Tend to agree with you, I actually owned an R/T 6 Pack 265 4 speed Charger back in the 80s and my good buddy had an E55 340 727 auto Charger at the same time. If we lined them up I could only just edge him out with a perfect launch and light. Otherwise if his car got off the line well you couldn’t haul him in! As for the 340s being intentionally strangled, that’s not true, they were large valve high comp 69/70 build engines (installed in 72-74 model cars) no doubt that a better exhaust and non std cam would have helped but Chrysler Australia were really focussed on the Aus built 6 cyl development at the time which was really driven by Federal Government local content rules. The 340 race car may have been something they toyed with the idea of but it was quickly abandoned and just became the stuff of myth ever since. For me I’d take a V8 package over the 6 anytime!
