1969 Dodge Superbee Becomes A Killerbee

What Happens When You Cross a NASCAR Cup Car And A Super Bee?

By Kevin Shaw

Photography by Jerry Heasley

A purist Mopar enthusiast might not like what Jeff Adkins has done to this classic '69 Super Bee. You see, there's a certain animosity towards those who choose to incorporate non-Mopar parts into their musclecars, and this Bee's got plenty of 'em. You can call it automotive discrimination or manufacturer profiling. Either way, Jeff has built himself possibly the most radical high-speed Super Bee in the world. With the aid of Richard Petty Enterprises, Mopar Performance parts, and one of the craziest ideas out there, this "Killer Bee" truly earns its name.

In 1968, Plymouth introduced the Road Runner, a zero-frills, low-buck musclecar aimed directly at the teenage and twenty-year-old market. The car was big, heavy, wide, and grimacing, with the option of a 383 or the venerable 426 Hemi. Road Runners hit the market place hard, swarming the streets, and even walking away with Motor Trend's 1969 coveted Car of the Year award.

At the same time, Dodge released the Super Bee, a sister to the Road Runner and comparable in nearly every facet. In 1969, the Super Bee received a pretty hefty shot in the arm with the 440 RB engine and the mid-year triple two-barrel carburetion setup. based on the Coronet, the Super Bee was aimed at drag racing and street driving American youths.

Conversely, the Charger in 1968 was drastically redesigned with a long, swooping, Coke-bottle design that looked to be slicing through the air even while static at a stoplight. The Charger would pass through several different manifestations before evolving into the Daytona: a 200-plus-mph grounded rocket ship, which dominated the NASCAR circuit until the judges banned it from the track.

Plymouth switched roles, and copied the Daytona the next production year with the Superbird, a Daytona-fied Road Runner, which would eventually go down as the last of the famed winged cars in NASCAR. The King, Richard Petty, had himself quite a following while racing the Superbird.

Jeff found this B-Body on eBay. The car was in dire need of comprehensive bodywork as the metal was more cancer than anything. Rich Oakley, proprietor of Retro Rods by Rich, was contracted to turn this bucket into a beast. Jeff wanted the Bee to really shout out as it would fly by, so he selected GM's Corvette Millennium Yellow for the skin. Rich Oakley's restoration shop, Retro Rides, also installed aluminum rocker belly pans, a steel-louvered rear belly pan, and smoothed out the firewall. To take the stress and torque that the incoming powerplant would produce, Rich's shop in Archdale, North Carolina, modified the unitbody design with Pro-shock coilover rear shocks and ladder bars.

Professional-grade four-piston Bicknell Racing Products calipers with Wilwood discs were put at all four-corners anticipating the speeds that the Bee was going to be able to reach. Jeff had the rearend installed with a 3.73 Locker-equipped differential. Large American Racing Wheels with Nitto tires planted the B-Body to the ground and do their best to keep from not boiling off when Jeff hits the throttle. The powerplant in question is a R5-P7 V-8, which translates to a 5.9L NASCAR Nextel Cup Magnum built specifically by Petty Enterprises for NASCAR racing. The 800-plus-horsepower full dry-sump engine can throw itself up to 9,000 rpm without a second thought. The Mopar block and heads contain a full roller Competition Cams setup with Del West valves and Isky valvesprings. A Jesel beltdrive and Moroso dry-sump pan plumbed to a Barnes dry-sump oiling system ensures the engine gets plenty of oil at the aforementioned 9,000 rpm. A very atypical Holley 750 rests atop the MP intake manifold, all port-matched and modified for optimal flow all the way down to the Billy Valitzsky headers.

After Eatmon Race Engines finished freshening up the engine, a Tex's Racing manually-shifted Super T-10 transmission with a Tilton clutch was bolted to it, and everything was lowered into place into the modified transmission and driveshaft tunnel, onto the heavily altered K-frame and customized transmission crossmember.

Tex's Racing (located in North Ether, North Carolina, rather than Texas) installed a Hurst long-arm shifter that juts up through a custom console. In fact, the whole interior is an example in custom interior work. Taking the yellow and black bumblebee theme to the next level, Jeff had all four of the '00 Chevrolet Cavalier seats covered in yellow jacket-themed velour and vinyl. A Grant steering wheel sits atop an Ididit steering column, while '02 Chrysler PT Cruiser door panels and handles were integrated into the door panel design. power windows were put into place, and a complete carbon-fiber dash was made with Auto Meter carbon-faced gauges.