Project Pittsbird Almost Done

[Bruzilla]

Hey 67, I checked the craigslist for Las Vegas and there are a couple of guys on there who are doing paint and bodywork on the side just like they are here. Just do a search for paint and bodywork and check out their ads.

And BTW, don't forget that it's a lot easier to haggle and negotiate with these guys as they don't have set shop fees the way a regular body shop does. I would tell them what you need done, and get a price. Then tell them how much you're willing to pay, and if they really want the work (and the money) they'll be flexible on the price.

 

[67 coronet]

Hey 67, I checked the craigslist for Las Vegas and there are a couple of guys on there who are doing paint and bodywork on the side just like they are here. Just do a search for paint and bodywork and check out their ads.

luckly my current project has only minor dings and dents so i will fix them myself.plus vegas is the ripoff capitol of the world,so i only farm out work to reputable shops here.much more interested in quality rather then price at this point.thanx for the suggestion though.

 

[Bruzilla]

luckly my current project has only minor dings and dents so i will fix them myself.plus vegas is the ripoff capitol of the world,so i only farm out work to reputable shops here.much more interested in quality rather then price at this point.thanx for the suggestion though.

I think Vegas would share that title with a lot of places I've been to. The simple truth is that once a body shop has your car, they've got you by the balls and they know it. It's damn hard, if not impossible, for you to refuse to pay whatever they demand because your car is usually in pieces and you can't just say "Hell no!" and drive off. And if you refuse to pay, they can take your car.

The problem is that even the most reputable shop has overhead to pay for, which is the biggest driver of costs. Nationwide, bodyshops average $45 to $100 an hour for their costs because they just can't afford to go lower and keep the lights on. This was one of the big appeals to finding a side work guy to me. If I could get overhead costs out of the equation, I could get the work done more affordably.

At the end of the day, it's not a reputable shop that's working on your car, but the reputable people who are in it, and if you can access the labor of those people outside the shop, you can great work done without paying the higher prices. Granted, there is more risk, but risk can be mitigated by doing your homework, checking these guys out, and making sure they're up to the task. You usually can't mitigate high costs because of shop overheads.

 

[dgraver]

I love it! The yinzers here in Pittsburgh would definitely love it! Do you plan on adding any other steelrs/pirates/pittsburgh stickers or paraphenalia?

 

[YY1]

I find it humorous that the Pirates were sponsored by Arco.

Arrrr!!

 

[Bruzilla]

I have a copy of Sports Illustrated from 1974 that has Bradshaw on the cover that sits on the passenger seat, and I have a Dollar Bank Pirates schedule from 1974 clipped to the driver's sunvisor.

I also have an old Penguins logo decal that reads "Compliments of Winkys" on the bottom, which was a PA-based McDonalds clone that shut down in the late 1970s. I was going to use the original sticker but it's so old the backing paper and decal adhesive have become one. So, I need to scan it and have it reproduced by makestickers.com, who did the other bumper stickers for me.

I wanted one of those small Jolly Roger flags with the white keystone symbol on it that I see getting waved at Pirates games to fly from the radio antenna, but I can't find one anywhere!!!

 

[Bruzilla]

I spent most of the Labor Day weekend working over, under, and in the car trying to get things finished up before football season starts, which was my original goal. Of course, the car had other ideas.

First, I went to install the new speedo cable I bought. I took the old one out, and started routing the new one in. This effort came to a screeching halt when I went to connect the cable to the transmission and found the supposed 100% compatible cable connection was much smaller than the connector on the tranny! The reason I had to replace the cable was I had broken off the retaining clip on the old one while I was swapping the gauge clusters out, so rather than lose time waiting for a new cable to come in, I pulled the speedo end of the new cable off, and used it to replace the broken one on the old cable. A few crimps later the old cable was ready to go.

Next, I needed to install the FM radio antenna I bought several weeks ago, only to discover that since I had bought it, several pieces had gone missing. The worst of these was the nut that holds the antenna in place. I went to Lowes and Ace and neither had a nut that would work. I went to Autozone and found they had the exact same antenna I had bought off ebay for $39 for $9.99 (note to self: always check to see if a part is available locally first!). I bought the antenna and installed it, only to find the cable for it came up about 18" short of reaching the stereo.

