73 plymouth duster

[kaharshs]

Well time to start on my 73 plymouth duster. This my 3rd one ive owned. Might rebuild it the same way I did my last one ,I should have never sold. Gonna shave the door handles,trim, tailight trim, and fuel door. Might do some other body mods as I randomly come up with them. The brown one is my new one the orange one was the last one I owned. It was originally a gold one with snake skin top and a slant 6.

 

[ryoken]

cool, my first car... 72 Gold Duster.... 340, 3 spd...

they make nice hotrods.... have fun!

 

[76zimmer]

any drivetrain mods?

should be fun, relatively lightweight cars= quick.

 

[kaharshs]

I already boxed the lower control arms while rebuilding the front end. Im gonna put some new rear springs in and adjustable shocks. 2x3 frame connectors with a roll bar to stiffen it up. Then my cheapest trip is get a set of stock a body axles from strange and have a c body 8 3/4 housing shortened up to fit the axles. My last 2 were small block car and on this one im either going 440 or a 360 stroked to a 408. Havent decided yet. Im leaning toward the 360 but if i find a good deal on a 440 i will grab it.

 

[76zimmer]

A few friends run them....kinda like the 383 chevy strokers, they seem to be getting really popular.

 

[AJMBLAZER]

Shecksy.

Neighbor guy had a poop brown Duster when I was a kid. I want to say a 318 and a stick.

Funny part was he joined the Air Force...sad part was it then sat.

 

[pauly383]

Pinion Snubbers rule

 

[kaharshs]

Dusters are like mullets everyone had one growing! Pinion snubber do kick ass. I was looking at my passenger side quarter panel and it looked bulged so I started using stripper to take the paint off and founf bondo I'm gonna take a picture of how much I scraped off. Don't know why they used so muvh because the metal doesn't look that bad.

 

[kaharshs]

Well I finally upgraded my welder to gas and solid wire. So I made some progress saturday. Got my quarter panel tacked on most the way. The key is to cut them together while you tack well across the butt line. After I get the right side buttoned up im gonna work my way to the back tail light panel and maby put on a left side panel. It looks like the car had been hit from the back left and they cut the left read quarter and half a tailight panel off a good car. they then brazed the two together. Kinda a hack job but it was a normal repair back in the day. I think im gonna make custom taillights and a roll pan for the rear.

 

[Merv]

I'm easy,I really like any old muscle car. A guy at work had a 72 Duster p.o.s with a 350 chevy in it I would have loved to see MOPAR guys faces when he told them that.

 

[kaharshs]

I thought about putting a 350 in mine, i have an extra one laying in my garage. I also like to piss off purists. Got the left site pretty much finished up with installing the quarter. Now I may replace the rear tailight panel and the left quarter.

 

[ryoken]

i freakin love 340's... it's all I built for a decade... motors spin like mofo's..... shaft mounted rockers baby!


how's the sheetmetal availability these days on the Mopars? I'd love to build another Cuda...

 

[kaharshs]

Its pretty easy to find sheetmetal. Aint cheap for mopar though.

 

[ryoken]

nothing is... thus why I traitored my beloved Mopar for Chevy after a decade.. they where 2/3's the cost to build...

 

[1AAuto.com]

I like Dusters too,nice car

 

[kaharshs]

Ive been busy lately designing, making molds, and parts for a customers project. So in short not much time to work on the duster. But my schedule is starting to clear up and I am ready to start on the left quater panel and rear tailight panel. Need to get this pig finished up and atleast in primer. Then its either a turbo for the slant six or the 350 I have setting in my garage.

 

[blazinzuk]

Turbo the slant six, cause it would be weird and thats kind of what mopars are about sometimes.

I hope to someday build an early 60s dart convertible with a turbo slant six and a 4 speed.

My first car was a 63 dart

 

[onetonbb74]

Nice, love dusters (A-body Chrysler), been around a few of them as my friend has a 70 duster, and a 68 cuda. One has a 383, the other will get a 340 as big blocks in a-bodys are a huge PITA. Gotta love the leaning tower of power, that thing will never die.

 

[AJMBLAZER]

I saw one a few years back that basically had a late model Australian slant 6. They kept using them much later than we did and developed them a lot further. 300hp was a factory rating in the late ones. Anyway, this guy had gotten pretty much a whole Aussie engine and loved it as it was lighter than a V8 but made good hp and torque like a diesel. Sounded cool.