My first full restoration attempt - 1970 'Cuda

I've owned this car since 1978, back when I was in high school. I bought it for $1000 from my first cousin who bought it from the original owner in 1972.

A few years ago, I was contacted by my cousin's high school buddy who told me about some of the crazy racing they did outside of city limits in Reno, Nevada back in the day. The starting line was a cattle grate and many raced the standing 1/2 mile. As you may know, there were no speed limits outside of town back then. There was simply a sign that said, end speed limit. It truely was the domain of the Rapid Transit era cars.

He also told me the original owner was a highway engineer, and used the car to test his theoretical speed limit calculations for the curves of highway 80 from the Donner Pass down into Reno. He asked me if the car still had the inclinometers in it when I got it. It didn't.

I remember riding in the back seat of this car when I was about 10 years old. We got on the freeway towards California to go out to dinner. I remember looking closley at the fabric of the back seat as my body was pinned to it from the acceleration on the freeway, thinking this is the coolest car ever! I've gotta have it someday.

A few years later, I remember sitting in it while my cousin went into a tire shop. The car sat idling with the pistol grip shaking back and forth from the lope of the big cam. I bugged my cousin to sell it to me ever since that first ride, and he eventually did when he was getting married. Later on, he built a clone just like it. He loved this car, but has since passed away.

The original owner's wife still lives in Reno, but doesn't like talking about her husband since he passed away a few years back. I may bring it by to try again once it's finished. I don't know yet.

When I got the car, the shaker bubble and hardware, the sixpack intake and carbs and all the parts related to it were gone. I used to have to put an old oil pan over the carb to keep the rain out of the air filter when it was parked in the rain. I drove it as much as I could afford the gas to drive it. An 850 double pumper with a Tarantula TM7 intake came on the car when I picked it up. It also had those heavy TRW 11.8 to one pop-ups and the stock sixpack camshaft. It gas knocked back then if the factory dualpoint distributer's timing wasn't set just right and if you lugged it, which was hard to do since it had so much power. I had traction problems below 60 mph, but once it hit third gear, it was wicked fast. I'll never forget how the ashtray would fly out of the dash and hit the back seat when I power shifted second gear. Only if I knew then about tuning what i've learned on this site since then....

This "black car" is still the stuff of ledgends to the people in the neighborhood who road in it back in high school. The stories they tell of their experiences in it are highlighted by wide eye'd looks of fear and wonder combined with a sinister little smile as they they recall the memories of the rides I took them on when they asked me for a ride and said, " I want to go fast!" I cured several people of ever saying that again. The other day, I ran into a guy I haven't seen in 30 years and the first thing he brings up is a ride he'll never forget in that black car!

I'll add more to the story and post some pictures as time allows. Thanks for reading.

As you can see in this shot, it had been hit lightly in the rear end passenger side bumper area and the front passenger side fender had a little body damage when I got it, but it was virtually rust free. The vinyl top and paint still looked good back then. I remember taking the trunk mat out ot the trunk, because it was wet underneath it and taking the plugs out and rinsing out the lower quarter panels, because my cousin had put the battery in the trunk, but didn't use a battey box. Some of the white acid had gotten in there and I wanted to neutralize it with baking soda and water. The paint was not too bad back then and it was a cool looking ride even though the tires and rims where some kind of uni-lug design. The interior was white, but had already started to yellow on top of the door panels and the front seats were kind of torn up.

One of the rear tires came loose once and bent the driver's side lower quarter panel up a bit. I eventually had to replace the lower quarter panel extentions because of all this, but only the lowest portions. It was the only rust on the car. I think it was the battery acid that was the real culprit.

The car was parked in the early '80's in my parents garage with about 54k miles on the clock. Hard miles, but the original numbers matching engine and transmision were still safely in the car. It sat there for about a decade and a half only to end up in a secure trailer storage yard for another decade, and then from I finally got a house and more importantly a garage where I could plan her resurection.

I found and bought all the original shaker and intake parts back in the 80's along with a tresure trove of other parts waiting for the day where I had the time, the place, the money and the patience to bring her back to her former glory....and maybe a little beyond.

