69hemibeep said:
...um, not as far as you know....
:jester:
Grab a cold one and take a minute to read
- Thread starter moparchris
- Start date
...um, not as far as you know....
:jester:
moparchris
Well-Known Member
Right on this is what I was looking for! Cool stories, for sure. As far as my story is concerned here is the side note.
Okay so as I stated earlier, the dad bought this runner for his son and gave it to him as a graduation gift. The son took it with him to Humbolt State college and proceeded to make mincemeat out of his driving record and kinda beating up the car with a few wrecks. The son tried to do some upkeep and mods to it only to make matters worse over time. He rebuilt the engine with 8 to 1 pistons and an "RV cam" and a 600 holley vacuum secondaries. All these mods helped to make the car have all the power of a good running 318 duster, I will tell you in a minute as to how I know that. Well the kid ended up giving the car back to his dad due to the lack of a license and job. Dad retrieved the Runner from Norcal and brought it back to Socal, stuffing it in the garage for safe keeping. This turned out to be really the single most thing that was done to the car to preserve its condition. Well 15 years goes by and the son is diagnosed with brain cancer and subsequently dies from his complications. Sadly this happened a few years ago and now the car is a sad reminder and keep sake for the families healing process. I feel like the car is where its supposed to be, although when I saw it I felt I needed to save it as I dont think the car will ever get its proper resto. It badly needs one. I told my friend that I didnt want him to pay for people to work on it anymore. I am its new keeper even though I dont own, I feel I owe it at least that. Unfortunately I dont think I will get the chance to own my car again. The other 2 kids want it if it were ever for sale, I will ask one day, when its appropriate, if there is a dollar amount that would allow me to buy. I dont want to be that guy who is a pest and constant bothering him to sell. So I am happy with the current situation and I know that at least it was never parted out, and every now and then I even get to cruise it.
I hope you guys enjoyed the story and pics. As a side note I still own my first car the 68 dart mentioned in the story. All this nostalgia has sparked some thought about my dart. I have tons of stories and memories with that car and it turns out that I really am glad that I hung onto it. Right now its in the middle of a full blown build from the ground up with a chromoly round tube back half and a twin turbo small block that has already proven itself to make well over 1000 hp! Try running that on stock suspension and a 28x10.5 slick. Been there done that but thats another story! Lets just say that I thank god I am here to tell about it!
PS thanks for sharing all your stories, lets here some more!
Okay so as I stated earlier, the dad bought this runner for his son and gave it to him as a graduation gift. The son took it with him to Humbolt State college and proceeded to make mincemeat out of his driving record and kinda beating up the car with a few wrecks. The son tried to do some upkeep and mods to it only to make matters worse over time. He rebuilt the engine with 8 to 1 pistons and an "RV cam" and a 600 holley vacuum secondaries. All these mods helped to make the car have all the power of a good running 318 duster, I will tell you in a minute as to how I know that. Well the kid ended up giving the car back to his dad due to the lack of a license and job. Dad retrieved the Runner from Norcal and brought it back to Socal, stuffing it in the garage for safe keeping. This turned out to be really the single most thing that was done to the car to preserve its condition. Well 15 years goes by and the son is diagnosed with brain cancer and subsequently dies from his complications. Sadly this happened a few years ago and now the car is a sad reminder and keep sake for the families healing process. I feel like the car is where its supposed to be, although when I saw it I felt I needed to save it as I dont think the car will ever get its proper resto. It badly needs one. I told my friend that I didnt want him to pay for people to work on it anymore. I am its new keeper even though I dont own, I feel I owe it at least that. Unfortunately I dont think I will get the chance to own my car again. The other 2 kids want it if it were ever for sale, I will ask one day, when its appropriate, if there is a dollar amount that would allow me to buy. I dont want to be that guy who is a pest and constant bothering him to sell. So I am happy with the current situation and I know that at least it was never parted out, and every now and then I even get to cruise it.
I hope you guys enjoyed the story and pics. As a side note I still own my first car the 68 dart mentioned in the story. All this nostalgia has sparked some thought about my dart. I have tons of stories and memories with that car and it turns out that I really am glad that I hung onto it. Right now its in the middle of a full blown build from the ground up with a chromoly round tube back half and a twin turbo small block that has already proven itself to make well over 1000 hp! Try running that on stock suspension and a 28x10.5 slick. Been there done that but thats another story! Lets just say that I thank god I am here to tell about it!
