proverbial older couple who drove very little and was a recent trade-in on a new Chrysler. I’m not 100% sure that information was correct as the Plymouth did have around sixty thousand miles when I got it. I don’t have any photos of my Plymouth; the pictures in this article were sourced from the internet, mine was a dark shade of brown.
In any case I was very happy with my new wheels. As opposed to the inline six in the Ford the Plymouth had a 361 CID V8 topped with the biggest two barrel carburetor I have ever seen, it must have been at least six inches in diameter. It was rated at 265 HP and 380 lb.ft. of torque; when you consider that the Belvedere, although considered full-sized by Chrysler, was actually more of a mid-size, the performance potential was obvious (although it didn’t quite pull wheelies). I went from driving a car that would barely get out of its own way to one that was capable of spinning the back tires at will. It was really easy to overload the rear suspension and get the back axle tramping up and down as it wound up against the overworked leaf springs. If my father had understood the significance of the “Commando 361” badges on the front fenders, I suspect I would have ended up with a six cylinder Valiant instead of the Belvedere.
Of course the downside of all of this performance was terrible fuel mileage, I averaged around 11 MPG in normal, around town driving. I’m not sure what the final drive ratio was in the Plymouth but it must have been fairly low; it would run up to 110 MPH without much trouble and then sort of hit a wall. Yes, I know (and knew then) that those kinds of speeds were not really a good idea, especially with an inexperienced driver behind the wheel. All I can say in my defense is that I grew up in a small town and it was easy to find deserted stretches of highway to use for research.
As was true with nearly all cars from that era, the Plymouth came with its share of quirks. One, that I discovered once the weather started to turn cool that first fall of my ownership, was that the engine was not going to start without the choke if the ambient air temperature was 50 or below. This wouldn’t have been so bad except that the automatic choke did not work correctly; the only way to set the choke was to raise the hood, reach under the air cleaner and set it by hand. You didn’t even have to remove the air cleaner to do this, there was room to reach in underneath and operate the choke. It was almost as if Chrysler had anticipated this problem and had created a work around. This almost made me long for the Ford with its manual choke.
Another point of individuality, common to all Chryslers of this era, was that the automatic transmission was operated by push buttons. Some people did not care for this but I found it very easy to learn to use. If you needed to “rock” the car out of mud or snow it was easy to go from Low to Reverse by punching the buttons, and not have to deal with the floppy lever found in Ford and GM vehicles.
Another little example of the Belvedere’s uniqueness was its marginal cooling capacity. From what I could tell Chrysler used the same radiator in all Plymouths. One that worked perfectly well when cooling down the slanty in a Valiant was somewhat overmatched dealing with a big inch V8. To make things even more challenging the original owners had installed one of those “knee freezer” after- market air conditioners; the type that perched on the transmission tunnel under the dash and ate into front seat leg room. To give the thing its due it would blow out ice cold air, unfortunately the only time you could run the AC was on the highway. Around town there was just not enough air blowing through the radiator and you could literally watch the temperature gauge move into the hot zone while stopped at a traffic light. It didn’t really matter; we didn’t have A/C at home so I was used to sweating.
I put over 40,000 miles on the Belvedere in the two years that I drove it. Most of that was going to school at the local community college or going back and forth to work. A good chunk of the mileage however was mindless cruising. As I said I grew up in a small town and the cruising circuit normally consisted of three restaurants, with occasional side trips to other spots. I don’t really remember exactly how long one of these laps was but it had to be less than two miles. There were many Friday and Saturday nights where I used up an entire tank of gas going from nowhere to nowhere. Looking back with 40+ years of accumulated wisdom it is obvious that I could have been making better use of my time and resources but back then it seemed important.
As time went on more and more “minor” things started to go wrong with the Plymouth. The worst was the heater fan quit working, the heater still produced heat but without the fan the heat didn’t get distributed very well. At highway speeds there was enough air flow through the system to at least keep your feet warm and to defog the windshield. Unfortunately, in town there was less air flow and it was just like driving a VW Beetle, wear warm socks and keep a towel handy to wipe off the windshield. You might think that not having reliable heat in one’s car would put a damper on one’s social life; in my case I was pretty socially inept then so this had no measurable effect.
