TV used General Lees

[Ghoste]

I think its likely been asked on here a dozen times, but do the GL fans have a hardcore way of knowing the legit tv cars from the wannabees?  It just seems to me like there are a whack of cars that make the claim and all with some pretty superficial evidence (at best).  Was there a list?  Does anyone actually know?

[Alaskan_TA]

If I remember right, Wayne Wooten helped with the sale of the leftover WB cars & he did have at least a partial list of them.

[marshallfry01]

There are always tell tell signs if it's a real one or an old replica. I always look at the design of the numbers. The interior will always be that light tan rattle spray paint color. The door jams and/or trunk and hood will be a different color. Usually an original has an interior that is completely trashed

[Ghoste]

So largely just educated guessing then?  No actual list maintained by WB?

[RallyeMike]

Who knows for sure if WB has kept the list, but I would suppose they did. As mentioned, W. Wooten was involved and they were all  sold at the same time under similar sale conditions. so all of the original TV cars are known and have paperwork from WB. Whether the VIN list is published or not, I don't know.

[Ghoste]

Wasn't Wayne only involved with like 12 or 15 that were left over at the end though?  And even that was several years after filming ended.  Did they actually keep a list, did they sell any of the cars prior to the Wooten deal?

[jaak]

Wasn't Wayne only involved with like 12 or 15 that were left over at the end though?  And even that was several years after filming ended.  Did they actually keep a list, did they sell any of the cars prior to the Wooten deal?

I don't think there is a comprised list. I think the problem is the screen cars built were contracted out, and those builders did not keep a list of the cars. WB hired a crew and built the cars in house from mid season 4 through the end of the series. Don't know of any list they kept either. So yes other than the remaining Lee's bought in the early 90's, It pretty much just an educated guess. I don't think WB ever sold any of the cars before the series ended, probably a liability issue... in fact I read somewhere that was why the Veluzat Brothers were fired from building the cars, they patched up the wrecked cars after destroyed on set and sold them. WB paid them rent on the cars, then a lump sum after they got totalled, and I think they were responsible for destroying the cars, but they repaired/sold them.

Jason

[Ghoste]

So there are a few that escaped then?  But you'd have to establish that Veluzat connection?

[69wannabe]

There were supposedly 17 general's left over from the show. One of them was still at the WB lot and was used in the first reunion movie with all the bird poop on it and then it was used in the 05 movie and I think it is still owned by WB and now has a crate 426 hemi in it and I thought I heard it was in a museum now. That leaves 16 that are still around and there are the one's owned by JS that were used in the reunion movies that are considered from the show or from the tv at least. As far as Lee 2, it pretty much got crushed I have decided. The car that made the high octane jump over the low boy trailer full of boxes may still be around. It landed butt down and was sold to someone locally if rumor is correct and the only source of that was Jo from the flower shop and sadly she past away last year. That car may still be in georgia but who know's where since it hasn't turned up and you would think that if it was around it would have popped up in the early 2000's when dukes stuff was wide open!! Would be neat to locate it tho!!!!

[Brock Lee]

There are a lot of claims made about the Veluzat's. VIN tampering is a common story amongst those that were involved.

There is also another story I have heard about the filming of "Double Dukes". The transportation department had been working with the Veluzat's to have stunt cars purpose built (as that was what 95% of the cars they were building were going to end up being anyway). They selected a fully caged car to roll on its roof. They perform the stunt and seconds after extracting the stuntman out of the car, the cage began to collapse. They flipped the car over and discovered the cage was constructed of exhaust tubing. Baxely was beside himself pissed.

[TPR]

This section of the Real General Lee site has been 'coming soon' for about 12 months now:

http://www.realgenerallee.com/1978-85-tv-series-gls.html

In fact, most of the site is still coming soon.
TPR

[Mike DC]

 
There's no way of knowing for sure, even with a VIN list.  There were swapped VINs.  

There were just too many people, supplying too many cars, too fast, too many wrecks repaired, and nothing over 10 years old was worth jack squat in those days.  Imagine a TV show in the early 1990s tearing up '79 4dr Novas - thats how little anyone cared about those Chargers at the time.



