PETTY CHARGERs -Which one won the 1974 Daytona 500???

[odcics2]

Last year Richard Petty sold his 1974 Daytona 500 winning Dodge Charger.

The latest MoPar Collector's Guide has a story about the 1974 Daytona 500 winning Charger
being discovered and is now restored.

Anybody shed more light or proof as to who is correct here??  I remember one car in Victory Lane, not two!

Any vintage pics to prove this one way or the other?    I'm sure there are third generation fans that would know.

[odcics2]

So.....   No Petty Charger experts here???

I guess I can't understand why a real Petty Daytona 500 winning car would not be restored as such.
The car in MCG is restored to a combination that never was.  Should have left it as a Buddy Arrington Magnum!

[73chgrSE]

I thought Petty found and restored the car decades later.

Did they have back up cars back then like they do now?

[odcics2]

In 74 for example, Petty had speedway car, short track car and a road course car.
maybe a generic back up too.

They would build new cars for the next year. How many   Who knows!

In 1975 I was at the Firecracker 400, and saw Petty win.
At the Volusia Shopping Mall, there was a Petty Charger roped off on display.

Bottom line: there were a lot of "74" looking Petty Chargers over the 73 to 1977 timeframe.

That's 5 years of the same basic style.  So, maybe 15 - 20 cars total???   And he did build a few for other teams, like Woody Fisher in ARCA.

[Aero426]

So.....   No Petty Charger experts here???

I guess I can't understand why a real Petty Daytona 500 winning car would not be restored as such.
The car in MCG is restored to a combination that never was.  Should have left it as a Buddy Arrington Magnum!

The car as reclaimed had been shortened up to be a Mirada or Cordoba, as I recall.    They had to put some toothpaste back in the tube.

[odcics2]

So.....   No Petty Charger experts here???

I guess I can't understand why a real Petty Daytona 500 winning car would not be restored as such.
The car in MCG is restored to a combination that never was.  Should have left it as a Buddy Arrington Magnum!

The car as reclaimed had been shortened up to be a Mirada or Cordoba, as I recall.    They had to put some toothpaste back in the tube.

That's understandable.  Have to do whatever you need to keep a car "legal" or to fit the latest body.