PS thanks for sharing all your stories, lets here some more!
moparstuart
Well-Known Member
Here is the beginning of the long drawn out story of my 10 year dream and project to build this car. It almost didnt happen several times but now it should be finish in less then a month .
For give my terrible writing skills and spelling. But tell me what you think of my dream car I love it .
It has always been my dream to own a 1970 plymounth superbird and or a 1969 dodge daytona charger. Or wing cars as they call them in the mopar muscle car world. My best chance of owning one was an R4 red/orange daytona i had spotted in hemming in mid 1996. Ernie pyle was the mans name who owned it. He was asking 25k for it which was not bad. It had some rough spots but was actully a decent non numbers matching 440 car. Ernie had owned the car for like 20 years and it had somewhere in it's past come from cotton owens ( famous name) in the daytona Nascar racing world. I only had senventeen thousand dollars saved at the time so i needed cash fast the car had already been in hemming 3 months and not sold yet . Ernie and i dickered for 4 weeks , he even snail mailed me pictures of it back before our hi tech emails today. After begging to borrow 3k from my dad . I got him to slowly come down to 20k on it. I was packed and ready to head for northern texas area when he called and had sold it to some guy for the 20k. I had done all the work beating him down tothat price because that was all the money I could scrap up at the time . This guy reaped all the benefits of all my work . The guy had promised ernie he was going to restore it back to perfect and keep it all his life ha ha. I found out a few years later that the guy had only held on to it for a couple of months. Then he sold the daytona to brent and sherri evans of illinios for like several thousand dollars more Brent and sherri told me later ernie had died one year later after selling the car. He was retired but did alot of toy collecting and RV ing accross the country
I have been chasing buying one ever since I could drive. Evertime i could just about aford one they would jump in price. Then I would save up somemore money and they would jump again in price. Still dreaming i could own a real one i was told by dick drake about a guy who had all the parts to make one. They were off a car that had crashed in the late 70's or early 80's. The car was not worth fixing at that time so it was scraped. The car was a lime light car supposedly from colorado. The body shop owner pulled all the good usable parts off the car. The plug was either not saveable or he was to lazy to cut it out ? He had the nose hanging in his shop rafters for 15 year or so. Dick had heard rumors of the parts for years and finally chased them down to curts body shop who was located at truman road and sterling in Independence missouri. At the time he didnt want to sell them and dick wasnt as interested in them once he saw the condition of the parts The nose was beat up and full of bondo 1 inch thick in places. The hood had a huge ugly six pac scoope riveted to it with a badly hacked hole two foot wide and nasty jagged sheet metal folded under. The fenders , latch trays upper and lower , bulk heads ,z brackets, wing , speedo cluster, and console where all in good shape.
In late 1996 i did some thinking and figured i had better try to find these parts again by tracking curt down and building myself a car. Giving in to the dream of owning a real one but atleast i would have a clone that i could call my own . Dick was great in letting me know about curt and the parts he had. I had sold aftermarket body parts to curt in the past at his shop so i started there. Unfortunately curt had hit hard times and gone out of buisness 6 months before i started looking for him. Talking to some other shops i dealt with in the area i tracked down his last name and got his home phone # out of the phone book. Curtis hill of 1926 N. blue mills rd. Indep. mo. I called him and just so happens he was hurting for cash at the time after loosing his buiness and shop. He ran right down to my job at the time certifit auto body parts with picture of the stuff very ready to sell. He wanted to feel me out on what he thought i would pay for them also he knew even in there condition they were worth good money. He had look up janik fiberglass reproduction parts. The price new for all the stuff was like 2000.00 to 2500.00 . So he figured he could get 4000.00 or more for it. Me being cheap as usual but nowing he knew what he had ,offered him the 2000.00 . We dickered back and forth until i purchased them for 3000.00. He also had a hemi cuda and a six pack or hemi challenger both in pieces that were not for sale at any price Huh. The challenger was in his garage and the cuda was at a storage locker he had out on 7 hwy south of fort osage. We had to go out to the stoarge locker to get the console from the super bird. The cuda was a manual car that had exploded the bell housing and ripped the trans tunnel badly. He had a tunnel cut out of another car to install in it. He was really pushing to sell me his cosworth vega which i had no interest in. I was all happy at that point i owned a wing. I then joined both wing car clubs to find out all i could about these awesome cars. After seeing pictures of my limelight hood with a six pac scoope in the middle of it. Kyle drake, dick's son vaegly remembered seeing the car in the mid to late 70's on a used car lot on southwest blvd in kansas city . He said it was in bad shape at that point and they were asking way to much for the car.
