If any of you are looking for a project car with the chops to run with a lot of modern cars, yet you’d still have a jaw-droppingly gorgeous classic to drive and show on the weekends, this 1956 Chrysler 300B would be a nice one. The seller has it listed here on eBay with a buy it now price of $16,000 or you can make an offer. It’s located in Redlands, California – about 60 miles but 2 hours in traffic – east of Los Angeles. Thanks to Ikey H. for submitting this 300B!
This is not a project for the faint of heart and possibly not for an amateur, although certainly, an amateur (like myself) could probably turn this project 300B into a great looking car. These are special, though, they really deserve a professional nut-and-bolt restoration. These are rare cars with only 1,102 of them being made. The seller says that this is “One of approximately 150 known to exist. 1 of about 23 or so built with air conditioning.” I love it even more now, a 1956 car with factory AC.
Whoa, now that’s a trunk! I wonder what the inside of it looks like.. (scratching chin).. Wow, yep, that’s one big space, easily $1,100 a month in Queens. The larger tail fins were new for these second-year 300s and they were really quite a car in the mid-1950s, basically race cars for the street with a minimum of 300 hp.
This car is almost like a work of art, it seems like everything was thought out and thought of here inside and out. The interior had to have been quite a place to be in the 1950s and hopefully it will be again. It’ll need a lot of work and money as you can tell. The seats were gorgeous front and rear. I would rather have this car in restored condition than any new car that I can think of.
This massive hulk is actually Chrysler’s “1958 Imperial Hemi” according to the seller. They still have the original 354 cubic-inch V8 which should have had 340 hp with two 4-barrel carbs. The next owner needs to get that original engine back in there pronto! It’s backed up by Chrysler’s two-speed PowerFlite automatic pushbutton transmission. Hagerty is at $74,800 for a #2 excellent condition car and that’ll be hard to do if you’re going to just bring it into a restoration shop. But, if the next owner can do a lot of the work him/herself I can see this beauty being restored and still not being upside down financially.
Carl Kiekhaefer, of Mercury outboard fame, raced Chrysler 300’s like this.( 3, I think) Hired Tim Flock ( for an undisclosed amount of money)one of the most successful drivers at the time, and won half the NASCAR races it entered. His other Chryslers did just as well. When NASCAR officials accused him of illegal parts ( they never did find anything wrong) he told them to “cram it with walnuts” and pulled out of auto racing to concentrate on his boat business.( even though, he had ’57 Chryslers ready to go) He was quite a character. Since these cars are so rare, and made such a statement in “56, and a resto is in order anyway, I’d make it like this.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/thehenryford/5413478418
That’s only because Bill France was jealous of him. Big Bill never won a race because he was always beat by the boys from Dawsonville and Atlanta. That’s why NASCAR came about. France couldn’t win a race so he thought he could manage it. See what that’s come down to today.
Very understated design, but has presence. Nice.
I have a friend who has the exact same car w/o the A/C in very nice original condition. He bought it off the original owner many years ago. His has the factory Kelsey Hayes wire wheels. These cars are really beautiful. I think they were only offered in white.
I love the design of these cars. I’m a big fan of the Volvo Amazon 122, which obviously adopted many of the Chrysler’s styling cues. But as pretty as this is, I still prefer the nose of the sister DeSoto.
Arguably the first “muscle car” as we’ve come to understand the meaning. I believe the sales price is fair and a great place to start for a rare but very complete project. The ’58 392 is a $2500 piece which would help fund the rebuild of the correct dual quad 354. Check for the “triple nickle” 555 part number heads to confirm authenticity.
NYET…..
300 letter cars… Horsepower race, YES, but ” Muscle Car” NO. these cars were NOT lightweights or mid-size cars.
.
. Please, let’s not try to re-write automotive history…
.
” Muscle Cars ” were light weight models that Detroit stuffed Real ENGINES into,…not big, long, heavy cars..
. ….. which is why the term was never used in the 50’s
IF they had put this engine into the '56 Plymouth Belvedere 2dr, then IT would be the first Muscle Car…
………….like the Real First Muscle Car, the 64 GTO .
Even the 61 Impala 409 was never called a Muscle Car
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’64 GTO the first Muscle Car? When will this myth finally be put to rest? And certainly not the massive Chrysler pictured here.
The 1956 Studebaker Golden Hawk, 3300 lb. small to midsize car with massive 352 pulled from Packard’s full-size cars under the hood. Manual Trans. (available w/ automatic). Tachometer. 160 MPH speedo. Full SW instrumentation. By some accounts the fastest and quickest car you could buy in ’56. What does the GTO do that the Golden Hawk didn’t do 8 years earlier?
While it looks complete, it seems everything will need to be restored. This is definitely a car that should be restored to original. A milestone car that is historically significant. It will cost the new owner a bundle but the end result will be worth it.
