LOL. My 2010 IS350, my 2013 Toyota Sienna have so much nanny intervention it gets annoying. When I drove the LC500 and RCF this September we were warned not to turn off the nannies. The Hellcat would be undriveable if it were not for a "computer" doing most of the work putting the power down. Try driving a Ford GT or Dodge Viper on a wet road at speed and let's see how well that goes. Throttle house just did a video on how a Ford GT tried to kill them

 

Shame that the Hellcats are going away, I like the rowdiness of them.

 

Doug almost got killed in a Hellcat.

 

LOL that's funny. It reminds me of a time when I was a teen and was using my fathers 79 Buick Lesabre with the 350 V8 to pick up my little sister from school. It was raining, I hit the gas a little to much at a left turn and the car went into a spin. It spun all the way around facing the opposite side, luckily there were no other cars. It almost spun out again trying to straighten out. Let's just say I was driving very light footed the rest of the way home, I told my little sis I would do it again if she opened her mouth

 

Looks like Doug scored a brown streak in his underwear on that one. Probably shouldn't be doing some of the things he does on public roads.

 

Everyone is so focused on the most insane 0-60 times and 1/4 mile times... and yes, these figures and how they are achieved are relevant... but they are not in and of themselves what makes the feel of a particular car engaging and *fun*.

How to make a Dodge EV muscle car fun and engaging beyond just the 0-60 and drag strip capabilities is where Dodge should be focusing. People who like blisteringly fast Teslas are going to like blisteringly fast Teslas, period.

But in the EV era the style, feel, and particular way in which a specialty car expresses itself and engages the driver is how each brand's offerings and specific models will set themselves apart.

Another reason why the Challenger and Charger going EV is what they should do to this end to fully embrace those two model identities but KILLING the Challenger and Charger as models is a very poor move which leaves Dodge having to start over to recreate a fanbase for unique and fun models all over again.

And yes, I know they have many classic 60's and 70's model names to resurrect but the Charger and Challenger have always been their most iconic fun machines if you don't also count the best Plymouth muscle cars like the Satellite GTX, Road Runner and crazily styled Super Bird.

 

The Charger also had a street-legal Superbird-clone, called the Daytona...named, of course, for its NASCAR-use. I went to high school with it.

Those two models, BTW, were not allowed to be sold in Maryland, because the State's DMV did not consider the front end a legal bumper.

 

Ah, right you are! I totally blanked on the original Dodge Daytona clone of the Superbird.

You had one of those in High School?? Very lucky! I can't remember a time when the Superbird/Daytona models weren't already going way up in value. In my high school years 60's-80's classics that weren't high priced special editions were still kind of attainable at that time.... but nothing like a Superbird, Shelby, Yenko, any 426 Hemi Plymouth/Dodge, etc.

Maryland really dropped the ball there. That's similar to whichever states forced the 1967 Shelby Mustang GT350 and GT500 to switch from the original in-board high beam lights that Carroll Shelby wanted to outboard high beam lights.

Dodge has many retired performance car names to chose from... the Daytona among them... but they really, really should just carry the Challenger and Charger into a next generation as muscle car EV's that emphasize the driver.

Maybe they'd also look into a revived Barracuda model...?

 

Yes.....Richard Petty made the Superbird famous, but the Daytona also ran in NASCAR.

Ha.....I Wish. Closest thing I had to that was a several-year-old Plymouth Barracuda with a small V8. Got a chance to drive some vehicles pretty close, though...Road Runner, GTO, Camaro SS. I've done write-ups on a couple of them.

When I said I went to HS with it, I meant it was sold during those years.

Yes......we've had several threads in Car Chat (including a currently active one) about American headlight-laws being behind the actual technology.


Since Plymouth is gone, Dodge did a Prototype Barracuda (essentially a Challenger with the signature 'Cuda single headlights)...but it never went into production.



Frankly, I'd like to see a Road Runner come back. I always liked the RR's bird-cartoons, Beep-Beep horn, and bright-lollipop paint colors. Dodge almost did it with the Charger R/T, but that has four doors and lacks the RR's bird-graphics/horn.

 

Sure modern cars have a lot of computer assistance especially with launch control.

But the driver is still the focal point and inputs for throttle, braking, shifting still matter. Knowing how to launch a car properly is a skill even with modern Hellcat.

Model S - you are a passenger along for the ride. Tesla wants to eliminate any human decisions altogether. Its a different ethos and some ppl like Tesla for this but it’s not for everyone.

 

spoken exactly like a person who's never driven an EV LOL. Drive one, then we'll talk

 

Those were the days. You could stick a shell of plastic, fiberglass or sheet metal on the front of the car, call it a bumper and tell everyone to F off...

 

I have driven EVs - Mode 3, Y and MB EQS.

There are no moving parts to an EV, nothing really to go wrong. ICE is way more complex and unless you have 911 TurboS are not easy to launch and get consistent times like u can in a Tesla. Its controlled by computer first, human inputs are secondary thats why its so consistent in its performance.

 

Well, everyone but Ralph Nader, the Maryland DMV....and, to an extent, DOT. But, I agree, regs were a lot less stringent in those days.

Also, consider this......that the only reason that the Superbird and Charger Daytona were ever sold for street-use was that NASCAR itself mandated that 1000 of them had to be privately-sold so they could run on NASCAR tracks.

 

If your talking about analog inputs like shifting in a manual transmission etc, then you are correct. An EV has none of those. But if you are a bad driver, you're going to be a bad driver regardless if you drive a Tesla or Camry. On a track you have to put in as much work in a Tesla or other EV as an ICE. I have friends that drive manuals and say the same thing about people who drive cars with auto trans. On the other hand I drove a Tesla Roadster many years ago, and it had no power steering, no drivers assistance like traction control and it was much more difficult to drive