No need to grab your dictionary, Street Muscle mavens. Inviolate means something untouched and unbroken. It’s something kept pure, safe from violation, or sacred. In-Violet was a play on words from the Plymouth marketing folks in 1970. Dodge called its purple “Plum Crazy,” which meant the Mayflower brand had to come up with something different. In-Violet it was.
Was the Plymouth ’Cuda sacred? Not really, regardless of what the collectors tell you today. Was it safe from violation? No, we’re pretty sure driving a purple big-block ’Cuda caused many owners to rack up traffic violations. Were they untouched? Not in the hands of enthusiasts like Jeff Burke. This In-Violet 1970 ’Cuda has been in his possession since 1984 and, looks to the contrary, this E-body has been touched plenty.
So the question is: Can a purple ’Cuda with a Shaker hood, throaty exhaust, hockey stick stripes and gills down its flanks be considered a sleeper? Only if you think everything you see is stock. This one looks the part, but it’s not even close to how it left the assembly line.
This is the same ’Cuda we used for our Design Engineering Inc. Adapt-A-Shield story. What you see is not exactly what you get. The engine is a lot more than 440 cubes, the suspension’s received numerous upgrades — even the lights have been altered. We think it is a perfect 21st century street machine.
Jeff had a ’67 Dodge Charger, but friends suggested he’d be better off in an E-body. He first found (and bought) a triple-black ’73 Challenger with a 340, but was still looking for something else.
“Back then, the prices of the cars was super inexpensive. You could get cars for under $1,000 and really nice cars for $2 or $3,000,” says Jeff. “Even Hemi cars could be had for under $10,000. I looked up and found this one, and ended up selling the Challenger.”
Tracking A 42-Year History
This was in June of ’84. It was originally a 340 ’Cuda with the Performance/twin-scoop factory hood, and it was EF8 Ivy Green Metallic with a black interior. Options included air conditioning and a 727 TorqueFlite automatic, and it had a 3.23 Sure Grip out back. It was still wearing its original F70-14 Goodyear Polyglas tires, one of which remains in the trunk for a spare.
The original plan was to change the color to Rally Red, but he decided “why not In-Violet purple?”
Why not indeed?
The body was in very good shape except for a little damage on the right front fender that he had repaired. Oh, and someone had pried the trunk open with a crowbar at some point, but decklids were as close as the nearest junkyard near the end of Ronald Reagan’s first term, so no biggie.
“I had visions of a little bit of drag racing and getting a 440 put in at some point, and I did that a few years later.” — owner Jeff Burke
The current engine, which began life as a 500-inch/505-horsepower Mopar Performance crate motor, is practiced in the art of deception. Except for the TTI 1 ⅞-inch headers, it looks basically stock under the Shaker hood assembly. Ha! It has been upgraded with all kinds of goodies to ensure that 505 ponies was a mere stepping off point. It now wears Indy 440 EZ cylinder heads, a COMP Cams Hi-Energy stick with 0.545-inch lift and 241/247-degree duration cam, and an Edelbrock Performer RPM intake manifold (painted orange to match the stock look).
Running the show is a Holley Terminator X EFI system, ensuring perfect modern performance and driveability without the tuning hassles. Add to that the TREMEC TKX five-speed and it is a whole new ballgame.
“That has just changed the driveability of the car tremendously,” explains Jeff. “No more having to tune it. It pretty much self tunes. That overdrive [in the TKX] at highway speeds — it’s just start it up and go.”
That five-speed definitely comes in handy, as a 3.91 cog resides in the rear.
“It’s like a new car, just beautiful,” the owner declares.
But it is not just the engine that’s been upgraded. The suspension got new, larger PST torsion bars (1.03-inch), QA1 upper and lower control arms, and Bilstein shocks. The rear springs are out of a Panther Pink Challenger T/A Jeff bought in ’82 and was using as a parts car. The rear sway bar is the stock late 1970 piece the ’Cuda was born with. The factory A/C was upgraded to Classic Auto Air.
Jeff’s favorite part of the ’Cuda is the overall look. He likes both ’Cudas and Challengers — every little feature they came with, including the Shakers, the stripes, the rocker gills — he feels that’s what made them special
One of his most memorable moments as a young man with this car was at the moonlight drags on a back road in Georgia. He’d put a ’69 340 in it and had just swapped in a set of 4.30s that day. His friend put the axle in on one side, Jeff the other. He was racing a ’69 Nova with a stick. The only problem, he discovered, was his friend only made the lugs finger-tight. He never torqued them down.
“That was pretty much the last time I did any real street racing because had that tire come off at speed at the top end, I could have killed a whole bunch of people because they were right there,” Jeff told us. He realized when he got home that something didn’t feel right in the back. That’s when he discovered the loose nuts. After that, he confined his racing to tracks, such as Atlanta Dragway and Paradise Dragway in Georgia.
Now that the current combination is all dialed in, he wants to get the car back to the track, just to see what it’ll do with the EFI and five-speed.
Forty-two years an counting: Perhaps this In-Violet ’70 ’Cuda is inviolate after all.
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