In the early sixties, Chrysler transitioned from the Virgil Exner styling cues to a more composead design language. Still, that change of heart wasn’t easy. I’ll drop two names: Dart and Lancer. Dodge designers must have found some really non-mainstream sources of inspiration some six decades – and some change – ago to come up with a car that’s so ugly it’s super-cool. Especially when it’s covered in barn dust and hasn’t run in more than two decades.
Right off the bat, let’s get the numbers out of the way: Dodge built some 240,000 automobiles for the 1962 model year, and a little more than one-quarter of those were Lancers. The year is significant to our story for two reasons: a) it was the last year of the Lancer station wagon (which had a lifespan of only 24 months), and b) the example in the video below is one of those rare gems from that period.
The Lancer wasn’t a new moniker in the Dodge lineup (it had been used between 1955 and 1959). Still, when Chrysler Corporation introduced the compact Valiant under the Plymouth umbrella in 1961, Dodge had nothing to offer their customers, so the Lancer was the badge-engineered emergency solution. Interestingly, a survey conducted by Popular Mechanics in 1961 returned a stunningly high appreciation (more than 77%) for the car’s drivability and looks.
That’s right; styling was a strong point for the oddly shaped Lancer, but the customer is always right in matters of taste. And we have to give the Dodge boys credit for going the extra mile (albeit it might not have been in the direction everyone expected them to go)—just look at the station wagon featured in the video.
The classic car hunters from Hagerty have unearthed a forgotten long-roof Lancer 770, vintage 1962, and proceeded to make it roadworthy once more. The car has been sitting for twenty years or so in Michigan, but not outside, thankfully (otherwise, the Hagerty clan would have needed a vacuum cleaner to collect it from the ground). Apart from three slit tires, the car is in decent condition – there’s even oil in the motor.
Speaking of which, the Slant Six (that’s what all 7,005 Dodge Lancer station wagons had between the front fenders in 1962) in this example is the more robust 225 cubic-inch ‘One-Tire Fire’ (the 3.7-liter, but not the Ironsides, because the block is aluminum) rated at 145 hp and 215 lb-ft (147 PS, 292 Nm). The automatic Torqueflite would have a pushbutton control system, but this video is focused on the drivetrain, not on the overall condition of the vehicle.
Now, being a Mopar Slant Six, it doesn’t need much to come back to life – even the fuel pump is working – see it spewing old gasoline all over the shop floor. There are a couple of upgrades to this trusty powerplant – namely, the electronic ignition ( note the box on the left-hand side of the firewall, next to the ballast resistor that also wasn’t installed by the factory) wasn’t introduced until 1973.