The Scamp was Plymouth’s two door hardtop A-Body built and sold from 1971 to 1976, similar to the Dodge Swinger. Given the propensity to rust of Mopar cars of this era, finding a rust free original now is not so easy.
According to the seller of this 1971 Scamp for sale here on craigslist in Tucson, Arizona, his car is not only rust-free but has its original paint, is complete and original, and with a freshly rebuilt 318 cid engine runs and drives great.
I am not sure about the originality of the stripe on the trunk, which doesn’t look right to me, and I don’t know enough about these cars to know whether the interior is original either. Original or not, it will need some work to be comfortable to drive around in. Mileage on the car is not stated, so it’s likely to have been well used, but appears to have been maintained and appreciated by its owners through its lifetime.
The interior is pretty clean too. It did not take me long to find out there is a wealth of information about Scamps online. This model has a pretty strong following too. One site I found is called Scamp Site and has lots of information about these cars.
From what I can tell of current Scamp values, the $5,700 asking price of this car in Tucson is reasonable. Considering its originality and lack of rust, the very handy rebuilt mill, it will probably sell quickly. V8 equipped Scamps and Valiants, like Dodge Swingers and Darts, are fun cars to drive and make for driveable, easy-to-maintain and reliable collector cars. Do any of our readers know enough about Scamps to judge this one for originality? Is it a good deal?
Already deleted. Looked like it still had an old ’73 AZ plate on it too!
hard to believe it was a lifelong Arizona car without A/C
My 72 Duster was the same color with a 318 and 3spd it had buckets that looked like these only white.
I agree David, the strips on the hood and trunk do not look like a factory option.
That gold paint looks original. The terrible stripes are homemade. Black seats are not original to that interior.
V8 Valiants usually had small front fender tags that say V-EIGHT. Possibly this year didn’t have them, or the engine was swapped? The factory 318 would have 230 horsepower, pretty good in a lightweight car like this.
most of my memories of my mother involve road trips in a blue scamp.
that was my mums daily driver back in the late 70’s early 80’s.
My dad bought it just before I was born ( 1977 ) and my mother drove it until she became terminally ill with cancer which would have been late 84 early 85.
it had been imported by the original owner when it was a year old and my dad chased after it from the day he saw it sitting in Edinburgh and then finally got it in 77.
I would love to find my mothers old one. the last we heard about it it had been painted brown and was in Glasgow.
Most definitely not original stripes!……otherwise, I love it!
See? Perfect example, as compared to the Rambler American of the other day. These were/are so much more popular, and the V-8 sealed the deal, apparently. Unless like James sez, there is a personal attachment to this car, this car has so many more possibilities, than say a Rambler American. There’s an excellent chance this car won’t remain like this, as the new owner probably has big plans to resto-mod it, as these A body Chrysler’s are hot today. I remember, at one time, stripes were all the rage, and Chrysler seemed to lead the pack. That rear stripe is a copy of the Swinger’s that had those and will probably come off. There’s an outside chance it will remain stock, but I doubt it. Nice find, though.
This brings back a lot of memories. Many years ago, my mom got tired of being a punching bag and left dad driving a ’63 Chevy Biscayne. She ended up toasting the powerglide drag racing some punk at the stoplight near our house. Until then, she was pretty much unbeaten, because she had great reaction times. LOL, so then, needing a car, she saw a 72 Valiant almost exactly like this, gold, no stripes, gold bench seat, and a 318 under the hood. She had that car for years, until the front A-arms rusted thru. I learned to drive on that vehicle, and took it out many nights without her knowing by drifting it down the hill and starting it a block away. It wasn’t the best car Mom owned, but it sure was one of the most fun! Both mom and the car are gone quite a few years now, but this post snapped me right back to that time, so thanks for the memory boost! LOL
The stripes were not offered by the factory. They would be tape and no sporty stripes were offered as Plymouth considered it a family car like the Valiant. If the bucket seats were original to this car, the rug and dash would have been black and there would have most likely had a center arm rest.
The Scamp was just a 2 door hardtop version of the Valiant. The Duster filled the bill with customers who wanted sporty with the Duster 340 and the ‘tape stripe’ sporty Duster Twister.
The Scamp and the Twister were only offered with the 225 Slant Six and the 318 V8. I would say the chances are good that the car was sold as a V8 without air conditioning even in Arizona as the Valiant line was aimed at being economy cars. Though that said, I don’t recall any without vinyl tops.
A funny story, we took a B5 blue Scamp with a gold vinyl top over a blue interior. Our scrappy sales manager had the top dyed blue. One Saturday, my friend and I were washing the used car inventory with a car wash machine and my buddy and I left the wash bay and went to tell the manager the brushes had removed a lot of the dye. Oh my how he blew up as he walked back to inspect the ‘damage’. I was laughing to hard and could not follow, but my friend was able to keep describing how ‘horrible’ the car looked. The air following them was quite blue as the manager cussed his way back to the wash rack. I would say he was relieved to see the Scamp roof was okay, but he was sure to return the favor to me a couple weekends later.
Stripes not original, seats not orginal and probably a bench seat car originally. C post looks rusty a couple or three inches up from deck. Common place to rust on vinyl top cars like this. Looks like aluminim intake. If it’s a 4bbl, hope they did a little head work to go along with it. 318s didn’t like a big 4bbl. Still nice car and could be fun.
We had one new in ’71, slant six, buckets no console, column shift AT…a great little car for almost ten years. This one’s been tampered with just a bit, headers, stripes etc…it’s sad how people mess with good cars over so many years. I’d take it and get rid of ALL the mods!
I had a 72 that was almost identical to this one. Same color outside /inside and vinyl top. Mine also had a 318. It had a bench seat which I eventually replaced with buckets that I got at a swap meet.