70s cars as they really were!

[espo]

Any sudden change in direction in a car with really loong shackles in the rear could easily induce oversteer as the rear end would shift to one side. Think of driving on an icy road and the rear end suddenly starts to come around and you're not expecting it. 

[Classicgas]

5 hours ago, Jantrix said:

The tail-up, nose-down with fat tires trend in the back was in full swing when I was a kid in the 70's/80's, and I loved it. I still do. If I had a muscle car with say "limited" resale value, I'd happily do that, still today. And drive it everywhere. ?

Agree 150%.

[JollySipper]

8 hours ago, Jantrix said:

The tail-up, nose-down with fat tires trend in the back was in full swing when I was a kid in the 70's/80's, and I loved it. I still do. If I had a muscle car with say "limited" resale value, I'd happily do that, still today. And drive it everywhere. ?

I was a car crazy youth in the mid 1980s (I was still a kid)... The style then was nose-up, tail-down, with usually Centerline polished deep dish wheels. It was usually something like a Monte Carlo or Regal. Nothing muscle, more "cruisers". That's the style I remember the most fondest, and would drive something sat up like that today.....

That fad stuck around until the mid '90s, at least.

[Scott Colmer]

This was actually 1980. The car was a local car that I bought, got running, and sold a couple years later. With me it had a ported 289 w/ a top loader and NOS. When I dropped in a set of 455 welded spline gears, things got really out of hand. With the new owner it got stolen and stripped.

 

 

[tim boyd]

On 4/26/2022 at 5:49 PM, 1972coronet said:

1-of-650 (+/-) 1970 Swinger 340s with the W15 Wire Wheel Covers. Original owner car in triple-green (including V8F tail stripe), 4-speed, disc brakes, power steering, radio, hood pins, scoops. 

Had Cragar S/S from 1972-2015 (hard to find in that [stupid] 5x4" bolt pattern even back then).

Here's a photo of the W15 wheel cover -- more images to follow when I receive them from its owner...

Yep....that was a popular factory option back then, even on musclecars back then. 

In my senior year at high school ('71-'72) I bought a set at the local C-P dealer and put them on my dad's 1969 F8 Chrysler Town and Country wagon.  They looked really sharp.  But after graduating in June '72, I bought a set of Rocket mags (poor man's Cragar S/S), 15x6 reversed, and a set of H78/J78 blackwalls.  As strange as that sounds, those actually looked really, really extra sharp!   As for the bearings on the front and rear, axles not so much!    TB 

[tim boyd]

For all you young'uns ou there, this thread of pictures is a very accurate remembrance of the average American street scene of the early to late 1970's.  Great times even if we didn't fully understand it at the time.  

My ride during this was pretty conservative by comparison, for a couple of reasons.  This car was my college and early work life transportation, it had been ordered and purchased new with recognition that factory musclecars were never to return and so this car would have to last a long time.   It was a 1974 Road Runner E58 (360 4bbl hi-po wedge), factory tach, cruise control (I was doing some long distance driving or work), interior and exterior decor packages, buckets and console, radio delete ( so I could run an AM/FM Stereo 8-track).  I had a fresh set of mags almost every year.  Shown here it had the BFG Radial T/A's that I won for finishing second nationwide in the 1976 MPC Customizing Contest (back then Radiall T/A's were very high-buck and essentially unaffordable for a college student - yeah, I was one very lucky dude on that one).    Fortunately these pix omit the skinny jeans, silk disco shirt, choker necklace, and long hair  of its driver/owner!  

These pix were taken at the 1978 USMA Street Machine Nats at the old Michigan State Fairgrounds at Woodward and Eight Mile Road in Detroit...

 

Look closely and you'll see i had added some 1973-74 Plymouth Satellite Sebring Plus trim (e.g rocker panels, et al) and a Mopar accessory luggage rack.  The front end was slightly lowered (bless those torsion bar adjusting bolts!), with some owner-added pinstriping on the decklid.   Those were my second set of "Bazooka" tailpipes.....by 1978 they were already scarce in the Mopar parts system....took the local dealer six months to find a set....in Hawaii, he told me.,,,   By this point I had already fixed the body once due to lower body rustouts, eventually it rusted out a second time and I gave it to a Lincoln Mercury dealer service manager in St. Louis when I was working there....but only after 140,000 miles over 16 years and essentially zero mechanical failures.  Still miss that car today.   

Here's the scale replica of it I built in 2020....

TB

Edited May 8, 2022 by tim boyd

[Classicgas]

Excellent replica Tim.

[Bucky]

On 4/26/2022 at 4:49 PM, 1972coronet said:

1-of-650 (+/-) 1970 Swinger 340s with the W15 Wire Wheel Covers. Original owner car in triple-green (including V8F tail stripe), 4-speed, disc brakes, power steering, radio, hood pins, scoops. 

