When John DeLorean at Pontiac stuffed the big 389 cubic inch V-8 from the full-size Bonneville and Grand Prix into the midsized Tempest LeMans to create the 1964 GTO, it kicked off the whole muscle car fad in Detroit.
Over at Mopar, big blocks went into sportily-styled midsize B-body variants to create cars like the 1966 Dodge Charger and the 1967 Plymouth GTX, but these were not inexpensive rides.
Plymouth came up with the idea for a budget-priced factory hot rod in the form of the 1968 Road Runner model, which came with a split-bench front seat, rubber floormats, plain steel wheels, and a cool "Beep! Beep!" horn, and Dodge wanted some of that action, so they launched the Super Bee in the same model year.
Since Dodge was more upmarket than Plymouth, you got a Hurst shifter with your four-on-the-floor gearbox and the Super Bee logos on the nose and tail were 3D metal badges and not just decals, but otherwise it was the same bare-knuckles street brawler as the Road Runner, available with either a 335-horsepower version of the 383 Magnum V-8, or a 425bhp 426 Street Hemi.
For 1969, a third powertrain option was added, and that's the one in the pictured car; a '69 Super Bee in Hemi Orange.
It was a version of the 440 cubic inch big block V-8 with three two-barrel carburetors and a host of go-fast bits. Dubbed the "440 Six Pack", it was hilariously underrated at a claimed 390 SAE gross horsepower and featured a fiberglass hood with a massive functional cold air intake and a hood pin at each corner. There were no hinges; if you wanted to check the oil at the local Sunoco station, you'd better have brought a buddy to help lift the thing clear.
Part of an "A12" package, along with the Six Pack motor you got a Dana 60 rear end with 4.10:1 gears, heavy duty suspension, and 11-inch drums at all four corners, and either a Torqueflite 727 automatic or an A833 four-speed. The rear leaf springs had seven leaves on the right side (five full ones and two half-leaves) and six on the left, to control spring windup and wheel hop. It was basically a turn-key dragstrip warrior.
The base price of a Super Bee was $3,138 and the A12 package added another $463. Add on power brakes, the Torqueflite auto, and SureGrip differential, and that brought the total to $4410, or about $37,800 in 2024 money. Not as cheap as the base 383, but still about four hundo less than a Hemi Super Bee. And it'd run darn near heads-up with that Hemi, too: Car Life recorded a 6.3 zero-to-sixty and a 13.8 second quarter at 104.2 mph.
As you can tell from the disparity in 0-60 and quarter mile times, the Six Pack 'Bee was traction-limited. Even with the super-chonky-for-the-time G70-15 tires, you had to baby it out of the hole with some finesse to keep the bias ply Goodyears from going up in a blaze of white smoke.
Dodge sold 1,907 A12 Super Bees that first year and all but 420 were hardtop coupes, making the pillared two-door car in the photos super rare.
It was photographed in May of 2024 using a Canon EOS-1D Mark III and EF 24-105mm f/4L zoom lens.
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