How do you build your car

Build it the way you want it. But...

Mopars and some of the other muscle cars are a little different because of some of the factory oddballs and options. I would obviously recommend NOT cutting up a '71 hemi 'Cuda. :toothy10: But a '74 with a 318/904? Game on.

Don't cut up stuff just to do it. Its amazing how much work can be done on these cars by just bolting things on. After all, a big block can go into a /6 car with bolt on engine mounts, a bolt in transmission, a bolt in rear end, and some bolt in headers (ok there's a little more to it, but it all bolts on :-D). If someone really wanted to put a /6 back in it, they could, and with very little "damage" to undo if any. Especially if you held on to the original parts (if they're #'s matching, otherwise don't bother). There's a lot of things you can do with factory parts, even if they weren't factory for your car.

If you use a little "common sense", you can do a lot to make a car yours without doing anything permanent. My Challenger was already a non-matching numbers car when I got it, and it was a 318/904 grocery getter to start with. It already has all new suspension- larger torsion bars, tubular UCA's and LCA's, drop spindles, 11.75" rotors, XHD springs and so on (all of which can be unbolted, actually), and will soon have a 400+ hp 340 and 4 speed. But I'm guessing that if I had to sell it for some reason it would be worth more as a 340/4 speed that handles well than a non-numbers matching 318 grocery getter that drives like a boat, so there's a little bit of common sense for you.

My butterscotch '71 Dart GT on the other hand is almost all stock, #'s matching, with buildsheet and fender tag present. It has some options, and for the most part I'm going to keep it original. But since the 318 is worn out, I'm pulling it for another small block. I'm going to hang on to the original block and rebuild at a later date though, so it can stay original. But in the mean time I can drive it. And I may convert to disk brakes, run larger torsion bars, stiffer springs and better shocks. But again, there are a lot of "factory looking" options that just bolt up. I can bolt up a set of '73-76 a-arms, spindles and disks and still look stock. It might not match the buildsheet, but its not a franken-car either. And if someone buys it later and wants to put manual 10" drums back on it, they can. If someone crawls under my car to find out I have 1" torsion bars instead of .88" bars, good for them.

I guess my point is for a street driven car there really isn't a whole lot of stuff you need to do that can't be undone anyway, so do what you want. It really isn't that hard to remove an aftermarket radio and put a stocker back in, its not like you're going to weld it in. Especially if you give a little thought to how you wire the new one. If you're going to back-half the thing, weld in a cage, and strip its guts, it probably makes better financial sense not to start with a rare model/option car. But other than that, have fun! Cars can be repainted, big blocks can be removed, and if you don't just slash and burn your way through the car its easy enough to do.