East Village Swinger

EAST VILLAGE SWINGER

I was walking through the East Village with a couple of friends recently when I stumbled upon this smart little beauty:

Sweet! This is a 1970 Dodge Dart Swinger in Dark Green Poly with a black vinyl roof. Scratches and scuffs aside this car is in spectacular original condition. Even the stance is correct as if it's sitting up on a new set of springs. I love this car!

The Dart was the compact offering from Dodge from the mid-'60s through the late '70s. Pinpointing the vintage on these rides is easy as the facade changed every year. The 1969 Dart sported a grill with a full-width horizontal central bar. The year after retained this split grill but the word Dodge wasn't written on the hood as it is here(it was however on the right side of the hood but the letters were small and non-script). 

How many cars have a facial expression? There is a subtley tilted eyebrow line giving the headlights a determined look that I think is great. That rust patch and the small scratches around the grill opening are reassuring as far as I'm concerned. The finish is original from the factory so there are no secrets lurking beneath a newer paint job. 

I love the old script writing of this emblem.

Remind yourself that this is a compact car when you look through the back window and realize that the trunk starts behind that back seat and runs all the way to the bumper!
With the slight bump-up at the beginning of the quarter panel and that bodyside folded paper crease it's easy to miss the subtle styling cues that make this a true classic.

Oh yeah it's 1970! In case you'd forgotten that how about we dot the I with a flower pulled from the Laugh-In set?
The Swinger was an option package on paper but in reality every 2 door Dart in '70 carried that name. Supposedly you could get a 4 door Swinger but very few left the factory.

The top edge of the fender leading into the quarter panel, angling down the sides, and continuing onto the bumper is just neat. Mopar as a company consisted of Dodge, Chrysler, and Plymouth in 1970 and you could find similar signatures across all levels of luxury. The mighty Imperial had many things in common with the lowly Dart even though they were meant for vastly different demographics.

This concave rear window was not cheap to produce but does a great job of making the overall look of this ride dynamic. With a perfectly flat angles rear window this would be cool but not nearly as distinctive. The fact that the hinge side of the trunk lid apes this curve shows that this wasn't a last minute idea tacked on to the model.

Looks like somebody liked the new rythym and blues quartet at some point.

The overall forward leaning arrow shape gives this rather square car some motion. The wheel wells trailing off in the rear adds to this.

Original funky hubcaps sporting the Mopar Fratzog in the center (the Fratzog was created in-house and given this made-up name by one of the designers. It is meaningless and was probably a flip comment but it stuck from '62 through '81!).

This Dart has a nice selection of options including the Music Master AM radio and air conditioning. However the one ultra rare option on display here is that steering wheel. This is the holy grail for Dart restorers; a 1970-specific, Dart-specific, Rim-Blow wheel. Basically the back side of the ring is one big button so if you're driving and need to use the horn you can squeeze the rim wherever you happen to have your hands already (smashing the center will still work too). This was a lauded option for the 'cudas and Chargers of the day but they looked different than this one. The fact that there is the cheapest looking button taped over the wheel on the left side under The Club leads me to believe this one doesn't work but it is oh-so rare and totally worth restoring.
The seat has been re-skinned by somebody more used to upholstering taxis. Just look at that slab of vinyl! Buckle up or you're definitely sliding into each other on corners.

Here are the handsome Dart dimensions on full display. I consider this to be a perfect classic car; enough performance to use in modern traffic, good enough economy for daily use, big enough to do classic car stuff like drive 6 people to the beach, but still parkable in scale.

