Y’know the Doppler Effect: it causes the sound pitch of cars and horns and sirens and suchlike to seem lower as they pass and move away from you at speed. It has nothing to do with today’s stories. Instead, they pivot on the Dopeler Effect, which causes dumb ideas to seem smarter as they approach you at speed. Both effects are relative; they depend on the observer’s frame of reference relative to the sound (Doppler) or idea (Dopeler).
In Autumn 2003 I spotted an absolute honey of a 1994 Spirit R/T on an automotive classified-ads website. Just about 40,000 miles on it, all original, belonged to a banker’s wife. Intercooled turbocharged 2.5-litre engine, automatic transaxle, 4-wheel disc brakes with ABS, 15″ alloy wheels, power locks-windows-mirrors-heated seats-antenna, sunroof, tan leather interior, perfect inside and out, and an affordable asking price. It seemed like almost the perfect AA-body; very near to exactly what I wanted, minus only cruise control and that deep metallic green paint they offered.
Problem: that classifieds site was autos.yahoo.com.mx, and the car was a Chrysler Spirit R/T in La Paz, Baja California Sur—over 5,300 kilometres and two international borders away from my home in Toronto. Oh, and it was 16 years too new to be legally imported into the States and six years too new for Canada. Still, it made my teeth itch so much I started running mind-movies of cockamamie schemes to get it in. I was emailing with the seller (using whatever came before Google Translate…oh yeah, that’s another thing: I can’t speak Spanish) and he proposed I fly in, have a lovely vacation there in La Paz and then drive the car home.
That is: drive the car 1,400 dangerous kilometres as an illiterate foreigner who doesn’t speak the language before I even get to the United States border, convince the US border guards I’m not trying to import the car to the states, but rather to Canada, cross the states diagonally, then convince the Canadian border guards to let the car in. Oh, gee, is that all?
Truly harebrained thoughts were inspired by late-production early-type Beetles and Minis and such brought in via subterfuge—or maybe even less than that; after all, I knew there was at least one other Mexican Chrysler Spirit in daily use with regular US licence plates. But false declaration is a profoundly stupid idea, just like all other kinds of lying to border guards. This is the likely outcome for an illegal car (and it’s likely what the would-be importer, in very deep doo-doo, wishes were their own fate):
Even if one manages to sneak a car across the border that isn’t meant to cross, it can still be seized (and destroyed, with the deep doo-doo and all the rest) at any time afterward. So: no. Okeh, how about importing it legally? It was potentially possible, theoretically. All I’d have to do is contract with DOT-registered and EPA-certified importers, put up a hefty bond, pay and wait for the importers to take apart the car and tabulate the construction and equipment differences to the equivalent US model, wait and pay for them to petition NHTSA to be permitted to modify the car to comply with US safety standards, wait and pay for them to do a three-day-long, multi-thousand-dollar series of emissions certification tests, then if NHTSA said yes wait and pay for the importers to do the modifications, wait for NHTSA to accept the documented modifications and for EPA to accept the results of the certification test, purchase costly import insurance, and…yeah…no. Even if that were successful, it would only get the car into the states; the only cars not built to Canadian standards that can be imported to Canada are substantially identical US models requiring only trivial modifications—all others are frozen out until they are 15 years old.
So I had to give up on that ’94 Spirit R/T. But its existence, and that of the illegal-alien ’92 (linked above), sparked another idea which in comparison—here’s that relative frame of observation I mentioned—seemed entirely sound, sane, reasonable, and feasible: build one! Start with a perfectly functional, intact automobile, take it apart for no good reason, and put it back together with a whole bunch of different parts. It’ll be great; all the parts will certainly go together with no difficulty, the resultant assembly will be a car even more perfectly functional and intact than before, and the project surely won’t take much time or money. A surefire plan, really; why, what could possibly go wrong?
