LateNight and PolarFox's Chrysler Crossfire Analysis ... - Page 2

qramos · 07-21-04, 06:26 AM

Now that is more like what I expected from it. The black SRT-6 looks real nice too. Chrysler really did an excellent job of styling the crossfire. That fixed wing in the back totally changes the character of the car; it doesn't look like a humpback anymore. With a smaller blower pulley, better brakes, a bit of suspension work and a more free-flowing exhaust, I could see myself driving one of those.

LateNightCable · 07-21-04, 11:19 PM

Who must have taken days to write what?
I think the SRT/6 is kind of the wrong route. It makes the car far too closely related to it's Mercedes parent. I understand that Chrysler style " Eurocool " is part of it's appeal, but what they really need under that hood is a 5.7 Hemi, instead of hand me downs. With 10 more hp., 80 lb.ft. more torque, and all the inherent American V8 vitality, this would launch the Crossfire into the " really special " catagory rather than simply spiced up.

And they can't say that they're already producing as many Hemi engines' as they can for the 300C and Magnum wagon, because they aren't. A Hemi for the Crossfire is a shoe in. It sholud at least be considered.

thepolarfoxqx · 08-06-04, 04:42 AM

You and your hemi. The hemi would fit actually, but is signifigantly heavier. Moreoever, this is a german built car, it would cost money to fuse a big american engine from a different set of standards into their already pretty much set up car. The beauty of the crossfire is they could develop it for next to nothing. I think they are bluffing when they say it is 330hp, i'd bet it still pushes the full 349, but they re-calibrated it for less low end. Look at the quarter mile time. From sixty on that thing flies.

PS: Anyone else think we should copy this post over to the mercedes thread too?

lol

LateNightCable · 08-06-04, 11:44 PM

They developed the Crossfire from a prexisting car, so the cost of dropping in a V8 in would be negligable, they wouldn't be losing anything. But just let them go ahead and be cheap and spineless.

thepolarfoxqx · 08-07-04, 04:35 AM

well, the point for them was they knew they'd never sell a lot of crossfires, never make that much money, it was a car to boost brand image. That was financially practical because the crossfire was effectively free to develop. They moved forward to a V8 powered SLK, so the crossfire is somewhat unique now, and the SRT is a potent challenger to corvette, something you'd never imagine from chrysler. Would a hemi crossfire be spiritually more correct and a cooler car, sure, but it won't happen. Too much money. They'd be mixing chrysler and mercedes parts. The mercedes transmission communicates with the mercedes engine ECU, you'd have to totally reprogram it to talk to a chrysler ECU, change the forward crossmembers, custom motor mounts to bolt a chrysler motor to a mercedes bay, you'd have an engine made in the US, shipped to germany, assembled, shipped back here, development and production costs are too much. Remember now that the north american cars division of DC lost over 900 million dollars last year, anything expensive that won't sell drastically more cars isn't going to happen, and nothing is going to make the crossfire a huge seller, it's just what market segment it's in.

LateNightCable · 08-07-04, 07:22 PM

A Hemi Crossfire would never happen probably, ( unless a creative tuner took it on ) but image cars are allowed to be mild money losers, at least for awhile. I wasn't picturing that the Hemi would be connected to the Mercedes gearbox, but rather the one that is in the 300C, both being 5-speed autos anyway. Which leads to another funny thing about the Crossfire. The SRT gets a 5-speed auto, while the standard car gets a 6-speed manual. It's rational in a way, but how peculiar.

Business gets in the way of inspired manifestation, that is one reason why the car business interests me less and less all the time.

thepolarfoxqx · 08-08-04, 12:18 AM

well, again, look at the mercedes parts bin, the slk320 got a 6spd manual, but the SLK32 was only a 5spd auto. I guess they just don't have a 6spd manual sitting around to take that kind of heat, so they just bolt up a 5spd auto from one of the V8 cars and call it good, plus, AMG has a theme going with all their automatic transmission cars.