Superbird Barn Find Plus Many Slab Sides
- Thread starter hergfest
- Start date
Thanks for posting that. It's refreshing to not have to listen to someone ramble on for 15 minutes while they're driving to their destination, which is far too common on Youtube. A little over a minute in and he was already showing us the good stuff!!!
In the earlier 1990s, I had the honor and privilege of being involved with the restoration of a SuperBird of one of our Cowtown Mopar members. Don had wanted a SB and another member from Waco had a line of one from a former Chrysler dealership employee. They finally found the owner and the car. At the time, it was at a body shop (a known '57 T-bird restorer) getting some body work done. Don and the car's owner came to an agreement, which also resulted in an agreement with Don and the body shop owner, so the car was plastic media blasted, body work done (to a high level), and the car was transported to Don's shop/shadetree shop in Haltom City. From there, many club members were involved in putting it back together, including me. I also donated a few gaskets from the Mopar Perf "Drag Racing Inspection Gasket Set" (EVERY gasket known to B/RB engines, which was about $80.00 USD at the time) during one late night session.
Two of our club members, J. Ditmore and the late A. Vasut, supplied the factory assembly manual supplements for SBs and Daytonas, which helped greatly in how the restoration activities were sequenced. Mr. Ditmore spent many hours working on the car by himself, in Don's shop, getting the car put together as if it was on an assembly line rather than in a private shop, which greatly aided many things! Another of our members, J. Peterson, knew about many "off-line assembly" items as he worked at the GM-Arlington Assy Plant, so that was educational and greatly aided how we did things, too. Don and some friends in another local car club were doing cars at the same time, so their main vendor for all of their parts was YearONE, under a company name, for the best volume discounts.
The car was white with a black vinyl top and black custom bench seat interior. Normal 440/TF car, so no rarer items there. Rallye Wheels and repro Goodyear white letter tires.
ONE thing that was done was a complete photo documentation of all inspection marks so they could be reproduced after careful cleaning. Then they were re-done, too. Care was taken to exactly match ALL finishes on the chassis, with paint and clearcoat. In that process, I learned a great amount of information on such things. Including that many suspension parts were dipped into a container of water with the black paint layered on top of the water, which would explain some runs and such on the parts. NOTHING was as perfect as many restored cars we now see, by observation, considering the realities of the assy line.
Chassis paints were sourced from vendors whose paints best-matched the factory looks and finishes. Not all "cast blast" colors are the same! Some were sourced from dirt track racing oriented companies, which was interesting!
The one real deviation from the factory build was to place some bubblewrap under the carpet, between the carpet and the normal jute padding. Suggested by the interior shop that installed the seat covers on the seats.
ONE of the neat things was that the full instrument panel was assembled on a work bench, in the "off-line assembly" orientation. Then, one night, with the front seat still out, the assembled inst panel was walked into the passenger compartment and the attaching bolts installed to hold it there. The heater box had already been restored and installed and the steering column was installed after the inst panel installation had been finalized. Then the front and back glasses were reinstalled.
A MAIN thing was the installation of the powertrain items. As with factory procedures, the complete K-frame was installed from the bottom, with the engine and trans installed to it! Don had a body-contact lift in the shop, so the body was raised, then the "built from boards" holding fixture was positioned under the car, then the powertrain was raised as the body was eased down by Mr. Ditmore, one night. The interesting part was that the subframe bolts had tapered shanks on them, which made them "self-centering" in nature. With no evidence of front body structure repairs, everything went back into its original position "as designed'. With NONE of the normal worries of installing the engine into a "fresh-paint" engine compartment from the top-side. Quite neat!
It was NEAT to be involved at the level where I could look at the car and its progress from a painted body shell, then progressing through each stage of the restoration daily and weekly, until the car made its appearance at the 1992 Mopar Nationals show field, where it won awards.
Through all of the progress, I had never really been excited about the white with black vinyl color combination, but as that's what it came with, that's what Don honored and re-did it in. After the car had taken its "Victory Lap" down the drag strip "Winner's Parade" cruise (Don drivng with Mr. Ditmore as his passenger), sitting on the grass awaiting the arrival of the trailer (to be re-loaded for the trip back to Haltom City), as it sat on the grassy area near the track's end, as I walked up on the car, I noticed that it just looked better than at any other time I'd seen it. This somewhat puzzled me, as I'd seen the car so many times over the time it was being rebuilt. I walked around the car, looking at it from different angles, looking at the full-daylight it was sitting in, clouds in the sky, anything which might be contributing to "the look" I was seeing.
THEN, it struck me! Just like a winning quarter horse that had just won a major race, The 'Bird KNEW where it was and was looking great in that knowledge. Appreciative of the love and care it had received in making it back to its prior glory as it had left the assy plant. Yep, the car knew where it was that day. Seeing it bask in the bright Ohio sun that day was magical to me . . . and the car, too.
