After a hugely successful launch in 1968, the production trajectory for the Plymouth Road Runner would peak the following year at 84,000 copies. The seller has one of those cars painted in the sought-after Hi-Impact color of Vitamin C. But it has been reduced to a mere shell, so the seller is throwing in a ’68 Satellite with a fairly decent body. The assumption must be that you can take two similar cars and create one from their remains. But the body styles aren’t the same, one being a pillared sedan, the other a hardtop. All of this is in St. Louis, Missouri and you can take home everything here on craigslist for $7,000 (firm). Thanks for the Mopar heads up, Gunter Kramer.
When it was introduced, the Road Runner was a derivative of the Plymouth Belvedere, one of Chrysler’s B-body intermediates to receive a new design for 1968. With its gimmicky name, horn, and power, the Road Runner quickly became popular with the youth movement of the 1960s. In an interesting twist, the seller only posts one photo of the primary car, a ’69 Road Runner, which has been picked clean of about everything worthwhile but its tags. Yet he/she posts an assortment of photos of the donor car, a ’68 Satellite (the top-line Belvedere), which may be complete. Yet the photos show it assembled and not.
One of the appeals of the ’69 edition is the Vitamin C paint which is noted on the cowl tag. It’s a pillared coupe, which sold in smaller numbers than the hardtop. It had a 383 cubic inch V8 with a 4-speed manual, both of which seem to have disappeared long ago. On the other hand, the ’68 version is a hardtop Satellite which may or may not still have a drivetrain, but a manual transmission is sitting on the trailer alongside the latter car. That and a 383 will be sent along with the two cars.
Cowl tag detail is provided to promote the proposed transaction. However you mix and match these cars, you’ll never have something to resell later where everything jives. If you moved the cowl tag from the Road Runner to the Satellite, you’d still have a VIN-plated Satellite. How would you treat this opportunity? “Rebuild” the ’69 as “Satellite Runner”, restore the Satellite as a Satellite, or use both cars as donors for another project you’re already working on?
We’re really getting some scraps nowadays.
Most mopar folks will also verify the VIN on left side of the trunk opening so if you try to make the satellite a RR they’ll know…
I think the radiator mount has a VIN on it too, so you’ll be doing a lot of welding in order to fake all of the VINs.
The “firm” price has one too many zero’s in it.
I have a car buddy who sold a 68 camero convertible who he put together with many doner parts. He cloned an ss . Nothing was original except the body matched the title. He resold it for a modest price not misrepresenting it. Some years later it made it to a big national auction. Some guy paid 119 k for it and was ticked off . They called my buddy and he told them to go fish he didn’t misrepresented the car.
Blank canvas!!
The first one in the listing looks like they took the “blank canvas” and used it to make smoke signals.
I’ll build it one piece at a time, and it won’t cost me a dime (?)
What shelbyGT500 said!
Could use it as an expensive doorstop
Posted a week ago, and nobody has jumped on it??
Place them in your front yard, on their sides, and p*ss off the neighbors.
“Rebuild the ’69 as “Satellite Runner”, restore the Satellite as a Satellite, or use both cars as donors for another project you’re already working on?”
None of the above. I would try to find a nice ’69 Satellite, so some sensible mods, and just enjoy it. Save myself the headache of spending all the money and then crying when the market is down 2 years from now.
sbc
Use the Satellite frame, add the Road Runner body, grab a Cleveland 350, add a pontiac 4 speed tranny, and then when all is done, install the flux capacitor from the DeLorean! Good to go right?
Meep meep NO! Hahaha
They did a 68 Wreckrunner on Hot Rod garage, took the nose, trunk lid, 383/ 4 speed out of a 68 Road Runner that spun into a telephone pole, and it worked, but these 2 cars are quite a mish mash cause one’s a post car and one’s not
$7K ?Hahahahahahaha
Why not just build the satellite it’s still a 68 b body there still just as cool if done right as long as you just don’t claim it’s something its not
I don’t understand why one would tear up a nice satellite shell for a roached-out roadrunner and I’m a Mopar guy.