Chrysler pioneered the big American performance car. By that, I mean the complete package, not just a hot engine option on a marshmallow-suspended sedan or coupe. It started with the superb Chrysler 300 in 1955, an incomparable car at the time with the firm suspension and beefy brakes to go along with its 300 hp hemi to make it a genuine high speed tourer in the best European tradition. In 1956, the new Dodge D-500, DeSoto Adventurer and Plymouth Fury all got roughly the same treatment: high output engine, heavy duty drive line and suspension components along with unique trim and other goodies to define these factory “specials”. Cheap they weren’t, but unique at the time they were.
In 1957, they all enjoyed the benefits of Chrysler’s great leap forward, with radical new styling by Virgil Exner, a new front suspension with torsion bars, improved steering, and the brilliant new Torqueflite automatic. All four were tested by SCI (300C review here), and all were deemed to be the best handling American cars, which only makes sense as they shared much of their underpinnings. The Fury was of course the cheapest of the fab four, and yet it was also the quickest from 0-60. That alone made it the bargain of the bunch and arguably America’s best all-round performance car at the time.
Already in the second paragraph, the Fury’s best quality is stated in no uncertain terms: “The Fury corners with a smooth agility that formerly has been obtainable only on outright sports cars, usually the kind that are sprung like a park bench…The Fury is the best-handling, best-riding Detroit sedan we’ve ever driven.” This was attributed to the 25% stiffer springs and shocks all-round as well as the superior geometry of its front suspension. The Fury’s torsion bars and rear springs were also adjusted for a lower ride height, and wider 6″ rims contributed too. Note: there is no intrinsic advantage of a torsion bar over a coil spring; it’s all in the geometry and tuning.
SCI did not spare further superlatives for its assessment of the Fury’s handling: It’s very difficult to adjust to the fact that there is a big Detroit sedan that can easily out-corner many bona-fide sports cars…it tracks effortless in the direction it’s aimed”.
What’s interesting (and a bit unexpected) is that the new 318 CID “poly” engine was tuned in such a way that it was not well-suited to be teamed up with the manual transmission. The poly was not an inherently deep-breathing engine, so the engineers had to give it a rather radical cam along with dual four barrel carbs and other performance tweaks to wake it up and deliver 290 (gross) hp. The torque peak came at 4,000 rpm, which is exceptionally high for a normally rather lazy engine like this. As a consequence, it made little torque below its peak, and bogged down on first gear take-offs. The testers had to use 4,000 rpm at the starting line to get a decent 0-30 time (2.8 sec.). SCI went as far as to recommend anyone buying a manual transmission Fury to invest in an aftermarket camshaft that delivers more power over a wider range of engine speeds. Now that’s not something you expect to read in a review.
But it teamed up just fine with the push-button controlled TorqueFlite, thanks to its torque converter that allowed the engine to quickly spool up into its power band on takeoff. The torque converter’s stall ratio effectively doubled its first gear ratio of 2.45:1, or almost 5.0:1 total, whereas the manual’s first gear ratio was 2.50:1. SCI came to the conclusion that the Fury’s engine was specifically designed around the automatic, rather unusual for the times.
It’s almost as if Chrysler wanted to force buyers into the TorqueFlite. And for good reasons, as it quickly proved itself to be as fast or faster in the hands of most drivers. Its effective gear ratio spread was much wider than a three speed manual, and even a four speed, and it shifted briskly and smoothly. Also, the manual transmission was exceptionally balky.
The performance specs given in the chart below are apparently for the manual-equipped version, although they also drove a TF version too. Unfortunately, no acceleration times were given for that, as it would have made a nice comparison. SCI did say that “Acceleration on the road with the Torqu-Flite equipped Fury can be startling at times…”. Just like with the 300C, the combination of a downshift and the opening of the second carb resulted in “suddenly you’re moving out with a tremendous rush“.
