Some may quibble with the title, but with the exception of a Corvette with the right engine and gears, the 1966 Plymouth Satellite and Dodge Coronet with the new 426 street hemi were the first legitimate 13 second street machines. Not that every magazine was able to break that then-mythical 1/4 mile barrier, but some did, including Car and Driver, which not uncommonly wrung out the the fastest times. No, we’re not talking about blatant ringers like the ’64 GTO that magically did the 1/4 mile in 13.1 sec. @115 mph, thanks to a hopped up SD421. There’s no reason to believe that this hemi Satellite was anything other than genuinely stock, and its 13.8 sec. @104 mph 1/4 mile time and speed were equaled by some other street hemi tests during their brief time on earth.
It was simply the most powerful production engine built at the time thanks to the giant valves and big ports afforded by the hemispherical combustion chambers. Yet it was utterly civilized and could chug off from a start in third gear. But once all eight venturis were open…
The irony was that the hemi came in such a plain brown wrapper. C/D called the Satellite coupe “drab”, both inside and out. Well, compared the curvaceous competition, like the 1966 GM A Bodies, best exemplified by the Pontiac GTO, and also the new Fairlane and Comet, “drab” is hardly unfair. Chrysler’s formal slab-sided rectilinear styling worked well on the big 1965 C-Body cars, but it was a dubious choice to apply that to the restyled ’66 B-Bodies. It’s almost Studebakeresque in its retro-boxiness.
Adding insult to injury, the Satellite had numerous quality flaws: the passenger door never closed properly, the console glove box popped open and had to be taped down, the windows didn’t close properly creating loud whistles at speed, and more disconcertingly, the steering box was not bolted down properly, which had a very negative effect on the steering until remedied. So much for it being a ringer.
But all is forgiven when the hemi is asked to do its thing. “It offers the best combination of brute performance and tractable street manners we’ve ever driven”. Its immediate throttle response and willingness to rev reminded C/D of their all-time favorite engine, the Chevrolet 327. Except in this case it’s substantially larger and of course more powerful. “It just doesn’t feel like a seven-liter engine—except for the fact that you’re suddenly doing 120 and you don’t know how you got there.”
The hemi’s flexibility and power made shifting in normal driving almost superfluous. Around town, C/D never used all four gears; either first and third, or second and fourth. The four gears were just superfluous in normal driving, and C/D recommended the Torque-Flite automatic, even for the drag strip. It was hard to beat a TF hemi on the strip; only the pros who speed-shifted could eek out a slight margin, but for Average Joe, the TF was the way to go.
It took C/D a while to work out the best technique at the strip, but they were quite happy with the results once they did. The firm suspension package that came with the hemi also helped out, especially Chryslers method of mounting the rear axle way forward on the rear leaf springs. It almost worked like a traction bar, but the downside was bad manners from the rear axle under heavy braking. Speaking of, front discs were optional, but the tester had the optional “metallic lined drums” (should that be metallic brake linings?) worked quite well, once warmed up.
The suspension included some of the best factory shocks C/D had yet encountered, and made for both good handling (although C/D said almost nothing about that subject) and kept the car from bottoming on big dips even when fully loaded.
The interior was “right out of any Plymouth taxi” and the tach, on the front end of the console “which is about as useful as wearing your wristwatch on your ankle”. And it only read to 6000 rpm and there was no redline.
Another reason to pick the TF: the clutch was exceptionally heavy. But all in all, C/D was unequivocal in calling the hemi Satellite “the best machine of the entire family of hot intermediate-sized American cars. Mechanically, it was superb. But if it was to really compete against the hot selling GTO, the Satellite was going to need a major bit of sprucing up, inside and out.
Related CC reading:
Vintage Car & Driver Review: 1964 Pontiac GTO – The Ultimate Ringer
Vintage Car Life Road Test: 1964 Pontiac GTO – “Honest In Performance”?
Vintage Car Life Road Test: 1962 Dodge Dart 413 – The Max Wedge Legend Started Here
A really nice clean and crisp design, the absolute opposite of the Bentley Tatra has posted on the site.
The modern equivalent of the 7.75×14 tires on the test car would be 205/75R14 (or thereabouts). By comparison, that’s approximately the same tire size you get on a 2024 Mitsubishi Mirage with 85HP. Wow.