This idea was juiced along by my recollection of riding in “Killer”, Hemi Andersen’s decidedly non-stock 1981 Aries, when I’d been there with D’Valiant some years before. He built that car up with goodies from a variety of later-year K-derivatives. It had a snappy turbo 2.5 motor in it, an A413 Torqueflite that shifted nicely, good brakes and wheels and suspension and on and on. Lots of fun. I wanted a Hemi-built car, too!
I found a Silver ’92 (American Dodge) Spirit R/T and thought to use the proceeds from selling its monster 16-valve motor and 5-speed transaxle to finance a swap-in of an 8-valve engine only somewhat less fun and a lot more dependable. That fell through; I think the car sold before I made up my mind. But not long after, I found a white ’92 Spirit ES with the Mitsubishi 3.0 V6 and A604 automatic. Aha! Hemi tried to discourage me: So you don’t apparently want to use the engine presently in the car. It seems a shame to make such a swap. But he did have a 2.5 turbo engine built up and on a stand…!
By the extremely eventual end of the project, he and I both wound up wishing he’d refused harder and I’d listened better. But we didn’t, so I bought that 58k-mile ’92 ES remotely—that was to be the first similarity with my at-the-time-still-ongoing-but-not-really Volvo 164 restification.
The first week in April 2004 I flew down to North Carolina and made my way to Yadkinville (YAD·g’n·Vee·y’l). It was a nice one-owner car. White outside, –grey– light quartz inside. Power everything except seats. Stopped in at a DMV office and bought a ten-day trip permit, pointed the car west, and drove it 4,400 km out to California. Longest stretch was day two: I left Tennessee in the morning and drove through Arkansas, Oklahoma, the Texas Panhandle, and into New Mexico. Two time zones and 13.5 real hours later, I’d done 1,700 km through sun, rain, wind and snow. Probably the day after that I made it to Ventura. The car ran smoothly and dependably. No breakdowns, no tickets, and 28 miles per US gallon (8.4 l/100km) overall. I could’ve done very well by visiting with Hemi for a few days, having some relatively minor, cost-effective improvements done on the car, then driving back across the continent to Toronto. But as I say, I wasn’t very good at listening to the world outside my head back then. So I left the car with Hemi and flew back to Toronto.
Hemi called to make sure I made it home OK. He’d put the car up on the lift and found a core plug that was soon to let go, and a broken tubular rear sway bar in the rear trailing arm—this happened to a lot of the K-derivative cars. Oh well, no big deal; a solid rear sway bar was on the shopping list, anyhow. Speaking of the shopping list, here’s an email I sent to Hemi in 2004:
Hi, Hemi.
I’m going to try to do this alphabetically, because I figure that’s my best chance of not leaving stuff off the list, but I probably still will.
A/C condenser: Existing
A/C compressor: Sanden (you supply)
A/C expansion valve: Existing or new per your experience in changing to R134a.
A/C hose-lines assembly: to match compressor
A/C refrigerant: R134a
Air cleaner assembly: I have supplied
Air cleaner-to-engine bracket: If did not come with air cleaner, I do not have. Should be common to other turbo setups.
Alternator: Nippondenso 50/120 (I will supply)
Battery: Existing
Boost gauge: Do you have/can you install?
Brakes: Inspect (pedal vibration) and advise
Bushings, front: Inspect and advise
Bushings, rear: ?? Advise (see “Suspension, rear”)
Cable, accelerator pedal to throttle: I do not have. Mopar P/N 4306 578 (or good used if you have it)
Cable, throttle to trans kickdown: I do not have. Mopar P/N 5277 825 (or good used if you have it)
Cable, gear selector: I do not have. Good used if you have it or new if you don’t.
Camshaft: Stock ’89-up turbo cam (you supply)
Camshaft cover: “TURBO”, hemi orange, smooth/shiny (not crackle)
Driveshafts: Install equal-length assembly (supplied).
Engine: 2.5 Turbo, Hemi-built
Engine mounts: Heavy-duty if available.
