Time and age catch up to all of us. Except some people manage to not show much sign of that pesky aging, until it comes on them all of a sudden. Such is the case with this 1975 Plymouth Valiant, still seemingly pulling daily driver duty in Brooklyn after all these years. While researching yearly trim differences to determine the year, I discovered this exact car is one of the top Google search results for a 1975, thanks to a writeup back in 2019 by Paul, covering Cohort photos from William Oliver.
Back when it originally graced this website, it looked like a solid survivor defying its true age. Today, it looks about as used up as a car can look. What happened to it? Well, being street parked in Brooklyn, that’s what.
For as complex and difficult to repair as modern cars are, many of them can soldier on without major maintenance for far longer than even the most dependable cars of the 1960s and 1970s. Back then, cars required much more attention to keep them going for decades. Especially in the area of bodywork and rust mitigation.
The Valiant is still the poster child for the rugged dependability of a slant six family sedan. Some of these were those old cars that refused to die even after being handed down multiple times through the family. However, even these durable beasts could fall victim to the 100,000 mile stigma, and many of them were retired before reaching that magical figure, which was the norm back then.
Given these cars’ durable mechanicals, I imagine many looked as rusty as this car, if not even worse, before they were finally taken off the road. In today’s case, with the extreme onset of rust between 2019 and now, I feel we’re watching a car deteriorate from age 4 to age 10 in real time rather than from age 44 to 50. You just don’t often see frequently driven classics take the turn this one did after being well preserved for so long.
None of this roof rot is visible in the photos from 6 years ago. As a lifelong southerner, I’m just not used to proper NYC grade rust. Yet, surely it would look worse if it had been living on the streets of Brooklyn for all 50 of those years. It had to have been a creampuff plucked from a sheltered life in a garage before it was subjected to this life.
The angle that hurts the most to compare this lovely Valiant to its 2019 former self is this front driver side corner. Evidently plenty of things have bashed into this side in addition to plow trucks heaping road salt on the car’s wounds.
However, Valiants were intended to be rational, basic cars for everyday chores, after all. So it’s somewhat refreshing to see one filling that role, even if it’s clearly hurt the car a bit. The interior looked exactly like you’d expect someone’s daily driver to look. Perhaps a little dirty, but not excessively so. I’d call it pleasantly lived in, with personal artifacts scattered around and clear evidence of constant use. And the classic NYC parking (and biking and walking) by feel has taken a few chunks out of the taillights and grille. The sturdy chrome battering rams have withstood the worst of the assaults without the damage the sheet metal has faced.
In the end, this is just an extreme case of the classic enthusiast’s dilemma. Do you drive your car and potentially damage it and wear it out? What’s the middle ground between putting it in the veritable warzone of a Brooklyn street and encasing it in a bubble of stale museum air? I probably stray too far toward the drive with my own classic daily, so I can sympathize with this dedicated Valiant owner’s Catch 22. As hard as it is to see a good car come to this fate, it is doing what it was built for. Getting normal car stuff done without much fuss and a moderate amount of style.
Related CC reading:
Curbside Classic: 1975 Plymouth Valiant – Valiant Right To The End
I mean…this means the car has been DRIVEN. Hard, constantly, in serious slush. Regularly creampuffed cars don’t really get rusty in NYC; they get moved a lot but not used a lot. This person probably goes upstate or such and doesn’t wash the car. It’s a shame, bc it’s not that hard to keep a car clean in NYC at all.
God I sound crotchety
Haha… Nah, you’re just pissed that a Valiant that lasted 50 years, appears going down sooner than later. You care.
This car has to have been redone and repainted at least once! It’s actually in too good of condition… Or a little old lady kept it in the garage for 40 years… then it got a new owner…
I always laugh when I see that yellow NY license plate, here in Ohio a yellow plate means serial drunken driver… WATCH OUT!
A few years ago a driver getting his 20th DUI almost got me head on as he crossed the centerline! I swerved left and he went off the road to my right and hit a pole… As I recall, they finally did something serious about him.
