MOPAR JOHNS B5 DAYTONA RESTORATION!!

[Mopar John]

Very nice............ Flashback to one particular '68 of mine............   

Troy

some nice work been going on there ! great pictures 

Thanks Guys!

[Mopar John]

                                                              THE DOORS!
No! I'm not talking about the rock band the doors but the doors for the Daytona! Next up was to reunite the doors with the body! The doors had been REDI - STRIPPED and all the metal work done before being reunited with the body. This first batch of pictures are some inside shots of the doors while they were still B5 blue. Overall they were in pretty good shape!

[Mopar John]

                                                    DOORS CONTINUED!
This batch shows the filler from a few dents most down low. This could have happened when the tires and wheels were off in the salvage yard. Someone could have opened the doors and hit something that was laying on the ground?

[Mopar John]

                                                     DOORS IN PRIMER!
This batch of doors show them in primer and waiting to be reunited with the body!

[Mopar John]

                                                         DOOR HINGES!
 This batch of pictures show the work done to the door hinges!

[Mopar John]

                                                   THE DOORS ARE ON THE BODY!
  The first 2 pictures show the drivers door and passengers door back on the Daytona body! The next picture is again of the drivers side. This door fit real well and all the body lines were great! I can't say the same for the passengers side! After lining up the door with the rocker and quarter panel there was a problem @#$%^&*()! The last picture shows how the quarter panel was off from the door on the top body line! I went back and looked at the original pictures and it was off from the factory! WOW!

[Mopar John]

                                                     PANEL ALIGNMENT
I was kind of bummed at this point that everything didn't line up. The reason being is that we were using the original quarters and doors. The first picture shows were Troy was preparing to grind out the factory weld and align the top of the quarter panel. The second picture shows this same area welded back up after the alignment. The third and forth pictures show the final alignment of this area. Troy spent a lot of time as each piece was added to make sure everything was right! It all paid off in the end, the body turned out razor straight!

[hemi68charger]

Wow... That was a major snafu on MaMopar's QC team.........  looks better now...........   

[Mopar John]

                                            BORZYCH RACING UPDATE!
From where I left off our next points meet was Sunday April 25th. I had my new slicks on, the new wires on and the new plugs installed. I drove 75 miles unloaded the car and was instaging when it started to rain@$%^&(!
They must have looked at the number of cars in the pits and cancelled the event rather quickly@#$*(!!!
So I drive over to my daughter Michelle's who lives close by for a visit. On Sunday May 2nd it was time to try it again! All goes well and I make my first time trial and the car is still missing all the way down the track@!#$%^&*!
When my buddy Keith gets back we start going over everything plugs, plug wires, etc. We change the distributor cap and rotor, the coil, the MSD chips anything we could change we changed. It still didn't seem to run right! Well I start checking all the wires around the battery and the main positive lead comes out of the battery terminal! I try to tighten it and it won't tighten up. Upon further inspection it looks melted and then I find a small pile of melted terminal on the battery. I have attached a picture of the terminal and the melted terminal. I found a spare in the tool box and replaced the bad one. The car seemed to run better? I ran my last time trial and it didn't miss but it didn't run fast either. I ran a 10.106 and cars I normally run with were running 9.80 to 9.90? So I dialed a 10.09 for the first round and my opponet red lighted and gave me another time trial! I ran a 10.081 on a 10.09 dial!
I would have broke out if he didn't red light by .009!! So for round 2 I dialed a 10.07 and I gave my opponent another time trial by red lighting myself. He was dialed a 9.40 and I didn't want him to catch me! Well since I left early he never did! So that was it for that weekend.

[Mopar John]

                                          BORZYCH RACING CONTINUED
I decided that since the car wasn't running very fast to order a few more parts. I ordered a new MSD cap and rotor. When they arrived I put them on and also put my good race coil back on. At this time I also removed the aluminum distributor clamp suspecting that it may have let the distributor turn when it was hot. I put the heavy duty stock steel clamp back on. Then one evening after supper I got 426 Linda to help me time the car. She likes the feel of 650HP! Well the timing was off by about 7 or 8 degrees! WOW!! So it was back to the track on Saturday May 8th and this time they decided it was too cold and too windy to race@#$%^&*)! I had to wait until Saturday May 15th for our next points meet. Linda had to work. On my first time trial I decided that the new slicks didn't look like the middle had as much wear as the outside so I raised the air pressure from 12lbs to 13lbs. I made my first time trial and the car was faaasst!! I looked at the time slip at the timeslip booth and had to look up and make sure it was my car number. I had just run a 9.628 at 138.67mph! This tied my quickest run ever on non radial slicks! I was very happy I had all my horses under me again! The next time run I went back down to 12lbs for comparison and ran a 9.561 at 137.71mph! WOW! My quickest time ever on non radials! My daughter Michelle along with my granddaughter Ashley and Michelle's boyfriends son Maxx joined me for eliminations. I decided to put a 9.55 on the car and if I wouldn't have left off when I passed my opponent I would have run a 9.558. It started to cool off and I decided to put a 9.53 on the car so I wouldn't breakout. We'll I slipped just a touch off the line and ran a 9.59 and got beat. It didn't bother me a whole lot since the car was running record numbers! Were off for about a month as the big boys come to town. I'll be back with more B5 Daytona restoration pictures in the mean time!