Engine vacuum hose harness: I do not have. Do you have access?
Engine wiring harness: I will supply (trying to find better/uncut)
Exhaust: Existing as possible, except as needed to accommodate new engine
Firewall heat shield: From a turbo car. Do you have one or do I need to
supply?
Fuel filter: FFV stainless w/armored hoses, Mopar P/N 4495 409
Fuel lines, flexible, chassis to fuel rail: FFV armored if possible (supplied with manifold assembly)
Fuel rail: Stainless steel FFV, supplied w/intake
Fuel tank: Plastic from FFV car, I will supply (w/filler, w/pump, w/straps)
Intake manifold: With air charge temp sensor (supplied)
Intercooler: I have supplied
Intercooler hoses: I have supplied
Radiator: I have supplied
Radiator coolant reserve tank: I will supply (Spirit R/T item)
Radiator fan assembly: I will supply (Spirit R/T item)
SBEC (ECM): Working on getting a non-broken one
Springs: Eibach (I will supply)
Starter motor: Bosch, I will supply
Struts/shocks: Koni, I will supply
Strut tower brace: I will supply
Suspension, rear: Solid rear sway bar, bushings as necessary. I will supply Panhard rod.
Tires: Existing unless wheels swapped.
Transmission: Torqueflite, beefed up as appropriate in applicable areas (clutches, planetary assembly, etc.) with firm but not butt-kicking shifts. Appropriate torque converter.
Wheels: 16″ items (you supply)
Thanks -Daniel
Whoof! Some of this stuff baffles me now. Panhard rod…?! That’s, uh, quite the list, even if it had been a static one. But it was dynamic instead, by which I mean I kept adding to it with cool parts I found and bought. Some of them were as described; I managed to score an all-metal heavy-duty radiator, OE Mexican-spec for the intercooled R/T cars, new in box. Others…well…”good condition” means something different on the Mexican used-parts market than it means in America, so quite a pile of junk accumulated at Hemi’s on account of my compulsive shopping. This pile contained many parts not actually needed, and it lacked certain parts that were very crucially needed. An engine wiring harness, for example. The V6 harness in the car wasn’t compatible with the 4-cylinder engine; too many different components in different places. Neither would a harness from a nonturbo 4-cylinder car; those had throttle body injection, so no wires for the turbo motor’s four injectors (amongst other lacking provisions). And a harness from a pre-1992 turbo car wouldn’t work either, because of significant changes made to the fuel injection, engine management, cruise control, and other systems for 1992.
There weren’t very many 2.5/turbo automatic Spirits sold in northern North America in 1992. Even expanding the count to the max by including LeBarons, the total was still very small, and this was now twelve years on. A harness was not turning up for me or for Hemi, no matter how hard we looked. And looked, and looked, and looked! In early October 2005 (T-plus 18 months) I mentioned this unobtainium wiring harness in casual conversation with an individual who had contacted me with some questions about a segment of the vehicle lighting industry. Oh, hey, no problem, this guy said. He was a staff consultant to several automotive and industrial cable assembly shops, he said. Give him a factory part number and vehicle make-model-equipment specs and he could readily have one built, he said. Here again, I’ll pause to point at an example of my deficient observational skills at that time: dude’s first name was Brian, and his last name started with an S. Making his initials—class? Anybody?—yep. Those letters might just as well have been in the form of a giant, flashing, buzzing red neon sign. He managed to string me along with a steady stream of bogus progress reports (e.g., I sent the harness back to the shop, they have to rework the pcm connector and make some changes. I do not have an eta in January 2006), promises, and excuses through at least March of 2007 (T-plus-almost-three-years). Eventually he dropped out of contact altogether, though I wasn’t the only one he conned; next I heard of him he was half-selling—i.e., taking people’s money but not sending—bogus “upgrade” headlamps for Corvettes. People suck.
