Kevin's JS23U0B Project

[7E-Bodies]

Greetings all. It's high time I get started on a restoration thread here and share some of what's been going on (or not going on).
On 7/1/2018 it was around 100 degrees in Cleveland Ohio where I drove from Peoria, IL with a borrowed 24' car hauler trailer in tow on my 2012 Ram half ton that was about to get the workout of a lifetime in the 1,000 mile round trip to "possibly" grab a very sheltered 70 Challenger RT (JS23UOB) numbers matching 64k mile project that had been skillfully disassembled in an impressively organized manner by an older Mopar enthusiast years prior. He had simply grown tired and had found the greater calling of chasing his grandkids around the country in their travel ball. Shoe-horned into his garage next to a show ready 68 Duster with a gen 3 hemi, he (and his stern, eager wife) was ready to gain room in his shop. With a deal already struck out over several phone calls and photo exchanges, and the typical "polite threats" of "please don't make me drive all that way and find out this thing isn't what you say it is". He assured it was all of that and more, and I have no complaints, regardless of the inevitable and expected small surprises that came along. Upon his opening the door of his garage, I fought to maintain the poker face. I was amazed at the solid and spotless undercarriage, the body panel integrity and the total lack of rust. It wasn't long and we were loading what was about to come close to being too much for my truck to handle. The sheer amount of spare parts alone was both exciting and daunting. This included two shaker hoods (one without crumple points, trim rings, bubble and base plate, that he hadn't included in the deal. His wife, arms crossed, simply told him "it all goes, the hording ends". The original F8 "hounds tooth" interior was perfect other than a split seam in the 6 way driver seat. The dash pad with only two minor cracks, carpet fair, panels and console superb, even headliner was nice. The grill and exterior trim nearly perfect, definitely restorable. All original glass was very nice minus wiper scratches in the original windshield.
Once the numbers were verified on the engine, 727 transmission, dash VIN, door, cowl, radiator support, title and build sheet, we loaded it all onto the trailer with the hoods in the truck bed and zero room to spare, almost all body panels bolted on and interior bolted in for transport, trunk full of everything that fit, we exchanged title and funds and I was on my way with a half inch to spare between my rear tires and quarter panels lips.
About 100 miles into the trip home, people passing us taking pics, thumbs up, honks, fist pumps and truckers hitting the air horns in recognizing what I had just scored, the sky started to darken. My amazing copilot, my then 15 year old son with phone in hand said "dad, this doesn't look good...red cell on a collision course with us that shows hail". This sarcophagus that hadn't seen precipitation in 30 years was about to get pulled through a hailstorm. The only overpass that I could pray to get under had already been stolen, by a &$*king PRIUS! The drowning was biblical and fortunately the rather loud hail was pea sized and didn't leave a mark on the car or truck and we had another 400 miles of heat and drying to go. At 3:30 am on a work night, we backed the load into my shop with little or no incident. I'd unload it in the days to follow.
I'll toss in some of the photos of the seller's stash as well as the drop off in my shop. I'll be adding to this thread as time allows and sharing the adventures. Any and all questions and requests will be addressed. The list of those here that have helped me along the way is sadly too large to remember. My gratitude is off the scale.

[CudaMoparRay]

Definitely keeping an eye on this, good luck with your project. 

[7E-Bodies]

 

[7E-Bodies]

Some Documentation including a shout out to Barry Washington for supplying some old car club docs from it's younger years. Too bad I couldn't track down the people named on them. Also, a side note...The seller provided me with the build sheet he'd found in the rear seat, but after organizing all of my parts in the days that followed the trip back, I got curious and removed the back of the driver seat and BINGO! Another sheet! Photo's show the exact way it was found. They are now both backed up on high density scans and the originals are in the fireproof safe.

[7E-Bodies]

Getting started by removing the glue from the old vinyl top and with a ton of help from @6bblgt and several others, I got the new top ordered and it arrived a few months later for a mere $800 
I then began on removing the two piece trunk pan the previous owner had admitted to installing and put in the new AMD one piece sent to my by @MoparDave. Slowly, the project began to make it's way into permanence in my shop and I became addicted to it.

[7E-Bodies]

 

[Cuda Cody]

This will be a fun thread!      

[7E-Bodies]

The other realization was that the original quarters had been patched in the 80's with 80's methods. I chose to replace them completely to the sail panel joints to make sure they were right. Again, @MoparDave had me the new AMD panels in no time at all and zero shipping damages. I removed the tail panel for easy access in placing the trunk pan. I'm glad I did it that way because there was some tiny rust issues where the tail panel met the trunk pan that was easily welded up and ground smooth. This also allowed the entire tail panel to be taken to bare metal, inside and out. Of course weld thru primer on all adjoining contact points prior to plug welds, then epoxy.

[7E-Bodies]

I needed that. Didn't want to be a pest, but a few have asked me to journal the restoration here. It may take a while.

[7E-Bodies]

Had fun checking out all of the numbers...sorry about the ones that are cut off, I had started out a bit guarded of showing the full VIN, but then realized there was little reason for it.

[7E-Bodies]

I've made it a habit to utilize every opportunity when something is removed, to make sure everything is protected. Here is a glance down the rear frame rails after removal of the old trunk pan. I then stripped scale rust for hours, then coated with 3M undercoating before using weld thru on the contact surfaces in prep for plug welding the new pan in. I'm Sure if the factory had done this, the hobby might be a little cheaper and maybe a lot more of these cars would still exist.

[7E-Bodies]

Chose to repurpose and remanufacture an old rack into a dash assembly/inspection cart and put to use a tavern's old shuffleboard top that was going to get burnt. Hoping the car turns out this good 

[7E-Bodies]

 

For the record, the previous owner had the clock rebuilt to quartz. I haven't tested it yet

[7E-Bodies]

This was the phase of getting rarer brake parts restored and ready (sealed with epoxy, will later coat in the proper black that I got from @RestoRick and he's been a huge help with undercoating as well. I'll also credit Brad at Brake Warehouse in Minneapolis for some amazing resto work.

[Floyd]

Looking great!  Did Brake & Equipment Warehouse restore your proportioning valve too?