Here’s a comparison of a few key performance stats of the four 1957 performance cars:
Note that the Fury had a manual transmission and the rest all had TorqueFlite. Top speed was estimated to be 120-125 for the Fury and 140 for the 300C, with the others slotted in between.
In posing the question as to whether the Fury was the best performance car of its time, it can only be considered so in the terms defined in this test, which emphasized its all-round capabilities. In terms of acceleration, the ’57 Chevy easily walks away from it. Even a 270hp Bel Air saddled with the 2-speed Powerglide was roughly as fast, and that’s just for starters.
The new Chevy 283 V8 was of course the second coming in the affordable performance field, and became an instant legend, especially in the 283 hp fuel injected version. The Chevy weighed some 200-350 lbs less than the Plymouth, which only added to the equation. A Bel Air coupe weighed 317 lbs less than the Fury coupe.
The performance stats given in the table above are from various vintage sources. The 14.21 sec. 1/4 mile time for the 283/283 version was achieved in a Hemmings test in 1976; it may have had better tires than in 1957, and rear axle ratios undoubtedly play into the equation in a significant way. Meaning, these numbers are not strict apples-to-apples comparisons, as that’s hard to come by. But there’s no doubt that a properly equipped ’57 Chevy was unbeatable in a straight line.
Heavy duty suspensions, brakes, oversize wheels, tires, and everything else to turn a ’57 Chevy into a competitive stock car racer were available from the dealer, as per this detailed factory booklet. There’s little doubt that a properly equipped ’57 Chevy would be able to outrun a Fury on a curvy section of highway too, or on a road race. But one had to spec it that way, as the hard core street racers, drag racers and stock racers did. What was unique about the Fury (and the D-500, Adventurer and 300C) is they came as a complete package, or at least mostly so (power steering and brakes were still optional on the Fury). The Fury targeted a different buyer, offering a more sophisticated package more akin to the Gran Turismo cars from Europe.
Of course that didn’t exactly come cheap; its $2925 base price was some 25% more than a Belvedere hardtop coupe. And it shows in the sales: 7438 for the year. By far the best selling of the Chrysler fab four, but hardly big numbers. The glory days of Chrysler’s performance cars was still some years away, but the seeds were clearly to be seen here in the Fury.
The Fury had a healthy top speed; some 115 mph as tested with a one-mile approach. 125 mph was estimated to be its potential with enough distance to get there. “At 115 we can state that the Fury feels just as secure as at much lower speeds, and this can be said of few cars”.
The Fury’s brakes were actually no different than the standard Plymouth brakes, but “the 11 x 2 inch center-plane brakes used on the Plymouth are exceptionally good by Detroit standards.” The brutal test from 100 mph resulted in brakes that were still usable, unlike many others tested. The ten stop fade test from 60 told a more critical story: By the fifth stop, there was a 42% loss of braking power and only about an inch of pedal was left.” But they recuperated fairly fast, and overall were better than average for the times.
Plenty of good words for the Fury in summation, “including some virtues that its competition are unable to match”. Straight line acceleration isn’t everything, at least to those 7,438 buyers of Furys. A rare car indeed, For the man who really loves cars.
I love, love, love these cars. The 59 Cadillac or the 57 Chevy always seems to get credit as the epitome of 1950’s American style, but the 1957 Mopars, especially the Desotos, have always seemed like the most beautiful, over the top cars to me. The gold trim especially really sets these off.
If the 300C went from 0-90 in 10.2 seconds, it was even hotter than I thought!
I guess that’s a typo for 20.2?
You guessed right. And I can’t fix it, because I didn’t save that. But I’ve added a note.
Paul, I went ahead and added a new chart in there with the 20.2 number — hope that’s OK.
Thanks!
Paul, are you certain that the 1957 Chevy was hundreds of pounds lighter than Plymouth? My sources say that they’re both around 3200 lbs.
The Plymouth was wider for 57, but not longer. The exception is the wagon, which used the senior cars’ wagon body.