Had Cragar S/S from 1972-2015 (hard to find in that [stupid] 5x4" bolt pattern even back then).

Here's a photo of the W15 wheel cover -- more images to follow when I receive them from its owner...

In 1975, I bought a new 1975 Dodge Coronet Brougham 2 door hardtop that had the very same wire covers.

[Raoul Ross]

This thread brings back a lot of memories... Cherry Bombs, Hi-Jackers and fat rear tires, the 70s made it easy to change to look of any ride. I remember my grandma saying, "it must be for gas mileage as they look like they're going downhill all the time!" LOL

Oh yea, if you could see the rear end it *had* to painted white!

[Scott Colmer]

On 5/9/2022 at 9:07 AM, Raoul Ross said:

This thread brings back a lot of memories... Cherry Bombs, Hi-Jackers and fat rear tires, the 70s made it easy to change to look of any ride. I remember my grandma saying, "it must be for gas mileage as they look like they're going downhill all the time!" LOL

Oh yea, if you could see the rear end it *had* to painted white!

Yellow slapper traction bars too.

[ChrisBcritter]

From Paducah, KY in 1975:

 

[ChrisBcritter]

And a selection from the (often NSFW) Internet K-Hole site:

[Oldcarfan27]

Found more this weekend!

And some modern interpretations. 

[keyser]

The black and white rear shot of the 68 Charger is wicked. Stance perfect. No weenie inset rear tires and empty wheel wells. 
drop the fronts and rears on most of these, and could be current. Great pics. 

Edited June 16, 2022 by keyser
Pic

[TooOld]

This is my '69 Camaro RS that I bought in 1974 for $700 , it had a very worn 307 with a 3-speed on the floor .  I swapped in a 350 otherwise this is just how I bought it , when I got back from overseas in '78 I drove it a few months then sold it for $800 . Really fun car !

[Snake45]

1 hour ago, TooOld said:

This is my '69 Camaro RS that I bought in 1974 for $700 , it had a very worn 307 with a 3-speed on the floor .  I swapped in a 350 otherwise this is just how I bought it , when I got back from overseas in '78 I drove it a few months then sold it for $800 . Really fun car !

Looks familiar! I too bought a '69 Camaro in 1974, for $1400, but mine was an SS350/RS with PS and power disks, console, M20 4-speed, 3.55 Posi rear. I drove it for 7 years and sold it for $1000. I miss it every day. 

[Jantrix]

I did a '69 Cougar like this nearly ten years ago. It was a lot of fun. Let me know if the photos are gone. I see them with the Photobucket watermarks on them.

 

[TooOld]

1 hour ago, Snake45 said:

Looks familiar! I too bought a '69 Camaro in 1974, for $1400, but mine was an SS350/RS with PS and power disks, console, M20 4-speed, 3.55 Posi rear. I drove it for 7 years and sold it for $1000. I miss it every day. 

$1400 sounds about right , mine barely ran and smoked like a locomotive but the engine swap really brought it back to life ! Never should have sold it .

[Oldcarfan27]

[Snake45]

1 hour ago, Oldcarfan27 said:

Those look a lot like my Snake-Fu'ed glue bombs...and members of my imaginary late '70s hot rod club The Retrobates. 

[Bills72sj]

I graduated in '79. All my friends were into cars. Back then muscle cars were just 10-12 year old used cars and were dirt cheap.

Our little group had all these cars...

Red black striped 69 Chevelle SS 396 4-speed

Dark metallic green 69 Mustang Grande 351 Winsor with flat black Mach 1 hood

Dark metallic green 67 Firebird 326 3-speed taken out 400 4-speed put in

Copper metallic 69 Coronet 440 with a 383

Dark metallic green 72 Duster with a 225 leaning tower of power

Red 70 Chevelle SS 396 4-speed with the whole speed parts catalog thrown at it then bought for $1000

Light green 67 Mustang coupe 289

Mine was a gold 68 Malibu with a 307 powerglide (and scary 4 wheel drum brakes)

 

A few years later I got my 1st Grand Prix (see pic)

My best friend had a 70 Challenger R/T SE

[Modlbldr]

Got a 69 Firebird that I want to do in a 70's style. Anybody got any tires and wheels similar to these?

Later-

[Oldcarfan27]

4 hours ago, Modlbldr said:

Got a 69 Firebird that I want to do in a 70's style. Anybody got any tires and wheels similar to these?

Later-

Post an ad in the wanted section. This thread is for stories and photos, not wants.

[Modlbldr]

5 hours ago, Oldcarfan27 said:

Post an ad in the wanted section. This thread is for stories and photos, not wants.

Sorry, thought I had moved over to the wanted section once I downloaded these pics on my phone.

Good thing is- I managed to bump this great thread from page 5 back to the top!

Later-

Edited October 10, 2022 by Modlbldr

[Daryl Romain]

Motion Camaro on Sunrise Highway, Baldwin NY around 1973.