What is for sure, is that nobody builds prop-cars like the prop builders did.  It only looks straightforward & simple if you aren't familiar with that stuff.  But try building a NASCAR clone that fools someone really into old Grand National racers.  Good luck.  (Hey, they still sell rollcage tubing and 426 Hemis, right?  How hard could it be?)  

For one thing you'd have to start with a nice surviving Charger.  No repro sheetmetal.  No rust repairs.  No Legendary vinyl.  No interiors pieced together out of 5 different cars & dyed to match.  If someone was doing this fraud to make money, they would have been a lot smarter & done less work by just selling the raw-material survivor Charger as it was.  

[DixieRestoParts]

As an aside to this, back when the show was in full bloom, I used to get asked every week if I'd been approached by WB to buy my car. I was told they were buying them up and would probably want mine. Whatever. My answer was always the same - not for sale. And it's still the answer today.

[UH60L]

I had heard/read online that there were 17 sold by WB in one sale to multiple buyers (some of which bought more than one car), 1 left at WB, and then the "LEE 1" car that was found in the wrecking yard and restored.

So that's 19 survivors.  The WB one and the LEE 1 one are, I'm sure, well documented.  The other 17 should still have their paperwork with them.

There was rumors of an undocumented car somewhere in the south (Georgia or the Carolinas I think) that still had camera mounts in the ceiling.  Not sure what became of that one.

I've only ever seen one of the 19 in person.  A guy from Seattle brought his down to Salem for the annual MOPAR show a few years back.  He had the documentation, I think he had it framed even.  His car, other than tune-ups and regular maintenance, was untouched and still had a few dents and dings from the show. 

He was a really cool guy, would let you sit in the car...but you had to go through the window.  I was said "really, I can do that".  I got a picture of me sitting on the top of the door, and one of my son doing the same.  :-)

Then after the show I got a picture of my car parked next to it.  Pretty cool.

My car is the white one, and that guy is the owner of the General Lee.

[chargerman69]

Friend of mine has one of the real ones here in Ont

[Brock Lee]

Keep in mind that when the Veluzat's and Ken Fritz each lost their WB contracts, they did not surrender remaining inventory to WB. Those cars ended up being used in other productions and some of those still exist. Some would argue they are not "real" as some never made it on screen, and technically even those that may have were never property of WB as they never bought them outright. These cars as well as every season 1 car would be missing from "the list".

[CornDogsCharger]

I run www.realgenerallee.com and yes, a lot of the site has been "under construction" since I started it in June 2014.  My intentions with the site is to basically give credit to the "REAL" cars and even call out... or put a red flag on the fake cars that are claiming to be real.  I have many other plans for the site but it will eventually come along as I have time.  So.... there were 19 surviving cars when Wayne came along to document them.  The offer was made to him by WB to purchase 17 of the remaining cars along with all parts and disperse them throughout the club members of The Dodge Charger Registry.  WB wanted to keep two of the cars (the second Close-up car and the sound stage car).  It was rumored that WB ended up parting out and scraping the sound stage car... but this is not 100% confirmed.  So we have 18, possibly 19 cars.  

Since the deal was made in 1991 with WB, a few other cars have been discovered.  LEE 1, SGL13, and two other cars that were used in the movie Gladiator... and then used again for other productions.  So now we have 22 or possibly 23 surviving TV Series cars.  

When the 1997 TV Reunion movie was made, WB already had the one TV series car and they purchased two more cars to be converted into GLs.  I own one of the two cars that were purchased.  The rumor of the TV series car being the one with all the bird crap on it is not true.  Actually that is my car.  Mine is easy to spot in both Reunion movies because it was the only car that did not have chrome bumper guards on the front.  So with the addition of two more cars... now we're at 24 or 25 cars total.

The second Reunion was in 2000.  All three cars from the '97 Reunion return for the '00 Reunion.  My car was prepped for the jump scene so that only left them with 2 cars to use.  John Schneider agreed to use his car in the second Reunion.  John kept his personal car and the three went back to WB... now we're at 25 or 26 cars total.  

Along comes the 2005 Movie.  Even though there were a total of 27 Charger on the VIN list for the movie, only 25 were actually USED.  Car#115 was too rough and was only used for parts and Car#126 was loaned by a gentleman out of Kansas to be used... but since it was a real #'s matching '69 RT/SE Charger, the crew couldn't stomach the thought of ruining a rare car.... plus, they really didn't need it.  WB already had the three cars in storage, so they put them to use along with the other cars.  The lame 2007 direct-to-dvd movie re-used surviving 2005 movie cars.  All 25 cars survived in some shape or form, so with the addition of 22 USED cars (25 cars used minus the 3 that WB already had).... now we're at 47 or 48 surviving cars total.  