Stuff was happening with the car—Hemi swapped in the engine and built and installed the transaxle and the accessories, the suspension and brake upgrades, and other such. But the car got kinda jammed in the door, too. Figuratively, not literally: Hemi had the best of intent, and he certainly had the knowledge and experience, and all the tools and facilities. What he didn’t have was the time. He was in a very difficult position: he wanted to close down his shop and retire, but on the other hand didn’t want to close down his shop and retire. But keeping the shop meant paying monthly rent, and that meant keeping the fast-turnover customers coming for hourly-rate work, and that meant my ’92 Spirit build necessarily moved slowly. Eventually mine was the last car before Hemi would close down his shop, which in itself made difficult and complicated conflicts for Hemi. We (Hemi, the car, and I) continued in a holding pattern for quite awhile, but it still wasn’t running. Eventually I arranged for a friend of mine in Northern California, another experienced Chrysler tech, one Mr. Haigh, to go get the car and see if he could make something of it. He drove down and fetched the car—with its paint and interior quite deteriorated from seven years in the Southern California sun and smog—and the small mountain of parts, including a Mexican-spec 1993 2.5 Turbo II ECM I had finally found in good condition. Here’s the car about to depart Southern California:
…and here it is in Mr. Haigh’s yard, in the middle of being put together:
Mr. Haigh put together a working wiring harness by cobbling together parts from the original V6 harness and from a badly hacked one I’d bought out of Mexico. At first it would only fire one cylinder’s fuel injector:
…but Mr. Haigh iteratively debugged it to arrive at these fine results:
From then on it was “just” a matter of hanging parts. Many, many parts all over the car. The headliner had fallen down under the beating-down sun in SoCal, too, so that was replaced.
A good stereo went in, with a flip-out-and-fold-up screen—de luxe!. Lots of little tweaks: spacers behind the front turn signals to bring them close to flush with the bumper face, rather than recessed. That kind of thing.
Eventually it was time for me to come fetch the car, which I did in Spring 2013 (T-plus nine years). By that time Bill and I had moved out West. The car ran and drove beautifully up Highway 101, with the only mechanical flaw being a noisy power steering pump. The Eibach springs and such rode harder than I liked, but made the car very capable on twisty roads. Fun! Here’s a pic taken moments after the end of that trip:
So those were the two times I drove that car: one road trip west in 2004, and one north nine years later. I parked it in the driveway and used it once in awhile to run a local errand, but it had to go; things other than cars took precedence with my time and resources. Having automotive tastes well off the bell curve makes one’s cars very difficult to sell; it takes finding someone else whose tastes are also off the bell curve by the same amount and in the same direction, and…well, the market for built Dodge Spirits is, ah, slow. I took pictures and made this show-and-tell video…
…and put up pages and ads with this accurate list of specs and upgrades:
Engine:
2.5 Turbo II intercooled, built by Hemi Andersen with top-grade, name-brand components and the correct 2.5T2 pieces and parts—intake manifold with air charge temp sensor, correct intercooler, Mexican 2.5 Turbo II ECM, new correct Valeo all-metal HD 2-row radiator, etc. New (not rebuilt) TE04H turbocharger is utterly silent. High-flow TC-Maserati airbox with big blowoff valve. All new vacuum harness made with silicone hoses and new vacuum ejectors and orifices. New, Mexican Chrysler Phantom R/T dual-pipe muffler (with real dual pipes, not the fake US “looks like two pipes but one of them is a dummy” item) sounds serious but not obnoxious. HD alternator and starter custom built to spec by Wes Grueninger at AutoLab. Flex-fuel injectors, pressure regulator, and fuel rail (stainless rail & regulator, braided stainless flex hoses, nickelplate high-flow injectors). The car has the correct USA 1992 2.5 Turbo underhood emission decal, and it blew super-clean numbers when I put it through a California emission test.
