The Yankee Express restomod build thread.

[Ghostrider 67]

Many, if not all of the mods meant that many other smaller changes needed to be made in order for them to work out. So, the actual list of mods is more than twice as long as the one posted.

The question of what to do with the interior was answered by deciding that I would emulate the Imposter Impala built by Chip Foose. A late model dash and custom interior in a mid sixties sedan seemed doable, I only had to locate a dash and interior that I both liked and that would fit in the 67 Coronet dimensions. No small task. I pulled the entire Dodge interior and sold it off.
I got out my trusty tape measure and wrote down the particulars of the Coronet and set out on the hunt through several salvage yards, and online, looking up car dimension stats to weed out the models that were too wide.
Back in 1986 I bought a brand new Audi 5000 Quattro luxury sedan at a West German dealership, off the showroom floor. I had been stationed there for two 3 year tours and spoke the lingo pretty well. Anyway, I have been an Audi fan ever since then, Great cars. So, It occurred to me to look at those for inspiration. Oddly enough Audi and Dodge had the same ideas about cab width. It was a match. So, I remembered that there was an Audi wagon, mid 2000's in my local yard just a few miles from me. I returned to check it out.
It was there, a 2004 Audi A6 Quattro Cross country wagon. The windows were up and the inside dry. It had not had any parts removed either. The interior was in good nick as well. I spoke to the owner of the yard and asked what he thought he might want for the whole shebang? $ 150 bucks.....yowza! Sold American. I came back the next day with tools and began taking it apart.
I took it all. Gutted the inside front portion and took the rear door panels as well. I did not take the seats, too small.
Now came the business of fitting that dash and console to the Coronet cab. This engendered a whole host of new problems.
Among them;
The dash leading edge next to the windshield didn't match the curvature of the 67 windshield base. Fortunately the Audi dash is deep, front to back, and could be trimmed to match without losing anything important except real estate covered in vinyl. Next the dash has an aluminum skeleton that attached on either end to the car frame pillars. While the dash itself was the right length the frame in the dash was shorter by about 5 inches. Bummer. This took some thought. I mocked up the dash shell without anything in it, just the frame and shell with the console tower shell attached, into place where I thought it needed to be. Moved it around a little to get the spacing even and then brainstormed ideas of how to bolt it in there. The only safe bet was the welding in of mounting plates to meet the mounting pads on the ends of the skeleton. Welding them to the A Pillars of the 67. I bought some 3/16 plate steel and got busy. Several iterations later it was bolted up securely in place. Looked good in there too!
Next came the base/platform to hold the bottom of the console at the correct height and position so that the console to dash mounting points lined up right with no strain or gaps between the two elements. Then, the issue of installing a 1967 floor shift mechanism and base under that console in such a way as to not interfere with any Audi stuff and still work right. The console sets way, way back from where the stock Dodge shift base would mount. Like, 13" back. Remember the dash is deep. So, I would need to craft a shift linkage arm out of two stock arms split in half with some material added to the center. I managed to incorporate the shift base into the Audi console body pretty neatly. I ditched the fake chrome shift lever bezel and replaced it with a rubber 4 speed shift boot. It's an automatic with a hand fabricated pistol grip shift lever handle, lever, and reverse lockout release. I bought a set of 10 way power heated leather bucket seats from a Volvo. Also having to be sorted was a center pull E Brake lever and mechanism. NOT something 67 Dodges came with. Lots of trial and error later I had a working prototype.
Here's some pic of these areas...including one of a complete Audi interior with everything in place.