My inlaws who have lived in NYC ever since I’ve known them (nearly 50 years) have always had the grimiest (sp?), most filthy cars such that the white vehicles (they always seemed to have white cars for some reason) were generally a spotted pock-marked grey. They parked about half the time in garages and the rest of the time on the street. Anyway, years ago I asked what they had against the occasional car wash…and I was told (by these folks who came of age in the gritty NYC of the 1970s) that washing ones car was for “fools”…as keeping a car filthy was the best theft prevention that there was.
Personally, I think they were just lazy.
Perhaps under the body it is actually an expensive imported luxury car- like the classic SNL skit with Phil Hartmann.
Looks like neglect. There is a reason car rust is so often compared to cancer. It can be treated early. But if you choose to ignore it, it won’t go away. With rust, it can take years of no treatment. Which looks to be the case here. As affordable and relatively simple rust repairs, eventually become unaffordable. And not worth the expense, by then.
Compared to many cities, New York’s winters, are not harsh. I don’t blame the environment here, so much as an owner(s), that simply let this car go. Rust, always tells a tale. An ‘open wound’ of rusty bare metal, with rust streaks down painted bodywork, doesn’t happen overnight.
There is plenty of time to treat it, before it’s no longer worth it.
I often did simple rust repairs for family members, and on my own cars. Prevents terminal situations months/years later. Once it takes over, it is likely too late. Rust emerging from the inside, being mist ominous.
sp: ‘most ominous’.
Washing and waxing cars regularly, has probably been the easiest form of rust prevention, since the advent of cars. When the threat of rust exists.
Conventional neighbourhood collision centres, will not touch rust. Worth researching shops, that typically do restoration, and rust repair. Reputation for quality work, and fair prices, is everything. There is a shop in my city, that is considered a go to source for rust repair. They’ve earned that trust.
So much more affordable, to treat it early.
Though it’s significantly harder to find a quality shop that will do rust repair in states that don’t have harsh winters. My daily driver has rotted out floors from water intrusion but fortunately it doesn’t appear to have ever seen road salt. Floors are easier to repair than suspension mounting points.
Word of mouth is invaluable. Seeking out forums, and customer testimonials, and recommendations. As I mentioned, shops that do restoration, will be more likely to deal with rust. It may require driving a fair distance, perhaps out-of-state, to find a quality shop. And leaving your car with them, for a week (or more). Finding a shop that doesn’t charge an arm and a leg, is also a challenge.
I’m in Ottawa, salt-induced rust has been an issue here since the 1950’s. When salt-use started to explode. And there aren’t a lot of rust repair choices here. It used to be a severe problem, transferred to owners. Before carmakers made better cars, less vulnerable to rust.
When cars started to rust badly here, people would just get rid of them. Very costly to maintain. Why it resulted in the largest automotive class-action lawsuit in Canadian history, against the Ford Motor Company. And their notoriously rusty, early 1970’s cars. Cars on the road here, have tended to remain newer for decades.
Just from observation over years, I have come to be able to identify severity of rust, that makes a car generally not practical for restoration. And I am by no means a professional, or expert. Just decades of seeing the damage, on the roads.
Sad thing about this Valiant, is that it took years of neglect, to get to this point.
Probably a car that was carefully treated by grandma and then inherited as a “free” car by a grandchild with little or no interest in cars or preserving grandma’s legacy, which isn’t helped by the fact that this Valiant is indeed a simple transportation pod and not a more valuable/attractive muscle/sport version.
Very true!
Why it’s great, when strangers will make offers on a car.
Perhaps helps out the struggling student, if they need some immediate cash. And might save a curbside classic.
Even keeping wax on hand in the car so you can put a band aid on a fresh bump goes a long way.
All good things come to an end, hopefully some young person will save this old heap from the crusher and use it to return a non rusty brother to the road….
-Nate
What’s the middle ground between placing it in the actual war zone of a Brooklyn street and enveloping it in a bubble of stale museum air?”
There’s a middle ground, I think: Fix any defects that arise as soon as you discover them. Immediately.
It also doesn’t hurt to check model-specific weak points as a preventative measure.
And: Remove winter slush from all accessible areas before it gets warm outside again.
All excellent advice. Here in Canada, I used to see so many cars driving all year with road salt visibly caked up inside their wheels wells. Underside cavities with white powder embedded into crevices. Glued there, like barnacles. Many owners never washed the undersides of their cars. When it needed to be flushed with water under pressure. Throughout winter, would be best. And end of season.
