So-Cal Chrysler 300M

Over the past nine years, I've run performance tests on a horde of modified cars. Many underperform their unchanged siblings in at least one test, and you'd be surprised how many can't match a production car in any exercise. Many tuner cars that outperform their unmodified versions require Juan Montoya-level driving skill, have a cob-rough ride, puke fluids, shed parts, or catch fire. So it was with pessimism born of experience that I approached the slammed So-Cal Speed Shop Chrysler 300M with its extreme gunmetal gray over eye-popping tangerine paint. Even if these hot-rodders had made the 300M quicker in a straight line, thought I, it was sure to bound off its bumpstops and pound my spine in the handling tests.

I'm pleased to admit I was wrong. The So-Cal 300M, what the company calls the "Candy Tangerine Streamline Metalflake Baby," not only out-performs a stock 300M in every test, it was easy to drive quickly in the handling exercises, rides acceptably well, and ran flawlessly.

We tested a stock '99 300M, our Long-Term Test car, on the same day, and Candy Baby was a whopping 0.7 second quicker 0-60 mph, a huge 4.1 mph quicker in the slalom, a giant 0.08 g grippier on the skidpad, and stopped 7 feet shorter in the 60-0-mph test.

In a classic hot-rodder move, So-Cal's 300M received a 3.5-liter SOHC Prowler engine that had been tweaked by Chrysler engineers. Though the internals weren't changed, the Prowler mill received a new intake manifold, throttle body, and Borla cat-back exhaust system. Both the stock 300M engine and the stock Prowler engine are rated at 253 peak horsepower, but Chrysler estimates the mods made to the So-Cal 300M engine boost it to around 300 horsepower. Another reason for the improved performance: Revised software raises the rev-limiter to 6800 rpm, provides more aggressive fuel and spark, firms up the shifts, and eliminates an irritating portion of the AutoStick program that forces upshifts before the redline in manual mode.

For me, the most impressive thing about Candy Baby was its suspension, modified by So-Cal's Jim Sleeper. Though the So-Cal-developed springs drop the car more than 2 inches, it rides and handles extremely well. Sleeper says auxiliary bump rubbers prevent chassis-unsettling collisions with bumpstops, which are so common in lowered cars. Aiding handling are BFGoodrich G Force T/A KD 245/45ZR17 tires on AZEV wheels.

An exact duplicate of Candy Baby would run about $10,000, without a stock 300M. Delete features like the Muth signal mirrors, Valeo Sylvania High Intensity Discharge headlamps, Recaro seats (not fitted for our test), or the blinding Sherwin-Williams Tangerine Candy Pearl paint, and the price would drop to around $5000.-Mac DeMere

SourceSo-Cal Speed Shop909/469-6171www.so-calspeedshop.com