Justin
"CornDog"

[RallyeMike]

Great info. So all of the movie cars were also sold and in the hands of private owners?

I've only ever seen one of the 19 in person.  A guy from Seattle brought his down to Salem for the annual MOPAR show a few years back.  He had the documentation, I think he had it framed even.  His car, other than tune-ups and regular maintenance, was untouched and still had a few dents and dings from the show. 

I saw Jim's car when he first got it, and while he has done a great job of maintaining the original patina, it is not wholly untouched. It original came with an interior that was partially painted tan, such as the dash face! It really shows how quickly they put some of these cars together.  I really appreciate that he has preserved most of the car rather than giving in to the temptation to restore it, ......dents, scratches and all, and his documentation of the whole purchase is really neat 

[Ghoste]

So a lot of these guys who claim they have a tv series car and they're only evidence is "I bought it in Georgia in 1979..." are likely bogus claims?

[CornDogsCharger]

Yes, the movie cars are all privately owned now with the exception of 1 or 2 cars. The car that is on display at WB with the flag covered up was the second close-up car from the tv series (from the 19 WB cars), it was used in both Reunion movies, and was also used in the 05 movie.  This is the car that had the new crate Hemi dropped in. They possibly have one more car that they leave in storage. But every other car was sold off to private collectors.  There are a few of these cars in museums though.

As for Joe Blow with a GL that was bought out of GA back during the series' run... 99.99% of the time it will be a fake.  The problem with this, during the show's heyday, everyone wanted a GL. When word got around GA that the first handful of cars were being built in a local small town... if you wanted a GL, you just go see this guy and he'll paint your car as a GL and it would look correct... because they painted the original cars. So then that person sells their GL and tells the buyer that the same guy who painted the tv cars also painted his car... then the story gets twisted and before you know it... it a "real screen used GA car".  There is a very slim chance that there are any other surviving GA GLs other than LEE 1.  Even the car that is at the Volo Museum that is claimed to be a surviving GA car isn't quite right. Yes, it was purchased to be used but WB moved the show to California and this car was not converted and used on the show. It was just a regular Charger that was left behind. Sometime after the production crew left, this car was painted (in the same manor mentioned above) and then now it's being called a "GA GL Survivor". 

Justin
"CornDog"

[skip68]

Hey Justin, I've heard rumors years ago that during the tv filming in California some of the General Lee's that jumped into ponds (or one) was left and never pulled out.   Do you know if that's true? 

[Bandit72]

Hey Justin, I've heard rumors years ago that during the tv filming in California some of the General Lee's that jumped into ponds (or one) was left and never pulled out.   Do you know if that's true? 

My guess is that they would have been found by now if that were the case...especially since it doesn't seem to rain in California anymore (according to our weather people anyways)

[rebby]

It would be great if there was some sort of registry of where REAL GLs were. I've been to a number of car museums all claiming to have a REAL GL (the one in Murdo, SD immediately comes to mind). It's good for marketing but, unless it is actually REAL, it's very deceiving and quite annoying.

[Homerr]

Justin, looks like you've done all the hard work on setting up the site - nice work.   


What's the status on getting content being filled in?

[CornDogsCharger]

I've also heard the story about a GL being left in a pond, but I think it would have been brought to surface by now if the story was true. As for the website, I just need to sit down long enough and type up all of my notes on the cars that I have taken over the years. The Reunion cars, movie cars, and auto trader commercial cars, I can enter all of that info. But the 79-85 tv series cars...  I have a lot of info and photos of the cars but I've got to be careful what I put out there. The tv series cars are really Wayne Wooten's babies... so to speak. I have many many many hours worth of phone conversations with Wayne and consider him a good friend. He is very cautious of what info is out there on those 17 cars. So whatever I put out there on the 17 cars, I'd really like to have his blessing. I have written up info on most of the cars, I just need to upload it.

On the Reunion, Movie, and Autotrader cars, I have entered info on many of them.

Justin
"CornDog"