California has brought back its black and gold license plates for all the retro lovers in the state, and they might do so for the ‘70s blue plates too. You wouldn’t have to wait if you bought today’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe Dart, but that’s only if its price isn’t too much to swing.
There’s a right way and a wrong way to do almost everything. The seller of yesterday’s 1991 Toyota Supra Turbo Targa showed us all a wrong way to advertise a car for sale. The mistakes included: not listing the car’s mileage, omitting an under-hood shot of what he described as an OEM-rich rebuilt engine, and saying the car wore stock wheels when the pictures blatantly proved otherwise.
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me three times and well, you’re not getting any love for your $15,000 price tag. That was the case here, as the Supra finished the day with a not so super 83 percent Crack Pipe loss, driven largely by lack of info in its shite ad.
Now, I will admit that the ad for today’s 1970 Dodge Dart sedan is almost as brief as that for yesterday’s Toyota. And, well, jinkies, its seller also neglects to include the mileage. Still, I believe that a picture speaks a thousand words so let’s have a look and see how things work out.
Many of you are very young. When I say ‘Dodge Dart’ your mind immediately goes to this decade’s Alfa-based FWD car that looked a hell of a lot like the old Neon. Of course you could be too young to remember the Neon and so now you’re totally confused.
For the rest of us—and soon you— the name Dodge Dart congers up images of sturdy sedans, wagons, and coupes that were Mopar’s bread and butter for most of the 1960s. This resto-modded four-door is just such an animal, and boy has this design aged well.
Chrysler originally applied the Dart name to a mid-sized platform the company introduced in 1960. It wouldn’t be until 1963 that the Dart took on the compact form for which it would eventually become famous. This, the fourth edition, arrived in 1967 and carried through until the 1976 model year when it was replaced by a craptacular pile of rust… er, the Dodge Aspen.
That makes this a mid-cycle car and ’70 did see a redesigned nose and tail as part of that. Later editions would carry proportion-spoiling bumpers, but these cars enjoy body-hugging chrome appendages on both ends. The bodywork in between is svelte and topped with an airy four-light greenhouse.
This one comes in an aftermarket spray job. The burnt orange hue serves the car well and is offset by nice chromework and straight panels below. The five spoke wheels are perhaps a little too modern for the car, but a set of righteous steelies couldn’t be that big an investment. Another investment will be in the windshield trim, which the car seems to be missing.
The ad notes no rust and it’s nice to see the respray extending into the door jambs and all the way down the engine bay. The carpets do match the drapes.
The interior is not quite as tidy as the exterior. Custom orange and black upholstery wraps the two bench seats and all four door cards, and looks intact all around. That may be without issue, but the dash welting looks a bit odd and the steering wheel is missing its center horn button. Also, a note to the seller—could you have wiped up all the dust in here? Other issues include a missing brake pedal pad and the question of whether the glovebox door closes.
Powering this almost-there Dart is a 198-CID edition of one of Chrysler’s crowning achievements, the slant six engine. That’s a mill that will outlive us all. This one is claimed to have been rebuilt and while we don’t get the deets, we at least do get a glimpse of it in the bay. Aside from a missing emissions hose and some questionable alternator/heater hose interactions it all looks pretty tidy. Speaking of alternators, Chrysler was the first American manufacturer to offer them as standard fitment back in 1960. Fun fact!
Behind the 125 (gross) horsepower six sits a three-speed Torqueflite automatic, another great bit of Mopar engineering. The car comes with a clean title and current California tags on those sweet original blue plates.
The seller describes this Dart as a Swinger but there weren’t any four-door Swingers made. That sub-brand was saved for the two-door cars only. There was also a Demon model but that name was retired after religious folks complained. Hey, there’s another fun fact!
Non-swinger it may be, but hip as a hippo it is and you’ll now need to decide if it’s hip enough to command a $6,000 price. What do you think, is this classic and almost classy Dodge worth that asking? Or, does that price mean this Dart misses the bullseye?
You decide!
Las Vegas, NV Craigslist (although the car is in Fresno, CA) or go here if the ad disappears.
H/T to Neil B for the hookup!
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