http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/e...item=140069266097&fromMakeTrack=true

Very nice, very rare 2nd gen

Orange underbody?

Red oxide primer - the way they came from the factory.

YES That is a very nice car! Here are a few pics of my 1971 Formula 400 that I bought off the original owner here in my own town...This car is 100% original including paint/interior/trunk spatter/ and the spoilers and vynle top were added at the dealer when new. the only reason I was able to get this car was the widow sold the house and had no where to put it.
..........CLICK ON THE PICTURE TO ENLARGE IT.

Here's mine, the one Sammy Hagar wrote the song about:

Now that's a survivor, John! Let me guess...45000 miles or so?

A little more...It is one of the nicest unrestored I have ever seen....I have all the paperwork with it as well...It was a steal last year at 5K...It has never even had a chip in the paint! Amazing! And the owner had died several years proir and it just sat untill I bought it.

$5k? Amazing indeed. What a find!

Nice cars Jim and John. And I like the hint of Mopar in the background. Is that a Challenger? '72 I think?

Thanks...It is my wifes 1970 Challenger T/A 340 6-pack with a 4-speed and a 390 rear gear from the factory.....She has owned it for more then 13 years now and has not driven it in the last 2+years. I will try to attach a picture..


John

John, if you ever want to let that 71 Formula go, I'd be interested. I still miss the 70 TA & 71 Formula 400 4spd I had in the early 90s. Nice AMX also.

Wow I guess I am dealing with some detectives here also That is my AMX a 68...As far as letting go of the 71...Soory...There is a waiting list of people that want that car... Hey did anyone notice the FGF in the backround? Where are all your eyes??? LOL I was given a set of in dash gauges with the 71 when I bought it...The original owner had bought them a long time ago and they are still in my shed, Anyone in need of them? Let me know.

John, if its the factory rally gauge cluster for the 71 then I might be interested, email me directly at Formula455ho@aol.com with some pics and a price when you get a chance. I've been thinking of building a 70-72 Formula as my next project the way my old one was. Thanks, Tom

Tom, They are the factory gauges.They are complete including the woodgrain dash, They are in my shed, It may be a while as I had back surgery a week ago and can hardley move. If you can wait then I will do as you requested. let me know
John

Yea John, I can wait, take care of your back first. I still haven't found a decent body to base the project on, but I have been buying some parts as I come across them. I still have alot to do on my 68 to get it ready for the street this spring until I can do a serious search for a good 70 -72.

it is very hard to find a decent body on a car here in New England...I usually find my cars on the west coast. I see you are from NY, I am sure you find the same there as I do here. So you are doing a 68? I have 2 of them am I am serching for another 67 or 68 ram Air car...I will pay going price if anyone has any leeds Please let me know.
Thanks
John

Yes, it is very tough finding finding a decent project of any kind of car up here in the Northeast, unless you get lucky, it was tough in the 80s worse now some 20 odd years later.

I found my 79 400 4 speed WS6 in Michigan. It has never left Michigan. 49000 original miles without a bit of rust ever. It just depends on how well they are taken care of. IMO That's more important than geographical location. It's easier to 'get lucky' with a southwestern car. They too will have rust if not properly preserved.

John, your correct about finding rust free iron in the rust belt. Jim, geogrpahics has everything to do with rust. If you have a native, it's more luck than the way in which it was taken car of. How it was manafactured may play a role too.

I was old enough remember--and old muscle was an interest--when the cars stormed the streets with new car warranties. Lots of the cars, especially the fg f-bodies, started showing extensive rust within a couple of years. The rust originated in the sealed areas and rusted from the inside out. Garage kept cars exibited the same problem. Any of the 50+ folks, living in the rust belts, who have kept a lifelong eye on fisher bodies can attest to this fact.

Unless it was a case of how it was manafactured--the plant and the varying quality of work from individguals on the line--something that could be a major factor, the climate, not care of the car, played the main role in the level of rust.

No, not luck at all. My convertible was also always a Michigan car and it was also rust free. It's the way they are taken care of. It was luck 20 years ago. Now they are all rusty unless restored or very well taken care of. Go car hunting for a few years and you will see that even the famous southern and western cars are rusty. If someone braggs to you that it's a southern car or a western car when selling it's just about meaningless.

Jim, I agree that what matters is the way the car was taken care of...But it is geografics that matter..The 71 Formula I own has Never seen rain or any kind of bad weather since the day it was new...That is why it is so nice, Also, I bought my 67 Firebird in 1974 when it was only 7 years old and it needed minor rust repairs then! I have kept it in a garage and it has never been out in bad weather in 33 years and it is very very nice But not as nice as any of the 150+ Dry cars that I have bought from the west coast in many years. It is a fact that we live in a very bad area for preservation of cars. I would much rather redo interiors on western cars then rust repairs on Eastern seabord cars. In fact, the cost of transporting them is extremly low considering you have little to no rust repairs needed on them.. I still look for cars to buy on a daily basis and I have yet to find a really nice original here on the east in years.