Yes. From the Standard Encyclopedia of American Cars:
’57 Bel Air coupe: 3278 lbs
’57 Fury coupe: 3595
317 lbs heavier.
The ’55-’56 Plymouths were already big; significantly bigger and heavier than the Chevys.
Also, the “senior car’s body” was just the same as the Plymouth, with a bit of wheelbase stretch. Otherwise all the ’57s except the Imperial used the same basic body. Just like GM in ’59, in which case Cadillac did too. For that matter, that’s where GM undoubtedly got the ideas from, along with the styling.
Same body, but different greenhouses and roofs on the sedans.
The new Ford GT uses torsion bar suspension
I remember my CR-X and some Porsches did too
Like the Plymouth, not the fender skirts
ITA – nix on the skirts – these cars look so much better without them and you hardly ever saw skirts back in the day.
These Plymouths were such gorgeous cars when they debuted. I love this gold/white color combo on the Fury coupe. I like the grille/headlight treatment better than that of the other Mopar cars of that year though the front license plate spoils the look a bit. And the novelty of fins wore off really fast for me (and lots of others).
Unfortunately these cars rusted like crazy – as a kid I remember that within a year or two on the salted roads of northern Indiana they looked really bad. The build quality was poor. My cousins had a 57 Belvedere and it was fortunate that they also owned a body shop and could keep up with the rust and poor assembly issues.
I prefer the ’58 Plymouth grille and quad headlights, but like the ‘tower’ taillights of the ’57 much better than the 1958 car’s ‘exclamation point’ version.
The ’57 dual headlights were borne from the uncertainty of not knowing which states were going to allow quad headlights. So, the ’57 Plymouth got duals with quasi-headlight turn signals next to the headlights.
What’s interesting is how the New Challenger repeated an almost exact duplicate type of headlight treatment but, this time, it’s done simply to mimic the quad headlights of the original Challenger, and foglights now reside where the turn signals were on the original E-body.
And, yeah, to this day, Chrysler has never fully recovered from the horrendous quality of those ‘Suddenly, It’s 1960!” Forward Look cars. A real shame, too, because they were hot sellers, at least until the quality problems quickly reared their ugly head.
Ironically, it was the rush to ramp-up production to get as many cars as possible to the dealerships which led directly to poor assembly.
These cars were originally scheduled to debut for the 1958 model year, but the Chrysler brass decided to move them ahead one year. There simply wasn’t enough time to work out various fit-and-finish details and body sealing issues, so some were addressed as the model year progressed.
The strong demand for the cars early in the model year didn’t help matters. Cars were being shipped from the factory regardless of condition. The corporation expected the dealer body to correct the problems.
The corporation was also under increasing financial strain – remember that it had just completely revamped its line-up for 1955 – so various corners were cut during the development of these cars.
Finally, in an effort to improve productivity and lower its labor costs, the corporation demanded more work for the same level of pay from the line workers. That didn’t go over any better in 1957 than it would today.
Not a unique situation. GM put similar pressure on its UK subsidiary Vauxhall to get the F-type Victor on the market before it was properly developed. Fisher took over the body design with little experience of monocoque construction, the thing was rushed into production before various quality issues were worked out, and the rust traps designed into the thing were largely responsible for the catastrophic rust reputation the car acquired both in the UK and in its overseas markets. Vauxhall never truly outlived that PR disaster. See Vauxpedia.
I’d like to present a sort of chicken-or-egg question about Chrysler’s civilian performance cars and their police cars.
I’ve read a lot of articles at Allpar concerning how important Law Enforcement sales were vitally important to The Chrysler Corporation, both financially and for bragging rights.
According to the articles I’ve read there, State Highway Patrols, most notably Michigan and California, required their patrol cars to meet or exceed *exceptionally* high specifications. To ensure their cars met these specs, Plymouths were fitted with the strongest parts from the big Chrysler parts bin – engines, suspensions, and brakes.
