Well I did it now

I found a Duster roller on Craigs List, and bought it without looking at it. It was the year I wanted, plus it was originally a 340, (well how bad could it be). I'm wintering in AZ, so I had it delivered to my home in Wa. My boy called me and said it was a rust bucket. Was this a mistake? Take a look at the pic's from Craigs list. The seller had a very convincing story. We are starting for home next week. Howco4

This might be the start of a restoration????????

Looks pretty good in the pics.,what's rotted floors,frame,body?

My son says the floors are rotted, and the trunk lid does not fit well, which may be a sign of rotted frame rails???

Car looks pretty dang solid. Here is a tip, take a magnet and go across the body and frame, if the magnet wonders and doesnt stay in place, you got some rot or body filler.

Whats your plans with it though?

I live just outside of Seattle so if you don't want them I will take the grill and hood off that rusty old car :grin:

It looks like it is saveable floors and frame peices can be replaced.
What was going to be just a motor replacement in my girlfriends 72 scamp has turned into a 3 year restoration.
Where was the car from? How long was it sitting? What had been done to it? That migh shed some lite on what problems it may or may not have.

My plans for the car were to drop a 340 into it after some resto work. I'm used to long term projects, but I need something fairly substantial to start with. I like to do all the work myself when I can. I just ,(for a change), would like to work on one that isn't a piece of junk to start with. Well I guess I will know for sure in about a week or so. I've always liked the early Dusters and Demons when they are set up properly. They just look a little meaner. Howard

I suspect talking to the seller won't do much good, as he was a reseller and was only interested in getting it off the lot.

My son says the floors are rotted, and the trunk lid does not fit well, which may be a sign of rotted frame rails???

Trunk lid not fitting well may just be a simple alignment issue.
From my experience the very rear end of the frame just behind the spring hangers are notorious for rot,that may be a good place to start.

They all start as pieces of (ahem) Mopar and wind up Beast's of Art !

After looking at some of the East Coast cars, this one may not be so bad. The pic's sure looked good. It still has the 8 3/4 plus 727 still in the car. seller said it had new brakes and tires. I guess we'll see. Howard

Build a 2 x 3 frame with a 4 link and coil overs in the rear and struts up front and a 14 point roll cage. You'll be fashioning all new floors and firewall that way. Just think, this could be the excuse to build the totally over the top car you always wanted to.

Eric's right on the money listen to him he's smart!

Well folks, we made it home safe, and have had a chance to take a quick look at the car. It's not as rusted as suspicioned. The major concern, none of body components line up, doors, trunk. So far I can't get the trunk open, just a hole where the lock was. The gaps on the door to fender on one side is allmost a 1/2 inch. The trunk lid also has a 1/2 gap where the lip meets body near the tailights. I will probably have to pull some components off to get a better idea of whats going on. I will "never" buy a car based on the sellers judgement, (or B.S.), again. The paint job was sprayed right over surface rust, and the 340 decals. Qtr pns look a little rusted at the bottom, but an easy fix. Back seat is full of parts. So tomorrow should be an interesting day.

Howard

Well the grill and hood alone is worth a small fortune, I'm not far from there either and would be willing to relieve you of the burden of having those fancy parts on your rusty car. My Duster has been awaiting those exact parts, coincidence, I don't think so, perhaps destiny :lol: :lol: :lol:

The hood has has an ultra large hole made for the scoop. I haven't examined the grill closely, but it looks to have part of one fastening ends broken off. I will know more about the car in the next couple of days.

Howard

holy crap dude, this sounds like my car, only different.

The way I got my trunk open was with a flathead screwdriver, if you look down the rusty little hole in the trunk lid you should be able to see where to put the driver. but other than that you sould like you're in good shape, but try the magnet trick i found alot of crap bondo work on my Valiant that way.

My continuing saga with the Duster. I does have some rust, but a little on each lower qtr pnl, and one rust thru on driver floorpan. My puzzle, is that both front fenders are bent up where they meet the door and the cowel. I've tried to find structual damage in the eng. compartment, and or frame rails that may be a sign that this was in a collision, or was used as a stunt car, but can't see any. What kind of door to fender gaps should I be seeing? The pass side shows almost 1/2 inch, (fender to door).

Howard

Take it to a good body shop to get an estimate for fixing it up, they should be able to tell you what needs to be fixed.

