73' challenger restoration - Dodge Challenger Forum: Challenger & SRT8 Forums

Butcher71793 · #1 (**permalink**) 11-27-2012, 07:00 PM

My name is John, I am 19 years old and back in July I got my very first challenger and also it is the first car I have ever bought. It is a 1973 with a 383... I dont believe there is anything too special about it compared to some ... It has had 95% of the conversion work for it to be a console shifter rather than on the column. I will be doing this build with my dad, and I work + go to college so it is going to take a while but my plan is to have it done in spring

Enough boring you with the details for now, time for some pictures!

Starting with when I brought her home with my dad

Now is when I will start talking about the work getting done on the car.... with pics of course!

First thing I did was go out and pick up a hood that happened to be laying around at a family friends farm

On one of the first days that I actually got to working on the car we decided that getting all the prep work to pull the motor would be a good places to start.

Putting a jack under the transmission. At this point we realized that there was a lot more missing on the car then we originally thought... like the drive shaft!

After that we noticed this little spot... which goes most of the way around the wheel well and at the time we didnt know if it could be saved or not.

Decided to look at that a later day so we continued onto the pulling of the motor.

Almost ripped the linkage off because we thought we already unhooked it

Since how it is seized and we couldnt manage to break it free, At some point in the winter I will be sending it off to a shop to be completely rebuilt this way I know it will be in 100% working order and I wont mess anything up and blow out my oil pan.

Now we just continued with our striping of the car

Butcher71793 · #2 (**permalink**) 11-27-2012, 07:01 PM

A few days later I got onto sanding mainly because it was bugging the hell out of me. At this point in time everything is ready to have the first coat of primer (except the engine bay and rear quarter)

This is why the rear isnt sanded and was needing to be replaced... instead of being a little patch spot for us, the whole thing was bondo... well okay most of it was bondo.

At this point in time my classes and work really started to add up and my dad got sick... so we didnt work on it... but during that time i decided to order some of the parts that we would be needing like the front end rebuild kit and the new quarter.

Here is where things started to get a little scary for me, I just paid $320 bucks (100 was shipping) for this panel.... and I only needed the bottom half! so I had one chance to cut this thing properly.

It worked out great! Not a problem, I then proceeded to flange it and grind some slits into the ends so that we could start test fitting. But you cant test fit without cutting out the old panel soo

The little trimmings that you see are actually gone now, it is all ready to have the rust preventative sprayed in. The panel fits all snugly just needs to be crimped a little and then the welding will begin!

This is how far I have gotten but really that quarter panel is the largest and most time consuming project that will be on this entire car. Most of the things that are left are small but there are a lot of them. The trunk is really good looking, there is one hole near the top that should be able to be filled in with two tacks then just grind them. Weld up the driveshaft that we have for the car, throw down new carpet, new trunk mat, put seat covers on, put on a dash cap, rebuild engine (but some guy will take care of that), get exhaust done (someone will do that too), primer sand primer sand primer sand, paint sand paint sand paint sand

. I believe that will be 90 to 99% of everything that needs to be done. Glad to be on the forum and look to see what you guys have to say!

**RRHemi** · #3 (**permalink**) 11-27-2012, 07:54 PM

Looks like fun! Enjoy!

RTkid · #4 (**permalink**) 11-27-2012, 08:23 PM

Nice car those are my favorite year challengers post progress pics yeah

**GlennW** · #5 (**permalink**) 11-27-2012, 08:33 PM

Hey John, welcome to the forum from Minneapolis. My buddy had a 383 Road Runner back in the day and those engines are just badazz... He had big wide meats on the back and that engine just smoked them both over with no problem at all. Should be a fun project and something to keep for the long term.

Butcher71793 · #6 (**permalink**) 11-28-2012, 08:12 AM

Looks like fun! Enjoy!

Nice car those are my favorite year challengers post progress pics yeah

He had big wide meats on the back and that engine just smoked them both over with no problem at all. Should be a fun project and something to keep for the long term.

It has been a pretty fun project so far! Even if the progress is pretty slow right now...

I will be posting up progressive pictures as we go along, It might be a while in between updates though, the semester is coming to an end, new classes need to be paid for and books so that means no new parts for a bit and cramming for exams so less time to work on the car. Hopefully this weekend or next I can get the quarter at least tacked on!

I plan to just have some moderate sized 15x8's for the back, nothing too beefy like the ones that are on it now. I dont plan to really do more than 1 burnout in this car.... I am on quite the limited budget and getting new tires once is enough for me haha.

I dont think I ever said my intentions with the car... I really plan to use the car as almost a daily driver, I dont *plan* on driving it out in the rain, and I am looking to get my father back into going to car shows where he can drive his barracuda and I can drive my challenger

PatrickY · #7 (**permalink**) 11-28-2012, 08:59 AM

While unrelated to challengers, I restored a 1965 Mustang Coupe last year. we put modern touches on it, some I did not want such as subs in the trunk (worst idea ever) enjoy it, and the time you get to spend with your dad.Thats mostly what I liked about the build

Galvatron · #8 (**permalink**) 11-28-2012, 09:25 AM

Awesome story so far!! I'm glad to see you undertaking this project and I can't wait to see it finished!! Thanks for sharing and good luck!

Butcher71793 · #9 (**permalink**) 11-28-2012, 09:31 AM

Originally Posted by PatrickY

While unrelated to challengers, I restored a 1965 Mustang Coupe last year. we put modern touches on it, some I did not want such as subs in the trunk (worst idea ever) enjoy it, and the time you get to spend with your dad.Thats mostly what I liked about the build

That is the most enjoyable thing on this build so far! I'm not even planing on having speakers in the car

. Not a single mopar that we have had, had a stereo worth listening to, so I actually enjoy the sound of the car much more than drowning it out with music. It's great for when you want time to just think too.

I do have a question for all of the guys who are keeping up on this already, but what modifications do you think I should do to it, I am completely open to ideas and if anything would make it better for an almost daily driver that would be nice to know!

Go Goody · #10 (**permalink**) 11-28-2012, 10:06 AM

An EFI setup for the 383.......Hotchkiss suspension, sways, shocks and springs

My dad has a hard time with a screwdriver.....Keep up the good work