Hot on the heels on the most recent “Meet The Fleet” felt like the right time to address some confusion over the crazy changes in Chargers! It seems that lately I just can’t stop buying and assembling Dodge Chargers. Gosh, I wonder why? Its only damn near the most awesome muscle car ever made! As I have discussed elsewhere, when Auto World opted to reproduce the insanely valuable Aurora original Thunderjet body they opted to keep Aurora’s strange “kinda ’68, kinda ‘69” styling with the 6 round tail lights-never offered on any year-and the divided grille up front. Its worth noting that AW also made a ’69 model for their X-Traction platform; this version has the proper ’69 style tail lights as it is a different body altogether, but its no surprise there was a market for a Charger for both platforms.
Naturally all of mine are the T-Jets, and its probably also no surprise that as yet I have not acquired an original Aurora version of this body, and again I say, gosh, I wonder why?
Its no wonder the real things are now well north of 6 figures in good condition, meaning that your humble blogger is unlikely to ever acquire one @ 1:1. But these HO scale versions are pretty fun too…or they would be, if I could make up my mind about where I want to put them! I have already done “New Builds” profiles of the yellow one which I originally bought for the Road Crew, then put into the Muscle Car racing fleet. I have now bounced it back to the Road Crew since acquiring my 8th Charger, a cool metallic green one which has taken the yellow one’s place as a “spare.” I have yet to give this one a name and a driver, so open to suggestions, but if none are forthcoming I’m sure I’ll come up with one soon!
It was hard to move away from those American Racing Torque Thrust wheels, although I did manage a little variety on the “oxblood” colored model with the RRR “Stones” which are similar (kinda like Torque Thrust II’s!)
| CAR | CAR NAME | DRIVER NAME | DETAILS |
| blue ’68 DODGE CHARGER | BLUE CHROME | BORIS “BLASTER” BARGELD | 440 |
| purple ’68 DODGE CHARGER | VINDICATOR | “HANDSOME HENRY” HOLLIS | HEMI |
| maroon ’68 DODGE CHARGER | MALEVOLENCE | PATRICK “BANDIT” BARTELL | 383 |
| green ’68 DODGE CHARGER | TBD! | TBD! | HEMI, for sure! |
Rest assured its only a matter of time before I get crazy enough one night to get into a bidding war on one of those originals and wind up spending hundreds on something that fits in the palm of my hand. I guess the reason I haven’t yet is that the reproductions are themselves so satisfying!
The first iterations on this repro body were made under the Johnny Lightning name and these seem to be almost identical to the Aurora originals. Later on when the Playing Mantis “split” occurred and Auto World became its own brand, the moulding continued under the AW brand as the bodies got more and more detailed with better and better paint and inkjetting technology brought to bear in the manufacturing. These newer versions are extremely cool, but I gotta admit I kinda like the “charm” of the more primitive early models.
All 4 of the racing fleet versions date from the later AW era except for the blue chrome version, which is the first one I acquired and because of that might still be my favorite one. In the Road Crew, the one that stands out is the orange one with the General Lee-style “Stars & Bars” roof decal: this one is not an Auto World version, it is an early reproduction by Road Race Replicas. I found this one at Aladdin’s Cave and until I saw it I had no idea RRR had ever made this body. The quality of the moulding is primitive, the windows are foggy and the tail stripes are sticky tape that look like they may have been put on by hand, but I love it because its unusual and quite rare. The other 3 Road Crew cars are all from the Johnny Lightning era. Of course the Road Crew cars don’t have the elaborate table of nicknames and driver names like the racing fleet, but they are all outfitted with those cool MEV 5-lug chrome reverse wheels and wear Jel Claws 2031’s on the rear to get that non-trac-mag power down; outfitted in this way, they all look awesome!
So, is 8 Chargers enough? Of course not! And right now I’m looking for one that got away, an Auto World Release 20 version in light blue. Think light blue sounds like a crappy color on such a tough muscle car? I thought so too, until I saw this!
Yeah…if any Detroit assembly line-built rust bucket is worth over $100K, this is it! CHARRRGE!
These are great models and I can’t get over the proportions on some of them! These are some sexy colors but this car looks great in most! I always think of Dennis’s car in Christine!