68' Dart "The Huntress"

[Serj22]

All my cars have had names. The Dart's name is Huntress, end of story.:glasses7: Well there is a story to it, but it's stupid. lol

Anyway, I picked the car up off Craigslist, and I think I got a decent deal. Body and motor had 83,000ish miles on them and the paint on the exterior was all redone. It looks nice, but the paint job is definitly a 10/10. You've heard of a 20/20 paint job? Ok same thing, except you can get closer and it still looks nice.

Orinally I thought the copper was painted in the interior and engine bay and trunk, since the interior panels were green-I thought the car used to be green. Lo-and-behold. I decoded the fender tag and the car was actually the color it is now, but not two-toned. The white was added later. The interior was ordered in green and also there was a green stripe across the back. Blech. I forgive the original owner and will chock it up to having too much money while high in 1967.

The interior is what I'm really ditching the most of in this project. I'm not looking to restore it fully, more than I want to have fun with it, while driving it. So, let's fastlane to where I'm at now:

This is how I bought her, and after a good washing.

Vomit-Inducing interior:

So I drove her around for a week back and forth to work, every single day and I finally get tired of not having a radio. I removed the plastic trim and see that the metal dash has been destroyed to fit the once great tape deck of the 80's. That deck left the car the minute it hit my driveway, but the hole was still there. So I routed new speaker wire and made a new harness for a new stereo, and widened the hole another 1/8" all the way around, and cut the plastic trim more. I didn't feel bad because someone else had already cut it...

I built 6.5" speaker rings to rest on the upper portion of the kick panels

Mounted and wired my new radio

It plays AM/FM/BLUETOOTH/Mp3, but no CD's so it consumes a little less power, and looks nice and clean. I will be building a custom bezel for it out of ABS to clean up the gap around the radio. It will look almost like it belonged in the car... well - you get the idea.

Then I messed around with the idea of a white dash, so I used some OneSHot paint on there. Looks neat.

I mounted the rings with the speakers, very hidden - and clean

More white painting:

Dash pad is getting replaced eventually so I don't care about it for now...

If you've seen any of my interior restoration sections, you will already know, but I then spry glued a car set cover to the back seat, which looks a lot better than a ripped to hell green floral seat.

It doesn't slide or move or wrinkle either. It is a very good temporary investment.

I did the entire carpet in autozone recycled carpet. I don't recommend that, but it is better than the original ripped to hell stuff. I also found out the floor is in awesome shape - no rust.

I also added peel n seal to the floor for some slight sound deadening.

I'll get a real custom fit carpet later, but this is good enough for now, and not as embarrassing as the old stuff.

After driving with no radio for a while I noticed the car was incredibly quiet, not just because there was no radio... but because it was quiet - the fan on the engine was louder than the exhaust and everything else. When you don't have the correct tools -take it to someone who does. SInce I don't know how to weld, I hit ABC muffler in town.

I explained that the car was dead silent and it felt wrong. He offered to set up some mufflers and see which one I liked. He popped a brand new glass pack out of the box, set it on, and it wasn't loud and obnoxious - just a tiny bit louder than stock... so I had him put it on. He said it was a used muffler, since he "used" it for that three minutes to see if I liked the sound. He welded it on and charged me $85 for the installation and parts, due to it being "used." He was a nice guy. Usually mechanic work around here is $90/hr minimum, and it took him about that long and I got the part for free. It was a good day.

After that I installed an electronic ignition kit and removed the points (I kept them). It got rid of a misfire at idle that caused shaking.

I also cleaned a lot of oil out of the distributor while i was doing it

A lot of stuff seems to leak... which I guess is expected. As you can see the block is red and the head is blue. I'm assuming the head got changed at some point. The valve cover was still red though - and it leaked real bad for some reason. I opened it up and changed the gasket. It did not fix the problem. When I retightened it a second time I noticed it didn't line up to the bolt holes very well. A few dents in it and cracks confirmed it wasn't the right shape anymore - possibly banged around somehow. I found a cheap chrome one, replaced with the same gasket and I have not had it leak yet - though I know it will eventually. At least it didn't happen immediately.

Also in those photos you may be able to tell I repainted the air cleaner. It still has the stock decal though - which I'll change out later. The radiator was replaced by the previous owner and he replaced the 4 bladed fan with a much larger 5 blade fan.

All the while I have been working on a custom center console simply because I wanted a drink holder...

And more will come...

And here's some more pictures just to throw them out there.

 

[Powerslave]

Glad to see your enjoying the site, already done quite a bit to your car. What do you have planned next?

 

[Serj22]

Glad to see your enjoying the site, already done quite a bit to your car. What do you have planned next?

Waiting on a Grant wheel I am having shipped from another member. Next I want to repaint the door panels.I may just strip them and put different fabric though. Wouldn't want to do that if someone needed 4 door green panels, since they are almost perfect, but no one really has 4 doors around or is restoring them.

After that, I will rip the dash pad off, fill in and fix the foam, and re coat that as well. I'm thinking either a solid black vinyl, or sewing in some white accents.