The final segment of the story took place on a low-traffic road (with no cross-roadnsps involved) through an agricultural area of Arkansas. Don and Steve (the co-conspirator of sorts in finding the car) had scoped-out these deserted highways on the way to Ohio. When they got to the desired place, they pulled over and unloaded the SB from the trailer, giving their sons instructions of "When you see us pulled over, then we'll re-load the car." So, Don and Steve got into the SB and took off down the highway. After a few miles to get things up to temp, with the windows down and vent wings turned fully open, they enjoyed driving the car and then WOT happened.
As they were enjoying the event of driving a new SuperBird as it was designed to be driven, at a bit over 120mph or so, the two vent wings suddenly closed themselves. When that sound happened, Don immediately checked the gauges and all were fine. He and Steve both looked around to see what had happened, as they had not felt anything in the road and the rebuilt engine was still running flawlessly. Then they noticed the vent wings had closed themselves from the wind rushing past them. They reported giggled like teenagers, smiled, slowed down a bit, taking that as an omen, and then pulled into the next country gas station they encountered. Of course, it created a "buzz" with the owner and attendants. Don and Steve bought soft drinks and waited for their sons to arrive with the trailer. After the soft drinks were consumed and some additional "coming back down to Earth", the SB was secured in the trailer to finish it's "rest of the trip home", like the great racehorse it was. Having shown its "stuff" on the show field and "on two-lane blacktop".
After a few more years of car shows and such, including some street driving, Don sold the car to a body shop owner in the Chicago area. The shop owner had recently completed at full resto of a GTX in his shop (it was HIS car), and noticed how much money it cost in lost production of that stall, so he concluded it was less expensive to buy a car already done to a high level of authenticity and effort than to do it himself. So the car was shipped up there.
In the process of getting the SB done back to factory standards, it became obvious that the SBs were a "cleaner build" than the 1969 Charger Daytonas, for several reasons, which evolved from lessons learned from the Daytonas. Something learned from the factory build sheet addendum documents. ALSO some of the things that many Wing Car restorers did not know at the time! Like the three layers of primer and overspray on the underside of the car, for example, particular to Daytonas as SBs had only two such things on their undersides.
It was a great experience and i thank God that I had the honor and opportunity to be involved in that SB restoration! One of my life's high points, for sure.
Several years later, another Mopar club member appeared with a fully-restored SB at one of our shows. In looking at the car, it was obvious that it had been restored to "Chevy standards" and not Mopar assy standards. We got Mr. Ditmore to look at the car and the many "incorrect restoration" items were respectfully pointed out. The owner wanted to win a trophy at Mopar Nats, so he undertook getting the car upgraded to Chrysler assy standards for the SB, which resulted in his pride of getting a major award from the strict Mopar Nats judging standards.
A few years after that, Steve took his '69 Daytona to Mopar Nats and put it through their Concours judging situation. Winning an award, too.
Those were some great times! I'm thankful I was able to have been a part of them. Many learning experiences, too!
Sorry for the length,
CBODY67
Two of our club members, J. Ditmore and the late A. Vasut, supplied the factory assembly manual supplements for SBs and Daytonas, which helped greatly in how the restoration activities were sequenced. Mr. Ditmore spent many hours working on the car by himself, in Don's shop, getting the car put together as if it was on an assembly line rather than in a private shop, which greatly aided many things! Another of our members, J. Peterson, knew about many "off-line assembly" items as he worked at the GM-Arlington Assy Plant, so that was educational and greatly aided how we did things, too. Don and some friends in another local car club were doing cars at the same time, so their main vendor for all of their parts was YearONE, under a company name, for the best volume discounts.
The car was white with a black vinyl top and black custom bench seat interior. Normal 440/TF car, so no rarer items there. Rallye Wheels and repro Goodyear white letter tires.
ONE thing that was done was a complete photo documentation of all inspection marks so they could be reproduced after careful cleaning. Then they were re-done, too. Care was taken to exactly match ALL finishes on the chassis, with paint and clearcoat. In that process, I learned a great amount of information on such things. Including that many suspension parts were dipped into a container of water with the black paint layered on top of the water, which would explain some runs and such on the parts. NOTHING was as perfect as many restored cars we now see, by observation, considering the realities of the assy line.
Chassis paints were sourced from vendors whose paints best-matched the factory looks and finishes. Not all "cast blast" colors are the same! Some were sourced from dirt track racing oriented companies, which was interesting!
The one real deviation from the factory build was to place some bubblewrap under the carpet, between the carpet and the normal jute padding. Suggested by the interior shop that installed the seat covers on the seats.
ONE of the neat things was that the full instrument panel was assembled on a work bench, in the "off-line assembly" orientation. Then, one night, with the front seat still out, the assembled inst panel was walked into the passenger compartment and the attaching bolts installed to hold it there. The heater box had already been restored and installed and the steering column was installed after the inst panel installation had been finalized. Then the front and back glasses were reinstalled.