Some people stay on top of this stuff. Others just let it go. Such is life. Rust doesn’t get terminal overnight. Why some people just pass it off.
Rust is very useful as a telltale sign, of a car that has been neglected overall.
Does the “undercarriage wash” option on automatic car washes do a sufficient job of getting rid of caked salt around the suspension, or do you really need to get under the car with a water hose yourself?
My approach for years, was to occasionally use the self-serve automatic car washes. Where you use the high pressure water spraying wand yourself. I’d get right down, and direct it above the top of the gas tank. And in other, hard to reach areas. Ensuring, they were regularly getting cleaned.
I’d do this in winter as well. Doing an extra thorough job, at the end of winter. Salt isn’t its most damaging, when it is frigid and dry. Rather, when it is mild and moist.
Oil-type sprays like Krown Rustproofing in Canada, help protect these areas as well.
The middle ground is fixing defects immediately? That can require a lot of money if it’s done at shop rates, if you can even find someone willing to work on a car such as this that isn’t a restoration shop with long lead times.
My middle ground is to fix stuff eventually and fix it right. My rule with my classic car is to only fix stuff correctly, which can be tricky on a meager budget that only leaves room for DIY. But it’s resulted in the car slowly getting better rather than accruing temporary repairs. Now keep in mind there’s lots of stuff that doesn’t work, some of it more important than others.
As a northerner who grew up when these things were everywhere, I am here to tell you that this is nothing even remotely close to “extreme rust.” These A bodies were about average or a little worse than average in terms of rust susceptibility back then, and some of these would look truly awful before they got hauled off. What often finally took these off the road was when the crossmember that held the rear torsion bar mount would rust through, sending one front corner of the suspension down to its rubber stop.
I will admit that that rust hole on the passenger side sail panel is unusual. You usually see damage under vinyl roofs, but I don’t remember bare roofs rusting back then. Maybe that spot just takes 50 years instead of 15.
It seems pretty extreme to a lifelong Georgian who hasn’t been outside the southeast much. Certainly enough rust to give one pause. I do believe you that it could be worse.
Those Valiants in Indiana, were being driven into the ground, no?
No intent of preservation, or long term maintenance. So, their bodies would look terrible, before the mechanicals gave up. Some may have had carbon monoxide leaks into the interior.
I’d say this Valiant’s rust, makes it beyond the point of worthy of repair.
Not worth spending thousands, fixing.
I recall seeing 1976 and 1977 Aspens and Volares in the early ’80’s, with very similar rust, all along the lower body. Not surface rust. Rather blistering from underneath, over large swaths of sheetmetal. Worse on the other side. Specifically, because of road salt. Most were off the road within five years. Sh*tboxes, just not worth fixing, by that point. This Valiant is approaching, that league.
The hole in the sail panel doesn’t surprise me. Look at the bottom line of the window. Where is the lowest point? Right in those two corners where water will collect over the years and seep through the gasket. Looking closely you can see subtle rust along both sides of the dutchman panel seam with the fender. There was never any kind of paint on the backside under the bracing so you were doomed if more moist than not.
I would at least have had to put some green tape over that C-Pillar hole as soon as I saw it… water getting in there is going to rust out the bottom areas…
Sad. Keeping drain holes clear and a little care would have kept the rust at bay. Street parking is another matter. My 67 LeSabre spent 5 years as a DD parked on the street in Queens, NY in the 90’s. Snow plows, other folks maneuvering their cars and motorcycles, and garbage trucks exemplify carelessness. No body panel was left undented and salty slush took a toll. Luckily she had good bones and is now in good care.
I appreciate your somewhat sympathetic take on this Valiant having done what they always had done best – perform without complaint or issue, even if this one is so much worse for wear.
Still, I’m having a hard time with this. There’s no more Plymouth. The traditional Chrysler brands seem to be languishing at Stellantis with the exception of a few niche-market outliers, like the Charger. How many pristine Valiants can be left? If this was an estate car and the driver needed wheels and couldn’t afford them, I’m slightly better with this. Otherwise, this Valiant ended up doing what any beater Dodge Avenger could have done and no one would have cared.
