A few days ago Tom Klockau coldly and cruelly stole my thunder by posting a most excellent capsule on the 1965 Chrysler 300 hardtop land-yacht. How did Tom steal my thunder, I hear you ask? Well, he had no way of knowing it, but here on the other side of the world from him, someone local to me has a ’65 300, which I see around quite a bit. I took photos of it last November, thinking ‘These will make for a nice CC Capsule one day soon’. Upon reading Tom’s post, I immediately thought ‘Oh poohs, now I can’t use the photos I took.’ Until, that is, I read comments from BigOldChryslers and psfm, whereupon I realised that Tom may have the thunder, but the car I found is the lightning on top, because it’s no mere 300, ladies and gentlemen, it’s a genuine bona fide 300 ‘L’. Beat that Mr Klockau! And for everyone’s viewing delectation, some more pics and info follows.
As Tom noted, 1965 was the final year for the original letter-series 300, with a solitary 413 V8 on offer in either convertible or hardtop coupe format. It seems that buyers preferred their numerically-named cars devoid of alphabetical suffixes, as the 300L sold just 2,845 units in ’65 – 440 convertibles and 2,405 coupes – versus the non-L 300’s 27,678 sales. Over half of the 300-non-L’s sales were 4-doors, but comparing like with like, there were 1,418 convertibles and 11,621 coupes released into the wild.
From sv1ambo’s flickriver photos
So back in the summer of ’69 ’65, what did a 300L buyer get that a 300 buyer couldn’t? Very little in the way of exclusivity it seems, as most of the 300L’s features were options on the 300-non-L. There was a different grille insert upfront though, as the non-L had an exclusive red cross insert. The rumour I just started that this red cross was a promotional consideration paid for by the Red Cross is completely untrue. The L lost the Red Cross connection in favour of doffing its crown towards the British Motor Company, with a round tri-colour badge in the grille centre that lit up like a Christmas Tree Wolseley. The Wolseleyesque badge on the feature car is damaged, but because it’s American, Prince Lucas of Darkness probably isn’t to blame. Thankfully the inter of nets have provided us with the slightly less-damaged example above.
Mike’s a lucky chap!
So the front badge is different, but what about the ones out back? Well the rear-quarter badge announces your 300ness to the world – although ironically it reads only ‘Chrysler 300’, neglecting to mention the ‘L’ that the owner paid extra for!
The badge on the fuel filler lid does, however, proclaim the Lness of the 300 to which it’s attached. This particular L also features the spectacularly scarce Misaligned Chrome Trim And Wonky Fuel Filler Flap (MCTAWFFF) option. It’s estimated that only 2 cars were so optioned, and even then by accident, making the feature car incredibly rare.
I’m not actually certain what differentiates the 300-no-L and 300-with-L inside. But going by the feature car, I suspect L-for-Leather may be one thing, as well as L-for-‘Lectric windows, L-for-extra-Lights, L-for-Lovely-dashboard and L-for-consoLe-gearshift. Overall, the featured car’s interior gave off a strong L-for-Luxurious vibe, with a sense of soLidity which is rare today.
Speaking of L-for-Lights, the covered headlights may have been shared between the 300L and the 300-I-can’t-believe-it-isn’t-L, but they are a standout styling feature of the car and deserve mention. I especially love the little crown emblems between the lights – subtle and classy. And what’s that hint of red to the right of the lights?
As noted last week by BigOldChryslers and psfm, the main visual feature that clearly distinguishes the 300-yes-it’s-an-L from its Lless sibling is the Nissan Pathfinder that accompanies it everywhere. Oh L, my bad, the main visual feature is actually the red stripe that runs along the centre of the side trim. When I first spotted the feature car a year or two ago, I assumed its red stripe had been added by an owner, so well does it accentuate both the lovely blue paint and the chrome trim. Thanks to BOC and pfsm, I now know better. I don’t know what the inspiration was for that red stripe, but IMHO it’s the standout design feature of the 300L. It is subtle but tasteful touches like that that make the 1965 300 – both Lfull and Lfree – a standout for Chrysler and for 1960s car design. So, Tom may have stolen my thunder with his 300, but I’m sure we all agree that a beautiful exampLe like this is the 300L-ightning on the cake!
