Wailing & gnashing of teeth...

After the thorough, and yet somehow still not complete, house cleaning I did during my vacation, I realized I'd better go downstairs and start opening some boxes to take stock of what I've actually got for this car. I know I have a new Rallye dash harness, but I'm starting to wonder what other wiring I've bought for it, such as lamp harnesses, engine wiring, etc. What I haven't got, I need to get, especially in terms of wiring--there's literally not a single wire on the car. Thank God I get a Year One sales code every other day; their wiring is the only good stuff in the industry (which is why most others buy it from them, i.e. Classic Industries).

Being a cheap bastard at heart, I also spent a couple of hours last night with the factory 1974 Mopar parts catalog, finding part numbers for OE hardware: Bolts, U-nuts, J-nuts, trim clips, etc. A lot of the stuff being sold by the restoration industry is straight out of the Au-Ve-Co catalog, which has a pretty good cross-reference for OE numbers. Things like fender bolts, U/J-nuts, and trim clips are dirt cheap from Au-Ve-Co, usually coming in boxes of 10 or 25 at a cost of literally pennies each.

Now, I'm cheap, but I'm not insane. Chrysler never listed much of the hardware by number, it just said "order by description" in the catalog. That means referring to catalog Group 18--great if you have a sample, not so much if everything is missing as it is with the Challenger. As such, I did break down and grudgingly buy a dash hardware kit for a whopping $70 w/shipping! The real bitch is the kit is only offered for non-AC cars, and mine has AC. However, now that I've got my greasy little mitts on it, and ready access to an Au-Ve-Co catalog, I can match up what's in the kit with what's in the book. Hopefully, all the AC hardware not included will be hidden behind the dash, where being correct doesn't matter to me. I was lucky enough that my visible dash-speaker and AC-outlet hardware were either in the car's original dash pad, or the spare 3-speaker dash pad I bought last year. I can match that stuff as well, meaning I could compile a full AC dash kit list for E-bodies.

I will post Au-Ve-Co's numbers cross-referenced to Chrysler's in a different thread as I find them, to save anyone interested some hassle and hopefully money... $25+shipping for a front-valance hardware kit is insanity, knowing it's comprised of well under $10 worth of Au-Ve-Co stuff.
 
Did a little diddlin' in the garage tonight. I couldn't do much for the Valiant since I'm still waiting on pin gauges and drill bits (thanks a lot, USPS Detroit processing facility--you could fuck up an anvil) so other than getting the carb stuff organized and changing out a vent whistle damaged in shipping there wasn't much to do.

When I originally got the Challenger, I couldn't order reproduction 4-speed pedals quickly enough. In the time that I've had them, though, I've become unhappy with that choice (the repro pedals, not the 4-speed). The '73-'74 cars used larger rectangular pads on the clutch and brake pedals, rather than the smaller trapezoidal units of the '70-'72 cars. The '73-'74 pedals are also shorter between pivot and pad than the earlier parts. The length didn't concern me, but I really wanted the later pedal pads. To me they just plain look better, so I resolved to buy a set of original pedals...

...until I started looking. See, I'd forgotten about the brake pedal lever. For ease of welding, in '73 Chrysler changed the brake pedal lever to one that twists 90°, leaving a big ugly flat plate coming from behind the pedal pad. It's not even centered, further reminding me of my Mom's '84 Escort. Chintzy. They did the same thing to the B-body pedals, which are actually different than the E-car stuff... at least, the brake pedal's different between the two.

73E-Pedals.jpg

73B-Pedals.jpg


It may seem minor to you, but that brake pedal drove me nuts back in '88, the Escort only recently having gone away at the time. Other than the catastrophic unibody rust, it was the only thing I didn't like about that car. It looked (looks) so cheap. The memory was so vivid the hatred began anew. I just couldn't run that pedal.

A year ago I'd bought a different set of pedals--just the pedals themselves--from a swap vendor I know. He didn't know what they were, but I knew the clutch pedal was late E-body. They cost me $15. After seeing photos of the much-hated OE pedal, I went out and discovered that the brake pedal is from some other Chrysler product that used large rectangular pads... and it was longer than the clutch pedal with it. What the... ?!

After comparing with pedals I have on hand, I know it's not from any of the following:
  • Any year of A-body
  • Any year of F/M-body
  • A 1956-'65 Forward Look/full size car
  • A 1966-'70 B-body
  • A 1970-'74 B/E-body
It's too short and the plate is too small to be from a truck, so that pretty much leaves early B-body and any of the C-bodies. If you have one of those cars and need a manual-trans brake pedal, you may not want to read further. 😳

I had a few options, including welding the larger pedal plates onto the '71 pedals and calling it good... but the way the repros are welded I did not relish the PITA grinding job that presents. I could also weld extensions onto the '71 plates, but that would screw up the spacing. Both of those options also involve mangling a different set of pedals. The option of spending $500 on used pedals was out there, too, but it didn't appeal to me any more than the first two. Modifying the automatic brake pedal was not an option--it has both that hideous twist and no offset.