When I was a teenager, I had a neighbour father who had a great knack of finding creampuff used cars, for his children. Nice early and mid-to-late 70’s pre-owned cars, in great condition. Mavericks, Hornets, Pintos, and Dusters. A Volare Roadrunner. They looked, and sounded fantastic, when they first acquired them. The kids would proceed to thrash the cars hard, for a year or two. Now beaters, with no future. And their dad would find a new victim car!
I know how you feel about this being sort of the last of a dying breed of beater Variants. . . Except it was made a beater more recently than most.
My daily driver 1985 Mercedes 300D was one of the last dirt cheap beater W123s I could find in the entire southeast. I was looking for an affordable car and figured if I waited any longer there would only be hopeless projects in my meager budget. They’re starting to age out of the role they once had and I’m happy to be contributing to keeping their presence in the road.
I have seen many analogous situations over the years. Someone (almost invariably young) finds a pampered cool old car like this for cheap and turns it into a daily driver and it ages fairly quickly. I’ve seen it happen to some very pristine cars, and it does make me a bit sad, but then what are folks supposed to do? Put every old Valiant and Falcon in a museum?
These cars got an unexpected extension in their lives and are now playing catch-up.
Guilty! I cringe at the number of cars I’ve run into the ground over years of buying and driving beaters. There are quite a few I wish I could have back now, but back then they were just cheap wheels.
Well, if it were mine, I’d use it as a test bed for my learning to do autobody work.
As I suspected, this Valiant is young enough (and certainly it wasn’t rare when new) that you can still get repair panels, which in and of themself are not terribly expensive. Whether it would be worth the money to do all that needs to be done to this car, that’s another question, but the parts are out there. I’d say that fixing that C-pillar hole is going to be the most challenging part, but the rest are pretty straight-forward panel repairs assuming one has (or develops) the skill.
https://www.c2cfabrication.com/collections/plymouth-valiant-parts/1975?srsltid=AfmBOor_qpThGH6_yQfaFDiO4_cvT8n6CmMbAJEOAHSr82lQO8Iath4c
The biggest problem here of course is that the car is almost certainly owned by someone living in NYC…and unless they have a place upstate where they want to take the car to work on it, there’s not going to be any DIY autobody work done on this car in its current location.
Shame though, the paint overall is still shiny, and you say the interior isn’t trashed. I’d think that anyone wanting to fix this car would be better off starting with this one versus trying to find another body in better shape. I haven’t seen one of these in a junkyard for years, and those I have seen have been swiss cheese mobiles.
Got some “white stripe”, tires going on.
Replying to Midsommar’s pondering question, I’d say the middle ground (in my own experience dailying 4 different old cars) is to drive them around 4,000 miles a year, pressure-washing the undercarriage, the door posts and inside the fenders about twice or three times a year, and obviously keeping up on preventive and corrective maintenance along with driving them gently and setting sun shades on the dash and backlight panel when parking them in sunlight.. In days when not being driven it is also a must that the cars stay covered-garaged..
Not only did wheel wells eventually get plastic liners, but underbodies became far better designed to not trap dirt and hold water.
I became very familiar with my dad’s Dodge Aspen wagon, as I did rust repair on it. I felt the wheel wells were very poorly handled on the Chrysler F-Bodies. It is no wonder the areas around wheel openings were notorious for rust on these cars. Minimizing the chance of rust, did not appear to be addressed in a reasonable manner.
Rear wheel wells had a exposed sheet metal lip around their circumference. Pressure-washing and automatic car washes would not reach this area. I saw it firsthand. As this lip/flange prevented water spray from reaching this area. Dry dirt. and salt. would cake there, and potentially sit for months. Or indefinitely.
You’d pull this dry dirt and salt out with your fingers, if you ran them along the inside of this lip, all along the wheel well opening. It created a ledge within the wheel opening, where road debris could collect and sit, protected. Atrociously poor design, I would say. No thought to long-term rust resistance. I suspect the Chrysler A-bodies had this same wheel well lip/flange. Those familiar with the bodywork on the Aspen/Volare, would know what I am talking about. I suspect this spanned other Chrysler cars lines during that era. Likely many domestic and foreign cars. Bad design, and engineering.
