Original hemi dart information

[Liteweight]

I believe there are basically 2 ways of doing this. First way is by process of elimination of KNOWN & accounted for cars. There were only 80 of these built. Mark , could you put together an updated list of cars that you do not have accounted for???
The other is to find where this car raced as a bracket car in the 70's, & then work backward from there.
Comeon guys, I live in mid Canada, I do not know the eastern tracks from that era. I don't know for sure but I'm thinking that there has to be a list of them in a National Dragster.
M68 , I'm not a collector of old print such as what you have, as cool as it is. They would be looked through once for the single reason to see IF there's any usefull information.
I'd be willing to purchase them from you, but I'm thinking the shipping from you to me would be a lil on the tall side. PM me, we'll see if we can put something together tho. Below are a few pictures of it when Tim Hennessey restored it in the mid 80's. You can see why there is no possible way of finding ANY previous paint colors. for those that are interested, check out the sledge hammer work done by Hurst to the PS shock tower. Ya, it's crude





liteweight

[Hemi Moose]

Liteweight,
Nice shots of the restoration process on the '68 Hemi Dart...I see lots of sand still located on the floor boards, and also see that they didn't blast the black paint off the side of the firewall bulkhead and door jam by the door striker...and that he also taped off the Chrysler door decal stating this vehicle does not conform to public highways...but I do have one question though, so when you do find out the origins of your Hemi Dart, will you repaint it to it's original race paint colors. - HM.

[hemidart3]

asking this because i can't tell from the above pictures but is the hole in the firewall for the brake rod to the offset master cylinder modified in these pictures? previous pictures i have seen the hole is hogged out on the left side and i had to do that on my clone. dave

[Liteweight]

Originally Posted by hemidart3

asking this because i can't tell from the above pictures but is the hole in the firewall for the brake rod to the offset master cylinder modified in these pictures? previous pictures i have seen the hole is hogged out on the left side and i had to do that on my clone. dave

I don't believe they are cut out or modified. I checked on the old pix I have & don't see any mods to the cutout either. Maybe, the original style of offset does not have as much offset as the current available reproductions??? I'm only quessing tho







liteweight

[Hemi Moose]

You know I was wondering about this for awhile now, is it me or am I seeing things...in some of the old photos I'm seeing splashes of a blueish - greenish color by the door decal, splashed on the side of the dash, on the door jamb by the door stricker etc, or maybe it could be just primer...it could be that the photo's are just old and the color is off, but it sure looks like a different color to me in some of those shots, because I see traces of blueish - greenish spots and also some red - brown under that black paint, I'm just sayin'...also I don't know if I mentioned this before but have you ever tried chipping off the old paint off the rocker seam lip that hangs down, where the floor pan meets...any old paint is usually caked on there pretty good if it hasn't been blasted already, and judging by the old photos it looks like the rocker panels weren't touched.

[Liteweight]

Good ideas, but I don't believe there was any of the old paint left, don't know for sure tho, & I just wouldn't be able to start scratching around on this thing looking for old paint. The paint on it today, looks almost as good as it did when it was painted in 1986. You'll see why I don't want to start scratching on this thing in the next few posts.
HM, the blueish green colors your seeing is not your eyes,but it's not the true colors either. They're from the old Kodak slides that I converted.

"Liteweight,
Nice shots of the restoration process on the '68 Hemi Dart...I see lots of sand still located on the floor boards, and also see that they didn't blast the black paint off the side of the firewall bulkhead and door jam by the door striker...and that he also taped off the Chrysler door decal stating this vehicle does not conform to public highways...but I do have one question though, so when you do find out the origins of your Hemi Dart, will you repaint it to it's original race paint colors. - HM."

Almost forgot to answer that. Not all the original paint schemes are something that I'd remove this paint for tho. You gotta admit there were some bad ones. I hope I'm given that choice. I quess, I'll have to see IF that opportunity is ever presented to me

liteweight

[Charlie A]

Can't wait to see this evolution!!!!!!

[Hemi Moose]

Originally Posted by Hemi Moose

You know I was wondering about this for awhile now, is it me or am I seeing things...in some of the old photos I'm seeing splashes of a blueish - greenish color by the door decal, splashed on the side of the dash, on the door jamb by the door stricker etc, or maybe it could be just primer...it could be that the photo's are just old and the color is off, but it sure looks like a different color to me in some of those shots, because I see traces of blueish - greenish spots and also some red - brown under that black paint, I'm just sayin'...also I don't know if I mentioned this before but have you ever tried chipping off the old paint off the rocker seam lip that hangs down, where the floor pan meets...any old paint is usually caked on there pretty good if it hasn't been blasted already, and judging by the old photos it looks like the rocker panels weren't touched.

Well does anyone else here see what I see, and think what I think !

I knew I saw traces of blue paint on this thing before...

Look real close by the drivers door striker...

.

[JCShiels]

Daryl,
Just a point of interest, I was looking at the 2 B+W photos of Wild Fire to see if I could tell what rollbar set up it had at that point in time and I realised that the guy that painted the car is in the picture. If you have the one that shows the car with Bob leaning over the engine on the driver's side and Tim on the passenger's side you see a man standing behind Tim, he is missing his left hand, that is Finley Jackson. Mark J has the photo if you don't have it.

[Liteweight]

Originally Posted by Hemi Moose

Well does anyone else here see what I see, and think what I think !

I knew I saw traces of blue paint on this thing before...

Look real close by the drivers door striker...

.

hey Hemi Moose
Thanx man for your continued interest in finding the history of my "unknown soldier". I really appreciate it !!!!!!
I've looked all these pictures over many times searching for something I'd missed. I haven't seen the blue before, but I think I see where you mention. Honestly, I don't think we can trust some of the colors that come through in these old pictures. There is alot of that blue/green hue in them, so I really can't say for sure there's anything there. The rest of the jambs look to be the original black that was applied by ma mopar in 68. The black on the rockers was applied by Paul Pittman when he painted it white for Lou Vignonia in 85.

All it's previous colors were eventually blasted off previous to being restored by Tim Hennessey.
I have a couple pictures on a PDF file that were sent to me by Paul Pittman of the car after it was chemically paint stripped previous to it's white paint in 1985. I've been tring to convert them over to a jpg file, but have been unable to do so. They clearly show the Lakewood 3 point rollbar in it, but again it's very hard to see any colors on it, just bare steel.

More to come on Wild Fire

liteweight