Another is it real? (General lee)

[jaak]

I don't think it is. Looks like it was never converted to look like a 69, inside isn't spray bombed tan, and the flag dimensions don't look right to me.

Jason

[keith88]

I got a post in my Facebook from Real General Lee owners  warning about this add that it is NOT real!

[ws23rt]

I got a post in my Facebook from Real General Lee owners  warning about this add that it is NOT real!

I've been reading about "real general lee cars" for years.---Is there a set criteria that is used to established one to be real?  Does ownership by the production company qualify it as being real?

A "real" car from the manufacturer is a tough enough situation.

Another question is about the market for GL cars. If a car can be connected in some way to the TV series, what is the approximate percentage value of that connection?

My intent is not to stir the pot -----It is to learn something for myself and perhaps others that wonder the same things I do.

The future market for the hobby is a big unknown but clues about what we are doing now could be telling something about where it is headed.

[VegasCharger]

He spells like he went through the Hazzard school system.

Yes like the following: "Due to my busy scedual I have been unable do do this."

scedual  !!! WTF!!! Not even close! Correct: Schedule. Incorrect: scedual.   LMFAO

[Mike DC]

I've been reading about "real general lee cars" for years.---Is there a set criteria that is used to established one to be real?  Does ownership by the production company qualify it as being real?

A "real" car from the manufacturer is a tough enough situation. shruggy

Another question is about the market for GL cars. If a car can be connected in some way to the TV series, what is the approximate percentage value of that connection?

My intent is not to stir the pot lol-----It is to learn something for myself and perhaps others that wonder the same things I do.

The future market for the hobby is a big unknown but clues about what we are doing now could be telling something about where it is headed.

There are no set rules for any of the GL issues.  Then problem is there were too many real cars, too little records, and there have always been too many fakes.


How do you know a real one?  Depends.  There was monkey business with the VINs back in the day from at least one of Warner Bros' car suppliers.  So forget about an authoritative VIN list that settles everything.  But we do know the VINs on the 17 cars that Warner Bros sold off after the show ended, and all 27 cars in the 1990s TV reunions & 2000s remake movies.  

There are several other cars that have turned up since then. But each one was a unique set of chance circumstances.  

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In the big picture they just didn't escape the movie-set-to-junkyard path very often.  Hollywood car suppliers 35 years ago were not in the business of selling off their cars to the public.  The mechanics scrounged them for usable parts before sending them off to the junkyard.  The studios wanted them scrapped for liability/etc.   Even in intact shape they were still just raggedy trashed versions of the Chargers available on local used car lots at the time. They didn't exactly look like a good collectible to invest back then.  

We're talking about cars with spray-painted interiors.  Headliner vinyl removed with boxcutters.  Non-criticial wiring all cut out.  Carpeting gone.  68->69 conversions done with pop rivets and no light bulbs in the taillights.  Transmissions run without kickdown linkages.  Half the body panels replaced without concern for lining anything up.  Gallons of bondo.  Side window glass getting broken in wrecks and never replaced.  Engine mounts collapsed from mini-jumps.  Etc.  <-- This is not a description of a jumped GL wreck going to the junkyard.  This is the kind of stuff you'd find on the "intact" driveable GL that hadn't done any major leaps!  The ones going to the junkyard were worse.  Unibodies bent all to hell, doors & wheels & other parts missing, roof skins cut off, etc.  

Now take the picture of a Charger that I just described, and try to view it from early-1980s eyes.   Back then even Hemi cars weren't valuable unless the whole car was in decent original shape.


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Nobody fakes real ones very well.  Partly it's just laziness.  The vast majority of fakes don't pass a one-second (and I do mean ONE SECOND) glance from the people who really know the originals.  The owners' made-up stories are equally weak for the most part.  

And partly, it's a bad risk.  You'd have to start with a clean valuable no-rust survivor Charger to do it.  If your sinister plan to fake a real GL didn't pay off then you're screwed. You started with a nice expensive Charger by 21st-century standards and wrecked half the value of it.  

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What is a real one worth?  No telling.  The were pretty individual cars when they left WB and they have gotten more unique over the years since.  Some have been restored & altered quite a bit.  Others hardly at all.

Also, for decades many of the potential buyers for "real" ones have spent their money on fakes.  We'll never know what the real ones would have been worth if that factor had not diluted their values so much.