 

[Serj22]

Oh and since it seems like everyone else puts these: My son and daughter like to help me work on the car too. Here's my son About to go cruising to pick up chicks.

 

[Abodybomber]

Cute kid. Clean car,nice work so far.

 

[Serj22]

Cute kid. Clean car,nice work so far.

Poetic rhymes for
haiku for restoration
refrigerator

:glasses7:

 

[Otateral]

Your progress looks a lot like mine when I first started. In all, I love what you're doing. Your paint looks pretty good compared to how mine started. If you've been on the site for long, you know which things to watch our for and what the priorities should be.

Keep that slant though, they're amazing.

 

[Serj22]

I really do want to keep the slant. But I also really like merging onto the freeway and not getting rear ended, so I'm looking for slant upgrades, or maybe a 318 or 360

 

[Idaho]

I like the car, and your creativity.
Cute little grasshopper you have there. Teach him well

 

[Serj22]

Thanks guys.

So, I decided I was not going to go the replacement panel route, or the spraying vinyl dye onto the green panels. I had just enough white vinyl left over from my console to do the front doors. I popped the 270 emblems off, recovered the panels in white vinyl, then popped the emblems and my new armrests back on. I will pull the arm rests back off in the morning to paint the bezels that hold them - probably black. I pulled a nice shape black rear door mount for an arm rest off. It is definitly for the rear seat of a 2 door, because it did not give you a way to actually grab and open. I'll pop that in the for sale section later...

When I pull the arm rest, I'll pop the panel again and stretch the wrinkles

The green is slowly but surely dissapearing.:blob:

 

[Otateral]

Looks nice. Go on youtube and check out slant sixes. There's some with an insane amount of power. Cheaper upgrades would be:

* 2 1/4" exhaust (and a muffler of your choice)
* electronic ignition (There's an HEI conversion article on slant six)
* super six 2bbl intake and carb

That should improve performance quite a bit. But if it's not enough, you can go to Dutra Duals, get some work done on the head, or go the extreme route and put a turbo on there.

 

[Serj22]

Looks nice. Go on youtube and check out slant sixes. There's some with an insane amount of power. Cheaper upgrades would be:

* 2 1/4" exhaust (and a muffler of your choice)
* electronic ignition (There's an HEI conversion article on slant six)
* super six 2bbl intake and carb

That should improve performance quite a bit. But if it's not enough, you can go to Dutra Duals, get some work done on the head, or go the extreme route and put a turbo on there.

Oh I've seen the slant sixes with power. I have been looking for the super six intake and the 2bbl carb for a while, as well as headers, but they seem to dissappear before I get to them.

 

[Serj22]

Got the Grant wheel in today. Pretty nice for a used wheel considering its age. Got a good deal on it too. The problem now is I don't have a wheel puller, and I need one. In the past I've been able to push my feet into the floor, lean out of the seat and pull till it came off and hit me in the crotch in a super hard fashion. That is not the case on this car. You win this time Dart, but I'm off to get a puller.

 

[Serj22]

So I popped the dash panels off again (left the cluster piece) and I am thinking of filling in the holes where the glove box is, thinning the paint off the chrome (naturally) and leaving it white. Then maybe have some kind of small piece of artwork where the glovebox is. I have a friend who's a sign painter and air brush artist. I may call in a favor for something cool. He's been hooking me up with the One Shot paint so far and nice sable brushes which I've been using to do all the painting. If you lay Oneshot (or any paint really) on correctly, it looks sprayed. The DART logo is covered in mask, it's not painted. I got my Grant wheel installed and the old green wheel is up in the for sale section. The radio and heater trim I'm debating cutting it out of my old bezel.

 

[Serj22]

Going to start work or the dash pad tonight. I'm ready for frustration. I've read up on it and I'm ready to do it. I'm going to start by pulling the smallest section to the left of the wheel remove all the green old stuff from it, clean up the foam if needed and wrap some black vinyl .

 

[Idaho]

Never done it but seen it here. With patience and a heat gun you should win.

 

[Serj22]

Never done it but seen it here. With patience and a heat gun you should win.

I've wrapped some complex seats and such with vinyl for boats, as well as trim moulding. I'm hoping it works well with a lot of heat as you say. I didn't wind up pulling any of the dash pads, and instead covered the rear doors with white vinyl to match the front, and painted the lower half of the C pillars White, and then will later paint the interior door metal and the upper C pillars black. I can't decide whether I want satin, or gloss... gloss would match the vinyl on the dash pad better.

 

[Idaho]

For whatever reason I think satin. Plastic painted gloss looks too much like plastic

 

[Serj22]

I thought the interior pillars were metal? Maybe they are plastic. either way, I think you're right about satin. The tops and bottoms of the door panels will be the same color/tone whatever i decide. I thought white would be too much white.

 

[Idaho]

Maybe you're right, I might be thinking of the later pillar trim. I have cars from both eras.

 

[Serj22]

Maybe you're right, I might be thinking of the later pillar trim. I have cars from both eras.