Transmission:
Torqueflite 31TH with all the updates and beef-ups and a nice shift kit, with lockup torque converter (works). Also built by Hemi Andersen. Crisp, quick shifts. Correct Mexican Federal Police BIG transmission fluid cooler.
Undercar:
Spirit R/T rear axle assembly with fully-welded solid sway bar. Eibach progressive springs. Koni adjustable shocks and struts. Big 4-wheel disc brakes. ’93 IROC R/T “Ninja” 16″ directional wheels in perfect condition with BFGoodrich Traction T/A P205/55HR16 tires. Quick ratio/firm-feel power steering rack and pinion assembly.
Rest of car:
Power locks, windows and mirrors, cold R134a air conditioning (all work), R/T trunklid spoiler, factory European export (Chrysler Saratoga) exterior lighting system, fat headlamp wires and relays, side repeaters, quad wide-angle/long-distance brake lights, twin red rear fog lamps, wide-angle turn signals. Integral daytime running lights. Factory European export seat belts (height-adjustable in front). Mexican instrument cluster (dash wiring also installed for optional digital dash cluster).
Stereo
Clarion NZ501 stereo/DVD/MP3/Satellite stereo head unit with dynamic satellite navigation system (no subscription required), BlueTooth, motorized flip-up touch screen, and line-in port (iPhone etc.), Clarion SRQ1331R 3-way speakers all around, Clarion THD400 HD Radio tuner sounds terrific.
Sounds like a pretty nice car, eh! They don’t go for much money, though, especially not relative to what I’d poured into it. I wound up selling it to an online acquaintance who’d bought some Dart-Valiant stuff from me over the years. A friend of his drove it back to him in…Virginia!
I could’ve done well leaving it in North Carolina. He made good with it, though; here’s how it wound up looking:
Now there you have it, the story of my second-to-last AA-body. I don’t blame Hemi for how this went, and neither should anyone else—and he’s a valued CC reader and commenter—so please don’t let’s be giving him any guff about it. Yes, okeh, he should’ve shut me down when I first floated the idea and firmly said no, and put his foot down and hollered no louder when I pressed the point, and we’d’ve done well if he hadn’t told me about that built-up 2.5 turbo motor he had on the stand. But me, I ought to have listened when he did say no in so many words. I ought to have got the hint when the car did just fine and went as fast as I cared to go with its original powertrain. I shouldn’t’ve initiated a(nother) nebulous, open-ended project like this and aggravated it by continuing to buy parts and sending them to Hemi.
The central trouble—as you’ll have detected if you’ve been reading my COAL series all along—was that I tended to fixate on an ideal version of whatever car was in mind and at hand. It was the ideal ’65 D’Valiant, the ideal ’85 Volvo 245…the ideal ’92 Spirit. When I latched onto the idea of whatever the perfect car was, it tended to blind me to the reality factors involved until they repeatedly smacked me upside the wallet. It took me a lot of years, cars, and dollars to finally understand was that unless one has Jay Leno levels of wealth and resources, there is going to be a canyon between the movies we run in our heads and the cars we actually drive.
That would have been a good car done right you should have kept it, though I can hardly talk I spent years building my old Minx the way I wanted it originality be dammed and sold it but I did buy another toy that has become its own problem,
Your alternate description of Doppler Effect should be in every dictionary! My father suffered this alternate Doppler Effect when trying to build or fix something around the house and with the cars. My brother with eternal gift of patience ended up fixing or finishing up what my father did.
With all of work in upgrading your Spirit to the ECE version, it seemed that you skipped the external rear view mirrors. And why let the front turn signal indicators glow as Daytime Running Lamps instead of headlamps?
I didn’t like how the adjustable shoulder belt anchor look. More of an afterthought or something from (trigger warning) J.C. Whitney catalogue.
The car had the ECE sideview mirrors until shortly before I sold it; I kept them for use on a car to be described in a future COAL instalment.
I put on turn signal DRLs because they’re substantially better than headlamp DRLs and I didn’t want to add more lighting devices to the front of the car.
