At it again! 1970 Charger resurrection

[tsmithae]

Alright, I am starting a thread on my '70 500.  I am a little late starting this, but I have a day off and nothing to do.



Picking her up, slightly disassembled, partially sanded/rusted, engine and trans sitting in front of her, hood and bumper in the truck bed.


The Interior


The underside


The garage she will be restored in, inside sits a 55 Chebby that I helped my late uncle restore (RIP), 67 Mustang fastback (owned by my other uncle), and 70 Chevelle (owned by yet another uncle).


The engine/trans


This totally rained on my parade that day... :bad day:


A week or 2 later, my parts runner is sitting a little low to the ground...  


Oh, thats why!

[tsmithae]

And now, more.  Let's start with parts I have been obtaining.

Wheels


'70 disc brake parts


Valve Covers

[nvrbdn]

  keep it up love seeing another 70 come back to life

[tsmithae]

And, more!

Almost completed engine


Interior pieces before




Some interior progress pictures





Getting some primer on her until I can do all the body work

[tsmithae]

And, more interior work.

Seatbelts Before


Double Dose of RIT


Hanging out to dry, I have yet to finish the buckles.


And, some dash work

Before



During



After with new gauge faces, orange needles, and new indicators

[BIGBLCK11]

Welcome!  Nice start.  Keep up the pics.  Color plans?  What was the original color? 

[tsmithae]

Thanks guys!  I will keep pictures coming on in.  The car was originally FF4, vinyl top, green interior.

I am going to go with 999, no vinyl, black interior, rear 500 stripe.

[Charger_Fan]

Looks like you're off to a great start.
I assume the previous owner sandblasted the engine bay? It's a bummer that he let it rust like that, without a coat of primer or something. Looks like it should clean off pretty nicely, though.

[tsmithae]

Thanks!

And, yep, he had. He was going to make a wing car out of it and had started on it when the roof at his shop collapsed and let in all that moisture and let her rust.  I did a little light sanding and that appears to be all she will need to clean up (well, maybe more than that since I tried to seal her back up a bit to prevent further rusting).

[BIGBLCK11]

  Cool, love 999 - A4 silver.  Of course, mine happens to be silver, just not factory.

[Silver R/T]

Nice project, keep up good work.

[twodko]

Welcome to the site! Great project and please keep the progress pix coming......we're pix addicts here! 

Tell me about the whole RIT experience. Have they turned out as well as you'd hoped? How long did you soak them and what was the water/RIT ratio?
My belts are faded and I'd like to do the same as what you've doen. Any info would be great. Thanks

[tsmithae]

The RIT was not a bad experience at all, As you can tell, I used an old, but clean, bucket and i used the higher concentration liquid dye vs the dry poweder dye.  I just followed the directions on the bottle for double strength.   Here's a picture of the weave, remember it was a faded green before.  I think I may do another batch and soak them once more before I finish the buckles and put them in the car. However, they actually look even better than that picture (which was taken day of) and the color set a little bit better.  But, for 40 year old seat belts... amazing results. I recommend it; however, it will also dye your white chrysler tags, just in case you're trying to preserve those as original).

[BIGBLCK11]

Question on the RIT.  I was worried it might come off on your clothes?  Have you rubbed it across something white?  I assume as some clothing itself is dyed, it should be good stuff and if it came off, nobody would use it.  Also, what were doing for the color on the buckles? Thanks.

[maxwellwedge]

Looks good! Please do us all a favor and get a proper steel fuel line(s)....too much rubber there - not the safest set-up. 

[Blakcharger440]

Looks good! Please do us all a favor and get a proper steel fuel line(s)....too much rubber there - not the safest set-up. 

If he swaps the fuel rail around then he would only have to run rubber to the steel line that comes from the fuel pump...or possibly just run steel line from fuel pump to the front of the engine after he swaps his rail around.

[tan top]

looking good ! nice work 

[tsmithae]

Thanks guys!

BIGBLCK-The RIT I think had mentioned letting things set for a period of time before use, IIRC, and, the buckles are in OK shape for now, I just need to clean up overspray on the chrome portions and reshoot the latch potions.

maxwell- That is a temp. setup that we are going to use to break in the engine once we finish modifying the engine test stand; my uncles built it to do chebbys and ferds. I plan on getting a new fuel rail and changing the setup for that. Thanks for the warning tho!

[maxwellwedge]

 

[UH60L]

Looking good.  Died the seat belts yourself, eh?  I think i'm gonna break down and buy new ones for my '69 from BEAparts.  A couple of mine have cuts in them and I'd rather just start with new ones that I know won't break, just in case.

I wish I could do my own body work, would have saved a ton of money.

Thanks for sharing.

[nvrbdn]

one most important question about this build is, is that a terrarium that the gauges are sitting on? looks like a coffee table terrarium. better pic of it would be cool. thanks

[Bob T]

Another 70 will hit the blacktop again, good efforts so far keep at it 

[tsmithae]

It's actually a coffee table fishtank that I dont have running currently (I am not home enough to actually have it up and running).

[tsmithae]

Well, momentous day! I have pretty much finished the dash project!  :party:

Ok, to start off:

Someone had decided to paint EVERYTHING black on this poor dash and needless to say, did so poorly and with cheap paint that was chipping peeling and fading. So, that had to go. I went with using Super Clean (worked AMAZINGLY) and toothbrushes.  Then, I went ahead with Rustoleum's paint for plastic to cover up the, by now, destroyed original finish.  Then, I did a coat of Testors white for the lettering on the gauge bezel. Next...

HOURS of careful masking (about 8 on that alone)



Then, I used a product that I found at a hobby store called Alclad to attempt to mimic the chrome.  This stuff worked great! Not quite perfect but best damn spray chrome I have found yet. Also, I found that easy-does-it with this, over-apply and the finish gets duller. Here are the results.

[tsmithae]

Alright, time for an update I think.

Unfortunately I travel for work and that takes up most of my time and lately I've been helping out my folks with a house remodeling that is taking up a LARGE majority of the rest of it.  However, I do what I can and the dash is FINALLY almost complete.  I ordered the odometer renumbering kit while I was gone this time (just got off of work and then a week long vacation in New Orleans) and as soon as I got home, I tore my cluster apart and renumbered the odometer.  Now, with any luck, I will get a little time to work on my car and not spend the entire break working on my folks house...








Also, just found these while I was away as well!