The 65 Dart is the best of the narrow bodies IMHO! Btw, I met someone who knows you at SEMA, Olli Manninen from Finland! Talked with him for a while, it seems that you guys over der are all Mopar nuts... I want one of those Finnish Mopar t-shirts!

I believe the FIRST car to run the Mr. Norm's "Hi-Performance King" lettering was a 63 Dart with Lakes pipes on it and it ran at the inside drag races in 63. Don't diss the Darts!

Keep the pictures of the trucks, K-cars and C-bodies coming.

That's cool Jim! Finland has always been a MoPar country, back in the day Chrysler outsold GM and Ford, I guess that heritage still shows!

Eric, spotted a clean Omni in Detroit and that was a bit exciting, I am getting worried about myself

Another busy day ahead! I had been talking about a visit to the Viper plant with GetAwayDriver since my last stay in Detroit and he made it happen! There was a possibility for three people to come on the tour and Kurt who generously let me stay at his place while in Detroit appreciated the chance to join the fun! The third guy was BigBlockHead who drove down from Flint.



Driving past GM Powertrain and Chrysler Warren Stamping;





Mount Elliott Tool & Die on the way...



And in we go!



The building is an old Champion Spark Plug factory and reminds quite a bit of some structures Yamasaki did for Chrysler;

http://www.allpar.com/cars/viper/conner-avenue.html

http://www.drivesrt.com/2014/srt-viper/







We got a nice presentation before entering the action;





I was amazed about the cleanliness of the truck factory and this place didn't exactly let us down in that respect;



A display of different milestone Vipers were placed right on the factory floor;







Checking key measurements, punched hole locations etc. CAAP receives various subassemblies ready to install, the engine being the exception. It is assembled in house on its own assembly line.





Engines ready to go;



Moparts members GetAwayDriver, BigBlockHead and Forwardlook. Maybe this day will be shared with future generations and the story teller is a hero...





Imported from Detroit!

"Eric, spotted a clean Omni in Detroit and that was a bit exciting, I am getting worried about myself "

Since I've owned my '93 Caravan, I find myself doing the same thing with older Caravans and Voyagers.

Is there a treatment?

There are no robots at this plant, everything is done by hand with much more attention to detail than on a normal assembly line. There are no repair stations either as all problems are corrected already in the assembly areas. In a process normally performed only on race cars, an alignment machine sets caster and camber at normal ride height, and then at jounce and at rebound (upward and downward travel of suspension).

High pressure water test area;



Quality control, some lucky fellows actually do this for a living;







Everything is super clean and neatly organized here;



Going back we pass the engine assembly line;









Thanks again for a fantastic tour! Memories for life!



Some Viper owners got a tour just behind us, quite an impressive row on the front lawn;

Can't believe I'm the first to post at the end of the Viper tour!

Forwardlook, as always your posts and pictures are awesome

Really enjoyed seeing inside the Viper Plant!

Looks like you guys had a great time, thanks for sharing it.




Whos 72' New Yorker is that?

That is the 73 that me and Hans picked-up in Kansas for him to drive around the country!

Very cool to get inside the Viper plant. Every time I read your post I think why the heck am I not going to these places on my own? Time? Money? The heck with it all. I need to get out more.

Thanks for looking guys! I'm usually not the guy to quote New York Times but they did a good video of the Viper assembly process;

http://www.nytimes.com/video/magazine/100000001993296/manufacturing-a-viper.html

Yeah, the New Yorker is a 73. I prefer the front end of the 72:s but since I'm poor I have to get these things cheap The 73 front end is growing on me and one of the things I liked about this car is the fact that it is triple green And it has a flawless interior...here's a short clip;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Kzg-bAoiZM

Eric, I always wonder why you guys in the US don't go out more, lol. There is so much to see. But maybe growing up with it makes it kinda everyday stuff? I don't know but to me every day in the US is like Christmas.

There wasn't a lot of time to waste as BigBlockHead had arranged for us to see the GM Heritage Collection. They have about 600 cars and trucks in their collection, less than half of those are displayed at a time.

http://www.gmheritagecenter.com/

Driving past Dodge City....







In the back we see a couple of Reliable Carriers rigs...this place is probably constantly busy having vehicles on display all over.



This was parked outside...there was also a Corvette group making the tour at the same time...one of the newer ones cut in front of me a block from the museum so that I spilled my drink...luckily on the recently bought floor mat and not on the upholstery of the car. Well, at least I didn't see any crying dolls









Everything on display is in this one huge open space;



There was quite a few displays showing the other fields GM had ventured into, a lot of interesting information to go through;











I've always liked the 1962 Oldsmobile Starfire. A much more refined car than the Impala it shares the basic body with.







This 1911 Oldsmobile with its 707 cid straight six is valued right in HemiCuda convertible territory;

Not too many Corvair Rampsides out there...











Original artwork for ads/brochures;







I'm not a big Corvette fan but this AeroVette concept was a very nice design, especially considering it was done in the early 70:s;











Might seem odd but I appreciate seeing one of these...maybe it is all the luxury compared to the cheap looking European ones...









Fine collection of the GM dream/concept cars;



1938 Buick Y-Job, Harley Earl's daily driver;



1951 LeSabre, made entirely of aluminum and featuring the first wrap around windshield;



1953 Cadillac LeMans;



The 1959 Cadillac Cyclone was the last of the GM Motorama cars;



1959 Firebird III, a gas turbine powered special that featured among other things an ultrasonic key system;



1954 Firebird;

Oldsmobile twin turbo 455



Oldsmobile Dual Overhead Cam 455;

The future?

I read an article this morning that asked people from other countries what they found most surprising when they first visited the USA. What would you say Hans?

Again, great pictures. Detroit isn't that far away. I would like to take a few days to head out there and visit some of these places soon. How did you get hooked up with the Viper plant tour? Is it public?