Chrysler Is Once Again Building a Performance Car

Ever since the Pacifica minivan debuted back in 2016, Chrysler has been in a bit of a new product lull. That is officially going to change on September 13th however, as an “extremely limited production” vehicle is slated to arrive just in time for the Detroit Auto Show. Thanks to some clever detectives online, it’s all but confirmed that said vehicle will be a high-performance variant of the ever-present Chrysler 300.

The excellent @TamerlaneBlog was the first to make Chrysler's plans public, posting screenshots to Twitter from a teaser email sent out by the automaker earlier this week. The message itself notes that the automaker is gearing up to release its most luxurious and powerful special edition models to date. That wording suggests that this is indeed not a new vehicle, but rather a send-off for one of the automaker’s aging products. Despite the continued enthusiast cries for a Pacifica Hellcat, it’s far more likely that such a project would be related to the Chrysler 300. This is all but confirmed by the filename for the teaser image, which lists the model in question as a 2023 Chrysler 300C on the automaker's website. That sedan does share its underpinnings with the Dodge Charger, which itself is no stranger to special edition models. The image attached to the message itself doesn’t provide many hints beyond that, though it does feature a sporty looking Chrysler wheel sitting in front of a red-painted Brembo brake caliper. That caliper isn’t the same unit as the one currently found on the Charger Hellcat product line however, which all but confirms that this car won’t carry the fan-favorite supercharged 6.2-liter V-8. The caliper instead looks like something you’d find on the "lowly" Scat Pack model.

Speaking of the Charger, Stellantis spokesman Scott Brown has gone on to confirm that this special edition model will fall in the same vein as the current Last Call special edition vehicles that Dodge is currently rolling out. Those machines have all looked back at Dodge’s muscle car history for inspiration, which is something a Chrysler product could easily mirror. Not that Chrysler needs to look back to the Seventies for inspiration, as a high-performance variant of the current Chrysler 300 once existed. The Chrysler 300 SRT8 first debuted back in 2005, and was aimed squarely at besting GM’s new Cadillac CTS-V. The muscle sedan would remain one of the great American performance bargains until 2014 when it was ultimately discontinued. By that point, the SRT8 was powered by a 6.4-liter Hemi V-8, which provided 470 hp and 470 lb-ft of torque. A familiar 6.4-liter Hemi powers every Last Call special edition model that Dodge has released thus far. Combined with the brake caliper image, it isn’t a huge leap to expect this upgraded 300 to adopt the Apache V-8 engine once again.

Chrysler has found itself at the end of a lot of jokes in recent years, but the automaker is clearly not ready to throw in the towel. We know the automaker has significant EV-related plans, which should finally see some new vehicles wearing a Chrysler badge. Before that actually takes place however, we certainly won’t be upset about getting another muscle-bound 300. Customers will reportedly be able to reserve one of these machines following the debut, though production figures haven’t been teased at this point. Dodge has been building around 1000 examples of each of the Last Call models, which is a figure we also wouldn’t be surprised to see here. Either way, you’ll need to act fast if you want a piece of Chrysler’s gasoline-powered history.

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