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Oh, crap... here I am commenting on a freakin' A12 thread.

I'll take Ro McGonegal at his word that the intake & carbs were ripped off from the car, considering I lived in the same city (Alexandria, VA) where he did at that time and know what sort of stuff went on in the middle of the night there.

The Hot Rod magazine article that McGonegal did many years later that talked about that whole deal w/ the car and the test day at Cecil County w/ Ronnie Sox has a lot of good info. I thought it was linked to the A12 Playground web site, but I have a copy of that issue somewhere, too. In it he did mention that he thought in retrospect that the car had likely been "touched" by the ChryCo people to be at the top of its game (he suggested it might have had "blueprinted" heads and a hotter pre-production cam that supposedly was tried out, but not used in final production), plus he mentioned how there was a 2nd set of carbs brought to Cecil that to to dry out which were on the car when it finally dipped into 12s, IIRC.

Also, some time ago I did some digging into the historical weather records for that March 1969 day and found the temp was only in the high 30s that day. Look at the pictures taken and you'll see everyone's wearing jackets and the trees haven't even started to show any leaves, yet. Considering the air temp + Cecil County being pretty close to sea level, I'm sure there was some extra MPH found simply due to the atmospheric conditions.

I'm sure the car was in an "supernatural" state of tune, plus the "minehsaft" air quality boosted the final results. IIRC, nobody who ever tested the same car later on (and was the car ever really "the same" after that day?) ran as well, but they didn't run it in the same conditions, either.



and then add it that on that day they had CHRYSLER'S BEST not only in the tech and tuning but in the DRIVER. And for anyone to think they could drive that car or any car better, quicker, faster would be either dreaming or another pro drag racer from back in that era. Even when the editors and others got in the car AFTER Ronnie Sox and the Chrysler team did everything to the car they didn't come close to his time and speed......and if you think a tenth or two is close don't ever bet any money if your car is a tenth slower.

The other test didn't have near the talent that was at Cecil that day and they even tried with a set of slicks and only got to the times of the slowest editor. I'm sure that engine was up on compression, had a different cam that was never production and the intake was cleaned up, the exhaust manifolds matched, the carbs super tweaked and the distributor set up for SS racing.

The possibility exists that:

1. the carb and intake were stolen by thieves

2. Stolen by the Chrysler crew the night before

3. A plan was agreed to by all that it was made to look like they were stolen. And for this point (#3) and #2 that is why nothing was damaged and even the hood was replaced neatly and there was nothing said about missing nuts and bolts

At no other test that I have read have I seen so many top level Chrysler R&D guys and that caliber of driver.....do you think they were going to show up with a knife at this gun fight I'm glad they did it and right at the end of the decade after how many times they were up staged by Pontiac with a decade of ringers The fastest, quickest non-two seater American car EVER during that era of the low dollar muscle cars!!! And when you look under the heading of Sports Cars in the want ads or internet you don't find a Mopar B-body but you will find a two-seat fiberglass or aluminum bodied...........

The A12 Mopars should be and IMO are the poster child of MUSCLE CARS and as Dick Maxwell said "It was the last B@d@$$ Street Car that we were ever going to be able to build"




MikeR