I then had to drive to Radio Shack for an extension cable, only to discover that Radio Shack should now be called Cell Phone Shack because they don't carry much of anything for radios anymore! I went back to Autozone and saw they had 12-foot extender for $5.99, but nothing shorter. Since I didn't want 10 feet of excess antenna cable laying around, I went to Pep Boys. They also had the 12-foot extender for $5.99. but they also had a three-foot extender... for $9.99! After getting an incoherent explanation of why a cable that's 12-feet long is $5.99 and one that's 1/4 as long as long is $9.99, I paid the money, went home, and finished getting the radio installed.

My only easy project this weekend was installing the old purple roadrunner horn. The original wiring was gone along with the horn, so I had to rewire the circuit and use an aftermarket switch, but now the car can "beep beep" with the best of them.

So, as I close on the finish line, the budget is now up to $5,445, and I'm dang confident I'm going to come in well below budget. I was going to sell off the spare parts I had laying around (old rear bumper, some body panels, and hood stripes), but one of our forum's new members has a 73 he's working on and he drove down from GA to get them. Since they were going to a good cause, I just gave them away. It helped him out and freed up more space in the garage, so it was a good deal.

 

[73runner]

Nice read!

 

[MikeyT]

very cool read. Awesome work!
Mike

 

[jaak]

Bravo!!! This is a great thread!!! A nice driving Mopar can be built on a budget. I really didn't keep up with a budget on my 69 Charger, but I can guarantee, there is a lot less in it the what most would think. I am working on a 68 Charger now and I am on a stricter budget. I'll admit it won't be as nice as my 69, but my goal is to have a nice cruiser. I have grown up around family and friends that do body/paint, so I have learned enough along the way that I can work on my own stuff. I too like you always, search CL, eBay, and forums to find the best deal on parts (one of my proudest is getting all 4 side markers for my 69.....they are nice and I got $10 bucks in them)

I hate reading a thread where someone is looking for a certain car of project...only to get 10 smart-alec replies like; "You won't find one for under 10K for a project", "Expect to pay 15-20K for a driver", or "If it isn't running, needs paint, be prepared to sink 30k in it".

You're an inspiration, to the average joe or the young guy that doesn't have deep pockets. You have proven that having a Very Nice, head-turning Mopar you can be very proud of and watching your pennies/having a budget is possible.

Kudos to you,
Jason

 

[Basket case]

looking great! my first mopar was a '73 road runner, and i'm not too far from Pittsburgh.

 

[ga66mopar]

Pretty neat thread. The roadrunner is looking good. I seen a guy attempt to spray por 15 and it was one big mess. He wont try that again.

 

[HYRDGOON]

Really cool project and theme you have there Bruzilla!

 

[rocky61201]

Love the car and your approach/method on the build. Think you could give us some more details on how your painter went about using POR-15? I checked out the POR-15 website and they have more products now than just the basic rust-preventative coating most of us have seen before.

They've got single and 2 part topcoats and clearcoats as well. What did you use? Is it the basic POR-15 rust coating and then block sanded? Or is there a clear over the POR-15 after block sanding as well? Sorry if I missed it in your previous posts.

Because it looks great and I'm interested for my next project. (If I ever finish the current one, lol)

 

[Bruzilla]

Step 10: Adding Spoilers

When I was street racing in the 1980s, there was a guy with a 72 Roadrunner that had a full-width front spoiler on the car, and I always liked that look. Also, I've always thought the 73/74 Roadrunners had a bit of a weak chin, and adding a front spoiler would make it look more aggressive. Taking a look at my car, I could see adding a front spoiler would make the body look unbalanced between front and back, so I would need to add a rear spoiler as well. This meant I would need to get a Go Wing spoiler from somebody.

I heard about a business called Spoilers By Randy (www.spoilersbyrandy.com), and he makes a custom 73/74 front spoiler that costs $160. Here's a pic of the spoiler as installed on a 73/74 car:

I was about to buy it when another forum member pointed out that the spoiler looked a lot like one for a 69 Camaro. I infiltrated some Camaro sites and found out the 69 Camaro spoiler looks about identical to the one Spoilers By Randy sells, and I could get an ABS one for about $30, or a steel one for about $80. I decided to risk $30 on an ABS one and see if it could actually be installed on my car.

