shot and posted at the Cohort by Constantine Hannaher
I don’t really know if this Dart sedan is a daily driver, but it sure could be. It’s the most likely car that old to be seen in dd use, and for plenty of good reasons. I won’t be surprised to see a Dart being driven for transportation 20 years from now. There’s still one or two like that in Eugene. And one could see that happening already 40 years ago.
I recommended Darts and Valiants to anyone back in the late 70s – early 80s that was looking for relatively reliable cheap wheels. I helped one single mom co-worker/friend buy a white sedan, which became know as the Kelvinator, and lasted for quite a few years of grueling Los Angeles driving.
I also passed along a couple of extra Peugeot 404s to co-workers that I accumulated along the way, mostly with good success too. But if something did break with them, they would come back to me to fix it. Or they’d sell it back to me and I’d resell it to someone else. A gold-brown ’68 404, known as “Goldie”, passed through several hands that way.
I’ve managed to deviate from this Dart, but I could just have easily gotten into the Dart resale business too. Probably even fewer return visits.
Among the pre-1974 cars, these Dart sedans were so much more attractive than their Valiant counterparts. I always found these more angular cars much more attractive than the Duster/Demon/Dart Sport. The Swinger/Scamp was my favorite, but this sedan would have been my second choice.
To think, these things were once as thick on the ground as a Ford Focus is today, and probably thicker once you added Dusters into the mix.
The color on this car is the paint I chose for the roof of my Tawny Gold 71 Scamp after the dark brown vinyl roof went bad. It was a not a 1971 color, but it came closest of anything of the time period for matching the interior of my car.
JPC: I agree on the Darts being more attractive than the Valiant models.
I’d love to find a mint condition, 318/Torqueflite/Factory A/C Dart Swinger Special Edition with that upscale, Brougham-ie interior from around 1974-75.
A young fellow brings a 1974 Dodge Dart sedan equipped with the 318 V-8, automatic transmission, power steering, power brakes, air conditioning and vinyl roof to the Chryslers at Carlisle event every year.
It’s an all-original car in very good condition that he bought from the original owner.
Agree, but only through 1972. In 1973, the 5-mph bumper Darts got what, to me, looks almost like an abbreviated Thunderbird Bunkie-beak. The Valiant was better looking 1973-74. Then, as usual with Chrysler, they switched back with the last 1975-76 Darts having a better grill than the Valiants.
But the best looking A-body of all was the 1964 Valiant.
It has VA antique tags so it is not supposed be a daily driver. If it is being used as one then the owner can be fined with a possible loss of those license plates.
In order to daily drive it, the owner needs to get current tags or register a set of clean vintage(for that era car) tags with the DMV. Ether one of these choices requires it to be safety inspected and registered like any other non historic car in VA
Many years ago, I was in the Dart/Duster sale/resale business and it was very profitable. Most of the cars I flipped had rust issues, especially rusted out torsion bar anchors. Mechanically speaking, they held up well. Bought many of the cars for $100 and resold them at $1000. Never had any problem selling them quickly either, as their reputation for mechanical durability made them easy sales.
Rust is the Achilles Heel of the A-body. If you live in a climate where foul weather (and subsequently salted roads) is not an issue, they’ll last forever.
The A-body rust isn’t limited to the rust belt. My ’75 Duster had serious rust problems after a few years, with annoying things like the remote control outside rear view mirror falling off the door and hanging by its cables.
By the way, this was in Florida.
Based on the experiences of friends and relatives who bought Mopars from about 1975 through 1980, it was as though the corporation had essentially given up on quality control during those years.
Can’t argue with that. Though my Duster was sturdy and reliable mechanically, the assembly quality was lousy and the interior was downright shoddy.
Although Chrysler still had some life in the mid-to-late seventies (Cordoba, Omnirizon), I get the impression there was a sense of despair during that time, not far removed from Studebaker’s final days.
The K-car was just around the corner, but I don’t think many thought Chrysler would make it to that point, at least not until Iacocca came on board.
Completely agree. My ’75 Valiant was bubbling out on the top/side of the front fenders at 3 years old, and I started having extensive welding repairs around the 7 year mark, including front torsion bar attachments, both rear spring shackles, upper ball joint, door jambs, floors, on top of a complete body job at nine years old. Nice drivetrain, but I should have run like a rabbit at the first opportunity.
I always liked the Dart Special Editions/Valiant Broughams from 1974-76. On my paper route in 1977 when I was 13 one of my customers had a ’76 Valiant Brougham and I used to sneak peaks into the interior on my way up and down the driveway. It was really nice!
