Long story about this 1970. Started out as a teenage desire to buy and drive this car once owned by a close friend of the family.

Drove it end of the senior year in highschool and that summer totalled the front end rear ending a Dodge Dakota truck.

Started my rebuild that year 1996, worked on swaping out the original 318 motor for a 383. Spent most of the time in junk yards replacing the parts, cleaning up the engine bay, and up grading the drive train. Finally got it running..drove it from California to ALabama. Broke down here and there but managed to make the 3000 mile trip, was a huge sucess although was never was pretty.

Why Alabama?
Mid Junior college 1997, my mom pushed me out of my home in California due to my excessive partying. I applied and got accepted to University of South Alabama and lived with my father.

Long story short, left 1970 Challenger behind in Alabama, after I could not take to bordom any longer. Being a student I decided to store this project at my fathers house until i had the means continue.

Seven years later, $1100 less the transport cost, and a house/family of my own... this car is now back in my garage in Califorina.

The elements of the humid south took its tool on this machine. Now its time to give this some real work and design. My blue prints are alike Joe Rogans Cuda by Foose.

Not pretty..under that rag top rush bubbles..

Started to remove all the interior and then started on the engine...

Front fenders need some work and removed them to focus on the core first.

Rag top slowly comming off, lots of glue and rust combined. Used stripper to loosen it up and scrape off.

Removed the rag, now started stripping and sanding with DA but was a slow process removing the combo. Heavy rust pits and some holes.

383 looking highschool style, started unwiring and removing the carb etc.

Holley 4 Barrel 650...

Cherry picked reminded me of 1997, the rubber mounts on right side were torn, on 318 mounts this got me a torn oil pan in Alabama..

The heart of it all..should i go 440? or up the cam and internals?

Empty engine bay from my work back in the day...

383 resting on stand for decisions to be made regarding up grading to max wedge 440 or just slight rebuild.

Started to get serious about removing rust/paint..

the whole top is rusted from the mosture trapped in by the rag top..it looks impossible..

The back window missing rust ate it all up, hidden by the molding, previous owner must have ignored this and covered up..my problem now..

added Rust Doctor to bare metal to try it out..4 weeks later still no sign of rust comming out of the rusted areas.

Half sanded and painted with RD..

Interior rusted where the water came in through front and back rusted areas would wire brush many hours to remove..

Respirator, gloves, glasses, power wire brush, and scrapper..