...and by the way, I started the restoration a couple of years ago and have been making good progress. I only recently discovered this thread and figured I better start from the beginning and post my progress.

Very interesting story and hope the restoration turns out as nice as you want it to be. Are you going to do most of it yourself or "farm out" some of the work?
I'd contact your senator and apply for some stimulus money.

Nice story! It looks like great starting point.

Yes.....by all means post some of the new pics. I know what you are going thru. I started in 2003........Look at my website and see what you are in for. Good luck. David


http://www.papadaveonline.com/index.html

Nice website David. Yah, it's definitely a longer term project for me, 3 years now. I'm still waiting to get some more "before" pic's from my buddy, who helped me with the paint, so I can post them in somewhat chronological order. In the meanwhile, here's another pre-restoration photo.

Here's one of the driver's side quarter panel rust/damage. You gotta love those rear shackles. Don't worry, they were only temporary, I threw them on there to lift the rear of the car up while in storage, so it didn't look so nose-high.

Another great story! Best of luck with the restoration & keep us posted

Ok, I finally got some more pics from the beginning phases of my restoration process. They are about 4 years old by now and were digitized from one of those disposable cameras my buddy had.

...another.

...ditto.

...#4

....and if I'd only know then what I know now.

One of the worst days of my project unravelled when I went over to see the progress my paint and body guy had made, and saw that he had cut away more of the sheetmetal than I felt was neccessary to replace the bad metal.

The car had the battery put in the trunk way back in the mid '70's. It was done without a battery box. By the time I got the car in 1978, powdered battery acid had made it's way into the lower , rear quarter panels. As a kid of 17, I knew this was bad, and used baking soda and water to neutralize it.

I pulled out the lower quarter-panel plugs and flushed the whole trunk out with baking soda and water. The factory trunk mat was still in the car, and it was contributing to the pitting of the sheetmetal in the trunk as well.

Once I had it all cleaned up, I treated it with ospho, primed and painted it. That saved my trunk floor, which is still in the car. later on I would discover that the lower quarters had been etched and weakened by the acid that had been pack down in them with dirt, small debris and gunk that I washed out last century.

They looked ok on the outside, but the sheetmetal on the lower portion had been compromised structurally as I found out one day while driving down a mountain road.

My cousin had installed these uni-lug aluminum rims with large excentric screw on lugnuts. My only guess as to the reason they made these things was so that one style of rim could fit chevy and Mopar. They were ugly and the design sucked. Once the unilugs were screwed onto the lugs, the rim would be installed and a large cap-type lugnut and washer would hold the rim on.

One day ad the ledgend goes, my buddy and I were coming down a winding mountain road towrds home at about 35 to 45 mph. Every once in a while, I kept hearing this faint...ting...ta...ting...ting....ting and then it would go away.

After the fourth time I heard it, I turned to my buddy and asked him if he was hearing that noise. He asked, what noise. Suddenly a large dark shape passed my drivers door, and the back of the car jumped up into the air about a foot and squated down on the ground with a loud grinding noise.

A split second later, I realized my rear tire had just passed us and was bouncing down the road in a lazy, surreal motion. I thought the worst was over when a few hundred yards after we skidded to a halt, we watched in horror as the tire disappeared over a cliff.

Shocked, we went over to look for the tire and rim. The tree covered cliff sloped down so steep and far that we could not see the bottom of it for hundreds of yards. My heart sank as I stood there thinking there was no way I would ever find that wheel, and if I did, I would never be able to hoist it back up to the road. I shuffled on down the road in disbelief at what had just happened. Just as I thought we were going to be stuck for hours, I spotted my wheel wedged in a tree crotch a few yards from the edge of the road. It took me twenty minutes to unstick it from the tree and lug it back up onto the road. I walked back up the road and found two of the lug nuts. Using a small pair of pliers and a bumper jack we borrowed from a passer-by, we put the wheel back on and limped on home, having to stop every few hundred yards to tighten the remaining two lugnuts.

My driver's side quarter panel had folded inward as the tire rolled off the car, and the sheet metal had cracked along the bend revealing the damage that the battery acid had done over the years before I had neutralized it.

