Emily's Valiant
Member
Hello all! Thanks for having me. Full story of my Plymouth below, but TL;DR I'm restoring my first car after parking it 6 years ago.
I am the daughter of a certified Car Guy, and when I turned 17 my Dad bought a '74 Plymouth Valiant for us to fix up. The original owner was a 94-year-old man named Irving whose 70-something daughter asked him to stop driving. It had all the hallmarks of an Old Man Car: a big, plasticky rearview mirror clipped onto the original, a booster seat on the driver's side to combat the sink, and a small, portable urinal in the massive trunk. Plenty of personality.
We fixed it up at my uncle's shop, polished up the OD Green paint, and my Dad's buddies painted a white stripe around the trunk. It even drove on white walls for its first year with me. Dad calls it the Valiant GT.
It was a riot to drive as a teenager. The battery was finicky and it would play dead when it rained. With two benches in a car that wide, you could fit 7 or 8 people if you tried hard enough. You could turn the big, skinny wheel with a pinky, but had to stand on the brakes with two feet. One day, my sister reached down to buckle in, and the entire seatbelt console came out in her hand, leaving a hole by the wheel where you could watch the tire spin. It made the trek up to Watkins Glen for the big festival they hold there, where it got plenty of attention rubbing elbows with gorgeous classics that were way out of its league. In maybe 2014 we discovered some structural rust we weren't prepared to face, so we parked it.
My Dad also owns a sentimental vehicle or two himself, so he was pretty understanding when I resisted selling it. He probably thought the Valiant would be a gateway drug to the real classics, not realizing I'd still be so attached years later. He's asked gently a few times over the last six years if I might consider letting it go, and finding a new toy to fix up and drive around ("Maybe a 2-door??" he says often). I knew it wasn't practical to keep it, but I couldn't bear the idea of somebody cutting it up. At Watkins Glen in 2019, I asked him what he thought it'd take to get it back on the road. Then the pandemic cost me my apartment, and my job shifted remote, so I'm back at my parents', facing the Valiant every morning when I walk out the door.
Suddenly, I have the time. I hesitate to say the word "restore" (is it considered a restoration if it's a 4-door old ladies drove to church and back?) but I'm a few projects into it and loving the process. I've cleaned the cowl, removed the seats, sanded the rust, rustoleum'd what I can and marked what I need to cut out. There's quite a bit of welding in my future. When I lifted the back bench I even found a long-lost yarmulke, undoubtedly left by one of Irving's nephews or grandchildren.
I'm new to the group but I've already taken advice from a few of your forums. I'm excited to get my big green monster back on the road, and I'm sure I'll be coming to y'all with plenty of questions.
Thanks for having me and the Valiant GT!
I am the daughter of a certified Car Guy, and when I turned 17 my Dad bought a '74 Plymouth Valiant for us to fix up. The original owner was a 94-year-old man named Irving whose 70-something daughter asked him to stop driving. It had all the hallmarks of an Old Man Car: a big, plasticky rearview mirror clipped onto the original, a booster seat on the driver's side to combat the sink, and a small, portable urinal in the massive trunk. Plenty of personality.
We fixed it up at my uncle's shop, polished up the OD Green paint, and my Dad's buddies painted a white stripe around the trunk. It even drove on white walls for its first year with me. Dad calls it the Valiant GT.
It was a riot to drive as a teenager. The battery was finicky and it would play dead when it rained. With two benches in a car that wide, you could fit 7 or 8 people if you tried hard enough. You could turn the big, skinny wheel with a pinky, but had to stand on the brakes with two feet. One day, my sister reached down to buckle in, and the entire seatbelt console came out in her hand, leaving a hole by the wheel where you could watch the tire spin. It made the trek up to Watkins Glen for the big festival they hold there, where it got plenty of attention rubbing elbows with gorgeous classics that were way out of its league. In maybe 2014 we discovered some structural rust we weren't prepared to face, so we parked it.
My Dad also owns a sentimental vehicle or two himself, so he was pretty understanding when I resisted selling it. He probably thought the Valiant would be a gateway drug to the real classics, not realizing I'd still be so attached years later. He's asked gently a few times over the last six years if I might consider letting it go, and finding a new toy to fix up and drive around ("Maybe a 2-door??" he says often). I knew it wasn't practical to keep it, but I couldn't bear the idea of somebody cutting it up. At Watkins Glen in 2019, I asked him what he thought it'd take to get it back on the road. Then the pandemic cost me my apartment, and my job shifted remote, so I'm back at my parents', facing the Valiant every morning when I walk out the door.
Suddenly, I have the time. I hesitate to say the word "restore" (is it considered a restoration if it's a 4-door old ladies drove to church and back?) but I'm a few projects into it and loving the process. I've cleaned the cowl, removed the seats, sanded the rust, rustoleum'd what I can and marked what I need to cut out. There's quite a bit of welding in my future. When I lifted the back bench I even found a long-lost yarmulke, undoubtedly left by one of Irving's nephews or grandchildren.
I'm new to the group but I've already taken advice from a few of your forums. I'm excited to get my big green monster back on the road, and I'm sure I'll be coming to y'all with plenty of questions.
Thanks for having me and the Valiant GT!
aboard Emily!