So what I’m pondering is whether these civilian performance sedans were just the icing on the cake of Chrysler’s desire to own the Law Enforcement market, or if the performance sedan development made it easy to meet Police specs.
I don’t think so. The fleet market was cut throat and the cars sold must have offered little profit compared to ones sold to individual consumers.
Also, the fleet parts are seldom the same ones the consumer cars received.
For example, LAPD required cars to have a rear sway bar.
So 1967 Belvedere and Coronet offered a rear sway bar to them. But the consumer midsize cars didn’t get a rear sway bar until at least 1971.
An attendee at last year’s Coffee & Chrome drove up in an almost identical car to this one, excepting that it had the (awful) continental kit, and slightly different wheel covers. Oops! In looking for the picture to upload, I discovered that the car was a Belvedere….oh, well! The “golden glow” of memory fades away…..again! LOL!!
(My first attempt at posting this mysteriously disappeared; so forgive me if it suddenly posts twice!)
That’s the 58 with the exclamation point taillights mentioned by Rudiger above. Also, the 58 had a busier, more intricate wheel cover design than the classic look of the 57’s that were used on so many customized cars in those years. And few cars look better with a continental kit; this is not one of them.
It would be interesting to me to compare the Fury’s handling to a ’56 Chevy.
The ’56 was known as the best handling of the three years; the spring rates were tweaked from ’55 and the cars were known to be good handlers.
The ’57, however, lost a little bit due to springs that were tweaked again to be a tad softer, after complaints that the ’56 rode too harshly.
One could order HD suspension on the ’57 Chevy.
But the evidence strongly suggests that the ’57 Chrysler suspension was intrinsically better,. Stiffer can get you around a curve faster but it doesn’t solve all problems.
True, one …could…order HD suspension on the ’57 Chevy.
I wonder how many actually did?
If the Mopars hadn’t been superior handling (including better than my Austin-Healey 100M) I most likely would have died 58 years ago (around age 15). 1st car was ’57 Belvedere HOWEVER it had a ’58 350 Golden Commando, 0-60 7-7.5 sec top of 126 mph Also had a ’57 black Bel AIR 2DR HT W/2X4 BBL 283, P/G with ps, pb, pw 0-60 8-8.5, top 118-120 mph, and a lovely black ’57 Fairlane 500 Club coupe (post) 312 4 bbl, Fordomatic, 0-60 9-9.5 , top of110-112 mph. Liked the chev, loved ford except handling. ply was whole diff world. From Cal, none rusted.
That’s what I would expect as well, stiff suspensions tend to be used in performance handling packages to mitigate geometry challenges that roll, dive, or don’t camber gain right(limiting compliance so it won’t reach these points). The Chrysler Torsion bar suspension was a pretty major leap from the norm at the time, and even though it may have been softer feeling, it’s actual behavior was (I presume) more favorable. March of technology.
Chas108:
For what this is worth: My Father said his new ’56 Chevy was quite the let down in ride comfort and curvy road handling when compared to the ’52 Ford he traded in on the Chevy.
The ’56 Chevy only lasted for 14 months before it was traded off on a new Plymouth.
Make of that what you will.
Most people never think of it, but the rear suspensions were exceptionally well designed on these too. Instead of mounting the axle at the middle of each leaf spring (which was common at the time) Chrysler mounted the axle 2/3 of the way towards the front of each spring, and also mounted both springs outboard of the frame rails. The short, stiff front part of the spring and the long, relatively soft rear part combined the attributes of a soft spring and a stiff one all at once.
And when Chrysler launched Torsion-Aire, they made clear the rear spring geometry was part of the package.
I talked to folks who had these cars. Lot ov them said they weren’t all that great. Best place to get one was hertz at the time. Quality issues leaky windshields led to rotten floor pans and rockers. Broken suspension parts. And don’t get into an accident its ugly steering wheel didnt collapse and dashboard hard.
