Remember all the wild “high impact/high performance” colors that Chrysler came up with in the early ‘70s to sell more cars to younger buyers? Sublime, Go-Mango, Hemi Orange, Top Banana, Pink Panther, Green-Go and Plum Crazy (my favorite). Who knew back then that these colors would increase the collectability of these groovy-painted cars decades later? This is one of those autos, a 1970 Dodge Charger R/T that started life in Plum Crazy but changed to blue later. And it has no motor or transmission, so it’s a clean sheet of paper. You can find this roller in Holden, Louisiana (east of Baton Rouge) and available here on eBay where the auction sits at $8,100 with no reserve. So, someone is about to acquire a new project.

Starting as a show car in 1964, the Dodge Charger would eventually be produced on and in a variety of platforms and sizes, although it’s most commonly known for being a personal luxury/muscle car of the 1960s and 1970s. You can still buy a Charger today, but it comes as a rather bold-looking four-door sedan now. The second generation of the Charger (1968-70) covers the period when the seller’s car was built. Most notable with the styling was the change from a fastback roofline to a “flying buttress” like the 1966-67 Pontiac GTO. R/T (Road/Track) would be a new high-performance package, influenced by the name of the muscle car publication Road & Track. You didn’t have get a 440 or 426 Hemi engine to order an R/T.

The seller describes this Charger R/T as a project and that’s not an understatement. Originating in Georgia, the car is said to have been off the road for nearly 40 years. Sometime during that dormancy, it’s engine and transmission were pulled, having originally been a 318 V-8 with an automatic. It left the factory wearing Plum Crazy paint, so the first owner was more interested in looking cool rather than going fast. We’re told that the car was in an accident many moons ago, suffering a good whack on the rear quarter panel on the driver’s side, buckling it in the process.  Someone got out the hammer and chisel, beat it back into shape ad repainted the whole car blue. Years later, the bodywork looks like something Fred Flintstone may have done.

Other than the driver’s side, the seller tries hard to convince us the rest of the car is good. The frame rails are solid and there is minimal bubbling of paint due to rust, we’re told. But there certainly is rust in the trunk floor as well as the quarters and the passenger cabin hasn’t escaped it either. The vinyl top that likely came with the car has mostly peeled away, helping to reveal its purple roots. The chrome and glass look okay, but I keep wondering about that accident. The seller says the car carries taillights from a ’69 Charger, so was the crunch bad enough that this section of the car also had to be reworked?

The only thing in the interior that may be salvageable is the rear seat. And what’s left of the front seat doesn’t match the rear. The rest is gone or damaged. This certainly looks like a car that was left outside and exposed to the elements, possibly with a window or two down. You’ll have to start from scratch inside, including sourcing a new conditioning system to hook up to the existing vents in the dash. If you don’t already have an engine or tranny to drop in, the seller has a complete 440/727 combo that can go with the deal for an extra $800.  But no pictures of it or any reference as to whether it was a running pair when they were pulled. The seller is something of a Charger fan as there are at least two others on the property where this one is.

If this were a complete car in fantastic shape, you’d be starring at $40,000 and up to get your hands on it. But this Charger will take a lot of work and a flexible bank account (and spouse) to whip it back in shape. There are probably better project cars out there to start with, so does it boil down to the original Plum Crazy color? How important is that paint to a car that was otherwise not rare or unusual at the time?