I knocked on it, it feels like metal and sounds like it too. lol. I'll go with that. Looking better with the rear doors in, steering wheel, etc... still waiting on oldmanmopar to sell me a radio bezel off a '70ish dart.

:blob:

Pretty much anything left that's green is going black. Interior is starting to remind me of a stormtrooper and I like that.

 

[Serj22]

Did some more paint work and trim detailing inside, still haven't pulled the dash pad. I took a vacation day from work and took the kids out, since i didn't have a babysitter (it happens) luckily the boss is cool with any family needs, and I got paid for the day. :blob: We went downtown, got some icecream for my daughter, and hung out.

Then we washed and waxed it when we got home... still need to pull that dash pad... it's definitly the next step...

 

[Serj22]

Many months and many things:

I have not yet pulled the dashpad, but I remove speed nuts on it here and there. Most the time I give up laying under the dash and cussing. Having bucket seats helps the process. Hopefully there is only about 2 left and they fall off on their own one day... I'm being patient with it.

I got a later type heater bezel off EBAY, which wound up coming with 2. One is trashy looking, but there, so if anyone wants one... $5?

Where to begin.
The head toasted out on the slant, but being the resourceful cheap person I am, I kept the slant, paid $270 to have a valve job done, brand new lifters, push rods, resurface, etc with gaskets included. Not bad. They even painted the head black for me. Not a color I was opting for, but... I'll take it, and it was free... so...

I put together a super6 setup thanks to members here. The whole setup so far has run about $260. That is with the carb, rebuild kit, air cleaner, super6 sticker, paint, etc. Just missing a way to connect it to the transmission. I may just build something and learn to weld. We'll see.



I put together a "Super Six" stripe, that I created and got an Ebayer to make for me for $40.00. Very nice vinyl and everything. I opted for "DART" to be written on the sides because I have no model badging, and I was tired of being asked what year Chevy it was. I was almost tempted to put "68" on it somewhere, because I still get "what year is it" which is fine... but my favorite reactions so far are the wordless ones where people just give me thumbs up. Weird - but cool.





I put the engine all back together and had a WWII setup in paint going on for a while in the dirty engine bay. Chased down a heating issue, and then replaced the radiator. Voeltagear on the site has been very helpful in giving me step-to-step heat chasing information, and when the fan he sent me pops up, I hope the issue finally goes away. We'll see...



After a while I went a different color route with the motor. All the reds and oranges and gray made it feel too much like a desolate wasteland. It needed color. I took the valve cover off with the nose art, and it is sitting. I think I may give it away on here. Don't know yet.

So I went with a dark blue, almost purple oil by 1Shot. I made it by eye till I was happy, but I mainly used a process blue, and dark red. That was to be the undercoat and also the detailing to help seperate the later colors. I used a lot of sandpaper, and a quick primejob beforehand, and got everything I wanted to be covered later.





With the thinner and all, it still took about 4 hours to paint - entirely with a 1" purdy angle, and a sable.

Then I found a really cool Hammered aluminum finish paint by Rustoleum. I wanted to do a chrome, but opted for this, just for some texture. I definitly like how it turned out. Then I hit some accents (without texture) of L Purple (1SHot) The hammer finish stuff insists you don't thin it, and once you brush it on, it makes sense. The paint coheres and pools together and then forms the "wrinkles" that make the finish. Really cool to watch, but you have to move around. So basically paint one spot, then move to opposite end of engine bay, and keep going like that, because if you brush over the stuff you put down, it lays it out, and you don't want that. It ruins the reaction.







I'm still debating if I want some color to lip up onto the firewall all the way, but I am nervous because I don't want to be able to see the purple or silver between the hood and fenders. I'm thinking i may make a thin black pinstripe up the corners everywhere to keep the color invisible when the hood is shut. It looks like it wants to go up further; and it would be easy to do so....

Next I saw a post on craigslist for a guy selling some 14" white Ford Falcon wheels with the SBP. He wanted $900 for em (ick), and I noted they look exactly like the crappy red ones I already had... so I got rid of the crappy red (brush job?) paint, and primed, and painted them gloss white, and hit the nuts with some white as well when they were mounted. I like the white much better, but don't really want the caps to go back. This was the first time i had them all off at once, and noticed three of them have the triangle emblem like the trunk, and one of them is two traingles pointing downward. They're all the same style though, and I had never noticed one was different. Not sure what to do with them if I don't want em back on. Maybe sell, but they're not a matching set... so...





I'm in the process of making a radiator shroud, and building some fiberglass enclosures for the trunk. One will house tools, and one will house a 12" subwoofer to condense the box that's already in the trunk. After that I am making a L.A.T.C.H. system in the trunk near the crevice of the back seat. For those not familliar, it is a system to use the hooks on carseats as anchors to basically cargo strap your children to the car. It will make me feel better than the poorly adjustable belts back there...

 

[Dartn440]

There is blue one of these nearby I thought of picking up. I have 6 kids, so I know about the car seat hooks. I am no genius, but I am thinking that big auto should have a program to retrofit old rides for free...would encourage a guy like me to keep em on the road. Have fun!

 

[Idaho]

Cool car, very creative.