74 Gold Duster (WIP)

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Sully1190

Sully1190

Look. It's a Gold Duster.
Joined
Oct 24, 2011
Messages
504
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Location
Clinton, MS
This is my first project in restoring a car. Except for that time when I was young and bought that 77 Midget. I've been getting a lot of help from my Father. And by alot of help, I mean I just hand him the tools he needs and try to glean as much information as I can. My younger brother's been... "helping" as well. Basically, he wanted to be the camera man. His work can be seen in this album here-> http://s265.photobucket.com/albums/ii218/Ian_Nelson_101/DusterRestoration/#!cpZZ1QQtppZZ32.

However, since he took pictures of alot of completely irrelevant things while he was bored, I took some of the highlights out to show.

First, a little history. I saw this car down near Biloxi when me and my family went to Cruise the Coast this year. Me and my wife had been looking for a car, so we drove back down, bought it, and were going to drive it back. Sadly, it only made it about 2 of the requisite 4 hours home, and we had to leave it at a motorcycle dealership in Hattiesburg and go back for it later on a trailer. After much ghost-chasing, we found out that the computer had burnt up (as a result of some tom-foolery in the wiring, implemented by the previous owner). Now it's all fixed and running once more. Body work's almost completely done, and hope to get it painted this weekend. Just gotta remove the stripes and smooth up a spot or two a bit more. For those curious, I think we're going with the black, half vinyl top, and plum crazy purple paint. Stripes aren't concrete yet, but we do know we want some. That may have to wait a bit though. Interior needs a little work, and I would REALLY like some new tires/rims for it. But, one step at a time. Here's some pics.

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Looks like a good start. How far are you going with it? Stock,modified? Paint sounds good.:coffee2:
 
It's going to be our daily driver. Probably mostly stock, but it's not going to be a show car by any means, so we're not worried about keeping it 100% factory either. Basically, whatever tickles our fancy ha.
 
cool! i'd recommend a few things.

as a daily driver, if you want to extend the life and save money in the long run and keep her going for years.

1. keep the coolant clean and dont use tap water at all. use prestone or your favorite brand + distilled water. you can get it at pharmacies in gallon jugs and sometimes at grocery stores. make sure the hoses aren't iffy and if you do blow a hose turn it off before it overheats. as long as you dont overheat it the slant 6's last a long time.

2. same with the oil... keep it clean, i would not recommend any "miracle addatives"... use a good brand of oil and keep it changed regularly.

3. i'm guessing it's an auto trans... if that is the case have the filter changed / new gasket and make sure the fluid is clean. this will extend the life by years; if it's a manual trans the same thing, but there is no filter. your rear could probably use new lube as well. but i would say auto trans filter/fluid would be a priority over the rear diff.

4. check the wiring closely (it sounds like you have been into it already haha). if you see any that look like they are about to break, then change the wires out before it happens. that way it doesnt happen at night or something while you are on the way to see a movie or whatever.

great car, and good luck! :D
 
What, you don't like that nice Cream Gold paint?

Lol..not many people do and you can't get any parts for that interior.

It's gonna look good...
 
Thanks for the suggestions Moparlover.

And TylerW, I actually was 100% restoring it, as it was. Snake-skin print vinyl top and everything. However, my wife wasn't very fond of that idea, and we are trying to make this a car we both like, haha. So, we decided that we both really like the purple scheme. Who knows, though. That could change before we get it painted as well.

Interior parts for the duster DO seem very hard to come by.


EDIT: Forgot to mention, durr, that we worked on it all weeked. Got one side's stripe removed, but it still needs alot of sanding and some solvent to remove the glue. A little body work done on the left-front, right behind the wheel well, where there had been a dent. And, finally, we ripped the whole vinyl top off. It actually came alot easier than I expected. Was pretty nasty in the crease under the chrome around the front window though. Still cleaning that all out. Did some bondo work on the place where the roof connects to the front pillars.

EDIT II: And pictures will be up probably tomorrow! Camera man is out of town.
 
I vote fire the camera man. How can you move forward without pics? Purple? I like. What did I miss?:coffee2:
 
Thunder said:
I vote fire the camera man. How can you move forward without pics? Purple? I like. What did I miss?:coffee2:
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If I knew how to work the camera, I would ha. And yeah. Going for the Plum Crazy, I think. Not original for that year, but hey. It'll be alright.