Front seatbelt height adjustment hardware was sourced by Chrysler from…VW-Audi! The parts bore the VW-Audi logos.
Wow. It’s hard to fathom why so much time, effort, and money was spent on such a genuinely unremarkable vehicle. It’s like putting marble floors in a porta potty…sure, it could be done, but why?
That said, to each their own.
Morning? No its not. I just got up for one of those nightly visits to that small room down the hall. At nearly 82, that is a normal routine these days. On the way back, today being Saturday, I thought I’d look to see what Daniel wrote about in this weeks installment of his COAL.
I was pleasantly surprised to see that 1992 Dodge Spirit and “Killer”, the little 1981 Dodge Aries I use to love to drive. “Let me read a line or two”.
“Visions of sugarplum started, no, no, that was wiring harnesses and SBECs started swirling around in my head, I think I’ll return to bed and pull the sheets over my head.”
Oh my. These highly, highly customized and specially built cars scare me to death. For the guy who does it, you know every single component and fastener. For the owner who follows, he gets a gigantic puzzle. What just broke? Is it in the parts book? Is it in the Mexican parts book? And if not, will what I can get from the parts book fix the broken car or set off a chain reaction of failures due to incompatible components?
My automotive OCD urges are to make a car into what sat in the showroom or dealer lot right after the plastic got peeled off the seats. And that kind of Quixotic project is expensive (and impossible) enough. You are to be commended for setting your sights so much higher.
That effect was greatly aggravated by the timing of all this. When I got my ’91 Spirit R/T, many-to-most of the AA-body parts were still available new; all one had to do was sometimes jump over a few hurdles. Get someone in another country to order and send stuff that couldn’t be had locally, that kind of thing. By the time I had this ’92, most of the parts were no longer available anywhere, and by the time I gave up my last AA-body (COAL coming up), even run-of-the-mill parts for them were getting downright scarce.
Were my sights set higher…? I donno about that. They were probably set at about the same height, just at a different angle.
I’m glad I don’t suffer from the engineer’s visions of grandeur for my cars. The truth is that I only understand the basics of what makes them go – enough to generally keep them out of the shop, and that has helped me save money over the years on cars rather than spend it. That’s not meant as a brag or as shade at the author, either; I respect the desire to make something customized and unique, and ideal. But he’s absolutely right that this is neither practical nor affordable.
I’ve pipe-dreamed about swapping a Subaru engine into my Westy to give it more strength to keep up with modern traffic. But I don’t have the time, skills, or money to do it, nor is it practical to put a water-cooled engine into an air-cooled vehicle. People have done it, but I content myself with making the best of what I already have.
No shade perceived here; you’ve hit on a really central point to all of this. I was able to dream up this assembly of theoretical best-of-all parts only because I’d accumulated so much knowledge about all the variants over the years and around the world.
Also, I have long envied people who have the talent, skill, expertise, equipment, and facilities to build or rebuild whatever they think of so it’s exactly just right—whether it be a custom car or anything/everything this guy touches. Seriously! Refurb/resto videos are all over YouTube, but this guy’s make all the rest look like amateur hour.
It has taken me a long time, but I, too, have pretty well come to understand that making the best of what one already has is far more satisfying than what I was doing before. A whole hell of a lot less costly and stressful, too!
The only car I ever “built” up somewhat was my stone age ’56 Chevy with a ’66 327 swap! Easy, even for me with no $$ because of college! There is a reason the $$$$ I’ve poured into my ’88 IROC-Z 350 has all gone to STOCK parts: reliable and “simplicity”.
My in-laws n wife thought I was nut$ to put $1800 into getting a semi ratty ’56 Chevy model 150 6 banger (1970-71) going..HA! You obviou$ly have far more disposable income than I ever had!
Have you REALLY learned your le$$on yet?? 🙂
What further adventures in your MoPar world lay ahead? DFO
What a journey, literally and metaphorically.
