I found mine in a local newspaper ad in 2001. It simply said "74 Dodge, needs work, $2000." I was unemployed at the time, but figured any old mopar under $2k isn't all bad. So I called and talked to the girlfried of the seller, he wasn't home, and she had no idea what it was but it ran and she said it was the one that looked like a camaro. That was a dead give away so I got directions, asked when the guy would be home and told them I'd be there. I figured at that price it must be a basket case, so I'll just nab it and part it out.
A buddy and I headed out at the appointed time and follwed the directions to their house. When I rounded a corner I saw it. "OHMYGAWD!" Talk about your bad 70s flashbacks...Cragar SS with N50 back and G60 up front. Of course it had the requisite air shocks and shackles. It also had its nose in the weeds, shag carpet inside with that fuzzy hairy stuff on the dash. It was dark dark blue, almost black and it had a pretty pitted roof from the original vinyl. The paint was severely oxidized.
So the kid comes out stats telling me what a hot car it is, how he blew away all these so called race cars and he was restoring it but didn't have room for it since he was moving into another house. When he popped hte hood to reveal a grimy, dirty 318 2bbl, I knew he was full of it. Anyway, I played along and asked him to start it since his g-friend said it ran. He said she was wrong, it won't start. He tried just to prove the point so I immediatly set into to talking him down because of it. Lopped $800 right off the price with that one.
I then asked him if he installed that classic stink big stance. This he was very proud of and confirmed that he had done it. However, he hadn't done anything to the front because the springs were missing. The previous owner must kept them when he bought it because it hadn't always sat that low. Well, I just had to start knocking more money off the price because of that. I mean really, do you know how difficult it is to find new front springs for a Challenger? By this point we were in the $500 range and he was hemmign and hawing about the price, so I pulled out 8 $100 bills, laid them on the fender and said that's my final offer and I'll get it out of here right now.
He agreed, went inside to get the title and we closed the deal. Once I had thepapers in hand, my friend and I set about correcting some problems. First was taking the air out of the shocks. Then we jacked up the fornt end, slid under it adn put about a dozen cranks on the t-bar bolt. Dropped it back to the ground and had it sitting level. Hmm, not bad I thought. Next we dug through our box of goodies and found a piece of wire. Since this was a 74, we figured the seat belt interlock was bad. So we jumped it to ground. Turn the key and nothing. "Battery is dead." the kid interjected watching curiously at all our activity. So we hooked up the jumper cables, turn it over, pumped it a few times and listend to the stacato sounds of a slowly awaking, old 318 through glass packs. Let it idle for a while while the lifters pumped up. Eventually the blue smoke subsided and the kid was jsut standing there with this look of disbelief on his face. I almost felt bad for him. He did come over and shake my hand adn said he had some great times in that car and he hoped I would enjoy it as much as he did. I assured him I would, hoped in it and drive it home.
It was missing a few trim pieces that I pcked up off various web sites. Another friend gave me his old carpet and dash pad when he replaced his. I smoothed the roof and resprayed it in the closest matching blue I could find. I also spent some time wet sanding the trunk and fenders to even things out some. I found out it has about 5 paint jobs on it. The AAR style scoop was a cobra jet piece I got at a swap meet and performed some mods to. The cragars came off and some wheels off my old Explorer went on. A TA deck spoiler and a ful chin spoiler completed the trans am look. I eventually began workign on retractable headlight covers and blacked out the grill area. The 318 was a real weazer so it came out and a 360 I had sitting in the corner went in. SInce I was swapping parts around, the 904 cam eout adna 4spd went in as well as replacing the 2.94 with 3:55. Fortunalty is was an 8.75 rear.
Decoding the tag shows it was fairly heavily optioned. It came avocado gold with a white vinyl roof, white interior, white stripes, a/c, light group, rear defrost, and deluxe wheel covers. After the green it looks like it was B5 blue, then black, then dark blue on two seperate occasions.
It needs lower quarters and trunk extensions. It also has some rust around the hood hinges and the cowl. I hope to get around to it this summer, but we'll have to see if time allows it. In the mean time it is undergoing suspension transplants and upgrades. I did the low budget trans am theme and will probably stick with the TA style through its rebirth.