19GoldDuster74 said:
Nice! What does your interior look like. Your car looks almost identical to mine except it came with white stripes, and a 318.
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Interior is a dark tannish color. Not quite brown though. Front seat has some splits. Plastic pieces outlining the head-liner are old and crumbling. Small splits in the corner of the dash. Carpets been taken out for just a rubber lining. Not too bad. Drivable. But it'll definitely be replaced with black when we get the money. Until then, I guess we'll be rockin the peanut butter and jelly look.
 
Plum Crazy will look good. As far as the P.B. and J. Make sure you use bread, other wise people will think your a little kinky.:coffee2:
 
Side stripes completely removed, nearly all body work done. After this round of priming and sanding, I'll see if I need to hit any more small spots with the spot putty, but everything major is finished.

Painted the grill today with some Krylon Nickel colored spray. It actually looks /really/ good.

We've completely removed the Vinyl top, cleaned up the rust underneath it, sanded off the little nob thingies that held on the chrome piece, filled the screw holes, and discovered more dents as we were sanding off the glue residue. I'm telling you, this girl had a colorful life XD The more we work on it, the more body damage we find and fix. But either way, it's been super fun, and is almost done. (Body wise)

We're also painting it ourselves now. Black.

Pics soon I SWEAR. As soon as I can make my brother upload them all.
 
Glad to hear you've made some progress. Waiting patiently for the pics.:coffee2:
 
Since those pictures, the car has been primed and sanded again. Tons more spot putty gone through. The whole body has these random blemishes on it that we keep finding, where the metal is just slightly lumpy, in places it would make NO sense to have had a collision with anything. They aren't dented in, either, most of the time. They stick out just ever so slightly. My Dad's wondering if that's not just how it came from the factory. It's about to have to be "good enough."
 
Some camera phone pictures that are more up to date. I'll be ordering paint today. Hopefully before close of business.

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I'll be ordering some high pile primer and gloss black paint.



Anybody have an opinion on how hard it is to apply stripes by one's self? I'd like them to be perfect, but I'm also cheap...
 
The primer you see on it there is Krylon sandable spray can. However, we just used it for, well... sanding. We hand-sanded the whole thing again after that. The primer and paint we'll be using are urethane. The primer is the thick, filler kind. The paint is single-stage.
 
Great work, you are making huge progress! My 1st car was a 74 duster with fold down back seat and fold down trunk divider.../6 buckets console too!!
 
I thought it was that make sure you sand all that off. Nothing good comes from primer In a rattle from my experience of aircraft and automotive painting. It looks good though keep up the good work.
 
Love the duster,like to have one,I do have a 73 swinger.Might be a little off topic, but haft to say man you have one nice collection of whitetails hanging in the back ground.
 
Great progress Sully. Looks like you've got a good handle on things. As for your question on the stripes, an extra set of hands would make it easier. As long as you don't rush the job you should come out good. Looking forward to paint.:coffee2:
 
4spdragtop said:
Great work, you are making huge progress! My 1st car was a 74 duster with fold down back seat and fold down trunk divider.../6 buckets console too!!
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Nice. I think I'm actually going to keep the front bench seat over buckets. Every car has buckets now. Plus, this way I can make the wife sit closer ;)

kaharshs said:
I thought it was that make sure you sand all that off. Nothing good comes from primer In a rattle from my experience of aircraft and automotive painting. It looks good though keep up the good work.
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We'd have to start completely over to get all of this primer off now :|

However... I guess if you're going to do something, might as well do it right.

What kind of problems are we talking about here?
challenger7four said:
Love the duster,like to have one,I do have a 73 swinger.Might be a little off topic, but haft to say man you have one nice collection of whitetails hanging in the back ground.
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Shoot me a link to your 73's thread!

Also, unfortunately, those aren't my, or my father's deer xp We're working on the car in my father's boss's shop. They're friends of the family. And those are the ones he doesn't care about keeping in the house.

Thunder said:
Great progress Sully. Looks like you've got a good handle on things. As for your question on the stripes, an extra set of hands would make it easier. As long as you don't rush the job you should come out good. Looking forward to paint.:coffee2:
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Thanks. So am I. There might be a slight delay on that paint though, as we shuffle money around. Rent and food comes first haha.
 
Ah. peanut butter and jelly again. Understandable. Will be standing by.:coffee2:
 
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