HeavyD, HeavyD,
My brother from a different mother...you are going to get trashed for your last quote. I agree with your statement about the early Mopars, but our GN's are already being called the most collectable car made in the last 35 years. Different times, different materials, different marketplace...you cant compare the two when it comes to collectability. The Mopars will always be 20-25 years older, cant change that, and therefore there will always be fewer and fewer. Rarity plays a big part in collectability. Th GNX's are doing pretty well for the "newest" factory, limited production muscle cars. I work in the automotive engineering field. Today, if you mention you want to build something out of metal, executives look at you like your flippin' crazy. "We can mold it out of resin or plastic for half the cost.", that is what you will get as a response. That is why our cars have the bumper fillers and other trim parts that go bad and crack and so forth. Imagine if they had aluminum fillers and stamped steel trim pieces??? My 62 Chevy's interior window trim is all light weight sheet metal. No fading or cracking to deal with 48 years later. The GN's and TR's and early 60-70's cars were engineered and constructed different and that affects the value and ease of restoration of the two. Even a well protected GN is going to need things done to it that the earlier cars wont, just to keep it collectable. Plastic has a lifespan. That is why it took me almost 12 years to find a perfect set of armrests for my 65 Plymouth super stocker. They are plastic and the bolts reacted with the plastic after 30+ years and they just broke when I set my arm on them one day. No one to this day repops the correct armrests for the 62-65 Mopars, but when they do, it will make restorations easier. Our GN's are ALL PLASTIC...wait another 10 years and see what your in for.
Building cars in the 60's was easy. The economy was BOOMING and everyone who wanted a job, had one. Most paid pretty well, not like today. Cars were cheaper, options were cheaper. In 1964, my father bought a new Dodge hardtop. It was a 383 4-speed car and had limited bells and whistles. He had just graduated high school. He got a job in the steel mill and his car payment was $55. 6 months later he ordered a new factory engine called a HEMI. It was $900.00 carbs to pan. Can you imagine, 900 bucks complete??? In the 80's, jobs sucked for alot of the country. The steel towns where I grew up hadnt recovered from loosing 900,000 jobs in a 3 year span. My dad went from making $17/ hr as a blacksmith for Youngstown Sheet and Tube to $9.00 hour in a bread factory. That was 1977, it took until about 1990 before he made that much again and prices were not from 1977.
Didnt mean to ramble, but when you have been in a family that has collected cars as serious as my family has, you get educated in all the outer world issues that effected the car manufacturing in this nation.
Take it easy,
Coach