Now it was time to find a car to put the parts on and make it my superbird. I had seen several clones in the magazines . I figured this car was a clone i was going to make it the way i wanted. I was going to drive this car alot and wanted it to air conditioning and be confortable. Not getting a rear window plug with the parts and having seen a couple convertible super bird in magazines and in photos from friends who went to the nationals. I fell in love with the idea of a limelight green superbird convertible clone made out of parts from original superbird . Now that i had a plan, and the superbird parts it was time to find a convertible. Being that only a 70 roadrunner or satelite convertible would work and that they were very rare also with less then 3500 of each made. I really had my work cut out for me . I looked for the better part of a year before i found a car i could afford . I really should have looked longer but was so excited to get the car i bought the first one that showed up in my price range. It was a white 383 sport satelite car I found in hemming from new york state on long island. At the time it looked like a great value for 5500.00 shipped to missouri. What a mistake buying a convertible that had spent all it's life that close to the salt air. Oh dont get me wrong on delivery cosmeticallly the car looked really good and very nice in all the pictures i got. It was all a cover up job though as you will see in the pictures in this book next. You will see how bad it was rusted and all the cover up work that had been done to it.
So now it was late 1997. Now I had the parts and the car to make my dream car all i needed was some one to do the body work and restoration. I have plenty of mechanical skills and have done several upholstery interior jobs. I have no talant in body and paint skills what so ever. I was already having my high school car a 1969 plymouth roadrunner restored . The work was being done at dukes body shop in warsaw missouri but they were already over worked and alittle behind on the roadrunner. So I decided to get several estimates and find some one who could do it reasonably and fast.
For give my terrible writing skills and spelling. But tell me what you think of my dream car I love it .
It has always been my dream to own a 1970 plymounth superbird and or a 1969 dodge daytona charger. Or wing cars as they call them in the mopar muscle car world. My best chance of owning one was an R4 red/orange daytona i had spotted in hemming in mid 1996. Ernie pyle was the mans name who owned it. He was asking 25k for it which was not bad. It had some rough spots but was actully a decent non numbers matching 440 car. Ernie had owned the car for like 20 years and it had somewhere in it's past come from cotton owens ( famous name) in the daytona Nascar racing world. I only had senventeen thousand dollars saved at the time so i needed cash fast the car had already been in hemming 3 months and not sold yet . Ernie and i dickered for 4 weeks , he even snail mailed me pictures of it back before our hi tech emails today. After begging to borrow 3k from my dad . I got him to slowly come down to 20k on it. I was packed and ready to head for northern texas area when he called and had sold it to some guy for the 20k. I had done all the work beating him down tothat price because that was all the money I could scrap up at the time . This guy reaped all the benefits of all my work . The guy had promised ernie he was going to restore it back to perfect and keep it all his life ha ha. I found out a few years later that the guy had only held on to it for a couple of months. Then he sold the daytona to brent and sherri evans of illinios for like several thousand dollars more Brent and sherri told me later ernie had died one year later after selling the car. He was retired but did alot of toy collecting and RV ing accross the country
I have been chasing buying one ever since I could drive. Evertime i could just about aford one they would jump in price. Then I would save up somemore money and they would jump again in price. Still dreaming i could own a real one i was told by dick drake about a guy who had all the parts to make one. They were off a car that had crashed in the late 70's or early 80's. The car was not worth fixing at that time so it was scraped. The car was a lime light car supposedly from colorado. The body shop owner pulled all the good usable parts off the car. The plug was either not saveable or he was to lazy to cut it out ? He had the nose hanging in his shop rafters for 15 year or so. Dick had heard rumors of the parts for years and finally chased them down to curts body shop who was located at truman road and sterling in Independence missouri. At the time he didnt want to sell them and dick wasnt as interested in them once he saw the condition of the parts The nose was beat up and full of bondo 1 inch thick in places. The hood had a huge ugly six pac scoope riveted to it with a badly hacked hole two foot wide and nasty jagged sheet metal folded under. The fenders , latch trays upper and lower , bulk heads ,z brackets, wing , speedo cluster, and console where all in good shape.
