I want to approach this subject lightly because I don't really want to offend anyone but I figured it would be a good subject.
I have been searching for a really nice driver Mopar lately. I was contacted by someone who had a car on my "list" of cars I would like to have. The photos looked pretty good so I decided to take a day trip. This was about 4.5 hours one way for me.
Within about 30 seconds of viewing the car I asked the seller if it had a driver frame rail recently installed.... he paused and said yes I put one in. I said the apron too? Yes.
I went to the back of the car and said so this car had a back panel installed right? Yes. And a passenger quarter panel? Yes. Then I said and this car was hit right? Like in an accident? Ummm... Yes.
So then I moved back to the engine bay and said who made the fender tag? Pause... Galen... I said do you have a build sheet to verify this? No.
So I did check the vin on the dash, that did match the radiator support. I didn't check close enough to see if this support was changed over with the rail and apron.... and I didn't check the vin in the trunk area.... but for some reason I just had a pretty strong suspicion that this car was potentially vin swapped.
I was pretty bummed when I left that I wasted so much time on a car that was just hacked together. Plug welds were not even complete. You could see this in all the areas that were worked on. Now I do body work and paint work for a living so I do know what I'm looking for. I feel like the average Joe might get taken because of some shiny paint and fluff....
One of the topics I'm really most concerned about is how unsafe this car really would be in a Collison and how the average Joe really shouldn't be doing this type of work on a car.... but they get away with it or just don't even know how bad of work they really are doing.
My other concern is this person appeared to really be a Mopar guy... but the entire process seemed really deceptive and unlike what I feel most Mopar folks are like.
What are your thoughts?
I have been searching for a really nice driver Mopar lately. I was contacted by someone who had a car on my "list" of cars I would like to have. The photos looked pretty good so I decided to take a day trip. This was about 4.5 hours one way for me.
Within about 30 seconds of viewing the car I asked the seller if it had a driver frame rail recently installed.... he paused and said yes I put one in. I said the apron too? Yes.
I went to the back of the car and said so this car had a back panel installed right? Yes. And a passenger quarter panel? Yes. Then I said and this car was hit right? Like in an accident? Ummm... Yes.
So then I moved back to the engine bay and said who made the fender tag? Pause... Galen... I said do you have a build sheet to verify this? No.
So I did check the vin on the dash, that did match the radiator support. I didn't check close enough to see if this support was changed over with the rail and apron.... and I didn't check the vin in the trunk area.... but for some reason I just had a pretty strong suspicion that this car was potentially vin swapped.
I was pretty bummed when I left that I wasted so much time on a car that was just hacked together. Plug welds were not even complete. You could see this in all the areas that were worked on. Now I do body work and paint work for a living so I do know what I'm looking for. I feel like the average Joe might get taken because of some shiny paint and fluff....
One of the topics I'm really most concerned about is how unsafe this car really would be in a Collison and how the average Joe really shouldn't be doing this type of work on a car.... but they get away with it or just don't even know how bad of work they really are doing.
My other concern is this person appeared to really be a Mopar guy... but the entire process seemed really deceptive and unlike what I feel most Mopar folks are like.
What are your thoughts?