A MAIN thing was the installation of the powertrain items. As with factory procedures, the complete K-frame was installed from the bottom, with the engine and trans installed to it! Don had a body-contact lift in the shop, so the body was raised, then the "built from boards" holding fixture was positioned under the car, then the powertrain was raised as the body was eased down by Mr. Ditmore, one night. The interesting part was that the subframe bolts had tapered shanks on them, which made them "self-centering" in nature. With no evidence of front body structure repairs, everything went back into its original position "as designed'. With NONE of the normal worries of installing the engine into a "fresh-paint" engine compartment from the top-side. Quite neat!
It was NEAT to be involved at the level where I could look at the car and its progress from a painted body shell, then progressing through each stage of the restoration daily and weekly, until the car made its appearance at the 1992 Mopar Nationals show field, where it won awards.
Through all of the progress, I had never really been excited about the white with black vinyl color combination, but as that's what it came with, that's what Don honored and re-did it in. After the car had taken its "Victory Lap" down the drag strip "Winner's Parade" cruise (Don drivng with Mr. Ditmore as his passenger), sitting on the grass awaiting the arrival of the trailer (to be re-loaded for the trip back to Haltom City), as it sat on the grassy area near the track's end, as I walked up on the car, I noticed that it just looked better than at any other time I'd seen it. This somewhat puzzled me, as I'd seen the car so many times over the time it was being rebuilt. I walked around the car, looking at it from different angles, looking at the full-daylight it was sitting in, clouds in the sky, anything which might be contributing to "the look" I was seeing.
THEN, it struck me! Just like a winning quarter horse that had just won a major race, The 'Bird KNEW where it was and was looking great in that knowledge. Appreciative of the love and care it had received in making it back to its prior glory as it had left the assy plant. Yep, the car knew where it was that day. Seeing it bask in the bright Ohio sun that day was magical to me . . . and the car, too.
The final segment of the story took place on a low-traffic road (with no cross-roadnsps involved) through an agricultural area of Arkansas. Don and Steve (the co-conspirator of sorts in finding the car) had scoped-out these deserted highways on the way to Ohio. When they got to the desired place, they pulled over and unloaded the SB from the trailer, giving their sons instructions of "When you see us pulled over, then we'll re-load the car." So, Don and Steve got into the SB and took off down the highway. After a few miles to get things up to temp, with the windows down and vent wings turned fully open, they enjoyed driving the car and then WOT happened.
As they were enjoying the event of driving a new SuperBird as it was designed to be driven, at a bit over 120mph or so, the two vent wings suddenly closed themselves. When that sound happened, Don immediately checked the gauges and all were fine. He and Steve both looked around to see what had happened, as they had not felt anything in the road and the rebuilt engine was still running flawlessly. Then they noticed the vent wings had closed themselves from the wind rushing past them. They reported giggled like teenagers, smiled, slowed down a bit, taking that as an omen, and then pulled into the next country gas station they encountered. Of course, it created a "buzz" with the owner and attendants. Don and Steve bought soft drinks and waited for their sons to arrive with the trailer. After the soft drinks were consumed and some additional "coming back down to Earth", the SB was secured in the trailer to finish it's "rest of the trip home", like the great racehorse it was. Having shown its "stuff" on the show field and "on two-lane blacktop".
After a few more years of car shows and such, including some street driving, Don sold the car to a body shop owner in the Chicago area. The shop owner had recently completed at full resto of a GTX in his shop (it was HIS car), and noticed how much money it cost in lost production of that stall, so he concluded it was less expensive to buy a car already done to a high level of authenticity and effort than to do it himself. So the car was shipped up there.
In the process of getting the SB done back to factory standards, it became obvious that the SBs were a "cleaner build" than the 1969 Charger Daytonas, for several reasons, which evolved from lessons learned from the Daytonas. Something learned from the factory build sheet addendum documents. ALSO some of the things that many Wing Car restorers did not know at the time! Like the three layers of primer and overspray on the underside of the car, for example, particular to Daytonas as SBs had only two such things on their undersides.
It was a great experience and i thank God that I had the honor and opportunity to be involved in that SB restoration! One of my life's high points, for sure.
Several years later, another Mopar club member appeared with a fully-restored SB at one of our shows. In looking at the car, it was obvious that it had been restored to "Chevy standards" and not Mopar assy standards. We got Mr. Ditmore to look at the car and the many "incorrect restoration" items were respectfully pointed out. The owner wanted to win a trophy at Mopar Nats, so he undertook getting the car upgraded to Chrysler assy standards for the SB, which resulted in his pride of getting a major award from the strict Mopar Nats judging standards.
A few years after that, Steve took his '69 Daytona to Mopar Nats and put it through their Concours judging situation. Winning an award, too.
Those were some great times! I'm thankful I was able to have been a part of them. Many learning experiences, too!
Sorry for the length,
CBODY67
Agree! We got to see it all in real time without a lot of "lead-in drama".
I think that Rocket will do those cars proud, one way or another.
CBODY67
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