Yes, this does seem to have all the trim bits for a 300L. The trunk lid does not seem to line up quite right either. However, the red stripe is not always on the chrome trim – see this for example:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/40997979@N00/1424774856/in/photolist-3aUkVJ-3aPP6i-3aUkCm-3aUkJ7-3aUm4f-emQBbQ-emQBQj-abCMqa-8JcjMF-8JfoDj-dc6mzK-3MZ5t5-dBSwbt-big5Tn-bhvhHx-3MZ5wo-bjZcA4-bhvkbD-bhviZi-big6tD-7tZWa2-fiLV9m-bB2HYq-fatcY2-dHBUeW-8orc7e-depUJp-bjYtSg-nFPpjq-8K22nt-dHwvfi-f4oYMQ-a5eXa6-6EDu7e-akAxD6-nGJ6yM-nos2sA-an9Syj-dUVDEF-dUVDQK-fECKM2-fEVjWd-fECLvH-fEU8ew
Yes, I suspect a little adjustment on the truck and fuel door latches would line everything up perfectly.
No doubt the owner removed the red stripe. Possibly it was looking weathered. The stripe is painted over stainless and chrome trim, so lacquer thinners should take it off.
Maybe, but the 1965 Chrysler brochure does not show a red stripe on the 300 L pictured in the right hand side:
http://www.oldcarbrochures.com/static/NA/Chrysler_and_Imperial/1965_Chrysler/1965_Chrysler_Brochure/1965%20Chrysler-14-15.html
Brochure pics have lots of inaccuracies. That car is a regular 300 that’s been edited to show the L tail end. It’s obvious that those details have been drawn in. Also, it doesn’t have the L logo on the center console lid.
I can see that the brochure does not look quite right. However the CC Cohort gallery has a number of 300 Ls in it, some have the red stripe and some do not. So the question is whether it was standard with an option to delete; or perhaps the stripe was not refurbished when the rest of the car was done. These cars are nearly 40 years old.
Exactly Fred, these cars are nearly 40 years old. Read what pfsm wrote down at the bottom of the comments and you’ll have your answer as to why some 300Ls may not have red stripes.
I’ve always found the 1965 Chrysler cars to be better looking than anything before or since, at least until the 1969 model year.
Friggin’ L, mate, nice write up. Red stripe made it go faster. L for lovely work, Scott.
You’re weLcome!
Scott, that’s one L of a find! There is nothing quite as delightfuL as a full sized Chrysler. Left hand drive and your pricey fuel has got to make keeping this old girl a true act of appreciation.
Indeed – and it’s awesome that the owner takes the time to drive it. With today’s price of fuel (see image below) locally, I think we’re safe to assume it’s not his daiLy driver though!
Nice find I have a feeIing Ive seen it before at a showbut could be wrong, Not many land yachts as daily drivers in the Bay either despite being a fuel port and marginally cheaper fuel but plenty roaming the roads on weekends.
I was fascinated by the red one I saw at a show in the late 90s in the UK.Stunning cars I’ve never seen another in the metal though an ultra rare manual 300L in gold has been rumoured to be on the south coast.
Rather unfairly the 300L has been looked down on for not having twin 4 barrels and a few less horses.I could quite easily put up with that.
Thanks for another great read
One wonders if things would have turned out differently if Chrysler had decided to stay with the dual carbs and a few more ponies to keep the letter-series’ performance further from the non-letter cars. It’s like they just gave up and were content to let the letter-series completely die out.
OTOH, maybe Chrysler had quickly picked up on the whole ‘brougham’ thing by the Pontiac Bonneville Brougham and Ford LTD and realized that full-size performance just wasn’t where the market for luxo-cruisers was headed. Yeah, you could still get a non-letter 300, but they were more interested in you buying a Plymouth VIP.
The dual 4 barrels on long ram tubes was last used on the 300G. Then a hodge podge of setups were used. Some with short ram tubes which resulted in more horsepower. But I think that the basic 300 kind of took a lot of mystic away from the letter series.
The ram intake was not particularly desirable for street driving unless you lived in a warm climate. It did give you more torque, but with carburetors (or throttle body injection, presumably), cold starts were a bear because the mixture would start to condense on the tube walls and create starvation problems. If you lived in Nevada or Arizona, that was probably not a big deal, but in a Midwestern or New England winter, that wouldn’t be much fun.
Resonance supercharging (what a ram intake does) is a perfectly valid idea, mind you, which is why it’s used by a lot of modern OHC and DOHC engines. However, it works a lot better with port injection or direct injection.
Today’s tuned port intakes are clearly much better designs that the ram induction manifolds that Chrysler used then.
It’s not so much that newer tuned port intakes are better as much as they are DRY, meaning only air passes down the runners and the injectors are right at the intake valve of the cylinder head. Whereas Chrysler’s long ram intakes were WET, meaning that the carburetor was at the far end and air-fuel mixture traveled down the runners. That’s what AUWM was getting at.