The challenge with installing a front spoiler on a 73/74 Roadrunner (or Satellite) is the lower part of the front license plate mounting area. This creates a bulge that prevents a flat spoiler from being mounted unless you install it behind the bulge, which makes the spoiler harder to see. I wanted one that stood out, so I would need to modify it. I measured out the area of the bulge, cut that sized section out of the spoiler, and found I could attach it without a problem.

I painted the spoiler satin black, and decided to paint the sleeve stripes from a Steelers jersey in the center as an accent. I installed the spoiler using sheet metal screws drilled through the top of the spoiler and into the lower valance. Here's some pics of the installed spoiler:

This pic shows the cut out I had to make to the spoiler:

As you can see in the pictures, the modified Camaro spoiler protrudes further out than the Spoilers By Randy spoiler, which was the effect I was looking for. And as an aside, this spoiler actually works! I noticed when I would drive the car to work, I had to keep making slight adjustments to the rear view mirror during the day, and I thought the mirror was loose, but it wasn't. Then I realized I would adjust the mirror while driving in the morning, then have to adjust it when I got back in the car to go to lunch, but at that point it was stopped. The spoiler was pulling the nose down while I was driving, which was why when I was stopped the angle of the mirror wasn't right. So there's more than aesthetic value to adding one of these front spoilers.

If you remember a few posts back, I mentioned I gave away a lot of spare parts to a forum member in Georgia who was working on a 73 Roadrunner. He told me he had a used Go Wing that he wasn't going to use, and he would sell me for $80, so I drove up to his place and got the spoiler from him. I painted it to match the front spoiler and mounted it using the usual procedures.

One other thing I wanted to do was add Steelers graphics to the rear window, but it seems like every Steelers fan in the country has the team logo in the rear window so I wanted something different. I had seen a neon light at a Steelers store that was just the outline of a famous picture of Steelers founder Art Rooney smoking a cigar, and I thought that would look cool on a car, so I drew up the outline and had a local sign shop make some gold vinyl decals of it for me. One large one for the window, and two small ones for the ends of the Go Wing. Here's how they turned out:

So I now have matching front and rear spoilers. I paid $30 for the front, $80 for the rear, and about $55 for the graphic and paint, for a total of $165. Not bad, and I'm at $5,660.

 

[HYRDGOON]

so let me get this straight.... Of all people YOU are putting a GM spoiler on your car?? lol :boxing:

Sorry brother I had too ;)

For what it's worth I love the look of both spoilers and what you've done with the graphics. As I stated earlier I love everything about this build thread, the car, the concept, the budget and the theme.

Awesome!

 

[Bruzilla]

First Car Shows

My wife and I went to eat lunch at a local Hooters in October 2012. We took the Roadrunner, and as we were pulling in I saw a blue SUV backing out, so I waited for that guy to leave. It seemed like he was taking his sweet time backing out, but he finally vacated the spot and I pulled in. As I got out of the car, I saw the SUV turn around and come back over to where we were. I thought what does this guy want?

He stopped behind the car, rolled his window down, and told me he loved the car and wanted to know if there was any way I would consider bringing it to a car show in a couple of weeks? Turns out he's the owner of several transmission shops in the area, and chief sponsor for the Middleburg Historic Festival's car show each year, and he wanted me to bring the Roadrunner to the show. That's the first time I've ever been invited to a show, so we told him we would be in touch with him to get the details.

So here we are with a low-buck, unoriginal as you can get, Roadrunner and it's deemed good enough by the head sponsor of a major regional show that he would go out of his way to ask us to bring it to the show. Here's some pics of the car at the show. We didn't win any trophies, but we spent most all of the six hours there talking to people who were Mopar fans, Roadrunner fans, or Steelers fans, which was about five hours more than anyone who brought a Mustang or Camaro to the show spent talking to visitors.

The best part of the show was when a young man of about 11 or 12 came by with his camera, and took pictures of every inch of the car. When I asked him if he would like to get in and I would take his picture behind the wheel, the look on his face was pure joy! He tossed me his camera, jumped in the car, grabbed the wheel, and I took his picture.

During the show, we were approached by folks who were there scouting cars for a new annual show that would be held at the Budweiser brewery in Jacksonville, and they asked if we would bring our car to their show! We took them up on their offer, and here's the car at the inaugural Jacksonville Budweiser Brewery Memorial Day Car Show. Again, we didn't win any trophies, but we're not trophy chasers. We get much more enjoyment out of showing the car off and telling the story behind it... and I really love the shocked looks on the faces of people when I tell them how much we have spent on the effort. Also, what's really interesting about this photo is I didn't take it! I'm the guy sitting behind it. This is a picture that I found on the internet that was posted by someone who saw the car and liked it enough to put it up with some other pics of cars that were at the show.

