Well I promised to start a build thread long ago and its another “better late than never” promise fulfilled.
I'll start with a few pics and will post more as the story unfolds.
Work on the restoration has been hampered by the consuming perils of building a new home this year (and next the way its going) and other life things that take priority over a silly hobby.
Nonetheless, here’s where I started…
And here's a couple taken recently...
Bought the car in pieces from a gentleman in Tuscon AZ 3 years ago; something no one really should do, but I’m still amazed with the completeness of OEM parts that accompanied the shell. Its an original Rallye red, black bucket seat interior, black vinyl top car. Came with numbers matching 340, 4 speed transmission and rear end. (and a build sheet!)
It was a power hood, dual exhaust tip car and very plain Jane after that… No “power” anything!
No worries, my passion is to bring these back to life NOT drive them or sell them.
So as with every restoration… we needed a plan; I’ve done the purist of restorations to the wildest of resto-mods and this would be a little different.
The Plan:
“two parallel paths”
Build the car as original and build a quasi Hemi Clone shaker hood car with a twist. Build the Hemi clone in a way that it could quickly revert back to its OEM state without a trace of the Hemi cloning; And of course, without any major restorative work including but not limited to… painting.
So it would be necessary to:
Paint the original hood and second set of rear side marker bezels.
Use different fuel lines and sending unit (without drilling any extra fastening points)
Use retrofit motor mounts on the 340 K-frame.
Mount and ground the electronic module to underside of shaker hood plate.
Replace the 2 speed wiper motor.
Use a Hemi Exhaust system.
And source a 426 engine, hemi 4speed and drive shaft.
Simple… right?!?
I’ll try and recap some progress from the beginning in subsequent posts and please be patient ‘cause you now know how busy and slow I am.
For now, I simply wanted to introduce the build and share something a little different with you.
Thanks for having me here,
Paul
