1970 Swinger Daily Driver

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Robj said:
Finally getting her back together. Been back on the road since Friday. Feels great!
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The more I see the F4 green, the more I like it!! Very nice shot of your car! Would like to see more!
Ben.
 
Here's three phases. How she looked when I brought her home, the way I drove her for awhile and how she looks today back in service as my daily driver. The world is right again.

I tried to make a fast trip into True Value on Saturday and a guy flagged me down on the way in and then another as I was pulling back out. Everybody loves a Dart. The second guy had one when he was younger and asked me to pop the hood. He just wanted to affectionately pat the air cleaner. It was cool.
 

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You know...you go out and buy a brand new shirt. You really like that shirt, so much that you wear it to your friend's house for the weekend BBQ. What always happens to that brand new shirt the first time you wear it? That's right a big BBQ sauce stain right down the front.

Eighty three year old gentleman on oxygen rear-ended me at an intersection in his Chevy just after I left work today. I just sat there for a second thinking, "Are you kidding me!?!?!!!!!" I got out and felt bad for him. Nice man. Said he felt like a big idiot for looking the other way at traffic coming instead of in front where I was sitting waiting for the same traffic. Deployed airbags, shattered windshield. I'm glad he seemed to be OK.

One step forward and three steps back. All my new door weather stripping arrived from Metro today too.
 

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Damn. Glad to hear that everyone seamed all right. Compared to his car, the Dart looks really good. Looks like main damage is the valence and trunk floor? Hows it look around the bumper mounts? Good luck with the repairs.
 
Really lucky, the quarters are untouched. Just have to paint a new valance and the trunk floor. The crossmember behind the valance will have to be replaced too. The bumpers have a very slight wave at the mounting points but you really have to look for it. The inner trunk wall where the bumpers mount looks fine. The body did flex enough for the quarters to tap the rear edge of the doors. Have to start pulling the layers off to really see what it looks like underneath.
 
Yea! That uninsured motorist premium paid off. Got the check to the tune of $3,179 a couple weeks ago. My bumper, valance and cross member all showed up today from AMD. It all looks really good. Now we can begin getting her back together....again.

So far she's been mistaken for a GTO and a Malibu. Hmmmm...for a Chevy town, people around here don't know their GM's very well.
 
Finally getting to take a better look at the damage under the valance.

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My brother in law is my body man and he's been busy with a two month long project. He's coming over this afternoon to take a look and hopefully get to the body work this week. I've got all the parts now. Every time I look at this I still can't believe it was only six days after it came out of painting. My daughter is off to school now so at least I have her car to drive for a few days while the Dart is in the shop.

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We've got my wife's '70 bug project in the garage now beside the Dart. The rain season is due to start any week now. Likely begin disassemble around New Years on it. I've never owned a VW, I've worked on a VW, I rode in a bug one time back in 1985. That's the sum of my experience. Time to get schooled.

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good luck on both projects and keep us imformed. And don't forget the pictures.
 
Trunk floor is done. My brother in law did his magic on it. This is after about half an hour of massaging it with several sizes of wood blocks and a lead hammer. He had a jack and a block of wood under the floor where the open drain hole is. After I left he smoothed it more with a hammer and dolly and put a skim coat over it before primer. I didn't think that crease would ever come out so well.

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Great, just Great! I got a subpoena in the mail today to appear at a court hearing for the old codger who rear ended me in my Swinger. He was driving with no insurance so not sure if that's what it's about. Guess I'm calling the DA's office tomorrow to get some more info. So besides all the hassle of the accident and repairing the car now I have to miss a day of work now too. I thought it was all behind me.

8/14/12 UNSIGNED CITATION
8/14/12 ACCIDENT
9/17/12 ARRAIGNMENT 9/25/12 10:30
DISPO DATE.: 09/25/12
DISPOSITION: NOT GUILTY PLEA
EVENT JUDGE: DOLLARD, JENNIFER V
9/25/12 TIME WAIVED
9/25/12 COURT TRIAL 11/30/12 10:30
9/25/12 ADVISEMENT OF RIGHTS
9/26/12 ASSIGN JUDGE TO CASE
9/26/12 SUBPOENA ISSUED
9/26/12 TRANS CASE TO DA
DISPOSITION: ACCEPTED
 
The repair looks good. I got hit by a guy on my bike and had to drive all the way to Chicago for court i was steamed. I sued for cost and time. I dont know why the local witnesses where not enough and the cops. What do you do. Hope shes back together soon.
 
