Alright y'all, before we get into this, let me give you a short background story about myself. I was born and raised in WNY. My family raced street stocks all of my life. The majority of my automotive experience is general maintenance, and engine building. We would build a few engines a year, to get us by. If the car needed a tranny rebuild, we would take it to a tranny shop, so I really don't have much experience with transmissions. I worked in an engine shop for about a year. Most of my time there was spent rebuilding inline 4 cylinders for my boss and his friends, for their model T's. I rebuilt a couple of inline 6's, and one or two v-8's. It was a small shop, not a whole lot of work, or experience to be had. Needless to say, I have very little, to no body work experience. Fast forward to now, I left NY, pursuing a career in criminal justice. I spent about a year here until I got the itch to buy a project car. I bought my 73 dart sport, which to me seems like a very solid car. Now, not knowing too much about body work, some of you more experienced folks might see it as a rust bucket. My question is, should I use this car as a learning experience, and attempt to do some of the body work myself when I get to that point, or should I just let a professional take care of it? Here is a link to a video I took of the car and some of the body damage I'm facing.

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10203281230937383

 

I don't know what the underside looks like but it doesn't look too bad. As to the rust repair there are lots of rust repair videos on You tube spend some time there

 

:welcome2: Body work is tricky and if it is not done right it will make the whole car look bad..So it depends on what you plans are for the car...It is a classic and I personally would have it done by a proffessional..With all the metal replacement, repair work, and paint it would make sense to just have it done or it could end up costing you more to fix a bad repair..Just my $.02...Bill

 

fenders are junk, rear qtsr are junk. rust in roof. I bet underside is a mess

 

Lol that was a morale boosting reply. Actually, the underside seems pretty solid. It was undercoated pretty well, floor panels are in good shape. Interior is close to mint. It's a project car for sure, but the original question was whether or not I should try to take this time to learn to do some body work, or let a professional do it.

 

Options:


#1 Sell the car, spend more money and get one that's done.


#2 Find a shop that will let you do some grunt work to keep cost down (hard to find)


#3 Buy equipment, educate yourself and get at it.


#1= Money. #2= Money+hard work. #3= Stuff you'll always have, Knowledge, Satisfaction of doing it yourself (the way you want it) Priceless.

 

You are young, and if you have the drive to start a project and see it through to the finish, no matter the out come, you have learned weather you have the talent for it or not

 

Sorry, trying to watch that makes my head hurt. Please learn to take photos

I would not touch something like that with somebody else's 10 ft pole