Great looking car!
It would be better without the vinyl roof, but still. I love those pre-1974 bumpers!
I want mine with the slant six.
Was the 4-spd on the floor (OK, 3 + OD) offered on a 6-cyl of that ear, or was this a 1975-76 option only? I wonder how they shifted.
(I remember 3 + OD was in fact an option in 1976, the year I started reading up on car facts as a kid, on the Dart/Valiant/Duster as well as Aspen/Volare)
The TorqueFlite is a great tranny, but the mpg possibilities with a manual trans are intriguing.
This car looks fantastic! It’s probably not a daily driver, but probably of “periodic driver” on nice days, when it can be enjoyed without getting rained on.
A833 OD 4-speed only on the ’75-’76 Slant-6 A-bodies in the US-Canada markets; that was the first 4-speed Slant-6 A-body offering since the ’64-’65 cars could be had with the non-OD A833 (which had a rather nice Hurst shifter—the ’75-’76 cars did not).
Thanks!
I’m certain it was offered on the Aspen/Volares too.
It was—initially with an aluminum transmission housing that was improperly cast, therefore porous. The specified lube was ATF, and it sailed right through the porous castings and onto the ground below the car. That was one of (many, many) costly recalls for the F-body cars.
This picture was taken just a few miles from where I live, but I’ve never seen this Dart around. (The Google StreetView image of the parking lot, though, does show a Mustang II).
It’s great to see these Darts still on the road.
Among many features, I loved the concave rear window on these.
The first car I drove was a 1973 Dodge Dart Swinger, in driving school. It had the same rear end, but the updated grille up front. Great memories.
This ’72 is in excellent shape. It might just be me, but the driver’s door looks to be a shade off from the rear quarter panel. A little bit of primer out back and ahead of the driver’s door to fix up some surface rust perhaps. The front bumper looks a bit askew, maybe from a parking barrier. Trouble possibly brewing under the vinyl roof. Nonetheless a great survivor.
+1 on the concave backglass, though in winter it compounded the damnuisance of the nonexistent-to-inadequate backglass defoggers of the day. Starting in ’74 a gridlines-type defogger became available (in large part because the state of New York began requiring it). It was a fairly expensive option, for it necessitated some pretty extensive upgrades from these cars’ standard-equipment rather marginal charging systems: a higher-output alternator, a much heavier main feed cable, a higher-current ammeter, etc.
Much though I like the ’70, ’71, and ’72 Dart front face, there really is something about that front bumper bar that just always looks a little bit askew from certain angles, even when everything’s perfect. I think it’s due to the fairly complicated collection of curves and angles. And at least on the ’72s like this, the convergence of the front bumper bar, front valence, and licence plate mount looks a little sloppy and thrown together. Would’ve looked better to close up that gap between the top of the valence and the bottom of the bumper bar, and provide a plate mount on the bumper bar itself.
But unlike the ’70-’71s, the ’72s had front turn signals big enough to be worth using, the front seatbelts were somewhat less clumsy to use, and there were a bunch of little engineering improvements sprinkled throughout. Still not much attention to body sealing; water got in past the windshield, past the windshield wiper pivots, past those otherwise-awesome underdash vent boxes, past the backglass. Only really egregious cases showed up during the cars’ reasonably anticipated lifespan, though—unusual things fail and wear out on unusually durable cars when they get unusually old.
Good call on the electric rear window defroster. Honestly, it’s really something on how poorly the electrical systems must have been engineered on domestic vehicles as Japanese cars seemed to have them as standard equipment much sooner. They were a pricey option on American cars for a long time, maybe all the way up to the nineties, when they were standard on many imported vehicles as early as the seventies. I always figured it was just another example of domestic manufacturers gouging the customer for a truly useful piece of equipment. I even remember the only way to get an electric rear window defroster on some models was you had to order a very expensive package ‘suite’ of options.
Hell, I even recall that an electric rear window defroster was standard equipment on the Fiat 128. Unfortunately, it didn’t have a timer so they invariably burned out when left on for too long.
Well, yeah, but to be fair it was standard on the Fiat 128 so your hands wouldn’t freeze. 😉
When I had the audacity to use the heater blower, windshield wipers and low beam headlights at the same time on my Fiat 128; the charging system warning light would glow dimly, as if to reproach me.
🙂
We should remember that “export” cars come better equipped than their home-market car, typically. That and the fact that many of the Japanese mfrs were grouping options packages for ease of manufacturing.