The “REAL” Chrysler 300.Whoever the next owner is will have a serious desirable machine I wouldn’t mind having in my driveway.
Please. Restore and share.
I do believe these were only available new in white, but wouldn’t it look beautiful in black?!?!
Black, red or White in ’56.
3 colors available from the factory; white being most common, black next, and red the most rare.
TorqueFlite 3-spd auto in ’56 (and after).
Still a 2-speed ‘PowerFlite (not TorqueFlite) in ’56, until the last half of the year….?
Also, wiki says 2 horsepower variants? Hmm, never knew that…..
Also, tan only interior, no matter white/black/red outside.
Late 1956 for Chrysler’s. Early ‘56s had Powerflite.
Actually, only the last couple of months in 1956 production had the new cast-iron Torqueflite 3-speed, easy to spot because of the 5 push buttons on the left side of the dash panel [instead of 4 buttons for the 2-speed Powerflite.]
Big and beautiful Hope new owner brings it back stock. Good luck
Cheers
GPC
The Holy Grail of letter series ‘300’s. Needs the KH wires
In 1955 they were all white but those colors were offered for 1956. This guy has a 1955 300 as well and has put them up for sale before. Like we agree the market might be going away from these beautiful brutes. I’ll be building a clone with what I have gathered – not many will know.
The hemi was banned for 1957 in NASCAR due in part to the winnings in 1956 and would not return until it’s sweep at Daytona in 1964 – then banned again.
I agree with Chris. These were the first American Muscle cars. Not the GTO.
When new they would blow everything else off the road.
This is a rare car. If I had the money I might restore it and keep the Imperial engine in it. Probably faster than the original engine.
Depends your definition of muscle car. Some argue, the Olds 88 was the 1st. Some say the ’57 Rambler Rebel. Muscle cars, to me, are big engines in small cars. This was still a tank, by muscle car standards. GTO was arguably the 1st intended muscle car from the factory.
As a Hudson guy I would argue for the 33 Terraplane 8 as the first mass produced muscle car- big block in a smaller lightweight chassis
Howard– as I said above– and you re-inforce: Big car engine in small car, factory installed and sold as a performance car… the 1956 Studebaker Golden Hawk.
My uncle had one of these new back in the day. My dad drove it a bit and said it was hard not to chirp the tires at stoplights. The conversation got started after my 7th grade music teacher showed up with one at an evening music performance. Drop dead gorgeous cars! And that’s coming from someone who grew up with (and still has) a triple white ’57 tbird. My music teacher also had a black convertible of the same car! So jealous.
Two thing jump out at me in the E-bay photos. In photo #s 2, 3, & 22, the plates seem to have only a year reg sticker, and a 1964 one at that. Cars reg.ed after 73ish have a month(left well) and year(right well). Also the plate is Fxx ### issued about 65ish. Yet has a 56 it should have an A to perhaps D plate (issued to all cars in 63, 63 and older) Also in photo # 9, one can see the “retro fitted” smog control in the upper radiator hose that was required to be installed on all 55 to 65 model year cars in CA. to get your 1975 reg. sticker. It also does seem to have the “type I” pvc system(vac hose, PVC valve) rather than the type II that also required a sealed oil filler cap.(PVC was also a required reto fit on all cars 55 and newer that did not have a factory installed PVC system (as of 01/01/1966) I’m not sure if this car came from the factory with PVC or a road draft tube. I know that on some taxi/fleet vehicles starting in the late 40s have PVC as a factory option. (Yeah yeah, I have done way to much dmv/reg work in Ca.)
An up date, could not edit post as it timed out b4 I could. It seems that this vehicle MAY have the “Type II” PVC system at one time. Note the hole on the forward side of the air filter. This would have been for the hose that would have gone to the SEALED oil filler/breather cap. Also the shiny (open?) oil filler cap.
I was issued GBG 000 plates in Culver City in January of 1963.
uhmmm, ok. I am going by what I recall. I know my parents had a 64 Buick that had a plate # ESQ-XXX, also a 69 Nova that had XGE-XXX. Perhaps it could depend on the DMV office and how many plates they issued? A low volume area (like Alpine or Modoc county) may have had “older” plates to deliver, while a high volume place(L.A. county) may have been issuing “later” plates. As I recall, during the transition from black to blue, DMV offices would pass out old plates until they ran out, then start with the new ones. We would get a “new” blue plate for a car, but get an old black plate for a truck…cause that is what they had
The reference to KH wire wheels is and has always been incorrect. I believe that Chrysler never used Kelsey Hays wheels on any of it’s products. What they did use was wires from Motor Wheel Corp.
Motor Wheel Corporation | hobbyDB (paste to browser)