Hello from a C-Body / General Mopar Freak from Denmark

Chryslerdude

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Hello fellow C-Dudes :)


I'm new in here.. from Denmark... and I love Fuselage cars, and has done so, for as long as I can remember.

Was born in 1967, so up through the 70'ies, I sucked in all the various elements that made "me". One of my favorite times, was watching American cop/crime-shows and movies on TV.. (ESPECIALLY fond of car chases), and I suppose that it was from this, that I got infected with deep love for US cars. Later this love got more and more specific, about Mopar full size cars.
(and hush hush, I also has me a tiny little weakness for Chargers)

As I grew up, I found out (a little late) that spending less than I earned, would enable me to purchase the cars of my dreams. Back then they (C-Bodies), were still pretty cheap, and since, I haveowned 5 US cars, and the craving seems to increase. Except for two Chargers, these have been Fuselage Chryslers only. I bought my first C-Body in 2003 - A burned out 69300 convertible from Calif, and by "burned out".. I mean that real flames was involved. My love for the car has only faded a little, but it got the nick-name "The Wreck" now..

I will post some pic's for starters, of my first C-Body ("the wreck") as I found it, after tracking it down, and rescuing it in Poland a few years back, after a failed restoration(or)deal.

If anybody want's to hear the whole "Poland story", I will gladly type it on request..! :-D

I am THRILLED to find this site.. All C-Body related picture, and reading material is something I find extremely interesting !

THANKS !

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[FONT=Helvetica, Arial, lucida grande, tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif]Thanks..

I had hoped it would be looking a bit different, after the "full restoration" I paid for.. but I guess it still looks good, even though it's faceless, and quite a bit "ratty" looking, :)
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Welcome aboard ChryslerDude...Always great to hear from our European Mopar brothers!

I know I would love to read about the complete story of "The Wreck". We all love history and stories of these cars, good, bad or other....;)
 
Hi Guys

Thanks a lot for the warm welcome.. I like it here already :)

Due to the time difference, I was on my way to bed (late as usual), when I wrote my introduction, and now.. it's morning, and i have to leave within to long.. So I will have to chop up the story about the wreck in Poland, in a few smaller portions. I hope that's OK ;-)

Here we go:

After I found the car (not yet named ;-), in 2003, and negotiations landed me on a price of 1500 USD, I was ecstatic paid by Western Union.. Completely unsafe, but in that particular regard, the seller was very honest.. so, the car arrived a couple of months later. It turned out within the first few minutes, that the fire had done WAY more damage, than the seller had informed. It was informed, that the fire had started when the fuel line ruptured (electric pump), and sprayed gas all over the engine bay and mechanic.. who them withdraw quickly, knocking a work light hanging from the hood, down onto the engine, which then broke, and ignited the gushing fuel. Anyways, I have included some pic's of the cars condition, upon arrival.. I can't remember his exact words, but I was informed, that a few hoses and wires would have the car back up and running.. :p

Here is is.. "An easy fix"


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I re-wired the whole dash and engine bay (all with the same blue wire, as I couldn't wait. for the colored wires I had ordered, ha ha), and got it running again, only to discover that the motor was busted.. It was supposed to be a fresh rebuilt, but had bent push rods, and damaged valves. It did have a recent, but "half-***" re-build done to it, so it was re-done here for a fortune (the first fortune), and ran PERFECT after that. But the car was generally still pretty trashed.. The fire had melted all plastic and rubber, from the front bumper, and back to the firewall (and a bit beyond too), windshield busted from the heat and paint burnt away completely from most of the right front fender, and hood. Living SO far from any possible donor car, made the restoration seem hopeless. Much more parts were needed, than estimated...

Sorry.. gotta run.. will continue when I get back.. (Maybe even in time for American time "morning reading" ;-)

Thanks for reading this far..!

:-D



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Dishonest people give us "standup" types a bad name in the car hobby. I know it useless to dwell on it now but its a shame you had to get the car under those conditions. Anyhow obviously it was a labor of love which I completely understand. Can't wait to hear the rest of the story (and see more pics?)
 
Welcome from Finland!

I have a '69 300 vert too and I'd love to hear more and see more pics...
 
Welcome to the site from the Motor City! It seems you'll fit in just fine here. You'll need to add yourself to our member map located in the "community" link at the top of the screen.
 
We should all applaud your commitment to bringing this one back to life. Hindsight is always 20/20 but an independent inspection would have helped a lot. Look forward to your updates.
 
Hello again :-D


Sorry for the long wait, but I have been away working all weekend.. :-/ And thanks for even more welcome's.. :) Also from Finland, and Germany.. I have some "C-Body friends" in both countries.. Daniel B. in Germany, and Jarmo (The best looking 300 Hurst I've seen), in Finland.. Maybe you know them ?

I would like to comment a little on the "dishonest part" of my post, that I was probably just as "gullible a buyer", as he was "a dishonest seller", but that said, he DID actually end up cheating me for some cash money, as I asked him to buy and include some of the parts that obviously would need replacement, and I seem to remember something about suddenly no more email communication, despite about 400 USD left of 1000 extra transferred.. but that's PEANUTS compared to what happened later.

Well, I'd better get on with the story about "The adventures of wreck "... :)


Before it was sent of, it had several other nicknames. The first one was probably "The Fire Engine".. This one, partly because it was very, very red at first, and partly because the horn went of by itself sometimes, and probably also because I kept the "burnt look" pretty much untouched...

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...and the last reason, was probably because it caught fire again... twice!

First time, was shortly after "the blue harness" was installed... This was not a real fire, but just smoke and some "finger burns". It was caused by a short, and because the horn relay was totally crazy after the first fire.

(FRIENDLY ADVISE TO ALL PEOPLE RESTORING FIRE DAMAGED CARS... PLEASE DO NOT ONLY REPLACE ALL WIRES, BUT ALSO ALL RELAYS).

Apparently, the horn relay was also damaged in the fire, but I never really thought of replacing it.. It looked OK, it was not my first priority to honk, especially not, as it actually worked fine and honked when asked to, BUT as mentioned above, I noticed that the horn would "self-activate" sometimes... most often at night, around 03.00 - 04:00 in the morning... so I had to get up, and run out to activate the horn button, and/or turn the lights on and off a couple of times, to get it to shut up. Never did I anticipate, what that relay had in store for me next.

One night.. around 3, it went off again.. MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP.. so I got up and ran to the carport as usual.. but today was a bit different... Coz there it was.. not only honking away happily.. BUT now with all lights on.. and I mean ALL.. turn indicators (not flashing, but lit), back-up, interior, dash.. everything with a bulb, was lit up.. and thick white smoke was oozing out from under the dash, and engine compartment... so I jumped in the car, coughing like a madman, burning my fingers while pulling out wires and relays from under the dash, until it finally stopped.

It was cold, and I was only wearing boxer shorts, and since there were very bad light in the carport, I went back to bed.. (to process my smoke inhalation).. but the next morning, I could see, that wires coming to and from the horn relay, were all melted, and subsequently melted OTHER wires in the harness, who then sorted, and melted even more wires, until the whole car lit up, like it was Christmas.

Second time, was a nice summer day, after I completed a left turn, i noticed light smoke, and flames licking up between the hood and windshield.. At this point, I had installed a emergency fuel pump switch (two coiled up wires, tied to the buddy seat bracket, ha ha), so the fire was almost dead, at the time I got the hood up.. but still, the repeated stories of fire, eventually became the name. It turned out, that one of those fuel-filters, with chrome end studs, and a glass cylinder between, had come undone, and leaked fuel out on the motor. When I later tried to tighten this, it turned out that the thread was "bad" in the receiving cap, so it was discarded and replaced with a non-transparent metal one. Hurrah for China parts!

But the "Fire Engine" name was about to change again.. The next name, had something to do with the failed restoration in Poland. From Copenhagen, there is a ferry, sailing to Swinoujscie in Poland.. And as the C-Body is a huge car and the restoration experience went SO wrong, you could almost taste the next name.

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I gotta go do some work, but will return today, and at least get us to Poland.. :-D



PS: I edited my last post a bit, as there were some typos.. and somehow, it also seems like some of my "spaces" between words, disappear when posting..? Strange.. I hope it wont happen again!

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