My two regrets......
1985 I was serving in the Army stationed at Ft Bliss next to El Paso. During this same time I was drag racing my 72 Rally Challenger on a regular basis. I had a 69 440 engine in a machine shop getting machine work as I could afford it.
My room mate in the barracks said "Hey Sarge, check out this add in the paper!"l looked at the ad which stated :71 Dodge Challenger, doesn't run, asking $800.I never called to check on it because I didn't have the money, and what I did have was going to pay the machine shop.
Fast forward 3 months.......My Challenger was up and running again with a fresh 440, so I was now looking for rust free body panels, since my car had some rust issues. So my barracks gear head room mate was with me driving through the desert looking for a new junkyard to scrounge through. We had heard rumors of one just across the state line in New Mexico.
We are getting closer to the yard and as I'm pulling into it I can see the rear end of a Challenger that has been flipped over on its roof. I get out of my Challenger and run over to the car to check it out. The hood, K frame, engine, transmission and rear end are all gone. The body is beat up pretty badly and the only panels that are straight is the front passenger side fender and the trunk lid, which still has the pedestal mounts for a "Go-Wing" spoiler on it. The car has a sun roof and power windows. The original color was "Top Banana" yellow, but had been repainted in a gold color. The car still had the rally dash, flip top gas cap and quarter panel side scoops........
So I talk to the owner of the yard and ask him about the car.....He said "I put an ad in the paper 3 months ago for this car and not the first person even called me about it."
So I asked him why the body was so beat up. He replied, "Well, I have a demolition derby car station wagon and I wanted to try it out before I took it to the track. It's holding up pretty good. See what it did to this car don't ya?"
So then I asked the final question...... "So what happened to the hood and drive train?"He replied, "Just 2 weeks ago a man came down from Albuquerque and saw it and just had to have it, so I sold it to him for $500. Then since the car was just a shell I decided to use it for practice with my demolition derby car."
He really had my attention now so I asked him to describe the above mentioned parts. So he told me this:"We'll the hood had a great big hole in it when you opened it up. The air cleaner stayed on the carbs, sort of like one of those Smoky and the Bandit cars. The valve covers were wide and fat and black. The funny thing is the spark plugs looked to be real easy to change. They were sitting right there in the valve covers, plain as day."
So I crawled in the car and read the VIN tag, because now I was feeling sick....Yep... It read JS23R1BXXXXXXX
So I really scooted the pooch on this one... I had a chance to buy a 71 HEMI Challenger with an automatic, sun roof and Shaker hood.
It was probably a one of one car produced deal and I really missed my chance. Oh well.
I ended up buying the rally dash instruments, trunk lid and passenger side front fender.I wish I was making this up.... True story
Then later that same year my platoon Sgt offered me his 6000 mile survivor 69 Camaro at a dollar a mile on the odometer. There was no way I could afford it, but I went to look at it anyhow.It was a blue 427 Yenko four speed car.......
yep. Need a time machine, but things were different back then. No money and no place to properly restore or preserve these cars.....