With only 7,438 Furys built for ‘57, it’s hard to believe that Hertz had many, if any to rent. Rental agencies simply didn’t rent twin 4 barrel carb vehicles.
Beauty is always in the eye of the beholder of course, but I think the optional, deluxe steering wheel shown is quite beautiful.
Somehow I suspect that any nagging initial quality control issues from 1957 have long since been corrected on the surviving models by 2020?
The article references “little old ladies from Pasadena”. Didn’t realize they pre-dated the Beach Boys!
+1. Jan & Dean did it too.
Spent my early childhood in a 57 Plymouth Savoy 4 door hardtop (I guess Savoy was one trim lower than Fury?). I remember the push button transmission and in particular the dash mounted mirror. When I sat between my parents in what passed for a child safety seat back then that mirror blocked my view!
The Forward Look Chryslers are beautiful cars, especially IMO the Chrysler and DeSoto models, and as has been discussed here so often, definitely caught style leader GM off guard.
One wonders what would have happened if the build quality hadn’t been so awful.
My aunt bought a new 1957 Plymouth Savoy sedan with the ancient flathead 6 and an automatic, presumably the PowerFlite. It was a cool-looking car in red with a white roof and those pushbuttons for the transmission. However, she had so much trouble with it that she traded it for a 1959 Chevy Bel Air and swore off Mopar forever. (I was too young to remember exactly what went wrong with the Plymouth.)
We all know that ’57 Plymouths have a terrible survival rate (especially compared to the ’57 Chevy!)
762,231 were produced–if ~700 remain, that’s 1/10th of 1%–and I bet many of them are low-production Furys like this one.
Now, if you want to find something REALLY rare, how ’bout a currently-existing ’57 Plymouth with the EARLY-STYLE GRILLE (shown below). The early ’57 grille has open slots; in the late design, the slots are bisected.
I believe the Fury was introduced later in the model year–so were any Furys built with the early-style grille?
Now that you mention it, I’ve only seen the early-style lower grille in photos from when these were produced. All photos I’ve seen that were taken more recently, and ‘57s I’ve actually seen in the metal, have the bisected slots.
According to an article on Allpar, Burton Bouwkamp (who was a product planner for Chrysler at the time) states that the assembly lines were shut down for a week during the production of the ‘57s, to work through quality issues such as leaks and the fit of glass, doors and trunklids (all of which caused rust issues). While Bouwkamp doesn’t state at what point of the production run this occurred, if such a thing happened it would be expected that the survival rate of early-production ’57s is relatively low.
Perhaps most of the earlier units simply rusted away… 😀
According to an interview with a Mopar stylist (don’t remember who), the slots were to mimic the 1955 GM Lasalle Motorama show car. The stylist didn’t like them and they were removed for ’58.
Great car. I missed (or had forgotten) the Fury/Adventurer/D500/300C link but an interesting insight.
The 300 was one of the cars that made me a Curbivore https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/qotd/qotd-what-made-you-a-curbivore/
How did the non-Fury Plymouth models (Savoy, Belvedere, Plaza) compare to the non-HD suspension Chevys?
Still the better car for curvy road travel?
Were the same year Fords any better or any worse than the Chevy and Plymouth?
1 much better 2 curves, yes 3 loved Ford style, handling worst of all.
My Dad’s first new car when he graduated from College was a prior year (’56) Plymouth Plaza, stripper, with the flathead 6 and manual. He hadn’t met my Mother yet, but her Dad had a ’51 Chrysler Windsor, with the (same) flathead 6 but a semi-automatic transmission. To this day, she’s never been comfortable with a manual, though I tried to refresh her on my ’86 GTi in 1998 when she was going to Poland with her brother…he’s had enough odd stuff happen to him on trips that she wanted to be a backup for him (and only the 2 of them went)…I took her to an abandoned Walmart parking lot and had her do starts and stops.