The final issue, and the one that caused me to move on from the Plymouth, was with the transmission. Chrysler’s Torqueflight has a well-deserved reputation for longevity and resistance to abuse but it finally developed a fluid leak that was beyond my capabilities to fix. The poor car began to leak transmission fluid so copiously that I was embarrassed to park it in paved areas. Even a short pause was long enough for a noticeable puddle to begin to form underneath. The transmission would leak out enough fluid so that it would not shift from first to second; the car would still move (somewhat grudgingly) but apparently would not generate enough pressure to accomplish the 1-2 shift. At this point the Belvedere needed professional help and I was past the point of spending any more money on an eight year old car with over 100k miles. I don’t remember if I was able to convince the dealer to take the Plymouth as a trade in on its replacement or if it just got hauled off to the boneyard. In any case it was an entertaining ride while it lasted.
That front grille treatment is highly reminiscent of the Rover P6, also launched in 1963.
Ahh, the memories of mindless cruising. I don’t think it was purely a small town ritual though. In my high school days, the circuit ran from the Dairy Queen to the drive in. Gas was 32 cents a gallon, bulk oil was cheap. We would all chip in to fuel the endless drive to nowhere in particular.
True…even in my 1948 Ford Tudor we could cruise for quite a while on a buck’s worth of gas.
Long hood, short deck. Even more so the ’62’s.
Before the Mustang.
…….” There were many Friday and Saturday nights where I used up an entire tank of gas going from nowhere to nowhere. Looking back with 40+ years of accumulated wisdom it is obvious that I could have been making better use of my time and resources but back then it seemed important.”……
Thanks for this, brings back memories of driving nowhere to nowhere. When you’re 17 and have your first car, that’s what you do…cause you can….and it’s important.
And funny thing about that for me, 40+ years later I still get in my old beater(s) and drive around to nowhere in particular.
Great write up and great car.
I know these were strangely sized for the day, but with the powerful V8, the still roomy interior and a touch of style, Plymouth was giving you quite a bit for your money in 1963. It went over a hundred thousand miles and was probably good for many more if the resale value justified a not too extensive freshening. Detroit had enough competition to still give the customer his money’s worth in the days before importing cars solved our terrible domestic quality, if that is what it did.
I agree. I’m too young to remember when they were first introduced, I’ve seen plenty of 1962 through 64 Plymouth Belvedere, Fury, and Savoy over the years.
I’ve always liked the 1962 through 1964 Plymouth Belvedere, Savoy, and Fury.
Love the front end on the 63. My uncle Richard had a ’65 in the same color as the first photo and that was such a yawner of a front end.
My mother’s maiden aunt had a 64 Plymouth, which I prefer over the 63 for it’s better styling (IMHO), and nicer instrument panel. Aunt Teresa’s car was even the same light brown as the car pictured here.
Yet, I like the “trimmer” sized Belvederes….just make mine a 65.
You never did tell us what was the last straw that made you get rid of the 61 Ford. I am curious.
Also, too bad this one did not get fixed but it easy to understand not pouring more money into a car that is starting to need lots and lots of repairs.
It wasn’t any one thing that caused me to get rid of the ’61 Ford. My father offered to spring for a used car as a high school graduation present and I wasn’t about to wait for him to change his mind. The Ford was pretty ratty; the seats needed to be recovered and the Bondo in the rear fenders was starting to crack.
I thought about trying to fix the transmission leak in the Plymouth but that would have done nothing to fix the heater fan issue. Sometimes one just needs to move on.
A very fine story, Joe, but:
No, yours wasn’t a Slant-6 Valiant radiator struggling to cope with the heat from a 361, it was just clogged or elsewise defective, and/or hadn’t been upgraded when the air conditioner was added, or there was another cooling system problem causing your overheating.
Mightn’t it’ve been simpler and more productive to long for the ~$5 at the time and five minutes it would’ve taken to fix with a replacement choke thermostat…?
Perhaps a bit of poetic license regarding the radiator 🙂 I doubt that it was clogged, I’m sure the overheating issue was due to the cooling system not being upgraded to deal with the after-market AC.
I have no answer why I never tried to fix the automatic choke. I got used to dealing with it the way that it was and just learned to live with it.