Finally, while at the Budweiser show, we were approached by folks scouting cars for an upcoming Jacksonville Automotive Muscle show, and they asked if we would be interested in bringing the car to their show. So we took it there as well.

So here we are in November 2012, being invited to the biggest car show in the area, an inaugural major show, and a small regional show, and I just bought the car in the woods back in February 2012, and have spent just a tad over $5,600! I think this is an excellent example of how anyone with a little smarts, initiative, and ingenuity can get a nice Mopar back on the road, and to shows, without spending major bucks and taking three years to do it. Now, it's on to getting the 360 out and a 440 in.

 

[Bruzilla]

Step 11: Upgrading to a 440, Part 1

I've always had 440s in my Roadrunners, and wanted to add one to the Pittsbird as well. At this point, I've got about $2,400 before I reach my $8,000 budget cap. In keeping with my methodology, I wanted to do this in a way that anybody could, and I can't expect everyone to be able to do engine rebuilds or swaps in their garages. This means I need to pay a shop to do the work, and come up with the cheapest way to do it.

I was going to get a an engine and trans that were ready for install, but I came across a smoking deal on Craigslist. The guy was selling a 1972 440 HP block, .030 over, with a 727B transmission, Mallory distributor, Mopar Performance valve covers, mini-starter, and a purple camshaft and lifter kit for $250. The bad news was someone rebuilt it and didn't turn the crankshaft correctly, so the engine needed to be rebuilt. I couldn't pass that deal up, so I went and brought the engine and tranny home.

I posted an ad on craigslist for for the 360 and 727 that were in the car, and started contacting some speed shops to get quotes. I found one local shop that would rebuild the engine and do the swap for $1,300, but all I saw was Fords and Chevies, and I didn't see where they had much Mopar experience. I was contacted by a guy who works at a shop in Jacksonville that does a lot of Mopar work, and he was interested in buying my engine and trans for a project car he was working on, and wanted to know if I would consider trading my engine and trans for a shop credit and having the shop he worked at do the work.

I talked to the owner of the shop, and we worked out a deal. They would give me a $1,300 credit for the 360 and trans, and the cost to rebuild the 440 would be $1,100, plus $600 for the swap, so I would be at $400 out of pocket to get the 440 rebuilt and installed. Combined with the $250 I paid for the core, and another $420 for an alternator, P/S pump brackets, pulleys, and new bolts from eBay; plus sender units and motor mounts from Napa (they are still available new from those guys); and a set of new headers and a rebuilt 850 Thermoquad I bought off craigslist locally, I'm going to be at $1,070 to get the engine rebuilt and installed.

I took the car over to the shop in March 2013, and we'll see how this goes.

- - - Updated - - -

Upgrading to a 440 Part 2

Unlike getting the paint & body done, doing the engine swap has posed some challenges. The first was it turns out my car didn't have a 727, but a 904 trans, which the guy at the shop couldn't use so that deal fell through. I reposted the engine and trans on Craigslist, and quickly (and luckily) got another buyer for it, but they would only pay $1,100, so my costs just went up $200.

Another issue that came up was the shop owner checked the 727B trans out and found that it needed to be rebuilt. Ouch! On the plus side, he does work on engines for guys that own a tranny shop, and his cost to have it rebuilt was $600 and that's what he charged me, which is a great deal for a rebuilt 727; and since I had gotten the tranny essentially for free I didn't mind paying to have it working right. So now my costs have risen another $800 between the lower amount for my old parts and the tranny needing rebuilt. Old Mr. Mayhem is finally showing his face.

On the plus side, the owner of the speed shop is a long time Mopar guy who's been working on 440s for decades (and owns a 69 Roadrunner himself), and he has another customer who comes in with a 71 Cuda that another shop put a 440-6 into. It turned out the other shop just pulled a 440 from a truck, slapped a six pack intake on, and called it a day, so the engine still runs like a truck engine. So fortune favors on the foolish (me) when the Cuda owner tells the shop owner to just pull the engine and he can do whatever he likes with it because the Cuda owner wants a completely new engine built with all new parts! So now I don't have to worry about all the little bits and pieces my engine that might be missing as they'll all be coming, free of charge, from the Cuda engine.