In late 1996 i did some thinking and figured i had better try to find these parts again by tracking curt down and building myself a car. Giving in to the dream of owning a real one but atleast i would have a clone that i could call my own . Dick was great in letting me know about curt and the parts he had. I had sold aftermarket body parts to curt in the past at his shop so i started there. Unfortunately curt had hit hard times and gone out of buisness 6 months before i started looking for him. Talking to some other shops i dealt with in the area i tracked down his last name and got his home phone # out of the phone book. Curtis hill of 1926 N. blue mills rd. Indep. mo. I called him and just so happens he was hurting for cash at the time after loosing his buiness and shop. He ran right down to my job at the time certifit auto body parts with picture of the stuff very ready to sell. He wanted to feel me out on what he thought i would pay for them also he knew even in there condition they were worth good money. He had look up janik fiberglass reproduction parts. The price new for all the stuff was like 2000.00 to 2500.00 . So he figured he could get 4000.00 or more for it. Me being cheap as usual but nowing he knew what he had ,offered him the 2000.00 . We dickered back and forth until i purchased them for 3000.00. He also had a hemi cuda and a six pack or hemi challenger both in pieces that were not for sale at any price Huh. The challenger was in his garage and the cuda was at a storage locker he had out on 7 hwy south of fort osage. We had to go out to the stoarge locker to get the console from the super bird. The cuda was a manual car that had exploded the bell housing and ripped the trans tunnel badly. He had a tunnel cut out of another car to install in it. He was really pushing to sell me his cosworth vega which i had no interest in. I was all happy at that point i owned a wing. I then joined both wing car clubs to find out all i could about these awesome cars. After seeing pictures of my limelight hood with a six pac scoope in the middle of it. Kyle drake, dick's son vaegly remembered seeing the car in the mid to late 70's on a used car lot on southwest blvd in kansas city . He said it was in bad shape at that point and they were asking way to much for the car.
Now it was time to find a car to put the parts on and make it my superbird. I had seen several clones in the magazines . I figured this car was a clone i was going to make it the way i wanted. I was going to drive this car alot and wanted it to air conditioning and be confortable. Not getting a rear window plug with the parts and having seen a couple convertible super bird in magazines and in photos from friends who went to the nationals. I fell in love with the idea of a limelight green superbird convertible clone made out of parts from original superbird . Now that i had a plan, and the superbird parts it was time to find a convertible. Being that only a 70 roadrunner or satelite convertible would work and that they were very rare also with less then 3500 of each made. I really had my work cut out for me . I looked for the better part of a year before i found a car i could afford . I really should have looked longer but was so excited to get the car i bought the first one that showed up in my price range. It was a white 383 sport satelite car I found in hemming from new york state on long island. At the time it looked like a great value for 5500.00 shipped to missouri. What a mistake buying a convertible that had spent all it's life that close to the salt air. Oh dont get me wrong on delivery cosmeticallly the car looked really good and very nice in all the pictures i got. It was all a cover up job though as you will see in the pictures in this book next. You will see how bad it was rusted and all the cover up work that had been done to it.
So now it was late 1997. Now I had the parts and the car to make my dream car all i needed was some one to do the body work and restoration. I have plenty of mechanical skills and have done several upholstery interior jobs. I have no talant in body and paint skills what so ever. I was already having my high school car a 1969 plymouth roadrunner restored . The work was being done at dukes body shop in warsaw missouri but they were already over worked and alittle behind on the roadrunner. So I decided to get several estimates and find some one who could do it reasonably and fast.
moparstuart
Well-Known Member
I got scammed by the first body shop working on the car this is a letter i wrote 2 years ago to get my stolen wing found no luck
sorry here is the wing story
I had to buy another one two weeks ago luckily( but not for my wallet) i begged and badgered wayne perkins in to selling me an extra yellow wing he had bought at the nationals 20 some years ago . i just found out 6 weeks ago it was missing and two weeks ago the new body shop was ready for it .
