Chrysler 300C still has a lot of life

12:00 AM CDT on Sunday, March 23, 2008
Terry Box tbox@dallasnews.com

Memo to Bob and Jim: Save the Chrysler 300C, the rakish, slightly felonious sports sedan that put style and drive back into big American cars.

And don't waste time on feasibility studies and focus groups. Trust me: This car is Chrysler.

As you probably know, Bob and Jim are Robert Nardelli – a flinty corporate titan type who formerly headed Home Depot – and Jim Press, the calm Californian who helped Toyota understand the American car and truck market.

They are trying to reinvigorate Chrysler LLC for Cerberus Capital Management, the private equity firm that bought the struggling automaker last summer after DaimlerBenz dumped it.

If the Chrysler 300C Heritage I drove recently is any indication, the industry's automotive odd couple has more work to do.

Don't get me wrong. I still greatly admire high-performance SRT versions of the 300C, Dodge Charger and ghostly Dodge Magnum (which is about to be axed).

And as an old muscle-head, I eagerly await the arrival of the new Dodge Challenger, a reprised and vastly updated version of a 1970s-era Challenger pony car complete with an optional 425-horsepower Hemi motor.

I also appreciate what Chrysler did for the wheezing full-size domestic sedan segment when it boldly decided to build the 300. Chevy took a half-hearted stab at redefining the segment with the Impala SS in the '90s, but Chrysler got it right – offering distinctive styling, strong performance and German handling with just a hint of old-style American ride.

But that square-shouldered mercenary in pinstripes Chrysler's German bosses loosed on the market in 2004 is a graying gunfighter today.


On the outside ...

My Inferno Red 300C still looked pretty good and had that wonderful 340-horse Hemi under the hood. Inside, the car was outfitted decently in light-tan leather and proudly displayed a retro red-white-and-blue 300 emblem as part of the Heritage package.

But it rolled on skinny 225/60 all-season tires mounted on ordinary nine-spoke, 18-inch wheels that looked pretty puny. The modest running gear didn't help the car's loosey-goosey stance – or image, particularly when every other cheapo six-cylinder 300 in Dallas seems to be fitted with giant, garish 22-inch wheels.

Then I got a look at the 300C's window sticker: $44,130, much of it for options and equipment associated with the Heritage package. To put this into perspective, I looked up Motor Trend magazine's review of the 300C when it was named Car of the Year in 2005. The retail price of the magazine's test car was $35,275.

Am I missing something? The car is largely unchanged since then, sales are down nearly 11 percent this year and the price goes up substantially?

Some of those misgivings began to ease, I admit, once the Hemi burst to life with that trademark intake moan – a mystical, ethereal sound from the distant '60s. This is one great overhead-valve V-8, a relatively compact motor that pounds out 390 pound-feet of torque, can make tons of horsepower when juiced up and is equipped with a cylinder-deactivation system that allows the thirsty Hemi to run on four or six cylinders when it's loafing.

As a result, the car is rated at 15 miles per gallon city, 23 highway – not bad for a two-ton bruiser, but it won't win you any free car washes at your neighborhood Greenie Club.

And there's no question that this car can still run when all eight cylinders are summoned. In a recent Car and Driver test of an '08 300C, the 4,100-pound sedan romped to 60 in 5.3 seconds and flew through the quarter mile in 13.9 seconds at 102 mph.

As many of you know, that's BMW 550 territory. In addition, the Chrysler is still equipped with an independent rear suspension and other high-tech pieces derived from Mercedes-Benz s

 

Great article! Love the American Heritage package too. Really retro and makes the car look much classier. If they don't bring back plymouth (which is more certain than not), they need to make their Dodge brand the value and Chrysler their luxury brand again.