It would be expensive, but I’d love to get a set of long rams and convert them to multi-point fuel injection.
My understanding is that plain intake manifolds with carbs or throttle body injectors are also wet. Fuel is metered in in the form of droplets not vapor, and then evaporates, which requires some source of heat. Generally coolant circulates near the carb to supply part of the heat needed. The incoming air will supply some heat. (I do know something about heat transfer, specific heat, etc…)
I have no experience with the early 60’s ram induction Chrysler engines, nor do I know anyone who had one, so I don’t know how temperamental they may have been.
Most intake manifolds on a V8 fit entirely within the V above the block and between the heads, where they quickly get heat soaked. For rapid heating when cold, they will also have either a coolant passage or an exhaust passage running through them.
As I don’t know anyone who ever had a Chrysler ram induction engine from the early sixties, I don’t know what sort of problems there may have been. However, the ram tubes were aluminum, which does conduct heat well. The carburetors were near the exhaust manifold, and there was a pipe from the exhaust to the carbs to heat the manifold under the carbs. Heat should also conduct from the intake valve too, so that once the engine is warmed up it should run OK. I can see that in cold weather getting it to run might be more difficult. Again, I don’t know what they were really like for owners.
Yes, if it was warmed up to normal operating temperature, the system worked fine. In fact, some owners claim it works noticeably better than a conventional manifold in very hot weather.
The dilemma any time you’re dealing with air-fuel mixture (rather than just intake air as in a modern port injection or direct injection engine) is that given an opportunity, the mixture will tend to cling to any heat conductive surface and re-condense, which then keeps the fuel from burning well. That’s actually one of the reasons rotary engines have poorer thermal efficiency and higher fuel consumption: They have a lot of surface area in the combustion chamber where fuel can condense (an effect called wall quench). Mazda went to great pains in the mid-70s to try to minimize that problem with combustion chamber shaping, but combustion chamber surface area is an intrinsic weakness of the rotary. (Direct injection would help, but I don’t think it’s yet shown up on a production rotary engine.)
The issue with the Chrysler ram tubes is not that they were badly designed (they weren’t), but that by their very nature, they provide a lot of conductive, relatively cool surface area that effectively sucks heat out of the mixture, allowing some of it to condense on the tube walls. (Passing through the tubes also causes friction heating, but when ambient temperatures are low and the engine is still cold, the tubes evidently still pull out more heat than they add.) So, some of the fuel just dribbles down the tube walls into the port, which obviously is not good for smooth engine operation. Once the engine and under-hood temperatures are up to normal ranges, this ceased to be a problem, but as people in cold climates know, getting up to operating temperature can take quite a while if it’s below freezing outside.
You need to remember that it takes heat to evaporate the gasoline and that heat has to come from the carburetor or the manifold as well as the in coming air. The air does not have a lot of heat capacity, so without a source of heat the carb and manifold will get colder. With a cold engine I can see that getting it running smoothly in cold weather might take some time, also if the automatic chokes are not working quite right that would make things worse.
I am not disputing that the ram induction engines may have been rough running cold and getting the manifold warm enough to work well might take longer in cold weather. Carburetors meter liquid fuel into the air, which then either evaporates or coats the walls of the intake manifold. Liquid fuel that get near the intake valve (which should get hot) should evaporate. With the long intake runners though, there is a heat source at the carburetor, and then heat at the end where the intake valve is, but in the middle of the runner, which is well above the engine, there is no heat source to evaporate the fuel on the walls.
Something that has come to mind is that my 69 GTO developed a problem that while warming up it did not run well – seemed to get too much fuel perhaps. Anyway I figured out that the spring like heat sensitive coil that controlled the automatic choke had failed. I told the service department to replace it – they refused saying that there was nothing wrong with it. So I replaced it myself and the problem was fixed.
The point here is that if the automatic chokes are not functioning right during warm up, this could be part of the problem too.
Hello all. I really love the lines of that 300L. 16 years ago, I had one. I found it very rusted out in a junk yard. A true 1965 300L with a 4 speed manual transmission.
I decided to give the car a chance at ‘living’ once again. So a friend and I made it into a Saturday Night Stock Car. I ran it for a whole season and it never failed to perform well. My friend continues to have the entire engine and bell housing/transmission setup. Someone may be interested some day.
At least proving its mettle one last time at the stock car track is better than the demo derby or going straight to the crusher. 🙂
Oh geez Man! What a waste of Machinery!