Sunday july 1st 2007 was moving day , With jim cordell fellow mopar (wing car guy) and his trailer we got to warsaw at 9 am and loaded it all up. Sean had all the parts ready (or so we thought) for us to load up and go. Two hours later we had the car wenched up on the trailer and my diesel truck with a stake bed loaded to over flowing with parts . After 10 years having my car sean quit working on it still oweing me about $5000.00 in labor . It made me sick to my stomach everytime i thought about it . For the last few years i have tried to block it out of my mine. After 4 years of sean not working on it . I finally decides i had better move the car . Had really been looking for a good body shop to take over the project for quite some time. Being gun shy already with the previous shop experiences i looked long and hard. Finding someone to take over someone elses work in mid stream was tough . I also needed to find someone reasonable because of how upside down i was from getting ripped off. Four different friends in HPAC who had work done or knew of his work recommended Ed Horner of Adrian missouri. So two hours after picking up the car we had it at ed's body shop . Now my project is going again and should be completed hopefully by the end of the summer .
now the wing story he had told me the wing was packed in the car ( it wasnt )
Missing (stolen?) Superbird Wing
Stuart Sutton, a club member from Overland Park, Kansas, is asking the wing car community to be on the look out for an original aluminum Superbird wing that was either sold by or stolen from a restoration shop in Warsaw Missouri. He has been building a Superbird clone for ten years. He contracted with Dennis Duke of Duke's Body Shop in Warsaw, Missouri (also doing business as Midwest Mopar Restorations) to do the work. Dennis Duke eventually ceded the project to his son, Sean Duke. Although Stuart provided or purchased all the necessary parts and paid a substantial sum for labor Duke just sat on the project.
After the car sat untouched and uncompleted for a number of years, Stuart found another shop to complete the work even though Duke still owed Stuart over $5,000 in labor. Stuart collected the parts but noticed sometime later that the wing was missing. Attempts to obtain the wing, or at least learn the truth of what happened to it, from Duke have not been effective. Stuart is now asking the wing car community to help him locate his missing wing or find a replacement for the missing part.
The wing is very distinctive--Lime Light Green with no decals and black overspray. The wing has a lot of black paint on the crossbeam. The car is now being restored by a shop in Adrian, Missouri. In just two weeks, the shop has managed to get the rear frame rails, trunk floor, quarters, doors, fenders and hood welded on or ready to install.
Stuart asks that you keep a look out for his missing part. If you have seen this wing or heard of it please contact Stuart Sutton at (816)935-1246, or call him toll-free at his shop at 1-877-230-4587. Since his new body shop is making fast progress on the car, he's going to have to find another wing. He asks that if you have, or know of, a wing for sale, you might give him a heads up or give the owner his name and number.
Please help bring Stuart's wing home!
thats most of my crazy story wow what a learning experience it has been but hey i will have my dream car and i will never let it go
stuart
sorry here is the wing story
I had to buy another one two weeks ago luckily( but not for my wallet) i begged and badgered wayne perkins in to selling me an extra yellow wing he had bought at the nationals 20 some years ago . i just found out 6 weeks ago it was missing and two weeks ago the new body shop was ready for it .
Sunday july 1st 2007 was moving day , With jim cordell fellow mopar (wing car guy) and his trailer we got to warsaw at 9 am and loaded it all up. Sean had all the parts ready (or so we thought) for us to load up and go. Two hours later we had the car wenched up on the trailer and my diesel truck with a stake bed loaded to over flowing with parts . After 10 years having my car sean quit working on it still oweing me about $5000.00 in labor . It made me sick to my stomach everytime i thought about it . For the last few years i have tried to block it out of my mine. After 4 years of sean not working on it . I finally decides i had better move the car . Had really been looking for a good body shop to take over the project for quite some time. Being gun shy already with the previous shop experiences i looked long and hard. Finding someone to take over someone elses work in mid stream was tough . I also needed to find someone reasonable because of how upside down i was from getting ripped off. Four different friends in HPAC who had work done or knew of his work recommended Ed Horner of Adrian missouri. So two hours after picking up the car we had it at ed's body shop . Now my project is going again and should be completed hopefully by the end of the summer .
now the wing story he had told me the wing was packed in the car ( it wasnt )
Missing (stolen?) Superbird Wing
Stuart Sutton, a club member from Overland Park, Kansas, is asking the wing car community to be on the look out for an original aluminum Superbird wing that was either sold by or stolen from a restoration shop in Warsaw Missouri. He has been building a Superbird clone for ten years. He contracted with Dennis Duke of Duke's Body Shop in Warsaw, Missouri (also doing business as Midwest Mopar Restorations) to do the work. Dennis Duke eventually ceded the project to his son, Sean Duke. Although Stuart provided or purchased all the necessary parts and paid a substantial sum for labor Duke just sat on the project.