Over the years I've had 2 Plymouth Dusters which are really identical cars to this except for the rear body. They are fantastic cars - easy as pie to work on and totally immortal with the Slant-6 engine.
I'll close this out with a cringe-worthy anecdote about redneck Putnam County where I went to high school: A friend of mine had a 4 door '74 Dart that he beat on relentlessly. He would tow sleds around fields in winter and practice e-brake u-turns and reverse Rockford j-turns all the time. When he finally got another car (an awesome 1980 Datsun 510 wagon) he decided he would blow the engine on his Dart (this was 1991 and any tan rusty 4 door '74 Dart was going straight to the crusher regardless). He drained the oil, put the back axle up on jack stands, a brick on the pedal, and stood back.
After 20 minutes or so of totally smooth running at high RPMs he took pity on it, took the brick off the pedal, and got it back on the ground figuring he would give it a more dignified death by driving it. He took it back and forth to high school (about 10 miles each way) for most of the week with no oil in it! Finally he was attempted a trip to the Danbury Fair mall which was over 20 miles away when it seized. Poor car wanted to give its owner another 100,000 miles!

Greenwood box coupe

GREENWOOD BOX COUPE

I was recently walking past the mighty Greenwood Cemetery when I saw this boxy beauty.

This is a 1979 Chevrolet Impala in original two-tone Carmine over Red (with a single Dark Blue fender of course). 

This generation of Impala replaced the massive yachts produced through '76. When this scale arrived in '77 it heralded the direction Domestic cars were headed for the '80s. The 1977 Caprice/Impala line received the Motor Trend Car of the Year award.

This somewhat flimsy looking grill is a surefire way to identify a '79. '78 had only 3 chrome horizontal bars within the surround. In 1980 the entire car was different even though at first glance they look similar.

Drivetrain combinations were many from a baseline 6 cylinder through 305 and 350 V8s. There was even a much maligned Oldsmobile diesel engine for anyone who wanted that sort of thing.

The 2 door coupes from 1977-'79 had this angled rear window foreshadowing the Monte Carlo Aerocoupe of the mid-'80s. Overall I think the design has aged remarkably well. With those huge forward-leaning wheel openings it retains a pretty aggressive stance too.

Two tone wasn't something common in this era of domestic cars but they pushed it in the literature for this generation Caprice & Impala. The brochure shows a very '80s dark red over silver combo.

Boxy was the new look for the decade to come and Chevy got it right on time. The huge federally mandated safety bumpers look alright on such a big slab.

That rear window really makes for a great profile on this ride.

For many years the way to discern an Impala from a lower trim offering was that the Impala had three taillights on each side while the Bel Air or Caprice had two. In '79 each model of this mid-size range had three openings. However Impala had the revers lights in the center of the center lenses while the Caprice had separate rectangular lenses below the taillight cluster.

I really dig the subtle way the rear panel has a crease 1/3rd of the way up where it angles back. The concavity of the tops of the taillights highlight this small detail well.

Purple tint & multiple 6x9s on the back deck mean this is owned and operated by pretty much exactly the sort of dude you're picturing.

Bench seat, crank windows, plain-ass steering wheel with a column shifter; no frills people! The interior is in great shape. I can just about smell that little tree from here.

Nothing like a set of Cragar SS wheels to make your ride look tough.

The orange slotted side marker light is Impala-only as well; Caprice had a wrap-around lens on the corner of the grill surround. The Caprice also had a stand-up hood ornament while the Impala has the bow tie logo in the grill center.

Well that's where we'll leave this Brooklyn tough guy. The 2 years previous to this one are my favorite for the later Impala, if only due to the slightly cleaner grill. Still this era looks great today especially in the 2 door coupe version. The 1980 model year would truly usher in the Box Chevy era which is hugely popular in some circles. This basic design lasted all the way up until the infamous and bulbous "Shamu" or Bubble Chevys of the '90s. Parts couldn't be easier to locate and the usability on a daily basis is great. If you're looking for a cheap way to get into car shows and drive a classic with a full compliment of creature comforts like reliable heat this might be the best bet out there.