Yeah, it's listed as:
THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA vs. ..............
Subpoena (Criminal) RE: COURT TRIAL

I'll call.
 
Started with pulling the heater box to refurbish it....Oh look, great access to the wiper pivot seals...and I guess the cluster and both bezels on the dash need freshening up and a new voltage limiter...well, the dash is bare now and I had to paint it some day anyway...and on and on- one thing always leads to another.

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Rim Blow didn't work so previous owner put a horn button on the dash

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This stuff was a lot easier 35 years ago...

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Slowly getting it together. An hour here and an hour there. Changing out the column levers currently.

I dropped the seats off at the upholstery shop yesterday. Counting down the days. Thirty-one until show season officially kicks off here with the biggest one of the season along with it's big Friday night cruise...

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Any updates to your sweet Dart daily driver? I have just bought a 72 that I expect to do the same thing with...... Couple questions:

How does the 318 do as far as gas mileage?

What kind of insurance to you carry? Finding it hard to find someone to insure my car as a daily driver because it is so old. I can get Liability, but that is it.....

Thanks!

Your car is Sweet!!!!!
 
Haney said:
Any updates to your sweet Dart daily driver? I have just bought a 72 that I expect to do the same thing with...... Couple questions:

How does the 318 do as far as gas mileage?

What kind of insurance to you carry? Finding it hard to find someone to insure my car as a daily driver because it is so old. I can get Liability, but that is it.....

Thanks!

Your car is Sweet!!!!!
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Thank you! I'm loving it. She goes to work with me every day and around town on errands.

Yeah, insurance is an issue. I called everyone I could find who offered "guaranteed value" or anything like that. I'm not in the car for a ton of cash. I got it for $2200. My brother-in-law is my body man and we both did the work on it to clean up the body, my neighbor is a painter and gave me a good price and I did everything else with the exception of the seats. I had them reupholstered by a fine local company for $1200. It actually cost me less to do that than to buy a set from Legendary and then have to have them refoamed and installed. Plus I didn't want to be limited to the factory color.

I kept the original dark green carpet. Gertrude had the vinyl floor mats that went up and over the hump front and rear. The carpet was very nice. I installed a dark green headliner and dark green dashcap myself. I replaced the armrests with dark green instead of the original goldish/green. They look really nice as a dark accent against the door panels which are also original. With all the dark green I decided I wanted the seats to be one tone dark green so now the accents you see are actually the lower lighter green panels on the door panels. I've always liked mostly dark interiors. I just think it's richer and sportier and contrasts nicely with the f-4 mid-green paint. Personal preference only.

The front seat is from a '74 Dart that showed up in our local Pick-n-Pull. I liked the high-back bucket style backs on the bench with the fold down armrest. I had the shop reupholster the front and rear matching the factory pattern style of the '74 front.

2200 car
800 paint labor
1800 materials
1200 upholstery
3000 headliner,dash cap, armrests, body and heater box seal and gasket kits, tires, gauges, fuel pump, fuel tank cleaned, alternator, brakes, misc from Pick-n-Pull and other general misc.

I've got about $9k into a very reliable daily driver that's also fun to drive. I couldn't buy a late model used car these days that runs this well and looks this good for anything near that. I was fortunate that the drive train is perfect. It runs great and never burns or uses a drop of oil between changes. When I found this car I truly used up my "once in a lifetime" credit for this life.

The collector car insurance companies will not insure a known DD. I think Hagerty would only give me 3200 miles a year. I will put a little more than double that on it. Long trips we take my wife's car.

I actually got rearended six days after paint by an uninsured motorist but I have that coverage and my company paid me based on a estimate from a local shop.

So it stinks with the insurance and I'd hate to see it wrecked by my own fault but if it's repairable, we'll do it ourselves and if it get's totaled it would hurt but it's not like I'm into it for $25 or $30k and it's paid for.

I get 17 mixed and 22 all highway. I've never driven a tank all in town because we live seven miles out of town on a highway.

We're working on a '70 bug convertible for my wife and that will just be a fun car for her which will qualify for collectors insurance.

Thanks again!
 
Johnny Dart said:
So what did you do with the other steering wheel ?
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It's in a garage cabinet. The plastic is badly cracked and it needs a new rim blow strip switch. I wanted to have a working horn as a daily driver for those idiots backing up without looking.

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Somebody had installed a cheapo horn button on the dash. Ugly, out of reach and of no real use. I wanted to put my extra gauges there anyway and they took care of the three holes for the switch.

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I got the wheel I'm using out of a different Dart at Pick-n-Pull than the one my front seat came out of.
 
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