Hey Guys,
I'm excited to announce that after 24 years, I'm finally starting the restoration of a car I bought back in 1987. Lots of cars have come and gone since then, but I've kept this one through the years. We have shared a lot of blood, sweat, and tears together. It's a 69 Charger R/T SE, 440, 4-spd, R6 red with white top and tail stripe. Black interior. Kinda rare combo for a Charger.
I first saw this car driving down the road and the owner hammering it. It was Red, primer, rust and Green. I thought, "What a pile". Later there was an ad in the local paper for a Charger for $500. I went to look at the car and it was the same car. It still had the Dana and for $500, I thought it would make a good parts car for another car I had.
The owner of the R6 car said he had smoked the clutch. I wanted it for the Dana, so I really didn't care about much else. As I walked down the length of the car looking at the bondoed up quarters, something caught my eye. The sail panel had 2 small holes close together. Could this be an SE? Yes, the owner said he had the emblems in a bag in the house. This was a R/T SE 4spd, R6 Red car. I knew it was something special and decided to buy it. I told the owner I'd be back the next day with the cash. Can you guess what happened?
Yep, I was beat to punch. Someone else bought it. A few months later I was sitting at a gas station and an older guy who looked like the main character in Sling Blade approached me while I was in another Charger I had, and started asking questions. He said he had one like mine only Red. This happened a lot and typically didn't pan out, so I thought, "sure you do". Still, he seemed to know about cars and asked about parts. I got his name and number and said I'd see what I could find.
Turns out he was a distant relative. I got a kick out of that one. He and his brother were big Mopar guys from back in the "day". His brother had (and the family still has) a 69 GTX he bought new. Several months later, either he called me or I called him about buying the car. Can't remember which now, but I bought the car for $900 with a ton of parts. Sold off most of the parts like an idiot a year later. The car sat untouched for a couple years while I finished college. Then, I sent it to a buddy of mine to build the engine. Three attempted engine builds and several years later I got the call to come get it.
It's a long story, but basically the car sat neglected for the better part of 10 years while I played with other cars. My buddy that was building the engine piddled with it in his spare time and something would always go wrong in the engine build to prevent me from picking it up. Like the 400 flywheel on the 440. My buddy didn’t bother to check prior to putting it in the car. Can you say, "beat the bearings out of itself?" Then there was the Mopar 509 cam that self destructed, and the Crane adjusters for the pushrods that would just snap. Anyways along about late 1996, I picked the car up and took it home. 3 engine builds later, it ran ok.
Shortly after getting it home, I did a title search through my home state of Tennessee. I got a record of every owner, including the original owners name, address, and MRO for the car along with the bill of sale submitted to the state. It is a bunch of great info. I could not reach any of the previous owners (20 or more) except for the original owner. He still lived at the same address and had the same phone number. He remembered the car and told me he had ordered it optioned the way it was for racing. He originally ordered it F8 and went back and changed it to R6. Whew ! Good move dude !
He said he street raced it and was very successful along with a friend who had a 70 440-6 Cuda. After an engine fire (which he suspects was sabotage from a sore loser) he traded the car on a Roadrunner. He said he always missed the car. Unfortunately, he had no pics or parts left over from the car as he'd had a house fire some years before and lost everything. I hope the guy is still alive, I need to make the time to go meet him. He bought the car new at Burgin Dodge in Knoxville, TN. and lived South of there in Tallassee, TN.
Anyway, back to the car. I have had it back in my possession since 1996. I am finally ready to begin the restoration, 24 years after I first bought the car. As a side note, I did have the car at my wedding along with some Mopars of my friends. As you look at the link with photos, I first found her multi-colored. When I got married, I sanded and primered her in Flat Black. It rained the day of our wedding and the fresh paint in the rain actually looks good. LOL. Today the paint doesn't look so good. Time has not been so good to the primer. LOL.
Here is a link to the photos:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/dixierestorationparts/I'll try and keep this post, the dodgecharger.com site and the flickr site updated with photos as the restoration progresses, and hope to add a section to our own website. I'm a working stiff like most of you, so this won't be a big money OE restoration. I am going to try and build it as correct as possible using a mixture of original, NOS and repro parts I have. My plan is to show it for a couple of years and then DRIVE IT!
Of course, any big name parts vendors reading this that want to donate to the project will be much appreciated. LOL.