He took the Plymouth from NE Pennsylvania (he worked for Sylvania out of school) to Marblehead, Ma, where he and my Mother lived right after they married, and my sister and I were driven from the Beverly hospital in it. He didn’t keep the job long (as a chemist, it was the only non-semiconductor job I think he had after college) and though my Mother and sister flew out to his next job in El Monte, Ca (he worked on solar cells…for a short time (1959-1960)) he ended up driving the Plymouth cross country (he was bringing some dangerous chemicals needed for the job with him in the car packed in dry ice, which he ran out of.
The Plymouth was soon traded for the first of two AMC Rambler wagons, both automatic…we drove the first one back east when he got his job at Westinghouse Semiconductor near Pittsburgh. It was the only Plymouth he was ever to own…though he had two Dodges in a row in the 80’s, they were the last MOPAR cars he was to own.
It would be interesting to see how this cornered—but first I’d want to drive a typical ’57 Ford or Chevy to calibrate my response.
The featured super-restored car is stunning, even if they started with a well-preserved one.
Here’s one more ad (eBay) that gives me a smile–couple would be celebrating their 63rd-or-so anniversary as I write:
“The ’56 was known as the best handling of the three years; the spring rates were tweaked from ’55 and the cars were known to be good handlers”
UHHH? Having owned a ’56 Chevy for 20 years I can’t say I would have ever called it a good handler! Exciting perhaps, but not good. Of course, I was younger, probably a bit dumber, and definitely drove the car’s installed ’66 327 beyond the pathetic drum brakes and suspension capabilities. Luckily both the car and I survived the operator’s ham fisted driving. Still, the old girl was lots of fun!! 🙂 DFO
My dad had a 1957 Plymouth four door post which he bought lightly used in 1958. He always claimed it was the fastest car he ever owned.
It probably was, too but when you are coming from a 1952 Chevrolet, a V-8 is going to seem like warp speed. It had the unique Canadian 313 Poly V-8. I can’t find an exact power rating but 200 hp to the rear wheels is probably a good guess. Dad’s had no power steering or brakes but it did have Torqueflight.
As a child, I thought dad was all knowing. He always said his ’57 Plymouth had a flathead V-8 in it. When I did a little research, I learned this was impossible but I never corrected him.
Dad was a man of 25 when he bought the Plymouth and to little surprise, he was hooning the thing to the max. One night while out with a cousin he swung to tail out in a sweeper and the bumper was smacking the little reflectors on sticks they put on roads in those days in lieu of guard rails.
When my brother was sick in 1959, he went from Ottawa to Montreal to pick up my granny. When he picked Granny up, he in turned out the dash lights and floored it. He went the 120 miles in one hour and twenty minutes. Granny said the Rosary the whole time and Dad literally booted it right up to the hospital door. Running flat out and over 100 mph didn’t faze him or the car.
Dad kept driving the living daylights out of the Plymouth until one night, he hit the 2 button a little fast and damaged the motor. He was already looking for a new car at this point, his first. He’d had the Plymouth appraised a week before and that it was good for thirty days. Dad drove the now knocking Plymouth to dealer and came home with his first new car, a 1961 Chevrolet Biscayne four door sedan, with Stovebolt and three on tree. The only option was the heater.
He didn’t like it.
I may have missed a note here, but shouldn’t we consider the ’57 Rambler Rebel as the best all around muscle car of it’s day? Beats all the cars listed in the chart above, on 0-60, including the FI Chevy.
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/ccoty-1957-performance-explosion-including-the-rambler-rebel/
That close-up of the pushbutton transmission control brings back a youthful memory…
When I was a child we had a 1959 Dodge station wagon (actually a Canadian-market Plodge, with the front clip from a 1958 Dodge and the taillights from a 1958 Plymouth). I’ve always thought of it as the ultimate 1950s car: tailfins, two-tone salmon pink and metallic bronze, and… the pushbuttons.
