Take one '65 Belvedere, stuff the engine compartment with dual-quad Hemi power, aim it down the dragstrip, and hang on as you're propelled to 135 mph in 10 seconds. During the early Super Stock era, that's just what Plymouth did while the quarter-mile competition ran for cover.
But with the dragstrip wars at full-throttle, Chrysler needed to keep its edge. So with a handful of standard Super Stock race cars in hand, Chrysler engineers set out to raise the bar even further by building not only a much lighter car, but also one that would provide vastly improved traction with the front and rear wheel positions moved ahead several inches. These single-purpose cars became known as altered wheelbase A/Factory Experimentals (A/FX) and were a hit for their power and performance, while also gaining notoriety for their unique appearance. Almost immediately, these funny-looking, altered-wheelbase cars became the first "Funny Cars," and, thus, the term began.
Bob Munoa has always loved early Mopars and their well-earned contributions to drag racing. Amongst his long list of previously-owned Mopars are Hemi 'Cudas and scores of cool and fast '62-'65 B-Bodies. Now Bob is not your ordinary Mopar guy, who just happens to have a few choice examples parked in his family's garage. Instead, Bob has a shop big enough to stable more than a dozen Mopars, with almost 30 early B-Body donor cars parked just outside. So when this veteran Los Angeles City Fire Captain recently got the impulse to build his own Hemi-powered '65 altered-wheelbase A/FX car, he definitely had the means.
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