After the car sat untouched and uncompleted for a number of years, Stuart found another shop to complete the work even though Duke still owed Stuart over $5,000 in labor. Stuart collected the parts but noticed sometime later that the wing was missing. Attempts to obtain the wing, or at least learn the truth of what happened to it, from Duke have not been effective. Stuart is now asking the wing car community to help him locate his missing wing or find a replacement for the missing part.
The wing is very distinctive--Lime Light Green with no decals and black overspray. The wing has a lot of black paint on the crossbeam. The car is now being restored by a shop in Adrian, Missouri. In just two weeks, the shop has managed to get the rear frame rails, trunk floor, quarters, doors, fenders and hood welded on or ready to install.
Stuart asks that you keep a look out for his missing part. If you have seen this wing or heard of it please contact Stuart Sutton at (816)935-1246, or call him toll-free at his shop at 1-877-230-4587. Since his new body shop is making fast progress on the car, he's going to have to find another wing. He asks that if you have, or know of, a wing for sale, you might give him a heads up or give the owner his name and number.
Please help bring Stuart's wing home!
thats most of my crazy story wow what a learning experience it has been but hey i will have my dream car and i will never let it go
stuart
mcmopar
Well-Known Member
Great story Bob. I should be so lucky to score a HEMI road runner! Glad to see you are restoring it so beautifully. 
Man - I've heard so many horror stories of shops ripping guys off. They ought to be publicly beaten by the people they have ripped off! Sorry to hear that bit about the stolen wing. Nobody wanted them back when they were new and now everybody wants one and will go to whatever lengths (illegal or not) to get one. It looks good now though
Man - I've heard so many horror stories of shops ripping guys off. They ought to be publicly beaten by the people they have ripped off! Sorry to hear that bit about the stolen wing. Nobody wanted them back when they were new and now everybody wants one and will go to whatever lengths (illegal or not) to get one. It looks good now though
moparstuart said:
Stuart:
Great story. Your perseverance obviously paid off! I love your car and want one just (well, perhaps in a different color - just to be somewhat different...) like it!
Someday I'm going for a ride in that son-of-a-gun... :yesnod:
Don't ever apologize for writing/spelling when posting on the bird's nest. No one here ever critiques that sh*t...
:jester:
Ray
69hemibeep
Sponge Bob Square Wheels
What Ray is eluding to is that when I got the car running I aired up the old tires and took it to the Saturday night cruise in a couple miles away, and the tires were so square i couldnt go over 30mph. Thus "Sponge bob square wheels"ACME A12 said:Good job, Bob!
You left out one part though - how you got the name in your avatar... :haha:
69hemibeep said:My first drive with Ginger, just trying the name you know high maintenance and all although I liked Maryann more, was on the tires it had been sitting on for 15 years. You would have thought the wheel hadnt been invented yet.
:banana:
:jester:
ACME
moparstuart
Well-Known Member
ray or anyone for that matter swing on by and we will go for a ride .ACME A12 said:moparstuart said:
Stuart:
Great story. Your perseverance obviously paid off! I love your car and want one just (well, perhaps in a different color - just to be somewhat different...) like it!
Someday I'm going for a ride in that son-of-a-gun... :yesnod:
Don't ever apologize for writing/spelling when posting on the bird's nest. No one here ever critiques that sh*t...
:jester:
Ray
:wave: :wave:Hoosier Bird
Well-Known Member
I'll be stopping in next time I'm out your way.moparstuart said:ray or anyone for that matter swing on by and we will go for a ride .
moparstuart
Well-Known Member
anytimeHoosier Bird said:I'll be stopping in next time I'm out your way.moparstuart said:ray or anyone for that matter swing on by and we will go for a ride .
:banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana:
John69RR
Well-Known Member
These are all great stories. I'll post mine when I get back home. I'm in Cleveland, Ohio for a few days for my dad's 80th birthday.
John69RR said:
You going to the Nat's in Columbus on any day while you're here?
East, West or South of Cleveland?