John's Quote,
"The 71 Formula I own has Never seen rain or any kind of bad weather since the day it was new...That is why it is so nice"

That's exactly what I'm talking about. No matter where the car was/is, if it was kept out of the weather it's got a greater chance of being rust free. Same car in Michigan, Texas, Arizona, New York, Maryland, Tim Buck Two, Cat Man do, it just doesn't matter if it was kept out of the weather. Answer me this, what the heck difference does weather or climate matter if the car was kept out of it?????????

I've found a couple dozen rust free cars here in Michigan. They were all special cars that had very low miles. Not your daily drivers. I find that the people who order the rarer cars don't treat them like regular cars. They baby them and keep them in the garage. They only drive them on nice days and some only go to the race track. Geographical location doesn't matter in the least bit with a car that is babied. The only difference in where a car was built, lived and moved around to, is weather. If it's a car that was kept out of the weather and kept clean there is no difference. The inside of a garage is the same just about anywhere in the world. As long as the owner has enough common sense to keep his eye on the ball with their car. It used to be, 20 years ago, that you could go out west and find a car that had been sitting outside and it would still have no rust. Show me a car, these days, that has been sitting outside since the 60's and I'll show you rust. Geographics matter? Nope, the inside of a garage is the same everywhere. With one exception, the geographics of natural disasters would have a greater impact on 'kept' cars than climate.

Jim you quote " Nope, the inside of a garage is the same everywhere. " Sorry I totally disagree...I just went to get coffee and when I opened my garage to get inside my Mercedes that was outside, The cars in my garage got damp! whereas the weather here is 34 degrees and raining If I lived in lets say in Southern Cal, that would not have happened the climate where we live always changes and that effects the cars a great deal peroid where some where else the climate stays mostly the same year round...trust me you were lucky and so was I to find nice cars where we live...

You can call scouting cars every single day in the last twenty five years luck. I guess.
As I stated, as long as the owner has his eye on the ball with his car/cars a garage will protect them from the weather. Of course a lack of common sense with storage will let a car rust. The people that I have bought my rust free cars from have very nice garages that have the humidity controlled to certain extent. I wasn't considering a 'barn find' or a car in a 'lean to' as kept cars. It's been raining here in my area for weeks now and my garage still has dust on the floor.
John,
You mean to tell me all your cars got damp today? You should definitely do something about that!

well Jim, I really do not care that much as I drive them and they will stay the same as they are till I am dead and gone...And if they do not, I will fix them. I will attach a picture of my friends garage that is climate controlled and you will see why it is....Your T/A and my formula were never in a climate controlled garage since the day they were new...As people enjoyed them at the time they were just new cars.

My convertible and my TA were always kept in a climate controlled garage. I bought them from the original owners and I saw the way they were kept. 'Rust' and 'Lucky' should never be used in the same sentence. They have nothing in common. It takes common sense to keep a car rust free, not luck. I have an excellent example; My 89 GMC pick up has taken me back and forth to work at GM since I bought it new. There is not a bit of rust on it anywhere. It has a lot of miles and those are 'year round' miles. How do you explain how it has been kept rust free? I know, I'm really lucky.

Jim, Can you find me some of those always climate controlled cars in your neighborhood? I would love to buy them... Hey BTW, HAPPY NEW YEAR

HAPPY NEW YEAR back at ya! I didn't mean that they were easy to find. I didn't mean that they would be cheaply bought either. I have a friend that has a climate controlled warehouse(in MI) that owns quite a few 69 TA's(9 I think) and they are always for sale for the right offer. He also has a couple dozen other TA's from 70-76. Most all of these cars were bought locally. All museum quality.

Here's another source for perfect cars in my neighborhood:

http://www.thebaycitymotorcompany.com/

http://www.oldride.com/member.html?vmbm=tbcmc

Also, Rosebush, the owner of be-cool radiators is in my hometown. He has quite the 'stable' of perfect cars too.

The state of Michiagn has always been the heart of classic car hunting grounds because of all the high level GM execs that live here. Some drove their special cars that were supplied by GM for a year or two and then kept them back in the corner of their carpeted garages. Sweet finds! Every 8th level exec gets a free car of their choosing every year. They also get the option to keep them at the end of the year.

Yes RESTORED cars....If rust free, More then likely not from where we live...That is my point...I do know that as a buyer of these cars it is a fact that the cars here have been repaired for rust and the "dry" cars have not.

Can't argue with that. You are the resident expert from Mass. Midwest cars aren't that predictable. I like it that way. It keeps your mind open and you never know when you are going to find a rust free car around here. I get at least one a year. Some years I find a half dozen. Some years I find a lot more than I can afford. All within a hundred miles of my home.

How many cars do you buy and sell a year Jim?

As many as I can. Never enough.