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Pat69charger's 1969 XP29 Charger rust-oration!

Finally I started in the 69, not much bit drilled out all the welds in the right hinge post. I have a question about how you guys have replaced the full rocker on these cars, the lower hinge bracket seems to have three spot welds on it to the outer rocker. I am wondering how you detach and re weld these to the rocker once installed? I can easily cut the old rockers and drill the welds from the bottom but that doesn't help when the new rocker goes on. I also found out that a guy I know through work but haven't seen in awhile is finishing up a 70 charger restoration. I contacted him and found out he had lots of parts not much body part wise but lots of stuff non the less. I picked up a really nice trunk lid, really nice leaf springs and a rear glass.
 

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Pat, I cant give no advice on your rockers at all, im afraid of them myself and just tore up the side of my floor (d-side) just to check the insides of them and i think ill be ok, but im not perfectly sure yet, when you start with the rockers your getting into lots of special work i guess ill call it, im no pro by any means and not one bit afraid of asking or sometimes begging for help lol, i would have to suggest talking with Will (Propwash), he did some rocker work and im sure he would be more then happy to help out with information, there are a few hear that when they see this im sure will help ya out... I wish you the best with it for sure!
 
Pat,

Do you happen to have a pic of where you're referring to on your rockers? I replaced one full and partial of another on my bird. Might be able to help you out.
 
Thanks for the reply propwash (Will is it?) I don't have a pic but I can get one after work. Basically there is a bracket behind the hinge post for the bottom hinge that has three spot welds down to the top of the outer rocker.
 
That's what I thought Don, in through the larger lower hole on the cowl side panel. Glad I don't have to replace the cowl side panel on this car, did them on the 73 and it sucked.
 
Well a bit of side track, I didn't post on here but mentioned in mopar4don's thread about a 69 RT that was literally 5 mins from my house been sitting since the late 70s in the bushes. The guy who told me about it couldn't rememeber where it was so it was like dead end for me. A few weeks later I'm at a family get together (wifes side) and talking to her uncle about my 69 charger and he says "one of our cousins (wifes second cousin?) had a 69 charger rt back in the 70s, nice car dark green 440 column shift white interior with a bench seat. That car he smashed up the one side and pulled the 440 and drug it up the hill behind the garage, far as I know it's still there". So I am gleaming, go to father in laws that night where he tell
me no that was jut an old dodge magnum....dreams shattered. Few more weeks pass brings us to this Tuesday evening. One of our regular customers rolls in with his work truck and a flat, normally the apprentices get those but they were busy on jobs, I was done and waiting for 5pm to go home so i took it. Fate....kinda, this customer is a mopar guy and has owned various mopars over that past 25 years and currently looking for the next. He and I always talk old cars and this time we got talking about my charger and he says " you know one of your wife's relatives, Gary had a 69 charger rt, hell of a nice car, 440 bench seat column shift, green I belive it was. That car should still be up behind the old building, he smashed the one side and pulled the 440 and put it in a dodge magnum". The puzzle completes itself more! The following night wife and I went for a drive through the woods trying to get that back way to where the car was, it had been years since she'd traveled these trails so we didn't fair out well. The reason we decided the back way first was the relative that owned the car passed away in the mid 80s, house fire wife and kids survived, sad story. The charger was behind his parents garage as he was still living home at 19-20 when he had it. His father passed in 06 and mother early 2014 so home had recent new owners. Before bothering them I wanted to verify it was there but it didn't work anyway. Tonight after work I decide just to go to the house, I knock on the door say the house was in wifes family's and there is an old car on back part of property I'd like to see if he didn't mind. He says sure I don't know much about cars but there is one up there that seems pretty much a wreck to me. I got up and find it, very very rough but many usable parts, engine and trans are gone, white interior is there but tattered since no glass or doors, rear end still there and k frame entire front clip gone and left 1/4. I check the vin and verify it's a rt snap a few pic and go back to the house. The guy says what kinda car is it, so i tell him it's a 69 charger, he said cool, I don't know cars so that really doesn't mean anything to me lol. I say dukes of hazzard, the general lee, he says oh that's cool do you think you can use parts? I said yeah he said then its yours! I nnow it's really rough and it burns me to the core to strip parts from a rt that is really not much worse if not a little better then my xp29 but unsure of the title. Anyway sorry for the long winded post I just still find it funny how the car was under my nose and in wifes family and I had been to the house never knew there was a charger just behind the trees.
pics are dark I will get better ones Saturday when I go back.
 

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Pat,
WOW, I really love to here stories like this! Thanks for sharing.

I nnow it's really rough and it burns me to the core to strip parts from a rt that is really not much worse if not a little better then my xp29 but unsure of the title.
I know what you mean about the thought of parting it out.
If I were you, I would snag that RT out of there ASAP, hang on to it for a while, and think about saving it. (If it is a title problem, you could check into it) Even if you decide to part it, those parts will be going to others to help with there dreams.
Looking forward to more pics.
 
The one good thing is it was my wife's great uncle car when it was smashed and was sitting behind his parents place since late 70s so he was last registersd owner. The downfall being he is no longer with us but his wife and kids are still around, maybe she could get them, just don't want to open any wounds for the family.
 
I don't think I'll be able to use the rt shell and build off it, I may be using the three to build one car. Here's a few more photos.
 

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Managed to get it dug out of the frozen ground and wheels onto it, don't ask me how I got nuts to start on the rear wheel studs that have been in the mud for over 35 years. Spindle on the left front was buried too had no threads left on it so I slid the hub and bearing from my other 69 on and put a nail through the cotter pin hole and that's what held it on lol. The the task of getting the 500 or so feet down an atv path through the bushes and trees to the driveway. Here are a few pics of the process and with it in front of my garage.
 

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Oh the fun, unsure of which platform to build off of now, the satellite or the RT. Satellite has a good firewall and cowls, repairable door hinge posts and cowl side pans and a really nice main roof structure that runs from the a piller to the rear wheel house, but the rear frame rails are non existent where the front and rear spring perches are, front rail on the left side is rusted and twisted badly where it meets the floor and there is no torsion crossmember. The RT has a good cowl but firewall isn't all the best, cowl side pans are rough and door hinge posts rotten. The main roof support is bad as well. The frame rails are still pretty solid from the spring perches back about half way on the left and is still all there on the right (both need replacing but for placement on jig) front rails all intact just rusty and torsion crossmemebrr is there as well as the floors up to the trunk floor ( all need replacing but have not fallen through the bottom like my other two. Question is do I pull the satellite of the jig and put that rt on and replace the firewall , hinge posts and main roof atructure with parts from the satellite or lead the satellite on the jig and replace the non charger parts with parts from the rt?
 
That's my plan now spoolin, I have a frame jig set up to factory specs I was going to use the satellite on but now I'll pull that off and put the the RT on. Few more pics ok the hoist.
 

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Sorry here are the pics in the proper angles.
 

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Having titling issues with the RT, DMV says it doesn't show up at all in their history.
 
Title issues suck, here in Ohio the DMV's files only go back 5 or 6 years if I remember correctly.
 
Title issues suck, here in Ohio the DMV's files only go back 5 or 6 years if I remember correctly.

going to try and use "possession is 9/10th the law" to get title. The owner of the land sign a letter where it states I got the car from him and the removal of it from his property was at my expense. See where that goes.
 
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