I have played those movies in my head, but never considered what it would take to execute. Now I know, in greater graphic detail than I probably wanted or needed to know. But it’s a useful lesson, and I hope others can learn from it.
One of my movies involves converting my ’66 F-100 into an EV. Others have encouraged me to follow through. No!
That’s a hell of a great movie, isn’t it! Pop some popcorn, watch it five times in a row…and then leave the theatre. Maybe in an EV or maybe in an F-100, but not in an electrified F-100.
Great read as usual, Daniel.
In my family’s shop, we used to take cars like yours in and work on them in slow times, generally January to March. It is very hard to deal with them as often the customers have unrealistic expectations. Having an impatient customer is the last thing a garageman wants.
I saw guys (and occasionally women) pour GAZILLIONS of dollars into cars like yours, cars that will never have any collectability. I saw guys pouring GAZILLIONS of dollars into rust bucket trucks. I saw women pour GAZILLIONS into old, rusty Jeeps
What I learned from this is to never buy a car and modify it much. Doing so will costs a GAZILLION dollars. Use that GAZILLION dollars to buy something decent that has most of what you want-and then LEAVE IT ALONE!
I totally understand the allure of making your pride and joy and there are very obvious exceptions-an intake, cam and dual exhaust on a Chevrolet 305, for example, is cheap and easy since there are no electronics to complicate things.
Then again, I am a cheapskate in most things, which has allowed an early semi-retirement.
Amen, hallelujah, oyez, preach on. Exactly this!
Good Saturday morning now, you all. I have had time to read the entire story. It does make me look back at those days in my small, 1 man shop, with one roll-up door similar to the one behind ‘Killer’. Previously I had a larger shop from 1988 until 1998 which I had to close it due to having major surgery. Recovery took around 1 1/2 years due to major complications during surgery, so in January 2001 I was back at it. I had plenty of customers and was the only guy working in the shop. When Daniel and I discussed his “Dream”, I was reluctant, but he was persistent and frankly, I thought it would be a fun project so I agreed. All the mechanical stuff was easy since I only worked on Chrysler products and had plenty of material lying around that could be used in addition to the endless flow of boxed ‘stuff’ that kept arriving as the assembly continued. Somehow the project grew from just a powertrain change to virtually everything except sheet metal and interior upgrades. Frankly, I don’t remember the list.
The major hindrance was the engine wiring harness. I don’t know how many tries we made to find one that was useable out of the many that arrived from various sources. They were all used, one which came from Mexico looked like someone just grabbed it and ripped it out of a car. Terminals missing or broken with many bare wires hanging out.
I even took harnesses home and tried to make one good one out of several bad ones. Finally the car was actually fully assembled except for that one MAJOR problem, the lack of one complete GOOD engine wiring harness.
In 2002, my wife and I had purchased a lot in a development in Arizona and had a home built. This meant that I commuted back and forth 313 miles, staying at the shop 2 to 3 weeks, then traveling home for a couple of weeks. Daniel was aware that I was not working on his ‘project car’ other than during free time and of course, when I was there. That tended to drag the project out to the 7 years at my shop before I retired at the beginning of 2012. When I finally told Daniel that the Spirit had to go, it was hard for both of us to face that fact, but that day on October 1st 2011 finally came. I waved goodbye to “The Spirit of Ventura”
Hey Daniel, thanks for great COAL!
Off Topic: I just come across this guy on YouTube, he seems to know a thing or two about automotive lights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2z5A-COlDPk
I’m glad you like my writing; I’ll keep it up as long as I have stuff to write about.
As to that guy on YouTube: plenty of stuff he gets right, but too much stuff he gets wrong; he’s not quite so clever and informed as he apparently likes to believe, and—this is the part that grates my carrots—right or wrong, he’s very sure of himself.
Also I find his voice annoying, but that’s purely subjective. Less subjective: he goes on at much greater length than necessary.