I decided to make the Pedal of Unknown Origin work. The first order of business was the pivot tube, which was too long to fit in the E-body hanger bracket. The pedal spacing was also way off, so it couldn't just be trimmed--I had to move it too. The factory didn't weld the tube like the repros, they actually swedged the tube on either side... creating a press fit in the pedal hole in the process. It's rather diabolical to remove, involving cutting one swedge level with the pedal, grinding away anything missed, then beating the other side of the tube out of the pedal. Excellent stress relief. I did the same thing to the automatic pedal so I'd have two good halves of pivot tube. After careful measuring, cutting, and measuring some more after straightening the mangled brake-lamp switch bracket, and trimming I ended up with two halves of pivot tube trimmed so each would press into the brake pedal to center them for welding--not that they could fall out once installed.

That left the minor issue of length. At first I thought the difference was only about 3/8" so I was just going to move the pivot tube and brake pushrod holes down by welding and redrilling. Correctly hung, the brake actually measured out 9/16" lower than the clutch, which made moving the holes impossible due to bends in the pedal. I'd have to section it, and the cuts had to be on the angled part of the pedal. Oy. A little geometry told me correcting the 9/16" height difference I needed to remove 5/8" of the lever. After cutting, I ground back the edges to 45° for plenty of weld penetration, leaving just enough flat to align the two halves. I did that by Vise-Gripping them to a piece of 3/8" stainless for welding... which didn't go well (turn the gas on, stupid! 😂 ). I broke the pedal, ground away the failed weld, and nailed it the second time.

After quite a bit of work, including a couple of touch-up welds in low spots (I was welding in poor light) and a lot of grinding--the pedal lever is tapered at the splice so the whole back edge needed straightening--I finish-sanded the area then sandblasted both pedals. I hung them in the car to check alignment, and they're perfectly level and straight across their tops. In the shitty cell-phone photo, the brake pedal is further from the firewall since the pushrod isn't seated in the master cylinder; the clutch pedal is clamped to the up-stop. All that's left to do is weld the pivot halves to the pedal and prime/paint the whole shebang.

The spliced area is in the photo, though it's not really visible in raw sandblasted metal. I'm pretty happy with the results. 😁

0920200132-00.jpg
 
A minor update related to a change of plans rather than any progress on the actual car.

After finding what, by available measures (ratings and photos), appears to be a pretty-good reproduction at a reasonable price, I decided to take the final leap to something I wanted for my '73 when I had it: A Challenger T/A hood.

Never one to be content with an existing molehill, I've successfully created a K2-sized mountain out of this. I knew I'd have to pop for the right pins and hinge springs, but I've become possessed by the devil in the details. Of course, I had to have the right air cleaner baseplate, which was a pricey affair as was the seal to make it airtight to the hood. The T/A rear-mount antenna is comprised of parts from more different cars than your average AMC, only the mast being an actual E-body item. It took me more than a week just to get through all the misinformation about that item alone (virtually nobody gets this item right, and my car's not even a proper application of it!). I can find no published specs on the length of the original extension cable, and you don't want to know what an original would bring if I could find one. Windshield-washer nozzles are specific to the AAR & T/A, and I just can't wrap my head around $115+shipping for such an item, especially when they're possibly the ugliest squirters outside the construction/farm implement industry. I'm looking at different options there. Core-support seal? Nope, that's unique. Hood moulding? Specific to T/A. I found a set of the specific T/A-only clips for said moulding NOS... for $275 plus shipping. No f__king way--I'll make something. A standard hood latch--I really wanted a factory cable-remote unit--is absolutely out of the question since there's no way to anchor striker bolts (T/As and AARs had only hood pins). My quirky sense of humor absolutely required that I purchase a reproduction secondary AAR-T/A data plate: the one simply stamped TRANS AM.

I have none of the antenna parts yet other than the bezel, no washer nozzles, and no hood trim and I've nearly tripled the price of the hood itself... and now I'm questioning whether I should purchase the correct air-cleaner lid, since my MP parts do not have the 45° lip found on fresh-air cars.

It never stops. I've made so many minute changes to this car, at this point I'm a grille, taillight panel, and marker-light swap from a pretty solid '70 clone--a T/A no less.
 
Be careful... I've seen soooooo many projects go sideways and/or be abandoned or sold off due to changes in direction.
It's always a temptation, for sure, but use the Force, Luke. Don't give in to the Dark Side.

I know a somewhat-local guy, who has over $90k invested in his '63 Chevy II, and it's still in primer and doesn't yet run. He bailed on it, and can't get anyone to even cough up $20k for the project... We had it in out shop for awhile, but he kept changing his mind on the body mods, so I had to tell him to get his plans right before asking us to un-do any more of the $15 thou we'd already billed him for. He didn't like that...
 
Fear not, dear Resto... this was literally the last major change I could make to the project. I've already got the early bumpers & brackets, the engine is not built but the details and parts are finalized, the interior's all stock bits, etc. I'm not interested in changing or deleting marker lights or other funky body mods. I don't want spoilers--the car came with a T/A spoiler and I sold it--and I also got rid of the chrome-wart flip-top fuel filler.

What I wanted in '88 for the old one is finally happening on this car. Other than waiting on a few parts, the final mold is cast.