Yeah, especially since it was a rare 4-speed car. He said it was already rusted out and in a junk yard though, so not likely to be saved otherwise.
WeLL weLL what a LoveLy car. The L is strong with this one! LoveLy find.
Today’s Downunder CC is brought to you by the letter L! And Chrysler Corporation. 🙂
hehehe. me love L. oh, CC! numnumnumnumnum
mm .. is this thing a derived Chrysler product?
I believe that should be ChrysLer Corporation… 😉
Heart breaker no matter what you call it. Never had a better Chrysler than a Newport, but …….Oh well.
What can I say but, “LoL”!
This car is one of many Mopar facepaLms. They must have noticed, by ’65, that the Other Two sell plenty of T-Birds and Rivieras. Do they turn their own “special” full-size coupe into a personal luxury contender, with distinctive sheetmetal and interior? No, they turn it into a trim package, even available on sedans, letting its special-ness decline until the thing vanishes in ’71, right as the personal luxury era begins to peak.
Anyway, sweet car, wish it was mine!
True, Chrysler was very late to the game with the personal luxury coupe segment, and they kept offering “fullsize muscle” when the other manufacturers were pretty much abandoning that segment, with rare exceptions such as the 69-70 Mercury Marauder X-100.
One of my favourite Mercuries.Certainly the best looking Marauder though the early ones are nice and I’m one of the few fans of the last Marauders.
After the Chrysler 300 debuted in 1955 Chrysler started putting a letter after the 300.
1956 300B – 1957 300C and so on. I think they skipped I for some reason. I’m not really sure when they stopped putting a letter after the 300 though. I think it was around 1968.
The 1965 300L was the last one.
Thanks for letting know. That’s helpful information.
Then in 1970 they had the 300 Hurst, called the 300H by a lot of folks. I owned one for a couple of years in the late seventies. I bought it for $1200 and sold it for $900. Maybe I should have kept it for thirty more years.
There was a 300 Hurst in the UK a few years ago which was heading to Australia when the owner emigrated.AFAIK it was one of one in the UK.
The word on the web is that ‘I’ was skipped because it could be too easily confused with ‘1’. Mind you they could have had fun with the ads: “Chrysler 3001: A Space and Performance Odyssey.” (With apologies to Stanley Kubrick)
Thanks, I thought it was something like that.
Well, if they hadn’t skipped the letter, it would have been in the 1962 model year, which would have been six years before 2001. (The original short story on which the movie and novel were based was written in the late ’40s, but wasn’t called 2001 and definitely hadn’t acquired the “A Space Odyssey” subtitle.)
The 1965 New Yorker had the same glass headlight covers.
I loved the “picnic tray” that come out of the dash and the hidden kleenex dispenser in the glovebox. The New Yorker had better inside door handles, the best I’ve ever experienced.
I’m surprised this fine car has no factory air. The 1965 New Yorker seemed able to bring the interior to meat locker levels in no time.
Someone should adjust the torsion bars, the rear is too high and the front too low.
That’s a beauty. I’m glad that my comments helped inspire you to write up this “L”ovely coupe.
There is another “L” medallion on the lid of the center console cubby. You can see part of it in your interior shot.
Now THAT is a gorgeous Chrysler! Love the color, the dumped down stance and the black centered wheels!
Beautiful car and a fun writeup. For a nemesis, Tom Klockau is a pretty decent guy and at least he is a hemisphere away from you. I have Jim Grey who lives across town and keeps writing up cars I have found. CC is a cutthroat, dog-eat-dog world. 🙂
That car is spectacular. They can take that interior, make a few mods, and put it in any car today, and it would be perfect.
The red paint in the chrome trim had a strong tendency to fade right off the trim, particularly on a car that sat outside a lot, and I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that some owners simply removed it. My dark blue 300L had more of its original red stripe left than any other 300L I saw. That paint is also difficult to reproduce because of its original rather low quality – a stripe that’s too shiny is very likely not original.
The cracked “L”ens illustrates another peculiarity of 300L’s. This grille ornamentation that was specific to 300L’s had a small light bulb that was wired to burn anytime the car was running. Therefore it would burn out relatively soon. A lot of these were replaced with a normal parking light bulb, which would fit the socket but was slightly larger. Being larger, it generated enough heat to crack the plastic “L”ens. Another peculiarity of the 300L grilles is that the tri-colored ring around that light is missing on a lot of L cars I’ve seen, and one owner told me that he came up to his car and found it lying on the driveway in front of the car. Perhaps they didn’t use a good enough adhesive to mount that ring.
