Harry: Hello friend

In 1964 Ford introduced a new sort of car based on the Falcon chassis. The Mustang was an instant hit and sent automakers scrambling to develop their own formula for a new “pony car”. GM came through with the Camaro and Firebird in 1967 but Dodge’s answer came a year earlier in 1966 with the Charger. The Charger was based off the B-body Coronet but sported a sleek fastback design along with luxurious touches in the interior like a full length center console, unique lighting for the gauges, and plenty of chrome. Chargers sold pretty well at first but sales died off in 1967 and a full redesign in 1968 brought the more well-known shape that starred in Bullitt and the Dukes of Hazzard.

When I first rented my shop space in an RV storage yard I noticed a very solid car sitting in the weather that I had really never thought much about. That car was a 1966 Dodge Charger finished in silver over a red interior. I popped the hood as it was loose and took a look at the data plate riveted to the chassis to learn a bit more about the car. It turned out that this was a very early build car with the desirable 383 4-barrel engine sending power through a four speed manual transmission. After years of trying to get in touch with the owner, I finally got to talk to him and learn a bit more about the car.

Steve is a huge Mopar fan and he always wanted a first gen Charger. He found this car in Redding in 1997 where it had been sitting since 1983. The owner’s name was Harry Klein and Harry had bought the Charger in July of 1966 from a young man who said it had been a Chrysler factory demonstrator of some sort. Harry kept meticulous records in a small spiral notebook documenting every tank of gas, oil change, and maintenance over the years. Steve brought the car home to Davis and started restoring it but life moved on and he had to store Harry in the RV yard when he left town to move to Los Angeles. After some negotiating, Steve agreed to sell the Charger to me and I promptly named the car “Harry” in honor of longtime owner Harry Klein. I phoned a great local towing company and we carefully pulled Harry out of the spot he had been resting in and nosed him into my workshop.

Harry: Dirty Harry

Although Harry was in pretty great shape from a rust and completeness standpoint, he was a filthy mess. I spent a few days power washing, vacuuming, and sorting out all the spare parts stored in the car. Unfortunately, some bottles of gear oil had decayed and blorped all over the trunk but that coating actually did a good job preserving the trunk floor which looked nearly perfect after some cleaning. I did some digging around and found a build sheet under the left rear seat marked with the words “ORANGE BOWL CAR” which meant that Harry could have been one of the Chargers used to introduce the car to the world at the 1966 Orange Bowl. I sent off a scan of the sheet to a well-known Mopar decoder and he told me the bad news that this was not Harry’s build sheet as the serial numbers didn’t match up. However, he said that it might be under the dash and he was pretty sure that Harry might be one of the Chargers at the 1966 Rose Bowl based on the options and also the date of assembly. I fired up the Google machine and found a picture of a silver 1966 Charger following Rose Parade Grand Marshal Walt Disney’s Imperial convertible but I was not able to establish any sort of provenance as the Chrysler archives were lost at some point in the company’s history. Even without that proof, Harry was shaping up to be a very cool muscle car with an interesting and well documented past.

Harry: Over my head

After getting most of the cleaning sorted out, I put a battery in place and tested out all the electrics. Most everything worked but I could tell that I would need some serious help to get Harry sorted out. I phoned around to the local repair shops but most of them couldn’t work on a car of Harry’s vintage and I couldn’t find a good local restoration outfit either. However, I got lucky with one of my calls and found just the right place to revive Harry-Center City Automotive just a ½ mile from my shop.

After some discussions with bossman Jim at Center City, I carefully winched Harry on to my trailer and took him over to the shop. After an inspection that revealed a bunch of rust in the cooling system, we decided to do a full rebuild of the original 383 with a few updates in the form of electronic ignition, some mild head work, and a slightly lumpier camshaft. Harry also got a restored radiator, a new exhaust system, along with a complete rework of the fuel tank and lines. The original Carter AFB was rebuilt and the brakes were serviced to make sure the whoa would follow the go. We also bolted on some beautiful American Racing Torque Thrust D rims with Cooper Cobra tires.

Harry was almost ready to fire up but we first needed to sort out a few complications that came up.