The real secret ingredient of this generation of Dart/Valiant was the drivers. Other durable cars didn’t last as long because they didn’t attract and keep durable drivers.
Good point!
Many Dart/Valiant owners were conservative, careful types. So, take a fairly robust car, combine with a caring owner, and it will last.
The same can be said of Mercedes W123 Diesels–which was built to a much higher standard.
Exactly! All the US made compacts with sixes and automatics (Rambler, Nova, Dart, Maverick, etc.) were robust…as long as you maintained them. Even the toughest car will die a premature death if not taken care of.
I’m not so sure it’s accurate to say that a well-cared-for Ford or GM compact will hold up as good as a Mopar. The more stout TorqueFlite is one factor.
But more important is the 30-degree cant of the slant-six. While the original intent was simply to lower the hood line of the car, there was another, quite a bit more substantial engineering benefit. Back in the day, Chrysler was big into experimenting with ‘ram-induction’ and the manipulation of intake runners to improve performance of their V8 engines. Well, the new slant-six got some of the same engineering. When the engine was canted over, it offered more room for more even length intake runners. The real benefit was that the first and last cylinders of the engine would now get a fuel/air mixture much closer to that of the middle cylinders.
Ford and GM’s upright six-cylinder engines didn’t have the room for long intake runner manifolds, instead having to use a ‘log-type’ intake manifold. This meant that the first and last cylinders got an uneven, smaller fuel mixture via a 90 degree angle, resulting in, at the very least, poorer performance.
But it may have been worse than that. Someone with more understanding can help out, but I think that, over time, the imbalance would cause a deterioration in the longevity of the non-Mopar sixes.
The one I paid $75 for, from some lady in a trailer made 10 miles down the road. No fault of the car just the buyer.
Ha! That’s the same thing I always say about Toyota drivers!
Until a few years ago, I had a ’67 Monaco. Not quite as DD-able as a Dart (too big to park in the city, mine lacked a/c), but it’s hard to imagine that anything would kill it. Regular–simple!–maintenance and it would just keep going. And the 2-barrel 383 got surprisingly good fuel economy. It was a handsome car, too–a hardtop sedan.
I eventually replaced it with a ’67 Imperial. Compared to the Monaco, it’s MUCH more pleasant to drive (a/c! disc brakes! FM radio!), but I don’t fool myself: it has many more gadgets, and eventually they will break. At least mine has manual a/c instead of the finicky Autotemp system.
Just yesterday at the Safeway supermarket in Petaluma, CA, I spotted a 1967 Plymouth Valiant, obviously well-loved with shiny paint in a color similar to that of the featured Dodge Dart, and optioned-up with air conditioning, upgraded interior, a trim package and 14-inch wheels. Maybe it was a Grandpa’s sunny-day car, out for an outing on a cloudy, drizzly day, but the low-middle aged gentleman loading groceries (remember how the trunk in those A-body sedans was too low to fit full-sized upright grocery bags?) belied that idea. He drove off before I could get a photo, and from the sound of it, there was an LA, small block Mopar engine and Torqueflite under the hood…even in its mild, docile-sounding state of tune, it’d have been a quick car.
I always liked the squared-off look of the 1967-1973 Valiant sedans.
No, in fact I remember just the opposite from my many years of driving them: the trunk of an A-body would swallow up almost enough standard paper grocery sacks to satisfy a survivalist’s deepest paranoia. More or less depending on the particulars; the ’63-’69 Darts and ’67-’73 Valiants were best in this regard, followed by the ’63-’76 Valiants and ’70-’76 Darts, then the ’60-’62 Valiant/Lancer (grocery bags were standable-up towards the car end of the boot, but not towards the bumper end), then the ’70-’76 Duster/Demon/Dart Sport (you could stand up the bags, just not as many of ’em).
If I recall correctly, the ’63-’69 Dart/’67-’73 Valiant trunk had about 32 cubic feet of space, which is over 906 litres or almost a cubic metre.
G. Poon: I think you may be confusing the Dart/Valiant with the early Fairmont/Zephyr. Those cars could not fit a stand up grocery bag in the trunk. There was no place in the trunk you could stand up a bag, unlike the older Darts…
There are still quite a few Darts of this vintage puttering around Los Angeles. I know of a ’64 and a ’65 that I believe are still daily drivers (I see them on the move quite frequently), and I’ve had two separate instances in the last year where I saw a pristine ’70-’76 Dart being driven by an elderly woman (two different Darts, two different women). I suspect there will still be many around even in ten years’ time, though perhaps not as daily drivers anymore.