It wasn't to much longer after this infamous incident, that the car began a long period of storage. I knew in my heart that one day I would have the resources, the location and the knowledge to restore it to the car I had always wanted it to be. That day would come, but it took a lot longer than I ever thought.

Three decades later and about 4 1/2 years ago now, I picked up some patch panels and trunk extensions and CLEARLY explained to my paint and body guy that I wanted to keep as much of the original sheet metal as humanly possible.

To make a long story shorter, I came over to look at the progress and discovered that he had hacked off about 8 to 10 inches more of the metal than i felt he needed to. I was livid and devistated to see this. After several days of plotting his death, I accepted what had happened, delt with it and moved forward.

Overall the patch installation came out good as did the overall paint and bodywork. There are some "issues" with the paint, as I now refer to them, but it's a black car, most people never notice them and that's another story.

The other side wasn't as bad, but still cut way more than neccessary. The final finish work ended up looking good and it was the first of three big disappointments on this restoration.

They looked nice once installed, and are the only non-factory sheetmetal on the car at this point.

On the way to get the engine compartment blasted clean. I didn't have a shop to do a rotissery job in. I had to move it from my buddies garage to get it media blasted and then to another shop to use the spray booth. It limited the options I had when planning the bodywork and repaint, as I had to keep it in rolling chassis form most of the time. Later, I would pull the front and rear suspension to restore them.

After blasting and the beginnings of some primer...

My buddy wiping it down before shooting it.

Here's the primer shot of the trunk.

...and the door jamb.

After priming, sealing, the TX9 base coat and several clear coats.

...trunk.

...and door jamb. Because there was so little wear and virtually no rust, I decided to leave the interior as the factory had sprayed it. The car had factory undercoating, which was in remarkably good shape as well. Later, I used some of Resto Ricks undercoating to touch up some spots that needed it and then cleaned and repainted it. Sorry Dave, there were no Q-tips injured in the touch up of the factory undercoating.

The car was finally back at my house for the long process of bodywork, priming and blocking and priming and blocking and priming and blocking......etc, etc.

The body was pretty straight to begin with....or so I thought. We spent just over 200 hours with long boards and such. I never thought it would end.

WOOW, cool story!!!
Definetly got me interested.. I'll be waitin for more

Deja vu! I was able to get back my Challenger R/T. it has the same damage to a 1/4 from an evening when I saw my rear M-50 come rolling past me!
It has alluminum slots, with long shank lug nuts, that liked to loosen on the driver side.

Made a sick feeling in the stomach, for sure.

Very nice work so far. The black is very slick.

I had to replace the seat bracing on both sides, because back in the early 80's, I tried to invent my own subframe connectors and they were just in the way. Ahhhh, the folly of youth.

I knew I messed up when I took them off and had a set squireled away for many years just waiting for this moment to make good on my mis-steps.

Back in the old days, the car body used to flex with a stock headed 440. I am going to run a motor with a bit more steam, so I installed a set of quality subframe connectors.

I figured after seeing what a lot of guys have to do to their sheet metal to deal with the rust issues most of these car have I can always spend the time to remove them if need be, and done with a bit of care, no one would ever be able to tell they were there.

Once everything was all welded and ground, I used Resto Rick's undercoating to blend the new stuff in with the remaining, original undercoating.

I freshened up each part and made some bolt on modifications/upgrades to the front and rear suspension and brakes.

...FirmFeel stage 2 box, bigger tie rods, bigger front swaybar and larger front 11 3/4discs, added rear sway bar and Doctor Diff rear discs with Caltracs and mono's.

Looks good.

Cool post! I can imagine some of the roads they used to race on around here, Pyramid HWY by chance? Great progress so far. You should be impressed with the handling mods you chose, Except for the Cal Tracs I have the same set in my 69 RR and its handles really well. Keep up the good work!

Quote:

---

I can always spend the time to remove them if need be, and done with a bit of care, no one would ever be able to tell they were there.

---

ANYTHING can be done. just need the right set of hands....Keep the pics comming