Once you get the brakes rebuilt, you'll have a nice foundation to start with. That slant 6 you have is a great engine, and once cleaned up & tuned will last a long time.
Yes, should be hardlines all the way. Probably was a manual and they put in an automatic. I did that on one of my Dusters as well. The manual the car was born with was worn out, and I was on a budget, so traded a guy who owned a boneyard some parts for a used 904 transmission, linkages & cooler lines. Went to the local transmission parts house and bought a torque converter and rebuild kit. A few days later I had a running rebuilt transmission that I put a ton of miles on as my family car. Now you can pull the floor shifter that is in there and replace it with one that would look nice. Sounds like a nice project car!
Monkey's is the correct term. I cannot tell you how frustrating it was to run boneyards looking for parts only to find someone had cut wires and ruined a harness & cut tubing to ruin cooler lines. Some don't care how they get a job done, but want it done as fast as possible and with the least trouble. Problem is, we who care about our cars must deal with the long term aftermath.
