Barracuda is finished and I've got the old-car blues.

[DAYLEY/CHALLENGER]

Get out and ride.  And smile as you go thur town cause you know you are getting looks....You have something that most folks haven't seen in a long time or for the younger set, haven't seen at all.  And yes there will always be something to tinker with on the car, but you will find you still enjoy the challenge.  

[jeryst]

Just keep this in mind. If you sell it, you'll be able to buy a new Challenger. All problems solved.

[FJ5_440]

Just keep this in mind. If you sell it, you'll be able to buy a new Challenger. All problems solved.

Don't do it!  It will get better!
I bought a "new" GTO when they came out and it shared the garage with my 69 GTO,  That summer I initially drove the new one quite a bit as the comfy leather seats, and AC along with 400 hp and 6 speed manual transmission makes it pretty easy to like.  Eventually I found myself driving the 69 every nice day and the new one sat in the garage unless it was raining.  It did (and does) everything better than the old one, but the new car had managed to become my bad weather driver. 

My 70 Cuda now has about 500 miles on the restoration, most of the bugs are worked out of it and I trust it more and more.  When the snow and salt go away the Cuda will be driven like it came off a used car lot.  If I get stone chips, scratches or door dings so be it.  When they get too bad or too annoying, I will fix them and eventually I might need to tape the jambs and have the outside resprayed.  Old cars are loud, and rough around the edges, and make little kids stare and point, and make people want to steal them. 

Aren't they great!!

[moparnut]

Don't worry,we all go thru it.Its called the human condition,"the grass is always greener,until you get there"WHile i love old mopars,most of the fun is the scraping up the money,hunting for parts,seeing progress and the general feeling of building your own ride.BUT!These are old cars,old technology,prone to problems here and there.You have to love working on them or it aint worth it.

[Swedefish]

Beautiful  .
Just step on it every chance you have, then the fun begin.
Thought just the same about my 383 -67 Fastback, but the harder I drove the funnier it gets to drive

[Srobinson4]

My Barracuda is basically finished with just the hockey sticks to go and registered by next weekend.  So now I have a car that cost half as much as a house, evrery time you touch it you get a scratch, nothing works perfectly because it is 38 years old (this month) and everything has been apart and put together again, it has a white interior that you can't touch, it drives, steers and brakes like a 38 year old car, and I have to be extra careful that it doesn't get stolen!  After three years of restoration, is this sort of anti-climax common?  Very few things went perfectly over the build and more often than not the final result was a compromise.  Admittedly, I've yet to take the car for more than a slow run around the block (did I mention that the 8 quart sump was a bad idea as I'm gonna hit that for sure), but for today, I think I'd swap it for a some new generation muscle if it came up. 

Someone tell me its going to get better.

There are a million people who wish they had your problem!   Great looking car!

[LAA66]

 I understand where you are coming from. It's like don't take it out because there maybe damage or it may leave me stranded somewhere. That is true and it will need to be dealt with as needed. Paint is going to be worse each day after the spray booth. Mechanical parts breakdown too. As for enjoying the car you must overcome the minor setbacks and look at the big picture. You have a unique machine that you recreated in a time when 99.9% of todays car owners simply purchase and drive them.

[MJS73]

Get collector car insurance!

Agreed!  And make sure you get an "agreed value" policy so that there's no dickering over the value if (God forbid) something happens.

It'll get better.  And you'll enjoy the car more as time goes by.

Nice wheels, BTW.

Mike

[DanGoodman]

if I could weigh in, if you remember when I first got my car back from the show and had some "issues" with several things, I made a decision to put it up for sale or just to see what it would bring, enough $$ that I would agree to sell it. I had no more attachment to the car.

After I got a few chips in the paint, a couple of light scratches, flat tire,  I love the car again. I still have some very minor issues, but the comments I get one I drive it, the friends I have made, the overall enjoyment of driving this car and sharing it with my son, have made me appreciate it more. I just wish we had more activity cruise ins or runs around here insead of short drives and parking it, makes me feel like I am really old  (the last part) I truly enjoy her now. And they told me she was a trailer queen.......Not this Challenger

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