Jeeziz, Paul, first that ’65 New Yorker and now this; isn’t torture against the Geneva Convention?!
My mother’s father, in Virginia as a matter of fact, had a ’72 Dart Custom in this same “Sun Fire Yellow” with a froggy (probably “lime”) green vinyl interior. Its lack of a vinyl top improved matters, I think, and it was otherwise very desirably equipped: 225 engine, power steering and power disc brakes, air conditioning, the dressup package (chrome bezel on the brake pedal, etc), 3-speed wipers with electric washer, the lights package (glovebox, “courtesy”, and “map” lights; the little fendertop turn signal indicators), remote sideview mirror, day/night rearview mirror, I think it probably had FM/AM, etc. It had the 2-piece seatbelts up front, with the shoulder belts never removed from their clips at the edges of the headliner above the doors. I loved riding in that car, in part because its sights and sounds (oh, but its sounds!) reminded me of the similar-color, slightly-less-loaded ’70 my folks had traded away when I was two. Grandpa David was about average height, maybe 5’9″, and the Dart was his car. Grandma Zelda, on the other hand, was barely five feet tall and drove a great big ’71 Cadillac Calais in the stereotypical manner: passersby could see not much more than a little wisp of grey hair in the driver’s seat; she looked out at the world through the crescent formed by the top of the steering wheel with the dashboard.
In 1985 or so, when grandpa was 72 and my sister was 14 and I was 11, my grandparents offered my parents the Dart. It was in lovely condition, but it needed a heater core—that telltale smell of coolant inside the car was a giveaway. “NO! ABSOLUTELY NOT!”, insisted my mother, who at the time was, ah, rather, ah, high-strung and, ah, strident and who had owned a VW Beetle in her 20s. “IF THERE’S SOMETHING WRONG WITH THE HEATER IT MEANS THERE’S SOMETHING WRONG WITH THE EXHAUST SYSTEM! IT’S NOT SAFE!” My sister was disappointed because she was within reaching distance of driving age, and it was a car. I was disappointed because I had always really liked Slant-6 Darts—especially yellow ones, in accord with Scripture—and it had just begun dawning on me just how nifty Slant-6 engines were.
Not long after the rebuffed offer, grandpa ran a red light. The car got knocked 30 feet down the road. Grandpa walked away, but it was the end of the Dart—and, I think, the end of his driving days.
(There are probably those who wonder just how the hell I could possibly know such detail about the equipment of a car I only saw on the occasion we flew in from Colorado to visit the grandparents in Virginia, and which went away when I was 11.)
The mismatched tires, front end damage, and rust repair but otherwise nice original condition leads me to guess that it was handed down to a younger driver from an elderly owner. The dual exhaust pipes would also probably make it a 318, in which case would make it quite a fun little car
The 318/Torqueflite/3.23 final drive ratio was a very pleasing powertrain in these compact cars which embarrassed more than one pony car (Mustang, Camaro) driver.
As I know from personal experience!
🙂
I think one of the key reasons these remain usuable today is the parts supply. The fact that this generation of A body lasted a full decade, and so much of the drive train was shared with other Mopars for years before and after means that spares are usually no problem.
That said, while you certainly can daily drive one, I’m not sure why you’d want to. I had a ’74 Dart from 2007-2014 and replaced it with a mid 90s Olds 98. The C/H body Olds or Buick has basically the same exterior dimensions as a Dart, but with a bigger, nicer interior and trunk. Comparable performance with much better gas mileage and easily a quarter of the maintainence needed.
Now a Dart/Valiant is a great, simple, low cost hobby car, but for everyday use you better live somewhere without rust, and really enjoy your toolbox.
Maintenance/replacement parts/labor prices for the C/H body GM cars are considerably more frequent and expensive than these Valiant/Darts would be?
I can only speak from my experience, but that’s not how my cars were. The issues with the Dart did tend to be minor, but were pretty much constant.
A close relation to the 60s Valiants we got from OZ, bloody good cars, very few left around as originals now but the restomod versions are popular, with either 225 slant 6 or 318 V8 they were quite hard to kill, the rust beetle saw most of them off the road eventually
The VA tags don’t surprise me, antique or not. These things are crawling all over SWVA year round in all sorts of condition. They pop up in various classified adds (online or paper) monthly as well. From modded show worthy cars, reliable 4 door slant six Dailys, or rusty beat up barely road worthy rigs.
Some joke about the GM J car being the cockroach of the road…..
