As if a very rare one-year-only limited edition car isn’t exotic enough, this 1978 Dodge Aspen Super Coupe is located in beautiful Honolulu, Hawaii. How’s that for exotic? And I don’t mean just the shipping charges. The seller has this beautiful example listed here on eBay in the 50th state, the current bid price is just $5,100, and there is no reserve!
We have seen a couple of the sister cars to this Dodge Aspen Coupe, the Plymouth A43 Street Kit Car. The Plymouth version is a more direct homage to Richard Petty’s racing history with bold graphics so if you’re hoping to go at least somewhat unnoticed, this Dodge Aspen Super Coupe is for you. Our own Jim ODonnell showed us a nice one last summer here and it looked black in the photos, although they only came in this “Sable Tan Sunfire Metallic” color as seen on this one.
This car is rare, reportedly only 494 of them were built in 1978 only. They went over and above with fender flares, a matte black hood and roof up to the Iacocca line, as I call it. As in, if this one had a half-vinyl roof with opera lights, but in this case, it’s just matte black paint on the front 2/3 and shiny brown paint on the rear 1/3 of the roof area. Here’s a YouTube video showing an old commercial. The Super Coupe part starts at the 3:35 point.
There are no really good overall interior photos which is unusual given that there are several good overall exterior photos. But, from what we can see of the inside, even with vertical photos, it looks almost perfect both front and rear. There weren’t any modifications to the interiors of the Plymouth or Dodge versions of the Super Coupe, at least from what I’ve read about the history of these cars.
The unusual vertical photos continue into the engine compartment which is unfortunate. But, what isn’t unfortunate is the visual condition of the 360 cubic-inch V8, it looks great. Being in a humid climate like Hawaii, there are a few small areas that are showing rust and/or bubbling under the paint, but the underside looks solid from what is shown. As far as shipping goes, the seller mentions that it’s $1,100 to ship it (literally) from Honolulu to the Long Beach, California area. With no reserve and even with the shipping charges, this could end up being a good buy. How much would you pay for this Super Coupe?
I lived in Hawaii for 3 years. Left because everything was too expensive.
Looks pretty cool on the outside but that interior brings back bad memories of trips to the mechanic.
Ebay ad has changed, now has a BIN for $20K. Too bad they didn’t come with manual trans. At least I have not ever seen a Super Coupe with a manual.
I sold a special ordered Super Coupe new & worked at a family owned Dodge Dealership at the time. It was a Dark Blue Coupe with a stick special ordered for a 22 year old kid.
I had no idea how unusual it was – at the time.
He totaled it a year later as I recall…..
Cool car.
Much like the Vega GT steering wheel, Mopar sure got a lot of mileage out of the Tuff wheel. I’ve always been fond of them.
And now it’s gone. Error in the listing.
Was relisted with a Buy It Now of $20,000…
both dodge and plymouth had the “petty kit car”… this “super coupe” is not really related as the kit cars had botl on flares, window straps, deeeeeeep rims, big 43 stickers, etc…. similar but different package on the same F body
my Dad was career Army and we lived in Hawaii several years. Hehad a absolutely perfect ’57 Chevy and was handed down to me. 2 years after returning to tme mainland that beauty became an absolute rust bucket. The Hawaii humid salt air ate away at it.
I would drive that but to far away
I know that factory performance cars were almost extinct in 1978. That said, I believe I recall the Motor Trend did a review of this car in ’78 or ’79 and said that it was the second or third fastest 0-60 and highest top end cars available on the U.S. market at that time.
Yes, the Mopar 360 was a standout in those days. Even with the dreaded lean burn system, it was a performance engine. My slant six of those days was troublesome to say the least. My Volare was one of the times I can justifiably say that I should have bought the V8.
I bet it will burn rubber…lol,but with where its located, and the build quality of those cars,hard pass!,but definitely a cool looking car.
Nothing worse than a hot looking ride with a column shifter. Get me a console shifter and T-tops on this and it’s a win.
Have to hand it to Dodge in these years. They had nothing to work with and still tried to turn out an exciting car. The Super Coupes, R/T’s and Aspens in general were toast in only a few short years.
In less than a year Chrysler Corp was begging the government for money.The build quality and engineering was horrible. It’s as if the line workers knew something was terribly wrong. People act different for a company when they think the doors could be locked at any time. The best thing Ledo did was kill these and bring on the K car.
Its both funny and sad but we are slowly seeing the death of everything relating to Mopar/Dodge and Chrysler again.
I sold Dodge and Plymouth Volares and Aspens new back in 78, and have followed the collector car market for decades. IMO this car is way overpriced at 20k minimum bid. Bubbling rust in places is the death knell for these cars.. Expect 5-6K minimum to fix rust and repaint. The car in perfect condition with low mileage on a good day won’t fetch more than 11-13k. Take out body and paint work and you are at 6-8k at best. I wouldn’t buy it for that even. Just not a desirable or very cool car IMO. They were OK back in the day. I’d rather have a 2 door Horizon or Omni stick than the Volare or Aspen… much better handling and more fun. The 360 at the time was a dog with poor carburation, and lackluster performance. Youd have to soup it up to make it run well. It may have put out 180-200 h.p. Column shifter automatic is just not desirable. A stick would at least make it feel like it go go a bit.