The latter fascinated me, and one day when I was about 5, I was out in the car by myself playing with the buttons and broke them. Only a couple still worked, so my mother had to drive across the lawn (reverse was broken) and to the local garage in second gear, so it could be fixed.
We had a 1957 Dodge Coronet 4 door hardtop. My recollection of this coral? with white top (my father called it the “vomit comet”) was of cheap junk. The upholstery was cheap cloth as I dimly recall. The headliner was like, cardboard? I got the idea that the windows did not keep cold air out. My father’s several company car 1955 Oldsmobile 88s and my grandmother’s 1954 Buick Special were much higher in quality (to my 13 year old self). A friend’s family had a ’57 Belvedere level wagon which, in my recollection, was of higher quality than the Dodge.
A comment of how strong Torqueflite was: You could rock a snowbound car by pushing Lo and then Reverse, as I recall; you could also rev the cars in Neutral and then punch Lo for a fast takeoff. I tried this once on a relative’s 1956 Dodge. The car survived.
How many 57 Plymouth Furys were built with manual transmission. Because i have never seen another one. I bought it new in 1957. My first car. Rich
I have no information on that. I’d suggest you try to find a forum on vintage Plymouths or such. But i think it’s safe to assume that there were some, even if you didn’t see any.
I’d like to know how many 57 Furys were manual too.
Mine was built as a manual when it left the factory but was converted to pushbutton Torqueflite before I bought it, and I couldn’t live without those awesome pushbuttons!
Back in the earlier 1980s, I was at a customer’s body shop. I noticed a ’58 or so Imperial Crown Coupe ready for the paint booth. I walked over to look at it. I noticed a little hole at each corner of the front windshield, inside of the windshield gasket. Same on the rear window. The front holes had a rubber hose attached to them which went to a similar hole in the kick panels. As the rear holes had hoses which went into the rear wheelhouses. DRAINS!! As if they knew the gaskets and the new curved-glass windshields were prone to not seal well!! So the post-design fix was those little drains.
A few years later, I saw the same style of drains on a ’56 Chevy sedan. The rear hoses were not hidden as they went into the rear wheelhouses, either. In plain open sight!
Wondering how well those hoses held up? Wondering how many actually were hooked up to the rocker panel drains??
Handling and ride? ’58 was the first year for the Chevy 4-coil suspension, so it rode nice and soft at normal speeds. Handling was decent. My ’58 Ford is built like a battleship, but is also fine in normal driving. BUT when the speeds go up and curves happen, none could match the Chrysler Torsion Bar front suspension for speed and firmness in ride.
Check out the Ross Roy “A Day at the Proving Grounds with the 1957 Chryslers” YouTube video. There are several which compare the Chryslers to similar GM cars and one that includes a Mercury. Watching the one where the cars go over an unexpected railroad track (on a country road) is quite comical (with respect to the GM cars). At least the chassis and powertrains were superior, if the build quality was not quite where it needed to be.
Also consider that 1956 was the last year for the “Briggs Body built” bodies for Chrysler products. Briggs was Chrysler’s equivalent to GM’s association with the Fisher brothers (i.e., Fisher Body). So the learning curve for Chrysler was quite steep, with a lot riding on the success of the 1957 cars.
There was never any air in Torsion-Aire. It was a name concocted by marketers to imply that Chrysler had some kind of air suspension like Ford and GM were offering as options in 1958. I guess they didn’t realize that neither of those versions were exactly the wave of the future unless you mean the future of about 50 years later. Almost all of them were soon changed to the regular steel suspensions.
No steering columns had the collapsible section at the time. The steering wheel is beautiful and innovative designwise in visually separating the column from the rest. And it (and also the very different but cool non-deluxe version) are dished. This idea was pioneered by Ford in 1956 and was certainly a bit better than previous designs that often featured a nicely projectile shaped center that protruded. And this example has the optional (maybe standard on the Fury) padded dash.
1955 Cadillac: