1962 Plymouth Belvedere "Jackpot"

[Bbodee]

So it's time to get a build thread going on my 62 Plymouth...I am also starting another build thread on the "Gasser Hotrods" forum...here:
http://www.gasserhotrods.com/forum/showthread.php?580-1962-Plymouth-Belvedere-quot-Jackpot-quot

What I am building here is maybe a gasser "style" car? A "straight-axle hot rod", "nostalgia drag car", "street freak"....whatever you want to call it. I'm not into naming a genre my car is "supposed" to fit into and building it to suit. When it is done it will speak for itself.

Anyway, what I am trying to build is a bad-*** hot rod...Something fun! Something that is going to make you smile just looking at - then maybe your smile cracks your face in half when you actually drive it! Something I may have built in the mid-sixties had I been around to do it. There are elements of old school Mopar super stock, street machine, and gasser influences thrown in there. The idea is to have it look period correct as much as possible, but with some leeway given to safety and driveability. Some things like brakes and fuel system are just too important go for me to go really "old school" on.

Thanks for listening so far...

 

[Bbodee]

I am going to start with a bit of history of the car...

Maybe 1991-92 or so...I saw this very car sitting in a parking lot in Daly City, CA. White with red interior - really nice condition. An old man's reading glasses and a cane sitting on the front seat, no joke.....I HAD to have it. I left a note on the windshield expressing my desire to purchase the car and then pretty much forgot about it.

About three years later,I get a phone call... "this is ..(can't remember the name), want to buy the Plymouth?"

At first I don't know what the hell he is talking about, since I am a Mopar nut gearhead, I must have looked at a dozen Plymouth's or more since then. So I figure it out, run over there with cash in hand, and make it mine.

First order of business was to rip out the old moldy carpet and the broken bench seat. It was originally a slant six car, but I set out to swap in a big block 383 - tracked down a big block pushbutton transmission, ditched the power steering, etc....

So here are a couple pictures of that FIRST restoration in progress, around 1995-1996 or so?? (sorry for the crummy scanned pictures)

 

[Bbodee]

A couple more:

 

[kdtjb]

Nice work, can't wait to see your progress.

 

[Bbodee]

So after the big block swap, there was still seat covers, paint, etc to be done. (the buckets and rear seat were from a 1965 Coronet 500 that I had)

Most if not all the mechanical work was redone, and in great shape. The car ran and drove great. But that paint....Ugh.. There were some rust issues, the cowl had some perforation into the drivers compartment and door jambs, and there were rusty lower corners by the front and rear glass. There were rusty bubbles beginning to come through the lower quarters on both sides. I located a replacement trunk because the lip had started to rot.

The body of the car was a ticking time bomb, but I didn't have the ability or money to fix it yet. I drove the car like this for a few years. I just enjoyed the fine running Mopar that looked a bit run down from the outside.

Anyway, drove it like this until Early 2003

 

[Bbodee]

So in 2003, for various reasons I had to get rid of the car....But the fortunate part is that I sold it to a friend, so that it stayed “in the family”. I wasn’t saying goodbye to it forever, hopefully. When my friend took the car, he had big plans to fix the rust damage (which was advancing as every year passed) get the paint done, and recover all the seats.

So this car sat, in his warehouse, In San Francisco (salty air) Ouch! This car sat there for seven years. Although he had good intentions going in, we all know that doesn’t always work out. I had asked him many times if he would consider selling me the car back, I was ready to tear into it if he wasn’t going to. So finally, a couple years ago he sold the car back to me, and I bought it sight unseen. I was HOPING the condition hadn’t worsened too much over the years.

Boy was I wrong! The cancer got this car something bad. Here are some HEARTBREAKING pictures of when I went to pick the car up from storage...What the hell happened?!?!

 

[Rolling Thunder]

Whats in that roll of carpet thats leaving the stains?....dead body?

 

[Bbodee]

Whats in that roll of carpet thats leaving the stains?....dead body?

LOL! Several dead bodies probably. I never bothered to look

 

[HitIt]

Finally!!! Looks good Craig. You rescued that car from certain demise.

 

[Joe Mopar]

Enough with the suspense already. Have any recent pics. ?

 

[HitIt]

Oh he's got pics. Joe- this is my brother Craig & he's made a ton of progress and done lots and lots of work.

 

[Bbodee]

Thanks Jeff! Yeah lots of photos to come, I have a couple years work to post here to make this thread current....I will try to post a bit each day until I catch up.

Here are some pictures of the car coming home and unfortunately lots of (Uuugghh) RUST DAMAGE

KIDS LOVE OLD CARS!!!

 

[Bbodee]

As you can see, the rust repair was going to be a MAJOR project. This was just the cowl/firewall. The window corners front and rear, and the quarter panels had their share of damage as well:

Notice the hole THROUGH the cowl panel AND firewall?

 

[Bbodee]

 

[poly1963]

cool car

been down that road cowl rust ugh

 

[Bbodee]

So the next thing on this project is getting the rust all cut out, making patches, and getting the sheetmetal all back together. The cowl area was especially tricky because there was the firewall plus an upper and lower cowl panel that covers the firewall. These three parts were all badly damaged and welded together with spot welds. They had to be cut apart and pieced back together with a variety of new patches in each.

It was like the worst jigsaw puzzle ever!

 

[Bbodee]

So bit by bit the firewall got back together, then some of the outer cowl panels:

 

[northerndave]

Nice work!

 

[Sonny Black]

love '62 '63 '64 belvedere's......so this tread is great!
looks like you are doing a great job

sonny

 

[Bbodee]

Now we we are getting somewhere - all of the cowl is pinned back together, the welds are smoothed out and the bare metal is etched. Frame connectors, cage, and straight axle swap are coming next! Stay tuned!