Stellantis
Amongst cars and truck historians, the Dodge Magnum frequently has the image of the underachieving more youthful brother or sister of the even more popular Dodge Charger. This specific line of vehicles has actually had it rough because birth, with the very first of its kind being a stopped working 70s Dodge Magnum that lots of most likely didn’t understand existed. In spite of the relative absence of appeal at its origin, the Magnum brand name handled to survive on in different types in nations like Brazil and Mexico up till the late 80s. Unbelievely, it was restored as soon as again in the mid-to-late-00s.
Whereas previous designs had actually stopped working to get the icon status Dodge was expecting, the 2005 Dodge Magnum was various. Shunning its predecessors’ mid-size 2-door coupe style, the brand-new Magnum was placed as a full-size station wagon boasting lots of power with its V-6 and V-8 engine choices. The fresh version of the cars and truck was favorably gotten, with Car and Driver even choosing it out of many candidates for its list of the 10 finest cars and truck designs of 2005. For a number of years later, the Magnum was a pillar of Dodge’s lineup till it was suddenly stopped in 2008.
With such an appealing redesign, some customers no doubt still question why the Magnum’s revival was interrupted. Obviously, business practicality was an essential consider Dodge’s choice, however the primary factors behind the design’s death pertain to specific significant modifications in the higher market that were taking place around the exact same time.
The Dodge Magnum was a wagon in an SUV world
Stellantis
While Dodge’s effort to totally transform the Dodge Magnum for its 2005 renewal was a strong choice, it can be argued that the type this pivot eventually took disallowed the Magnum from ever reaching its complete capacity. Put simply, the Magnum was a top quality station wagon launched at a time when station wagons were falling even more and even more out of style.
The appeal of station wagons started to decrease quickly throughout the 1990s, specifically in the United States. What was as soon as thought about the essential household automobile style was now having a hard time to go toe-to-toe with the progressively popular world of contemporary SUVs and crossovers. Improvements in these kinds of vehicles implied that they boasted an equivalent quantity of roominess, a greater motorist’s seat, and a sleeker style. In time, it ended up being clear that the rise of the SUV, in specific, wasn’t simply a passing pattern– it was handling to make the once-beloved wagon totally redundant in the eyes of numerous Americans.
By 2005, much of the damage had actually currently been done. SUVs had actually shown that they weren’t going anywhere anytime quickly, and wagons were having a hard time to keep a reducing piece of the pie. In some methods, the revival of the Magnum was among the last efforts to breathe life into the wagon area, with its refined curved style and focus on power and adaptability. Dodge even tried to place the cars and truck as a “sports tourer” instead of a wagon.