(over the years I have come to see that what peeves us most about other people is often what peeves us most about ourselves. I’m not saying, I’m just saying.)
I haven’t commented much on your COALs, but I have read and enjoyed them every week. You and I definitely had some similarities in our youth when it came to cars, but we took very different paths as adults. I am amazed at the time and effort you put into these various vehicles, as had my circumstances been different I probably would have followed the same path and probably had the same end result. I too had visions like yours of “improving” my cars, starting with my first car a ’72 Chevelle and several others that followed. Although I lived and breathed cars, when I got my first good paying job in my early 20s, I kept driving old cheap cars despite my temptation to do otherwise. Even when I got my Torino from my dad, I did very little to it until I was more established.
It was definitely the more boring path and sometimes I still think about the cool cars or upgrades I passed on to save cash but I have no regrets. When it finally came time to start working on my Torino, I had matured to the point where I didn’t do anything too crazy to it. While I have made a number of upgrades, they are all well thought out and use almost all factory parts to the point that most would think it factory correct (other than a few obvious giveaways like the exhaust headers).
It’s too bad after all that work into this car, you didn’t get to enjoy it much. I suppose the long time to complete the project had a major role in your change of heart. Over a decade priority’s can change significantly. It is good to see it went somewhere were it was appreciated. Keep the stories coming.
You learned those lessons a lot sooner than I did, it sounds like!
I may have learned my lesson earlier, but didn’t realize it until later in life. The only reason I didn’t follow your path was because since my youth, it browbeaten into me to never accumulate debt and to put every red cent towards house and education. And even though my dad was a car guy, he always hammered home how a car wasn’t an investment, but an expense and a rather costly one at that.
Another great COAL story, Daniel! Reading today’s installment, you just re-triggered a memory of something that I wanted to do….some sort of replica of a Mexican Federal Police Spirit. After seeing a couple of pictures of one in a book, I thought it would be cool to to do some sort of replica. The base vehicle would’ve been relatively easy (when I thought of this 20 years ago…), find a 2.5 turbo 1989-91 Dodge Spirit/Plymouth Acclaim. External trim would be easy to remove, various differences in head & taillamps could be swapped around, ant the cool-looking pushbar that was used could be fabricated. Paint? Maybe the black-and-white or maybe some solid color with the bumper covers painted argent silver (see various AHB/A-38 police package Mopars from the 80’S). Interior? Since I worked for a wholesale auto parts distributor, I knew of a carpet company that would do a molded rubber replacement for the carpeting.. With a little selective parts scrounging from other K-based performance vehicles, I could come up with a really interesting kinda-tribute/clone.
Of course, I never did it (nor my high school-planned 440 Duster, AMC Eagle with 4.0 litre EFI swap, phantom 1977 Chrysler Lebaron 300, 3rd-generation Hemi-into-a-Diplomat-ex-cop-car swap, phantom 1970-72 Valiant sedan make into a US version of the Australian Valiant Pacer,,,,key ingredient is using a 1971-72 340 Duster ‘shark tooth grille’,or other various projects that pop into my mind). Still-it doesn’t hurt to keep the creative juices flowing.
Your Saturday COALs are one of my weekend highlights-thank you!
You’re welcome and thanks, Dave! Yeah, it’s fun to think about one-of-none cars, and some of them are temptingly easy to build. This South African ’68 Valiant wagon, for example, uses the Australian VE Valiant wagon body with the US ’68 Valiant front clip. Those taillights practically beg for a talented sheetmetal artist to graft on a ’67-’69 Barracuda front clip. It would take some doing; those Baccarudas are the exception to the bodylines and door openings all lining up on the rest of the ’67-’76 A-bodies. But just think of the reactions at car shows!
This is the Curbside I truly love. I’ve often built up cars like this in my mind.. many times over… but very few actually escape the mind and I start buidling them in reality. Was great to read through your story.
Thanks, Brian!