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Member
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Location: Savannah, GA | After having the mopar *Muscle* bug bite me in high school. I set out to find a car I could call mine. 2 years into college, I found it, a 1973 Duster on ebay that was just 1 1/2 hours away and was in decent shape. After buying it and having all the emotions sink in and coming down off the first high. Little did I know that these cars make you do some weird things...like staying up til un-godly hours of the night to bid on needed parts or slaving away countless hours sanding in 1 spot because it just wasn't perfect. 8k and 1 year to the dot later. I have my Dream car. Now ofcourse it doesn't stop there, there's always something to add or change. So in turn the car never stops evolving. But the mopar bugs venom has started to mutate and surface again. This time in the form of ....gasp *FINS*....... After reading in a local tell-n-sell, a vague ad about a 59 plymouth all original not running for $1200. I mulled over the possibly of the shape of it. After talking it over with the wife which is also a car person (purple and silver el camino) and has always loved the look of the fin cars. I decided to give the person a call.. The guy sounded surprised to have someone call about it. it was indeed still for sale. I drove out there on the weekend to see it. What we found was a 1959 Plymouth Savoy 2-Door 318 poly with a 3-speed manual on the column. And it pretty decent shape...It had some cancer in some places, but you can't be to picky when it comes to classic's let alone 2-Doors. We agreed to the price and I went back the following weekend with a uhaul to bring her home. After a much needed bath and boxing up all the loose things. I covered it with a tarp to await the day it would all begin.
Check out the albums
http://s993.photobucket.com/albums/af57/73Duster340/ |
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Exner Expert 19,174 posts. Neil passed away 18 Sep 2015. You will be missed, Neil!
Posts: 19146
   
Location: bishop, ca | Whew, Daniel; well, you've come to the right place!
What do you want to do with/to your car?
Welcome aboard!
BTW, do you know the car's OEM color---from the firewall image, it might have been red.
That would make it a red/red car, which would be relatively very unusual.
You can post up a pic of your car's Paint/Trim data plate on our "Fender tag Decoding" message board
and our 59 PLY experts can have a go at decyphering its information, for you.
Edited by d500neil 2009-10-12 4:34 PM
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Expert
Posts: 2679
| Congrats on finding your dream car, and a nice finned 59 Plymouth.
She looks to be in pretty good shape, especially for 50 years old.
A little body work, paint and interior, she will be a head turner for sure.
Very nice, good luck with her. |
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Expert 5K+
Posts: 7806
Location: Williams California | Good find!
You'll enjoy this site, a lot of knowledgeable and helpful folks on this board.
---John |
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Expert
Posts: 1508
Location: new york | Nice car congrats! Good luck! and the v8 motor sweetens the deal! Good Luck and HAPPY MOTORING! and welcome Victor... |
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Veteran
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Location: canandaigua, ny | I want bigger finns now,
cool looking car
drive em enjoy em |
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Member
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Location: Savannah, GA | I know where a 68 newport is that is complete in a yard. plan to pull the 383 big block/727 combo in it with maybe the rear. I have to do some measuring. Going to add under-dash ac to it and some big bucket seats and going to make a custom center console for it. Got much to prep. Got a guy that does the interiors in the gulfstream jets here in Savannah. We did custom body work and paint on his 70 barrcuda. Already picked up a scarebird disc brake converison kit.
It appears that it was all red. The pillar tag is missing. Makes me alittle mad. I guess I'll have to look all over the frame for a serial number. Any idea where to look? |
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Expert
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Location: Slidell La. | Congrats , you ll like it here , lots of info . I ve got a 59 also , got any questions , drop a line . Whats with the interior shot , it has the column shift and powerflite buttons on the left . There s usually a delete plate there . It may have been converted to auto and the shifter was left in there . |
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Expert
Posts: 1590
Location: Scottsdale, AZ | Nice find and welcome Daniel! Good looking 2 door and not that bad of shape looks like. We've seen worse get resurrected. Plenty of guys around here with the know how and can help you find parts. Again welcome. Jay
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Elite Veteran
Posts: 852
Location: Etters Pa | Fins,
Don't get yourself too riled up over the Vin plate not being on the door pillar, all 59 Plymouths had the holes drilled in the pillar but not all had the plates installed there, it all depends on which plant your car was built at look on the bottom of the data plate near the master cyl. Does it still have the data plate? Some 59's didnt't have it on the data plate so also look around the heater box, some had a small aluminum mounted in various places on the firewall.
Edited by BHWINC 2009-10-12 11:36 PM
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Member
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Location: Savannah, GA | its actually has a 3-speed manual in it. unknown which is original. |
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Inactive by user's request
Location: Las Vegas, Nevada | FinsForever - 2009-10-13 5:20 AM
its actually has a 3-speed manual in it. unknown which is original.
Welcome aboard!
It's a lot easier to convert from stick to automatic than the other way around. I know this because I have three '59 Plymouths with manual transmissions. Maybe a previous owner started a conversion and gave up for some now unknown reason. If a previous owner parked the car due to a slipping clutch, maybe he wanted to solve the problem by putting an automatic in, but decided not to complete the project. One of my '59s was a surfer wagon at one point in its life. The modificcations that owner made and the parts he used to fix stuff was the things nightmares are made of. 
Please start a photo album to document your car's details and progress.
K. |
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Inactive by user's request
Location: Las Vegas, Nevada | Oh, and I had a '73 Duster, too:
 (mine01.jpg)
 (mine02.jpg)
Attachments
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 mine01.jpg (49KB - 98 downloads)
mine02.jpg (55KB - 97 downloads)
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Inactive by user's request
Location: Las Vegas, Nevada | FinsForever - 2009-10-12 7:32 PM
It appears that it was all red. The pillar tag is missing. Makes me alittle mad. I guess I'll have to look all over the frame for a serial number. Any idea where to look?
Some '59s were built without pillar tags. For those cars, the serial number was stamped on the car's cowl trim tag (under the hood) instead. My Detroit-built wagon never had a pillar tag, and has the V.I.N. on the trim tag under the hood. My Evansville and L.A. built '59s have pillar tags for the V.I.N.
K. |
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Finally growing fins