[moparstuart]

wow john congrats on the great runs , pretty fast for an old guy 

[Mopar John]

wow john congrats on the great runs , pretty fast for an old guy 

Stuart,
Your only as old as you feel and when I'm driving that car I feel a lot younger! We have a couple of ideas to make it even a little faster! I may test and tune in a couple of weeks! What usually drives most guys out of the racing hobby is lack of money or they get where they can't work on them any more.

[Mopar John]

                                                     MORE BLOCK SANDING!
After a week of my favorite shift (NOT REALLY) midnights the last 2 being 12's I'm back with some more pictures! Now that the doors are on the body they have been block sanded to get everything at the same stage of prep. This batch of pictures show the doors on and now block sanded. ENJOY!

[Mopar John]

 Here is another batch of the doors and body now block sanded! The next time I post will show the doors and body in primer again! Stay tuned!

[Mopar John]

                                                ANOTHER COAT OF PRIMER!
The next 2 batches of pictures show the Daytona body and doors getting yet another coat of primer. This took place after several block sandings and some final spot putty to get everything razor straight! The body and doors then sat while the front fenders and hood were repaired. The pictures in this batch are of the drivers side, the back of the Daytona, the passengers side and last a close up of the passengers door.

[Mopar John]

                                    ANOTHER COAT OF PRIMER CONTINUED!
This batch of pictures shows the roof repair area in primer, a close up of the drivers door, the drivers windshield pillar lead seam area and last the passengers windshield pillar lead seam area.

[Mopar John]

                                                      FRONT FENDERS!
As I stated previously, I started the hunt for the original Daytona body parts that I needed early on. This hunt included both front fenders for the B5 Daytona. From all the outside storage and poor prep work on the underside it looked like the fenders rusted from the inside out! I bought a real nice passengers fender from Monroe Schellinger early on. I wasn't so lucky on the drivers side. I think I bought 3 differant Daytona fenders and each time the last one was a little better. When I decided to go all out on the B5 Daytona I decided to use the fenders off the R4 Daytona and then put the best of what I had bought on the R4 Daytona. The fenders that came off the B5 car are now stored in my basement in case anything tragic should happen? I have attached a picture of the drivers fender from the R4 Daytona that was in real nice shape. I also have attached a picture of the passengers side fender off the R4 Daytona. This fender has some metal damage from someone trying to jack the Daytona up using a conventional bumper jack @#$%^&*(!! They bent up the lower valance and the mast of the jack put a crease in the fender! When I return the pictures will show the work being done on the fenders after they came back from REDI - STRIP!

[Mopar John]

                                                DRIVERS FRONT FENDER!
The next few batches of pictures will show the work done on the drivers fender. The first 3 pictures show the inside of the fender already in primer!

[Mopar John]

                                           DRIVERS FENDER CONTINUED!
Next up was to repair the mount that was at the top back by the cowl. It was slotted?

[Mopar John]

                                            MORE DRIVERS FENDER MOUNT!
When the drivers fender was placed on the Daytona body it was obvious why the fender mount was slotted! It had been welded on in the wrong place. Troy had to remove it and reposition it in the correct location! This batch of pictures will show that work going on!

[Mopar John]

                                          FINAL DRIVERS FENDER MOUNT!
  This batch of pictures only has 2 in it. The first one shows the last of the relocated drivers mount and the other shows the drivers fender mounted for the first time to the Daytona body! When I return to the drivers fender it will be on the Daytona body with the other fender and hood!

[Mopar John]

                                     DAYTONA PASSENGER FENDER REPAIRS!
This is the side that someone used a rear bumper jack to pick up the Daytona#$%*(! This first batch of pictures will show some of the metal repair work to that area.

[Mopar John]

                                           PASSENGERS FENDER CONTINUED!
 When I removed the fenders off the R4 Daytona I had a nut that was welded to the fender break loose. I was able to save it and used a plastic wire tie to keep it with the fender so it didn't get lost. This batch of pictures shows that part being welded back to the fender.

[Mopar John]

                                      MORE PASSENGER FENDER REPAIRS!
This batch of pictures will show a few more repairs to the fender and some shots of the inside having primer on it!

[Mopar John]

                             PASSENGER FENDER HUNG ON DAYTONA BODY!
There are only 2 pictures in this batch. The first picture is the last of the inside in primer! The second picture is of the passenger side fender now hung on the Daytona body! Each step of this process was just a thrill for me after waiting all the years to get the car restored! My next post will be of the repairs to the hood!