Last vintage Daily indeed
I DD’d a 67 Valiant in college in 2014. I know a waitress that drives a 74 scamp daily. The carburetor mounting nuts are missing so the carb just kind of sits loosely on top of the manifold. Gets no maintenance what so ever but still runs everyday.
Nice find. I remember tons of these around well into the 80’s when most of its competitors had disappeared off the roads. A 4-door brown early to mid-70’s dart seemed to be the proverbial old lady car in my hometown. And they were in about the same condition as this car too.
Hi,
I am, I believe, the second owner of this Dart. I bought it on eBay Motors from a seller in Pensacola, Fla in 2009, winning the auction by bidding $3,100. I had it shipped to Rockville, Md from an independent hauler I found on uShip. Looking over it after arrival, the Dart was in good condition considering its age. Apparently, it was well loved and probably had 141,000 (or 241,000) on the odometer. According to the first few digits of the VIN LH41G2R, it rolled off the line in January, 1972 at Windsor Assembly, Ontario. The Dart came with a 318 V-8, A/T, and A/C that blew ice cold on arrival, and added later in its life, an Edelbrock 4-barrel carb, dual exhaust, and electronic ignition that gave it surprising acceleration and a bit of a growl when I stomped on the gas. No power brakes though, manual drums, and stopping required more lead time and a hard firm mash on the pedals. The Dart had been put thru a minor restoration about 25-30 years ago. It had been repainted once, the vinyl roof was replaced with a spongy aftermarket one and rust had bubbled up from the window edges. The carpet and headliner were also aftermarket, and the front split bench seats, armrest and headrest had been recovered in a beige that was way off of the original yellowy tan, but well stitched. It had an under dash Audiovox FM converter, but the radio wasn’t working. The gold colored dash had a small crack in the center, but was surprisingly intact and spongy, not brittle. The instrument panel was worn, with plasti-chrome rubbed off and chipped in the corner, but all gauges except fuel gauge worked, the dash’s fake woodgrain applique was in decent shape. The rear package shelf showed significant water damage over the years and was bleached and warped. All hubcaps were accounted for and free from dents, but the flat black trim had faded from the years in the Florida sun. Dart and Custom emblems were still there but sun bleached. The chrome Dodge emblems on the front and rear decks had disappeared. The tires were mismatched and dry rotted, and a trip around the block resulted in the steel belts of the front driver side tire bulging out of the sidewall slapping the inside of the wheel well with a sound of beating eggs with a whisk.
During its life, the front driver side panel had been gashed and the metal was peeled back extending into the driver’s door. Plus, the inside door panel had huge scratches on the metal sill. The body side vinyl molding on the sides were missing. So, I went to work to iron its creases. I had a local body shop patch the gash, straighten as best they could the front bumper, and repaint the front quarter and inside door sill. They did a passible job, and explained because the old repaint was not matched to the factory color, they couldn’t exactly match the color, so it did seem a bit darker a shade than the rest of the car. I ordered a set of Firestone (F-28?) whitewall tires on the internet, a sending unit for the gas tank, and vinyl side molding. After getting the car out of the shop it looked even better, still no peach though.
I drove the Dart around occasionally for about 5 years before selling it to a father and son from Northern VA for $1800. Attached is a photo of the car for sale in Lisbon, MD in 2014. And just last week, I bought another Y2 Sunfire Yellow ’72 Dart Custom Sedan, this one with only 14,000 original miles, garage kept by a little old lady from Aurora, Il who traded a ’59 DeSoto for it, according to the original sales slip!
Oooer! Tell us about your new Dart! It sounds a lot like my ’73, which I wished had been a Y2 ’72. What colour’s the new car’s interior?
Next Dart arrived yesterday here in York, PA from Chicago area. Belongs in the Smithsonian, it’s that well preserved. Strange for a Dart Custom, A/T but no AM Radio! Dash is blank all the way across. No A/C, just heat. Black vinyl and checkered cloth bench seats, woodgrain dash and door panels, no rips or tears. Ashtrays never saw a cigarette. Original plastic litter bag found in glovebox contained user manual, broadcast sheet and sales receipt. Got title and tags, drove this time machine home 8 miles. Drum brakes and numb power steering meant two hands at the wheel. Opened the trunk, spare tire was bias-ply, never used, no dry rot, had air.
Pic
I felt compelled to come back to this thread to leave a photo of the car, seeing as the original photo didnt post. Here it is in the Mopar Survivor tent at the 2022 Chrysler at Carlisle.
Thanks for posting, Chris, and letting us know more of this car’s story.