Fortune favors me a bit more when the shop owner makes a trip to Gainesville to get a set of rebuilt 915 heads for the Cuda, and finds not one but two sets at the machine shop. Turns out someone down south was getting a car ready for the Gator Nationals, and ordered two sets of 915 heads, but then the project failed and the machine shop was stuck with the heads, and when the my shop's owner came in and said he would buy both sets for the right price, they made him a smoking deal to recoup their losses. So I ended up with a set of totally rebuilt 915 heads, with hardened seats, new everything, plus a new camshaft that's cut for the heads, for $800! One last bit of good news is the engine I bought had a Hemi torque convertor on it. I was hoping that given the previous owners of the engine had put so many performance parts on it (Mallory distro, MP valve covers, mini-starter, HP fuel pump, etc.) that the internal stuff would be upgraded as well, and I wasn't disappointed.

So my engine swap costs have risen from $400 of my own money to $2,282, but that includes a rebuilt transmission, rebuilt 915 heads, a correct camshaft, and $212 I had to pay for a new aluminum three-core radiator. So I'm going to have a lot more power and reliability than I was originally shooting for, and I'm still $118 under my original budget, and that's before I make some money back by selling the SB radiator that was in the car, the SB kickdown linkage and some other parts off the 360, and the BB purple camshaft and lifters I don't need anymore. Hopefully I'll be able to get about $400 for those... just enough to get a good sure grip 8.75 rear maybe?

While my original target budget was $8,000, that was just to get a car back on the road and looking good, and I never imagined I would be at $8,000 and have a car with a roaring 440 and that looks good enough to get invited to car shows. I'm expecting the next stages of the project, getting a sure-grip rear, a suspension rebuild, seat covers, and replacing all the weather stripping will put me over my original budget, but I'm still looking at having a top-notch car for under $10k if I do it all right.

- - - Updated - - -

Love the car and your approach/method on the build. Think you could give us some more details on how your painter went about using POR-15? I checked out the POR-15 website and they have more products now than just the basic rust-preventative coating most of us have seen before.

They've got single and 2 part topcoats and clearcoats as well. What did you use? Is it the basic POR-15 rust coating and then block sanded? Or is there a clear over the POR-15 after block sanding as well? Sorry if I missed it in your previous posts.

Because it looks great and I'm interested for my next project. (If I ever finish the current one, lol)

There's a whole process for using POR-15 as it's intended to be used, but these guys just use it as a base primer and they treat it like any other primer except you just can't spray it because it'll ruin a spray gun. They don't use the other POR-15 products since the POR-15 will be covered with standard paint and clearcoat.

They just applied it with brushes, which looks like hell at first (as would any paint you brush on a car). But once you sand the POR-15, it looks like just as good as a primer you sprayed on and sanded, so the sanding is the key rather than the application method. The thing you do need to be careful about is not letting any water, not even a drop of sweat, get into the POR-15 container as it'll ruin it. Use a new, dry, brush.

- - - Updated - - -

so let me get this straight.... Of all people YOU are putting a GM spoiler on your car?? lol :boxing:

Sorry brother I had too ;)

For what it's worth I love the look of both spoilers and what you've done with the graphics. As I stated earlier I love everything about this build thread, the car, the concept, the budget and the theme.

Awesome!

I thought about the morality of affixing a Camaro part to the car, but I decided to do it for two reasons. The first was the Camaro part was just about identical to the custom part, and since there is no spoiler for this car ever designed by Mother Mopar, I figured it didn't really make a difference if I used a Brand X part that fits or a custom part.

The second reason was the point of the project was to make the car look like it would if I built it in the late 1970s, and back then I would be more worried about price and adaptability rather than manufacturer.

 

[Basket case]

the only surpriese about that car being asked to a show, is the fact your were surprised. That car is beautiful. you should post up some pics on the beeper site.

 

[HYRDGOON]

"I thought about the morality of affixing a Camaro part to the car, but I decided to do it for two reasons. The first was the Camaro part was just about identical to the custom part, and since there is no spoiler for this car ever designed by Mother Mopar, I figured it didn't really make a difference if I used a Brand X part that fits or a custom part."

I agree it's a non-issue for a generic part and ended up working awesome and pocket-book friendly for your build!