Sold my 770rwhp twin turbo Mustang and bought a 72 Duster.

[Driver500]

I've had been looking for a nice cruiser to take the place of the Mustang and found a this on Craigslist.

Took a trip to see the car and ended up bringing it home. It wasn't running well, but a few tanks of non ethanol fuel and a few doses of Marvel Mystery Oil seem to be helping that nicely.

Once home I removed the PepBoys flames, neons, chrome fender trim, and misc tweety bird stuff. And cleaned it up a little bit.

The scoop is off for now until it goes to the detailer.

The mobile dent removal guy came by and did a nice job removing some of the bigger dings in the sheet metal. It goes to the detail shop tomorrow to receive some much needed paint repair.

Motor is as far as I know bone stock low compression 318 with a Holley 2bbl carb.
727 Automatic
8 3/4 rear end

Mod plan for now includes getting it up to safety specs and a few appearance mods.

I don't plan for this car to ever be as fast as the Mustang, but it should be a fun weekend cruiser.

 

[xblitzkriegx]

heh, a set of small valve [1.78/1.60] small valve heads, decent set of TTI headers [ they dont hang 4" off the ground ], better compression, edelbrock air gap, and a cam from hughes engines would be a GREAT start. the only expensive thing there is the headers. regular a body headers are horrible cause they go thru the suspension. i hated that.

i owned a 69 barracuda notchback for a long time. shoot me a pm if you wanna talk or have questions about parts.

oh, btw. its pretty much given that you need to have MP valve covers and air cleaner on the car. theyre somehow standard issue when you have a mopar.

 

[truefiveo]

Yea there's a ton of write ups on people making nasty power out of 318s.

 

[CobraBob]

Now seeing that Duster brings back some fond memories of my own Duster. It was a '71 Duster 340. From the factory it had decent power. Mine was orange with black interior (buckets and console). I massaged the motor a bit to make it a local Vette killer. One of the highlights of leaving my job then (6AM) was to occasionally uncork the headers. I was very lucky to have never gotten stopped by the cops.

You should be able to get that Duster in respectable condition pretty easily. I had to laugh at the fuzzy, flamed dice and Tweety Bird mats/wheel cover. The things people do with their cars. LOL!

 

[Mikeyb619]

that interior is ...

 

[stangposse]

Why?

Enjoy it!

 

[Driver500]

heh, a set of small valve [1.78/1.60] small valve heads, decent set of TTI headers [ they dont hang 4" off the ground ], better compression, edelbrock air gap, and a cam from hughes engines would be a GREAT start. the only expensive thing there is the headers. regular a body headers are horrible cause they go thru the suspension. i hated that.

i owned a 69 barracuda notchback for a long time. shoot me a pm if you wanna talk or have questions about parts.

oh, btw. its pretty much given that you need to have MP valve covers and air cleaner on the car. theyre somehow standard issue when you have a mopar.

Yea there's a ton of write ups on people making nasty power out of 318s.

yep more power is pretty much textboko on these things. It may even go the single turbo route. Still not going to shoot for more than 500rwhp though.

Now seeing that Duster brings back some fond memories of my own Duster. It was a '71 Duster 340. From the factory it had decent power. Mine was orange with black interior (buckets and console). I massaged the motor a bit to make it a local Vette killer. One of the highlights of leaving my job then (6AM) was to occasionally uncork the headers. I was very lucky to have never gotten stopped by the cops.

You should be able to get that Duster in respectable condition pretty easily. I had to laugh at the fuzzy, flamed dice and Tweety Bird mats/wheel cover. The things people do with their cars. LOL!

I know right. :dw:

that interior is ...

That was one of the big selling points. The body needs some work but anyone can do that. Sourcing random interior parts is a PITA.

Why?

Enjoy it!

Exactly that. I was done with the Mustang and it stopped being fun. Sold it off and starting from scratch on a new build. This one will be more of a Budget Bruiser project though.

I told my buddy about it and he says. "I never knew you were into Mopar." Told him I wasn't into Mopar... I was into cool.

 

[truefiveo]

Yea these cars are time machines as soon as I saw the pics
Carry On Wayward Son by Kansas started playing in my head.:beer:

 

[STAMPEDE3]

I think I have a 280 cam and factory 4bbl intake in the garage somewhere.

 

[CowlHood]

super sexy

 

[Driver500]

Well, the car has been receiving some much needed paint restoration over the last few days. From 20' it looked decent, but up close it looked like someone had been rubbing it with steel wool. Plus the quality of the paint job wasn't that great with runs in the clear, over spray, and other major imperfections. I'd rather not shell out the $$$ for a repaint right now and direct those funds towards other items in the build so I dropped it off with Andrew at Hi Performance Detail here in Baton Rouge to see what he could do with it.

I'm pretty excited to see how it came out. When I dropped it off he did a test spot on the trunk lid and just compounded one area. It looked like someone had rubbed a bar of soap over the before area. I can't wait to see what the finished product looks like.

Lot's of pics of the process will be added later.

 

[smitty2919]

Man, that will be a complete change in driving style and expectation out of the car.

I wouldn't dare do ANY highway manuvers in that LOL.

Looks sweet. how much you pick it up for?

 

[jerrad]

I love it man, looks like a great starting point.

 

[Alex_SVT]

Love it. My grandpa has a '71 Demon 340.

 

[Driver500]

Man, that will be a complete change in driving style and expectation out of the car.

I wouldn't dare do ANY highway manuvers in that LOL.

Looks sweet. how much you pick it up for?

Agreed. It's not a car I want to go over 80mph in right now. I'm starting to see why guys that drove these cars think they are so much faster than they are. Small tires, iffy suspension, and a torquey motor make it more fun but much less of a fast car.

I've been eyeing the Hotchkis setup for this car. It's tested to bring the car to just a shade better than modern day Challenger handling performance. That won't be for a while though so until then I'll just enjoy going slow and feeling fast.

 

[smitty2919]

Well, at the same time it's a different mindset also.

You get in the mustang to go out and terrorize the streets. This car will promote a more laid back approach to driving with an appreciation for a muscle car...a muscular cruiser if you will lol.

 

[Agent_177]

Congrats. Beautiful Duster!

 

[Torch10th]

Agreed. It's not a car I want to go over 80mph in right now. I'm starting to see why guys that drove these cars think they are so much faster than they are. Small tires, iffy suspension, and a torquey motor make it more fun but much less of a fast car.

I've been eyeing the Hotchkis setup for this car. It's tested to bring the car to just a shade better than modern day Challenger handling performance. That won't be for a while though so until then I'll just enjoy going slow and feeling fast.

You'll really like that Hotchkis TVS. It also provides room to grow if you decide to do any geometry changes by way of control arms and such. You can certainly get that thing to handle fairly closely to a modern muscle car with a bit of tweaking.

 

[T76 Mach]

Brother had a DooDoo brown one back in highschool.Ugly but fast is what everyone used to say at the track

 

[lawdog302]

Looks like its in pretty good shape. You will have just as much fun with that car im sure.