As promised, more glorious pictures of my 1968 Plymouth Fury III 2-door. It's a "C-Body," meaning it shares a chassis with all New Yorkers, Newports, Town & Countrys, Polaras, Monacos, and any other Chrysler-made full-sized boat you can think of.
Another shot from the other angle. Love that grille / headlight combo!
This pic was taken at Homecoming 98. The ol' bomber sure looks smooth when all polished and clean....and at night time.
Here's the interior. Note the badass dash / instruments, and the chewed up front seat. I just got a replicated front seat, which should be on sometime soon. Also note the door panels are all in mint shape, as well as the (non-visible) headliner and backseats.
Here's a pic from the original ad. Looks pretty nice huh? You'll notice the black, black tint coupled with a hideously lowered stance. You'd think that it was purchased from a professional lawn cutter. Would you believe the owner was actually a late 20's white woman from WI? The tint problem was solved the night I got it home, the lowering problem will be solved soon enough
Some amusing annecdotes about the Fury
I bought this car during the MW homecoming in 1998. Everything worked on it, every little electronic thing, save for the cigarette lighter ("Fix the cigarette lighter"). It ran well, drove down the road straight, didn't smoke, leak, or make any funny noises. It wasn't fast, and I wasn't expecting it to be with 180K. I bought it to own an old rear wheel drive V-8 car that I wouldn't be ashamed of to pick girls up with.
I fixed all the things I knew how to fix (or had the guts to try and screw up on). I took all the tint off, tried to fix the one side only tape player, replaced burnt fuses (restorting the interior lights), ripped out the crappy Radio Crack tape player and ungodly large rear speakers (also from Radio Shack) which revealed the rear package tray had been hacked to death. Eh.
After a brief (real mechanical) diagnosis by Dr. Margarian, the Fury was in worse shape than I thought. Low low compression in every cylinder, a bad wrist pin / rod knock, hole in the radiator, leaky heater core, and a loose front end. Mr. Magarian advised me to keep revs below 4,000 unless I wanted to trash the motor, and confided to my friends that it would not last past the winter. In the two months that I actually drove it, I got more head turns, honks, thumbs' up, and questions than I ever would have gotten with the Voyager. Cool cool car. I took it to Senior Homecoming (to downtown Chicago and back) without a glitch. It ran 80 mph all the way there. It always started for me, and never stranded me. Until that night.
It was 4 am. As I was plundering home, I decided, hey, why not, let's give 'er the ol' gas. It took a while to reach full throttle, but at around 60mph, poof. Everything shut down. No electronics, no motor. Off. I stopped and tried to restart it. Nothing. Great. As I hop out, I notice a wisp of smoke from the engine. Did I overheat it? No, unless my gauge went bad. -kerchunk- I pop the hood to realize a small electrical fire on the bulkhead disconnect at the firewall. NOOOOO!!!!! I put it out with my hands, then attempted to push the car off the road and onto a sidestreet. Let me say this: It is impossible to push a 4000+ lb car up even a one degree incline. I had to call Julie (sister of RCM's John), and she thankfully helped me push it out of harms way and drive me home. The next day, me, my father, and Tommy went out to try and fix it. By some grace of God, we got it to start and drive it home. When I discovered that the black and red mains from the battery were touching eachother insde the dash a month later, I still question to this day as to how we got it home.
So, I parked it in the garage and worked on it every day (during December) for about an hour a day. I got everything out, and I finally got it to run again. But it was unreliable now, and it sits there to this day, except for the occasional tool around the block.
The interior is out of it, and I plan a full on resto. I'm going to strip the entire unibody and have the sheet metal done to it. Then prep and paint. I was dreaming of a two tone metallic blue to match the interior, but I'm probably going to stick with a quality white finish (for $'s sake). Got any color ideas that would work with a light blue base /dark blue accented interior? Suggestions are welcome.
