A good example of buying a 70 Duster done rather than building one

jimharvard said

LOL! you are SO right SGBarracuda!! i've owned and run a body shop and still do my own work and paint and i would NEVER attempt to assess the condition of a car from just a picture! you MUST see a car in person to determine its actual condition. could this car have hidden rust and a lot of bondo? sure. but can you tell that from the pictures of the car? ABSOLUTELY NOT and anyone who thinks they can is simply NOT a "bodyman." LOL!

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But can you not make an educated guess based on pictures? Lack of prep, bubbles under the paint, body contours looking off? Not saying you should be 100% convinced, but can't you get a feel for it?

Is it a rust bucket? Maybe not. But there is enough to say that some shortcuts were taken leaving me to expect that there is much more rust than what is visible. Rule I always hear was, if can you see the rust, then there is a fair amount more that you can't.

I think you have to take things as a whole, based on what you have available. And based on what is available, I have to say I kind of doubt this is a real 340 car.

Does that make it worth less than the asking price? No idea, that depends on the person willing to pay it. But if it was me and I wanted a real 340 Duster and was willing to live with and fix the issues, it would piss me off no end if I found out it was a VIN swapped 318 car, whether I could afford to build a clone for the same money or not.