If you can't make it to the Nat's there are a few good cruises in the area. There's a cruise on the West side in a park near Vermilion on Sunday that usually brings in 3000+ cars
, last year they had 3,300 cars. Too bad it's the same weekend as the Nat's but still a lot of Mopars considering.Wish Dad a Happy Birthday for me
MikeR
John69RR
Well-Known Member
Can't make Columbus. Would love to have gone. Called Mike at BE/A today to buy some parts and found him in Columbus also. I'm in Garfield Hts. Southeast suburbs. Will pass on the wishes to dad. Will be flying back to Houston on Monday.
moparchris
Well-Known Member
Okay time to bump this one up to the top. I wanna hear some of your guys stories about the car that turned your blood Hemi orange. :acme:
moparchris said:
Wanna hear the story that turned my blood Metropolitan "Berkshire Green"...???!!! :lmao:
:jester:
ACME
Metropolitans Rule
Roadcuda
Well-Known Member
For me I can't say it was any one car that made me a Mopar or No Car type of guy. It was more that I as grew up my father only had Plymouths. His first car was a '36 Dodge, then in '53, (when I came along,) he got his first Plymouth. Then a '56, followed by a '58 Sport Suburban which is the car I have the most memories of. It lasted 125k miles, but barely. Mechanically it was pretty good. But those were of course the worst years for lack of rust protection. With the fender eyebrows one ot the worst places, he took the brackets for house flower boxes, and bolted them to the back of the headlight buckets and to the inside of the fenders. and used a thick pipe to help hold the floor up because the rockers were all but gone. The car finally had a rod bearing give out in '65. That's when he switched to a Dodge Coronet wagon. With any of these, or later year mopars he owned, I don't recall that there were ever any major problems with these cars. They were always good reliable transportation. Since my father always did as much of the repairs that had to be done himself I did have an interest in working on our cars, but I was never the real gearhead that alot of guys were then. As for the muscle end of things I was just learning about racing, and stock car racing was at the top of things. That was despite the fact that in the North East there wasn't a lot of coverage of southern racing. Well the year I really picked up on that was in '67. I was looking to see who was driving Plymouths and one name came up alot. That was the year that Richard Petty set the wins records for a year that will most likely never be broken. For anyone that dosen't know, he won 10 straight races that year and 27 for the year. So for me, an early teenager then, and the fact that he drove the same brand car as my father, well then I knew what the best car was. In fact I was one of the very few who defended the brand while in high school, but that's another story. I had already taken a liking to the early Barracudas when they came out, but my father didn't feel having one was practical for a family of 5. Then when the Roadrunners came out in 68, I wanted one, but I knew it would never happen. It was in '73 that I was able to get my first car, and of course I was looking for a Roadrunner. I found a '69, 383, 4-speed. And yes, it was F8 green. The car had been beat on and as I found out the hard way needed more work then I thought. But I was still hooked. Then the first gas crunch came along and that car was sold. If I had only known then what I know now with these cars, I would have kept it around. Oh well. When I started collecting antique cars I was mainly getting the regular family style Plymouths. remembering the old '58, I had a '58 Sport Suburban and a '57 4 dr. I had other lower priced cars because I could never find the next Roadrunner that I could afford. Things finally changed enough in '04 when I found the current Barracuda, and the next year my bird came along. I finally have the cars that I always wanted in my youth. Better late then never, and I think I can enjoy them more now the I would have back then.
These was the main things that got me where I am now, wanting to own nothing but Mopars. I still hope to stay that way, but with the recent changes only time will tell if that will happen. One thing is for sure. If I don't like what happens with the new Chrysler, then I will hang on to my '03 PT Cruiser, and '04 Dakota for as long as I can get parts!
These was the main things that got me where I am now, wanting to own nothing but Mopars. I still hope to stay that way, but with the recent changes only time will tell if that will happen. One thing is for sure. If I don't like what happens with the new Chrysler, then I will hang on to my '03 PT Cruiser, and '04 Dakota for as long as I can get parts!
moparchris
Well-Known Member
Nice story Roadcuda and congrats on finally livin the dream!
Ray, is this the first conversation in a series of conversations where you eventually tell us your a closet green guy? :yesnod: :lmao:
Ray, is this the first conversation in a series of conversations where you eventually tell us your a closet green guy? :yesnod: :lmao:
moparchris said:
My cover has been blown...by a bluish-green Metropolitan.... :lmao:
:jester:
moparchris
Well-Known Member
Bump this one again! Resurrected from the dead by ole Acme. Lots of new guys here, lets here your stories about the car that set you on the Mopar or musclecar path!!
4spd69RR
Well-Known Member
Great stories guys, one day I have to right mine up and post. I think we all have had a car that has left an impression on us. All I can say, the day I sold my first runner I cried as it drove down the street with the new owner. I still have the VIN number memorized RM23H9A214947 to this day and check every runner I come across especially purple plum crazy ones.