I didn’t have problems with the choke thermostat coil on the 1960s Chrysler products I owned. What would always go bad was the vacuum pulloff, whose rubber diaphragm would crack and leak. The choke would close, the engine would crank and fire, but without the vacuum pulloff to open the choke slightly, the engine would run out of combustion air and flood/stall. Take off the air cleaner lid, stick a pencil into the choke to hold it open, and restart. Wait for the engine to warm up some, and go. Don’t forget to pull out the pencil and put back the air cleaner lid.
Those who have only driven cars with electronic fuel injection are spoiled!
“Those who have only driven cars with electronic fuel injection are spoiled!”
+1. Yep…all the fun we had (and still do) with carbed vehicles, they don’t know the fun they’re missing.
These 63,64 Mopars were nice cars but the neighbors with the big Impalas and
catalinas all figured they were too small and kind of goofy . I don’t figure they
did too well on resale value Also how was it that the previous owners,
the old folks,had the great big engine instead of the 318
maybe it was a police car
They probably just wanted to drive fast. I’m 64 and I still like to drive fast. Seriously, the Plymouth came from a dealer in a small town, a place where any serious shopping would require a 40-50 mile round trip. The previous owners probably felt time was money
It is a shame for the cause of the transmission leak was most likely the shift rod shaft seal. A $3.00 part and lots of Mopars were scrapped because of it. I had a ’67 Dodge Coronet that had the same problem. Also another reason the intake manifold well chokes had problems is the heat riser manifold passages became plugged up.
My ’66 A-100 van had the same transmission leak. A minor design flaw in the Torqueflite was the fact that the shift rod shaft penetrated the case below the fluid level when parked. A new o-ring alone didnt stop the leak due to wear. I had to replace the shaft as well. Often, the backup light/starter interlock switch leaked as well, but not as profusely.
As a kid, I always thought these 62-64 Plymouths a d Dodges were just strange. But I would really like one now.
I loved the pushbuttons on my 59 Fury
It’s the first car I remember from my childhood. I have always wanted one.
The Belvedere name continued on the same basic car in ’65. It was my paternal grandfather’s last car. Because the “full size” Plymouth became “intermediate” when the new Fury line was introduced Grandpa felt he got a bargain since the Belvedere price went down that year. His trade was a ’62 Studebaker. Same small town dealer, different brand. Since the ’64 GM intermediates were pretty big in a historical context, I guess it all worked out at the time.
Nice .
Although I’m a Bowtie Guy , I fully understand my Friends who say ” MoPar or NO CAR ! ” .
My self I love the MoPar ‘A’ bodies the best , light and nimble , easy to Hot Rod and oh so much fun to drive hard .
=8-) .
-Nate
I like all three cars, GM, Ford, and Chrysler. They each have something I like.
This is the first car I remember riding in – my dad’s ’63 Fury 4 door sedan, in pale blue. I don’t remember it very well, but I’ve always remembered those strange turn signals.
Interestingly, there’s an interesting article on Allpar.com:
http://www.allpar.com/history/plymouth/1963.html
that indicates the front clip was originally intended to mate with the rest of the ’62 body. What an interesting progression that design made.
Although never a MOPAR guy, I have a real fondness for several 1960s and 1970s full-size models. This model year is a true standout to me in looks. I noticed another poster (also named “Philip”!) noted the front end similiarity to a Rover P6, but what this car really reminds me of is the ever-so-stylish 1963 to 1965 Buick Riviera. It has that forward leaning prow, with horizontally-alligned quad headlamps in the grille like the ’63 and ’64 Riviera. Although the resemblence ends no farther back than the A-Pillar, the rest of the car is very “clean” and unfussy. Oddly enough, I absolutely love the 1960 Valliant, which was obviously very “neo-Baroque”, but the ’63 Savoy/Belvedere/Fury still had a nice balance of sensibility and style. Dodge cars had more peculiar styling (’62), or uninteresting. But then of course the mid range cars at Olds and Buick were also rather staid compared to Pontiac (especially) and Chevy.
My Dad was a Plymouth man (indeed all of his 4 siblings and parents drove Chrysler products). He’d had a ’51 and a ’56 Savoy (the later in two tone black and white), but when he started looking at cars at the end of the ’62 run, my Mother absolutely refused to own anything as ugly as that car. So at that point he switched to Chevrolets with a ’63 Bel Air. I suppose he could have reconsidered the ’63 Plumouth which was slightly less ugly, but I think he had already converted in his mind.