I would say about 1/4" either side, here's a picture of mine, I don't think my car has ever taken a side hit so everything is pretty much as it came from the factory except for the saggy hinges of course. You can lift the door quite a bit so I expect things to line up really well once I put in new pins and bushings.

http://i74.photobucket.com/albums/i258/rj440/DSC00229.jpg

Thanks for the pic of the door gaps. I do know that the doors were off this car at one point. Also the door gaskets were removed to paint the car. The doors do not sag, however, with no hinge play at all. The bend in the fenders happened for a reason. A body shop might be an alternative. I do have a Swinger project I'm trying to finish up, so will store this until I have the room to work on it.
Howard

Someone probably had it all apart and just did a sloppy job of putting it back together, if the door lines up with the quarter ok you should be able to move the fenders back towards the door. I haven't taken mine apart but I just finished a basket case Camaro and was able to move the fenders around quite a bit to get the correct spacing.

The fenders on this will move in and out in reference to the engine compartment, but there is no elongation in the mounting holes to let them move in towards the body. The door lines up with the qtrs pretty well. Still a mystery to me. Will enlist the opinion of a couple of street rodder friends to get their take. Howard

ok,,all you mopar guys, howco needs our prayers to help him out with this,,,,Bow all yer heads and here goes. oooh mopar gods , please grant howco the wisdom to do what is right and correct to save one of your flock from distruction. Also we ask that he not rob parts from his current project in order to faciltate the rebirth of the a-body.We also ask others that follow his troubles and concerns to come forth with wisdom ,knowledge and cheap parts with low shipping cost.Also we ask,,,ooooh mopar gods,,,that you bestow upon howco the ambition and skill to save this forgotton child of yours as well as a few extra $'s to lighten the hardships a bit. As well,,his signifcant other,, may need to have some help with understanding his addiction to the ways of mopar.We ask this in the name of all that is mopar and in his name we pray!!!

P.S IF ALL THIS IS NOT IN YOU POWER TO GRANT, THEN OMIT THE ABOVE AND JUST BESTOW ONTO HIM A HUGE KICK ASS 220VOLT MIG ON GAS AND A PLAZMA CUTTER WITH A 4X8 SHEET OF 18ga.,,,,AMEN

Amen to that Bro. Jims71duster. Amen

:prayer: LOL Jims71.

The fenders on this will move in and out in reference to the engine compartment, but there is no elongation in the mounting holes to let them move in towards the body. The door lines up with the qtrs pretty well. Still a mystery to me. Will enlist the opinion of a couple of street rodder friends to get their take. Howard

These guys are just funning ya Howco, be careful though. If you every get that trunk opened a big furry assed rat might be in there feisting on whats left of Jimmy Hoffa, kind of like last night on CSI when that rat jumped out of that dead guys gut. (shades of Alien). That was just sick.

How'd I get here anyway.

Terry :burnout:

Well I did open the trunk. I had to use the Mopar tool # 3: a long skinny screwdriver. Found: bent up headers, some rusted exhaust pipe, a spare door, (from the wrong year), and some brake line. I did find out why the fenders were bent. The previous owner,could not figure out how to get the upper bolt inside the wheel well out, so he used Mopar tool # 2, a pry bar to remove the fenders.
I"m just about finished dismanteling my parts car. I was able to secure 1 good door, 2 good fenders, 1 good hood. Still some small parts yet to be had. The car was a 3spd on the column, with clutch and brake pedals still in tact, (rare?). The rest is not too rusty, but will likley end up in the crusher, (floor pan is gone, trunk floor is gone, plus some dented sheet metal. Will attach pic.
Note: Mopar tool #1 is a very large hammer. Howard

Can`t be afaid of alittle.......well alot of rust.Good luck!

I'd take a look at the flor pan, particularly right around the tranny hump. Actually found mine was crunched a bit from an old accident I would suspect. Either rear ended or hit in the frony pretty hard. amazingly enough my doors seem to work fine and have good spacing, the passenger door had been replaced as well. they can pull a lot of stuff out but will usually leave floor pans alone because they are covered with carpet and you will typically never see it anyway.

I've pretty well have everything scoped out on the car intended for restoration, (not the orange parts car in last pic.). The trunk had the wrong trunk gasket, causing it not to align, or close properly. The 340 duster I'm going to restore is an automatic without the origninal V8, (but I do have one). I'm still missing headliner, and trim over doors and windows. ( I also got 3 instrument clusters with the orange parts car, (suprise surprise).
Howard