Twofer Thursday (?) comes through with a Grand Prix Fixe

LAST MUSCLE DAYS AND THE DAWN OF MALAISE

Well it's been a beautiful spring week here in Brooklyn and the cars are starting to roll out of their winter hiding spots, rubbing their eyes and shaking off their hibernation. This first ride arrived on a block near my home recently:

Here we have a 1970 Pontiac Grand Prix SJ in Baja Gold Poly. This is an interesting car, as the Grand Prix was Pontiacs full size luxury coupe throughout the '60s before the name was transferred to this smaller midsize platform in '69. This change, along with the fact that these were still the days of huge free breathing engines, made the GP a luxurious muscle car.

Even though it's midsize this car has the distinction of having Pontiacs longest ever hood.

This thing looks like a bully with the back jacked up and some dents.

This car doesn't give a shit about mouthing off in the bar! No, this thing wakes up with the occasional black eye and just heads right out to work. The bumper guards are doing their best so far but this beast has been around.

As usual the grill is a great reference point when assessing the year of a '60s to '70s GM product. In '69 the grill inserts were horizontal as opposed to these vertical slats. This prominent schnoz was aped on the 1971 Thunderbird.

The standard engine was the very capable 400V8, though a 455 could be ordered for the first time this year. Emissions equipment like catalytic converters and smaller ports within the engine were still years off so this thing could get up and go.

This car dwarfs everything else on the block. The hinges for that hood needed to be extremely robust.

This small series of faux gills replaced the Grand Prix nameplate in '70. The wheels are stock originals, but missing the red center which said PMD for Pontiac Motor Division.

Lots of little rumples all over the body. Scrapes along the side. This thing has been driven and parked on the mean streets of Brooklyn since new.

Curiously enough this was where the faux gills were the year before.

The interior looks pretty good when considering the amount of damage sprinkled about the exterior. That wrap-around cockpit would continue on through the '70s, with a similar steering wheel and gauges as well. Too bad it's not a stick shift!

These door handles are a bit of a novelty; press in on the grooved left side and the handle pops out to the right.

These slotted lights are pure Pontiac. The turn signals on the larger Grand Prix from '67-'68 and the first iteration of the Firebird had a similar treatment.

Gold car = trunk full of gold! At least that's what somebody was thinking when they mercilessly tore the lock off of the trunk.

From what I can gather the taillight on the left with the chrome lines is correct. The right side seems to be a replacement from a '69.

From what I could find Atlantic Pontiac was located where a huge auto parts store now resides between Grand and Classon Streets. Being that that's around 2 miles away it doesn't seem that this car has left the vicinity in 46 years!
Time to move onto the younger sibling of that gold bruiser:

What we have here is a 1972 Grand Prix in Starlight Black. After the '70 model year outlined above the front was changed from quad headlights to a pair. The '71 looked much like this one but didn't have that crosshatched grill pattern.

Something about the single headlight bulging out of the hood on each side gives this car a menacing air. Black is the right choice for this beast. I like how Grand prix is written between the grill and the right light. It's pretty uncommon to see a name placement right on the face.

This was parked a block from my shop at a combination fix-a-flat and rim shop. Occasionally cool old rides will show up.

Very thoughtful to leave the vinyl around the lettering on the roof. Tearing off the material is actually a smart move as any moisture trapped under the vinyl will rot your roof out completely.
*Nice to see an old police sticker on the window. I remember when common belief was that if you had any sort of police sticker on your window your chances of getting a warning rather than a ticket went up dramatically. 

Much of the body is similar or identical to the '70. The trunk now has that V prominence mimicking the hood, but the quarter panels are the same.

Another clue that this is a '72; the triple taillights were added this year after only 2 per side the year before. The lines on the trunk allude to its larger cousin the Buick Riviera Boattail of the same year.

Here is the red centercap missing on the gold car.

Everything is the same inside as the gold car with the exception of this bench seat.

This was the final year before a redesign that added size and weight in concert with lowered horsepower. You can just see the beginnings of the Malaise Era in this ride; personal luxury coupe, vinyl roof. long hood/short deck combo, etc. It didn't really take hold until the following year, which is roundly accepted as the beginning of the end for American automotive design.