I enjoyed the photos of the feature car here because it’s the same dark blue color that my old one is, except for the top and interior colors. I think that’s one of the rarest colors – I never saw another dark blue 300L during the years I owned mine.
I think in another post it was mentioned that the illuminated badge was banned in some states – presumably the blue and/or red sections were the issue. Certainly out here a blue light is illegal due to (emergency services use) and you also cannot have a red light on the front of your car. Of course this doesn’t deter some from changing their parking lights or similar.
Looking through the CC Cohort gallery I found a few plain 300s with a red stripe-
https://www.flickr.com/photos/28826708@N03/4939904152/in/photolist-8wwipf-bygeMx-bkmkRW-8a2Wkd-89UuY4-89XLAd-hQvfNr-8a36iY-bkmkXy-bkmkUE-aRiKjF-aRiKXt-hReUnG-bi867H-btKVAg-bi86kc-hReJ6m-xQCrp-aoXNrK-59SyMr-iPFXAt-ajXUri-8TWeFW-75Qgoe-f5AZSE-8W58BM-7Bs22G-6ysXVk-75Ubzq-75Qit2-eiv8o5-eipp9M-d74LnC-aLj4Bz-7Bodui-7Byzmn-7BCobY-7BCo8w-eu8owN-arA98G-93xZH1-eu8nMb-eu5cdH-eu8n7f-3aUkCm-93uTvZ-93xZXG-89XLUN-89UuEn-a78aUm-hRf9nV
So you think it’s original? Maybe those are factory original 5-spoke mags it’s wearing too. I actually know the owner of this 65 300. Want me to ask him about it? 😉 What’s even more interesting than the red pinstriping on this car is that it’s a 4-door SEDAN, not a hardtop. Canadian production only.
My brother added red pinstriping to the beltline trim on his 66 New Yorker too, just because he liked the look. It’s not difficult.
I am not saying that its original. What I am saying is that a red stripe at this point in time does not mean much of anything. What I don’t know is whether the red stripe was standard on the 300L or perhaps optional. There could have been an option to delete it. It might have been available on the base 300 as an option. I have not been able to find a list of options.
I will say this about the previous turquoise 300 that we had: there are a number of bits on that car that are wrong. The rear fenders are missing emblems, the trim between the taillights are from a New Yorker and the antennas are probably not original either.
There are other 300s in the CC Cohort with red stripes. I guess that if they were added on by owners, why not other colors?
red striped 300
https://www.flickr.com/photos/52900873@N07/5814182208/in/photolist-9RMcNQ-9RJix4-ar2iWN-a78ERq-524dej-a75M4k-ar2kXs-7bDMFr-abCMqa-ejQ7i2-ar2my5-aqYG52-aJPrPZ-bGcSpD-ik3ybn-hr7pxA-hr8aBg-aJPqn2-aJPr7t-78aAsh-8E8ESy-hr7mvo-8DTSaZ-dfhy9B-ekwN1o-4XnhiD-i3S4Az-dgUag6-a78FfL-4F9yR-8DJwPb-dc6mzK-3MZ5wo-2nh1qA-8AWNkF-72b936-7tZWa2-5YVmkY-9fQDN7-fNNFmS-fNw6DT-fNNEKy-aJPswv-aJPteB-dfhoWA-i3sDez-i3ttfn-3MZ5t5-an9Syj-dfhsbg-7bJMXo
It was definitely standard on the 300L and I’m almost completely certain it was not available on the regular 300, since the point of it was to differentiate the L from the regular 300. People would’ve added it (red specifically) to their non-L Chryslers because it was easy to add to make them look like L’s.
Dual antennas are not correct for a 1965 Chrysler, though if you ordered the optional power antenna it was located on the passenger side rear fender. When raised, it was supposed to point straight up, not sloped back.
Missing fender emblems doesn’t surprise me. 1966 300s were supposed to get Chrysler script emblems on the bottom right corner of the trunk lid. Some didn’t get those. I’ve also seen pics of several Chryslers with the wrong arm on the shifter (incorrect black plastic end on the handle, should be a one piece chromed metal handle) and at least one Newport with a woodgrain inlay in the dash that was only supposed to be on the New Yorker.
If you want to get really picky, the hubcaps on the turquoise car look to be correct for 1965 but not correct for a 300.
Nice articLe Scott, I definitely Learned a few things to help eLiminate any doubt as to whether a 300 convertibLe I’ve seen a few times is L-equipped or ill-equipped.
An interior feature you missed – the L for Large brake pedal. That thing must be a foot wide!