Some cars are about practicality. Others are more about fun. While the Chrysler 300 SRT8 has its practical side, to be certain, it’s more of a fun car. It’s a sports car. It’s about power, speed, luxury and looking hot with it.

Perched on top of special 20-inch SRT8 alloy wheels that you won’t find on any other Chrysler, the Chrysler 300 SRT8 certainly does look pretty hot. It’s nice to see a sports car that looks like a sports car – and you can get those alloy wheels in black rather than chrome if you want to as an option. The Chrysler 300 SRT8 has a deck lid mounted spoiler out the back – it wouldn’t be a real sports car without one. Throw in fog lights, dual exhausts and nine colours to choose from and you’ve got a good looking car.

OK, now the bit you’ve been waiting for: what has the Chrysler 300 SRT8 got under the bonnet? The short answer is “plenty”. For those of you who want a longer answer, the Chrysler 300 SRT8 is powered by a 6.4 litre V8 motor that can deliver a very respectable amount of power indeed: 347 kW of it, in fact, when the engine turns over at 6100 rpm. The torque reaches its max first (when the engine does 4150 rpm) but when it does, it packs a punch of 631 Nm. Which is quite enough torque for any vehicle on the roads – much more torque and it’d be a farm tractor, just about. It’s quite a lot to play with, coupled up to the 5-speed autostick transmission. The official Chrysler Australia website doesn’t tell us exactly how fast the Chrysler 300 SRT8 can go at top speed – but we are probably safe enough saying that it goes way over the speed limit.

With all that speed and power, safety is an absolute must and once again, the Chrysler 300 SRT8 has got what it takes. In fact, it’s got quite a lot of the alphabet if you count up all the letters in the abbreviations used for all its active safety features: the Chrysler 300 SRT8 has got ESC, EBD, ASTC, ERM and FCW. Before you start wondering if alphabet soup has managed to get into your computer screen (or whatever screen you’re viewing this article on), here’s a translation: Electronic stability control, electronic brakeforce distribution, all-speed traction control, electronic roll mitigation and forward collision warning system. (And there’s another abbreviation out there, which isn’t really an active safety feature unless you want to be picky: ACC for adaptive cruise control). Other active safety features on the Chrysler 300 SRT8 that haven’t picked up abbreviations include the Blind Spot Monitoring System and Rear Cross-Path Detection System (which needs an abbreviation), front and rear park assist, and a reversing camera. On the passive safety front, the things that you don’t want to see used but the Chrysler 300 SRT8 has anyway just in case include active headrests and airbags all over the show.

Sports cars should also look good on the inside, and the Chrysler 300 SRT8 certainly does. The standard seats, which have jet-black Nappa leather (perforated) upholstery, look much nicer than anything in my living room, but the optional black/red trim looks even hotter. No matter what colour they are, the Chrysler 300 SRT8 is very, very comfortable to sit in thanks to eight-way power adjustment with four settings for the lumbar support for both the driver and the front passenger, while the driver gets a memory function for his/her seat. The front seats are heated and so are the rear seats. There’s space for everyone to recharge their phones thanks to the three 12-volt power points (in the front cubby bin, centre console and the reare centre console) but you might not need to with the Bluetooth prepared voice command hands-free system. However, to use the phone system, you’ll have to turn down the sound system, as 19 speakers, one of which is a 900-Watt amplifier, can put out quite a lot of noise. But you can turn it down easily enough using the steering wheel-mounted audio controls. The other thing that the Chrysler 300 SRT8’s steering wheel controls (apart from the direction the wheels are pointing in, of course) is the cruise control. Naturally, there’s leather wrapping the steering wheel and the gear knob, too.

Anything else that the Chrysler 300 SRT8 has on offer? Well, there’s Smart Beam auto-dipping Bi-Xenon headlights with auto-levelling, automatic dual-zone climate control, rain-sensing wipers, heated/cooled cupholders and the optional dual-panel panoramic sunroof. And a premium security alarm just in case someone can’t resist the tempting looks of your Chrysler 300 SRT8 and tries to pinch it.

Current model series cars include the:

• Chrysler 300 SRT8

For any more information on the Chrysler 300 SRT8, or for that matter any other new car, contact one of our friendly consultants on 1300 303 181. If you’d like some fleet discount pricing (yes even for private buyers!), we can submit vehicle quotes requests out to our national network of Chrysler dealers and come back with pricing within 24 hours. Private Fleet – car buying made easy!

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