Now to get around to figuring out issue with the garage furnace... 🤬
 
Belated update...

I got a tentative quote for bodywork and paint a few weeks back, which includes stripping the entire car down to bare metal anywhere it's not EDP (i.e. the roof, decklid, and valances), finishing the hood in low-gloss black, and laying down the stripes. It was a damned good estimate; less than I expected. However, I told him I know the nature of old cars and bodywork in general and there may well be a "supplemental" (a.k.a. surprises under the existing primer). I actually expect that to happen. I said I would not hold him firmly to the estimate. He was pleasantly surprised by that: "Mopar guys need to learn to come off their money. Every time I give an estimate to one of those guys, they say it's way too expensive. Apparently they're not aware of material costs these days." Ironically, he's a Mopar guy himself. I said I wanted the car done well, not inexpensively, and him to bask in glory when I tell people who did the body and paint: "You're putting your name on it, good or bad." He was actually happy when I told him the color. "Black is the best way to show off my abilities." Thank you for reacting correctly!

While I really wanted to do this car front to back by myself (excluding machine work), the simple fact remains the car will be black. That's enough of a headache just to keep clean later, never mind having to repaint the car once or twice after I screw it up royally the first time. This is a dream of 30+ years and I want it to be right the first time. For what I was quoted, even if it goes over by a grand or two, having it done right is well worth not blowing a bunch of effort on "I guess it's not bad for your first paint job."

And so, it's going to a pro.
 
I liked this, not because I don't think you'd be un-able to do the work yourself, but because if you've decided to take the car to a shop, that is exactly the right attitude.
Most people don't quite understand, but with an attitude like that, the chosen shop is likely to bend over backwards to make and keep you happy.
:)
 
My OEM Hemi (.920") torsion bars arrived today. I had completely forgotten about upgrading the spindly 318 bars until last week. I'm glad I remembered when I did; Mopar Performance torsion bars are going dodo at a breakneck pace, and the Hemi bars are goners already.
 
@restoman
restoman said:
Be careful... I've seen soooooo many projects go sideways and/or be abandoned or sold off due to changes in direction.
It's always a temptation, for sure, but use the Force, Luke. Don't give in to the Dark Side.
Click to expand...

Dr.Jass said:
Fear not, dear Resto... this was literally the last major change I could make to the project. I've already got the early bumpers & brackets, the engine is not built but the details and parts are finalized, the interior's all stock bits, etc.
Click to expand...

Everything was going quite swimmingly until this past weekend, but now I may have a slight change in direction on my hands. I got a very solid lead on the actual 340 from the Challenger I had in 1988. How solid? I spoke to the guy who almost certainly bought it straight out of the car in early '89. He doesn't think he has it anymore, but if he sold it he's got a good idea where it went. If he's right, I know the dude that has it.
 
Dr.Jass said:
Everything was going quite swimmingly until this past weekend, but now I may have a slight change in direction on my hands. I got a very solid lead on the actual 340 from the Challenger I had in 1988. How solid? I spoke to the guy who almost certainly bought it straight out of the car in early '89. He doesn't think he has it anymore, but if he sold it he's got a good idea where it went. If he's right, I know the dude that has it.
Click to expand...

sonds like you just adjusted the angle of that snowball again LOL

but hey how cool is taht finding the engine you owned would be sweet
 
That's not much of a change of direction as it is a substitution of parts.

Hope you get back the 340 from your first Challenger Doc!
 
71ChargerRT said:
That's not much of a change of direction as it is a substitution of parts.

Hope you get back the 340 from your first Challenger Doc!
Click to expand...
The block I currently have for the Challenger is the one from my '73 340 Charger Rallye, which I've owned since September of '91 when I bought the car to which it was original. That Rallye was Y1 Top Banana, no vinyl, black interior, black stripe, and a console auto. So that engine comes pretty close, but the actual Challenger engine in the tribute car would give it some "authenticity", so to speak. The Challenger engine launched the whole Mopar thing for me, so yeah--there's some sentimental value.

As if that's not enough, a friend has offered me a 1974 Charger Rallye 440 that's originally Y5 Yellow Blaze, no vinyl, black interior, black stripe, with a console auto. Y5 is also a vivid yellow, maybe brighter than Y1. The engine and trans are missing from that car, talk about a good place to stuff the 340 from the old Rallye... :cool:

iu



The fella who potentially has my engine also knows a dude I've been trying to find for literally decades. He used to work at a grocery store and always drove old Mopar muscle. I was told he had about twenty cars behind his house way back then (and there are still cars back there). My original Challenger vanished from its decade-long resting spot around 1999, but I question whether the guy would've scrapped a legit 340/4-speed shell. While it is a definite long shot, it's entirely possible the dude with cars behind his house has what's left of my old car. 🤔

I completely expect all of this to go off the rails, for the record. For the time being, it's fun being this excited about cars for the first time in awhile, even if it's all based on false hope.
 
I found and still have a speeding(?) ticket with the VIN from my first Challenger, if I ever come into some money I'd love to track it down and hopefully own it again.

I wish you luck on your hunt for your Challenger Doc!
 
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