Imagine some wealthy, hopelessly demented car enthusiast took a fire-snortin' Dodge Viper and had a custom-design shop render it as a big four-door sedan. Not bloody likely? Well, if that styling scenario gets your attention, coil your eyeballs around this completely reengineered '98 Intrepid ES sport sedan.
No, this second-generation Intrepid isn't packing the king snake's wide-asp rubber, V-10 fangs, or even its bellowing sidepipes. Much as we'd like to see a howling Dodge four-door that erupts to 60 in four flat and sucks up a quarter mile of tar in 12 seconds at 120 mph, the line of serious paying customers would be way too short.
Dodge, precariously dependent on trucks for profit, is aiming to jump back into the high-volume, front-drive V-6 sedan market occupied by first-class appliances like the Chevrolet Lumina, Ford Taurus, andHonda Accord and Toyota Camry.
But is the new sedan recipe right? Dodge officials say they know that snake-eyed styling won't be enough to win over Accord and Camry owners. Few vehicles in any market feature more invisible styling than those midsize sedans. Indeed, both Japanese cars have built a loyal, growing customer base not on styling or performance but on long-range durability with low maintenance, good ride, mechanical refinement, and build quality, which allows them to maintain their premium used-car values.
Dodge engineers say their mission was straightforward: Capture the styling excitement, crisp handling, and class-leading interior room of the first-generation Intrepid. Then go after the quality, noise, and vibration gremlins associated with the old platform's wimpy powertrains, uneven quality, and lack of road isolation.
We peeked briefly at six areas during an exclusive preview at Chrysler's Chelsea, Michigan, proving ground: powertrain, body structure, subframes, suspension, brakes, and interior. The MT exam included instrumented acceleration, braking, and handling tests on the featured 3.2-liter/225-horsepower Intrepid ES "P-0" prototype. Be aware that this was an early development car, not an assembly-line-made, production model. Here's what our early look disclosed.
The Intrepid's two aluminum V-6 engine choices are all new. The standard engine in the base car is a 2.7-liter/200-horsepower DOHC V-6 with cast-in-place iron cylinder liners. Our ES test car, however, was equipped with the premium 3.2-liter SOHC aluminum V-6. Chrysler pegs its specs at 225 horsepower at 6300 rpm and 225 pound-feet of torque at 3800 rpm. This engine is a screamer with a rev redline at 6800. Company estimates for its fuel economy are 19 city and 28 highway. But you're going to have to wait for a fuel-efficiency review. Most of our proving-ground drive was done with the go pedal buried in the carpet.
Either this car weighs more than its competitors, or the competitors are conservatively estimating their own horsepower. With the brake pedal squeezed, the throttle pedal applied, and the 3.2 groaning against its torque converter, we brought the revs up and launched the ES with just about a foot and a half of tire spin and waited 8.9 seconds to reach 60 mph. Not bad, but far from standard-setting. For comparison, the Camry with its 3.0-liter DOHC V-6 does that same trip in 7.7 seconds, while the '98 Accord, with its new 3.0-liter V-6, spooled up to 60 in 7.8 seconds and pushed on to complete a quarter mile in 16.1 ticks at 87.3 mph.
There are no Intrepid transaxle options. The only trans teamed with either engine is a fully electronic four-speed automatic, called the 42LE. Even when driven hard, this transaxle rewarded us with smooth, quiet, spot-on shifts. Later, during the high-speed-handling review, we used its "AutoStick" feature to hold lower gears for sharper engine response through the cones. By moving the shift handle to the rear of the gate and then rocking the handle side-to-side, ratios could be accurately selected up and down, almost like a clutchless manual. Just short of manual-box precision, this system worked well and was fun to use.