(pics coming) why put a diplomat front suspension in an a body?

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Sedanman

67-9 Valiant specialist
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I found a 68 signet 4dr locally that will surely end up getting scrapped if I don't save it. I went to look at it and have never seen such backwoods engineering. They put the front suspension out of a diplomat in it which is too wide so they welded L shaped brackets to the frame rails to make it work,drilled additional holes right next to the original shock holes,cut and boogered up the trans mount and actually welded it to the trans tunnel and seem to have hammered the driveshaft into the transmission because it won't come out even beating it with a hammer. The engine was equally screwed,the lower end is a 67 solid cam motor and it had hydrolic rockers and some brand X pushrods in it. It's a good thing I saved the front suspension from that 71 dart I cut up and the rest I have leftover from a 67 valiant I parted out. It will be going back to the /6 drivetrain that it came with originally had and put back to driver condition and sold as a driver. I'll post pics when I get it home. I will have to sawzall the trans bracket to get the trans out. The kid I bought it from paid a shop $3900 for this car as is of course
 
Here are a few that i took with my phone on the day I was there.
 

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It's still in real nice shape despite the v8 hack job they did. The lower fenders are bondo'd but the rest of the car is solid and complete. I do have a wiring harness coming for it since the gremlins got into the original one. It also has a decent set of 14" Crager's and tires on it.
 
The body does look straight. Some people should not be allowed to touch tools.
 
I was actually speechless when I saw how bad the hack job was. That has never happened in all my years of buying and selling parts and cars. I have to sawzall the trans mount to get the trans and driveshaft out. They really hammered the shaft into the trans. It's a lockup trans
 
I wish to 'all some of you guys would buy a real camera. I'd like to have seen just what that was
 
hodgepogery. It does have a very clean under body,frames and interior.
 

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FMJ body spindles work tho, thats as far as i would go.

What a freakin hack job. Glad your saving it though
 
I was going to part it out but it has plenty of life left to give someone. I only part out the unsalvageable. The shell and interior are pretty nice as you can see. They did have a 727 in it. I tossed a bunch of stuff out and kept the good stuff. It did have a steel crank. They added the disc brakes to the car using the stock control arms,didn't upgrade the master or prop valve so I'm sceptical. They didn't have the ball joint sleeves avail when he did the swap.
 
They also had to modify the column to firewall bracket because it wouldn't line up.
 

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