Alrighty folks, this week we are going to look at one of the weirdest muscle cars ever created [Ed Note: weirdest and most awesome]. It may look like a space ship from the outside, however I assure you that it is all muscle where it counts. One of the most well-known names in racing made this car one hell of a monster on the track. Read more after the jump on the 1970 Plymouth Superbird.

If this car looks a little familiar it is because it shares some of the same technology as one of my earliest posts, the 1969 Dodge Charger Daytona. To some, it is almost impossible to differentiate the two cars, and I admit that when I first learned about these a few years ago I also had trouble telling them apart. The principle difference between the Daytona and the Superbird is the platform that each car is built on. The Dodge was based on the Charger platform and the Plymouth boys took their extremely successful Road Runner platform in order to make the Superbird. After the success of the Daytona in 1969, Plymouth executives sought to get in on the winnings that their divisional brothers were enjoying, so they implemented the same technology for the 1970 model year.

The same NASA-derived wind tunnel testing was applied to the Road Runner and the resulting nose cone and rear wing are slightly different. The cone on the Bird is actually 1 inch longer than the 18 inch cone on the Daytona. In addition, the rear wing of the Plymouth had a more aggressive angle on it in order to keep the rear end from getting too squirrelly on the track. The pre-existing NASCAR rule that required at least 500 production units in order to race had been modified somewhat for the 1970 season. Instead of a fixed 500 units, Plymouth was required to build one Superbird for every Plymouth dealer in the country, or 1,920 Birds. Even if they had trouble selling in dealerships, the Supebird’s did quite well on the track and were raced by NASCAR legend Richard “The King” Petty. “The King” made the car famous on the banked tracks of NASCAR and even served as the voice of a baby blue Superbird in the animated motion picture Cars (I love that movie).

Power for the Superbird came in the form of three massive MOPAR V8’s that all put out big power. The base engine was the 375 horsepower 440 Super Commando V8 that featured a single 4-barrel carb atop the intake. The 390 horse 440 6-pack was an option on the Superbird as well (not on the Daytona) and was adorned with 3 2-barrel carbs that utilized a progressive linkage that opened them according to throttle needs. On the top of the power pyramid was the venerable 426 Hemi that cranked out endless amounts of power despite its conservative 425 horse rating, and of the 1,920 Birds built in 1970, only 93 were Hemi’s.

Hope you enjoyed a look at the last winged muscle car from Detroit, tune in next week for a look another AMC muscle car. Big_Blocker out.