MarkJ

Most of the vehicles in the early seventies were dogs because they were trying to make them less polluting without the catalytic converter. That did not come out till 1975.

Alan, i too had problems with the carburetor. The car would die at the most inopportune moments. Like trying to get on the highway from the apartment complex I lived at. Also trying to pass somebody on a two-lane highway, it wouldn't shut off, but it would stumble and then go. Very scary car to drive. I was so glad to sell it to my cross the street neighbor. When I did, he side swiped it getting into his garage. I think I only kept it for 2 years and replaced it with a 1975 chevy monza with a v8 and a floor shifter. I could never get my wife to learn how to use a clutch so i eventually sold it too. I finally got a 1976 Chevy laguna s-3 . but I got that with a 350 2 barrel and it was a dog too. The only way to get that car with a 4 barrel was to get the 400 small block that they were having trouble with the head gaskets so I didn't want one of those.

I came upon a picture from one of my mother's photo albums on the anniversary of her birthday. she passed back in 2019. It was a picture of my very first new car. I had come over to her house to wash it because I was newly married and lived in an apartment where you could not wash your car and I didn't want to go to a car wash. I was fixing to leave, and she said, wait dear, let me get a photo. So she took it. It was 3x5 in her album so I blew it up to 4x6. 1973 Dodge Charger SE. I purchased it for $3995.00 plus tax, title, and license from Royal Dodge in Alvin where Nolan Ryan grew up. They had 5 of these cars, 4 with 400 2 barrel carburetors . 1 had the 440 4barrel carb for 500 bucks more but I already thought I was paying too much. Man I wished I had payed that extra money. the 400 was a dud of a car.

The front suspension on this was not fun again like the first one. The instructions call for a part that's not even in the front suspension, so you have to figure out which part they really wanted you to use. The rear suspension wasn't that bad this time because i remembered a tip about the parts so I wouldn't try to put them on upside down. When I removed a lower rear control arm from the parts tree the part broke without any undue pressure on my part. I had to glue it back together before I could continue. When I mocked up the build with the tires and wheels it sat true with all 4 tires on the ground my first one wasn't just right on that. the tip on the pennies was helpful in getting that right

This seems so much better than the old mpc kit from the seventy's. I've always liked this generation of Plymouth Belvederes. Might have to get one. Yours is looking mighty fine.

Mock ups.

I did things a little differently this time. Instead of putting the center and front cage together and then installing it to the underpan, I just started from the rear and installed the chassis pieces to the underpan as I went along. Things seemed to fit together better this time by doing that. I had to take my wife's hair dryer to the under pan to flatten it out, before I could start installing the chassis pieces. It was pretty warped, but I finally got it to fit the body after frying my fingers a little in the process. the hood was pretty warped, but I got it fixed too.

Coming along perfectly, Jason. Woodgrain on the dash looks superb.

I noticed on the instructions this time that it said to put 3 pennies under the front lower control arms so I did it this time. Maybe the stance will be more correct. Also, I noticed on the last build that only the upper surfaces of the engine are visible so i will only paint those parts of the engine.

Thanks, Les. Yes, it was a parody on Rambo. And Charlie Sheen was the star of the flick.

Oh, is that French? I just got it from some sequel comedy movie I remembered from a while ago. I really don't remember the name of the movie, but I know it had part deux at the end of the title because it was part 2. For some reason I think Charlie Sheen was in it but I'm not sure. I've never been out of the states and don't plan on it anytime soon. Canada would be nice but don't want to fly and I don't want to drive that far.

I know I said I wasn't going to do a wip on this build, but I always do a wip. This will just be for things I noticed this time around that I missed last time. It won't be as extensive as last time. Building isn't as much fun without a wip.

Excellent build to go along with the other excellent builds. What kit did you use for the Stott build?

Started on my next Nextgen kit but no need for a wip. Things are going much smoother on this one so I'm going to keep my own record of the build just to see if I can beat the 88.5 hours it took me on this build.

Don't know how I missed this. Excellent job, Randy. Looks flawless.

I could not find the wip pictures, but I basically took thin strips of .010 styrene sheets and glued them together and then added a wiper insert right down the middle of the narrow box, added a mounting deal and thats about it.

Neil, I think I took some wip pictures of making it so I will post them here if I can find them.

Forgot the front

More refs.

Thanks, Bruce. Make sure when you do the decals that you do all the big decals first. if there are any that border the grille opening, they will overlap the opening just a little bit so you have to put the grille decal on after you do those. I found that out the hard way.

Here is what the real car looked like.

It's free. But you have to buy a bunch of paint in dropper bottles sold by Vallejo and some high-quality artist brushes to get the paint to flow on properly. But you never have to worry abought orange peel or grainy paint or any of the other things that can happen when you are spraying. Thats why Pierre's paint jobs are always perfect. He has figured it out completely. i'm still working on it.

Thanks, John. They are not all that hard to build. You just have to make sure you put the parts in correctly. Some parts can be installed upside down, but if you do, then you cannot proceed because the next part has no place to go. I have to blame Trackhouse racing for giving me the incentive to build a couple of these. They came on the scene this year with two drivers that have really added a lot of excitement to the sport. I will eventually get back to the vintage cars after I get through with my next new one. Plus, they are kind of expensive.

Andrew, join the brush painter's society and you will never have a hair in the paint problem again.

I forgot to mention I had to make a wiper blade for it and a 4-inch half clear half black rear spoiler.