The F-Bodies also had an exposed fastener at the front of the inside of the wheel well. This fastener, being close to the wall of the wheel well liner would hold caked dirt and salt. Again automatic car washes and pressure-washing would fail to remove this accumulation. It was not easily accessible. You had to be aware of it, and target it specifically with a pressure-washer, to reach it. Brutally bad engineering.
1976 and 1977 Aspens and Volares had road grime and salt splashing the inside tops of their front fenders. Front fender tops were rusting from underneath. Why the government forced the massive fender recall on Chrysler.
If you closely examine how cars from this era were built, if you described it as gross negligence or ignorance, I don’t think you’d be far off.
Some cars took extraordinary care by **owners**, to keep rust to a minimum. Those familiar with these bodywork details, would know.
Next time you encounter a Volare or Aspen, look for it. I’m sure it plagued the A-Bodies, early M-Bodies, etc. And other Chrysler lines. As standard build quality.
The outerbody, underneath, and inside cavities, need to be designed to shed dirt, grime and salt. And not trap water. This was poorly handled, or not addressed at all, at times.
I’m sure a myriad number of cars were handled like this, at one time. I quickly prepped a graphic, showing where dirt and salt would accumulate indefinitely. Ironically, the sheetmetal lip would protect it. Automatic car washes would not touch this area, during that era.
I would specially target this area with a pressure washer, on my dad’s Aspen. Otherwise, a significant buildup of salt and dirt, would remain there untouched. An invitation to quarter panel rust.
Most Mopar vehicles of this period always had rusted quarters. Mopar put the gas tank under the trunk floor giving you a shallow trunk. It also gave you a sharp narrow drop off on each side down to the bottom of the quarters. You can barely get a hand back there but debris can get back there and rust you out from the inside. This car shows exactly that.
Doors rusting as the bottom drains are now clogged after years of debris getting past the outer window gasket which has no doubt deteriorated. No one takes off their door panel to clean inside. Same happens in front quarters with debris down the cowl. You need to detach the fender bottom and pull out a little to get all the crap out. I routinely do that to my 626, Focus, and 3 to remove the little vegetation that gets in there. We have no salt but rain and it will leave the vegetation moist. My other cars are covered so no rain or vegetation concerns.
The negligence seems remarkable, given new car development costs of hundreds of millions of dollars in the 1970’s.
Would love to hear, what body engineers knew at the time.
I had a 77 Volare in the early 90’s in ARIZONA, that had some rust bubbling up behind the rear wheels. The rest of the car was rust free and I don’t believe it was ever a Rust Belt car.
Interesting. The forced government recall, only addressed the front fenders rusting prematurely, in the 1976 and 1977 model years. Including rust occurring, at the top of the fenders.
My observations here in salt country, was that the F-Bodies were particularly vulnerable to rust, along the the entire surface below their lower body crease. Including around the rear wheel well. Perforation of the rear of the rocker panel was common. Due to salt spray from the front tires.
I maintained the exterior as a kid, of my dad’s Aspen. I was quite meticulous. I remember being shocked, when I ran my finger under this rear wheel well sheetmetal lip. And there was a semi-moist paste-like buildup of dirt/mud just accumulated there. Automatic car washes were apparently, not removing it. Nor me, with a pressure-washing wand.
I rmember this bizarre story in the local daily newspaper, of a woman’s entire 1976 Volare tailgate blowing off on a local freeway. Due to apparent severe rust around her tailgate hinges.
That’s almost a twin of the one which lived across the street and up the block a few houses back when I had my ’71 Dart twenty-some-odd years ago in Toronto. The neighbour’s green ’74 developed a whole lot more rust over the years I saw it in use, too. Here’re the two of them:
And I can’t see a green ’74-’76 Valiant without thinking of Tom Couch’s “U-R What You Drive”, much of which has aged poorly and all of which can be read at the photo-illustrator’s site. Here are the relevant facing pages:
Who runs a now-rare, beautiful old car like this into the ground? Cars should be driven, no matter their age or worth, but this is ridiculous and a crying shame. Do this to some modern day Corolla, not something like a once very clean relic of the past. Smh.