There were just two V8s in the first Great Race at Bathurst in 1963 (a pair of Studebaker Larks). There was talk pre-race of Ford running a team of works-entered V8 Falcons, but there was nothing to the rumour – and anyway, there was no V8 in the Falcon range in 1963.
But there was a third V8 in the entry list for the 1963 Armstrong 500.
According to Australian Autosportsman magazine, the sole Chrysler Royal entry attracted heaps of pre-event publicity and was even ‘being proclaimed a winner before the flagged dropped’.
Alas, the Chrysler did not even get to face the starter’s flag – apparently, it fell off the trailer on its way from Bowral to Bathurst!
The big 1950s-styled AP3 Royal (with automatic transmission) at face value seems an unlikely Bathurst contender. But with its 220hp 313cid (5.1-litre) V8 (in the late '50s the Chrysler Royal was lauded as the most powerful car on the Australian market), the big Chrysler was good for 100mph, so it would likely have been one of the fastest cars up Mountain Straight and down Conrod. Whether it would have kept stopping at the end of Conrod Straight all day was another matter, with drum brakes all round and an all-up mass of more than 1500kg.
As for all the pre-event hype for the Royal, we wonder if it had anything to with the fact that its entrant/driver was one Clyde Hodgins, whose day job was motoring writer for the Sydney Sun-Herald.
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