Project Overkill Revisited

Today, find out how muscle car rescued a 36 year old piece of hemi

history, a who's who of muscle car survivors. And we'll show you how to complete a budget paint job.

Hey, guys, walk in the muscle car as you know, you gotta build them before you can beat the hell out of them. And if you've ever tackled a project like this, you know, that can take a lot of time. So today we're gonna get you caught up on a project that we have a lot of time and effort invested in project overkill. Some of you guys may not know the whole story. Don't worry, beatings will start promptly at one

and we get a lot of questions, how is it? We took an old rusty hulk and turned it into something like this. And here's a whole story and it starts in the movies.

This one goes way back.

It's a 70 challenge built when gas was cheap

and muscles ruled the streets,

but it's had what you could call a challenge in life. Rode hard and put up rusty

back in 02. Our friends at year one helped set up seven challenges.

The high speed movie, too fast, too furious.

Two of them were movie cars. The rest of them were for one purpose to get abused on film.

And when it was all over the beater that would become overkill went to year one,

they brought up the muscle car to start a whole new life and it showed up in our shop with no motor,

no transmission and looking awful tired,

36 years old and just took a bad whooping.

This thing needed some big time help.

This was back in the very beginning of muscle car and I was still by myself in the shop. So I pulled in Ian and Jessi from Xtreme 4x4 and started tearing the Challenger to pieces.

Everything had to go, the hood bumpers, great fenders doors, interior inside and out. We took it down to a skeleton

and it was only then we could tell just how bad a shape it was in,

man. Those movie guys really know how to

crash a car. The interior of overkill was destroyed. They even pulled the Dukes that had to jump with it and bent the frame. Now, the first part in any major surgery is cleaning up the patient and we sent our challenger to blast from the past in Lebanon, Tennessee to get stripped.

They took it right down to the bare metal man. There were still a lot of hard work ahead.

So no time was wasted getting the challenger back to the shop and a job like this, you got to put it on a jig to keep everything square and level the small stuff. First, we took some rust, added rear window. Channel Jared, did some welding and fabrication to get it back in shape

was rust everywhere. Jared told me it wasn't that bad. Look at those quarters and that's the good side. They're too far gone to fix. So we're replacing them. New metal from Good Mark was in order, Jared, cut the quarters along the body line, laid the new ones over them to get the line just right, trimmed them down, then welded the new ones in place.

Next, the firewall got some attention. All the holes are filled and everything was ground down. Nice and smooth.

The body panels were hung just to see how they lined up,

test fit number one and everything was looking pretty good.

Then the challenger got a custom K member from Red Top speed shop because the stock K member was just not gonna give the ground clearance needed for this baby.

The only engine that would do the challenge of justice is the legendary

hemi, the most notorious engine ever back in 70. You can get one of these in anything. Mopar built

a 426 just wasn't big enough. So the 528 was sent from Mo Park performance. 610 horses, 650 ft pounds of torque. Be afraid

be very afraid.

Overkill still has to be able to run down the highway.

So, Keesler five speed overdrive and a Dana 6370 threes from Curry were installed

then a

little test fitting.

Now the engine needed to be centered. So engine mounts had to be

fed.

Some braces were installed for both of the fender wells and another one behind the firewall to tie everything together.

Well, what do you think lou,

I think it's really cool, man.

And that was just in the first couple of months. Overkill's been in and out of the shop for over a year now. So don't go anywhere because coming back after the break, we're gonna show you how he really made the star shine.

Coming up overkill gets a dose of vitamin C

man. You guys did a beautiful job on the body work and paint on this thing. You know, this car rolled off the factory with kind of a funky color purple, but you put on this color and it was called vitamin C orange look, man. All I know is this thing came with a 3 18 2 barrel and a torque flight

and then we gave it an upgrade.

One thing you find out for sure on a job like this, you're going to do a lot of test fitting,

put something on, check it, tweak it, pull it back out,

nothing goes together just once

overkill is so modified. No way. A stock exhaust is going to fit

the flow master was called.

They sent us a bunch of tubes,

man. This

he is going to roar through these

in

pipes.

Once everything lined up, just perfect overkill was blown apart. Then sent out for a quick coat of Rhino liner

that will also provide a little insulation

and cut down on the noise inside

like we care

next up the paint booth.

Nothing fancy quite yet. Just a little epoxy primer. So no rush shows up while the rest of the body work is being done.

All the body panels back in place overkill is starting to look like the street rod. It's going to be

sitting low and mean five inches off the deck

just waiting to get out of the shop to go cause some trouble

with everything in place. It was well lit up.

Some more holes were filled in

needs an antenna. Anyway, the sound of the engine and the smell of burning rubber is all the music this thing needs.

Then Brent took over to finish the bodywork with the delicate touch of a true craftsman.

Jared did a great job on the metal work. All Brent had to do was spread a light coat of mud

that

totally

three rounds of priming and blocking with a polyester primer got the body laser straight

auto body color and supply mixed up the vitamin C orange base that Brent topped it off with three coats are clear.

This project was started more than a year ago

and now it's finally time to put overkill together for real.

The km

from Red top gets sandblasted. Then powder coated

the engine and tranny were mounted on it.

Don't want to scratch up that paint. So everything's going in from the bottom.

We got lucky. The

hemi went in exactly as planned. Dead center in the middle of the engine bay and it looks great.

The Dana 60 came from Curry. It's the same where Ren Chrysler put in the original

hemi

cars. Well, plus it just looks cool

tubular upper control arms and shockwaves from air ride will handle any bumps.

The centrelink comes from Laughlin racing

CNC machine out of a single piece of steel. It goes in first, then the rest of the front suspension

to keep things going in the right direction. A gr sent a close ratio steering box.

Most of the trim is original because nobody's re popping it.

That grill is going to run a pretty penny, but that's ok. When building a car like this,

the front bumper will get a new life too.

All cleaned up and re

chromed.

It's topped off with a vinyl roof for that genuine seventies look, this car is going to go to see

us. So everyone autographed it under the vinyl.

Countless man hours of work came together to make one fine looking right, but it's not done yet.

We're looking good on

outside next up on the list plumbing wiring and we're saving the interior flask. Yeah, but that is not gonna happen today,

but stay tuned because you're gonna see a lot more project overkill coming up later on in the season, but stick around because coming up after the break, more muscle car

after the break, we're Smoky Mountain bound to check out some super rare muscle.

The Smoky Mountains of Tennessee known for the serene beauty and family atmosphere, but that's not why we showed up.

We're here for what else? Muscle cars and the Forge Invitational is where the rarest of the rare show up to strut their stuff

for the last five years, Tim La Pata

and his family have been pulling this a list of cars together and for them, it's become a family tradition, welcoming fellow muscle car enthusiasts. We give it that personal uh personal touch and, and the people that bring their cars from across the country and as rare cars as they are, that's where we would like to provide a personal, personal atmosphere for everybody.

Getting that personal invite is not so easy.

The RSVP into this show you right? Needs to be sporting numbers like one of 24 1 of six, even one of three

made in 67. The only three of them ever built other cars on the ticket.

Survivors. This 69 boss 429 only has 902 original miles on the clock.

This time capsule is even used by the MC A is a benchmark to judge other cars.

Here's something else for you, Ford guys. A mock one twister special, less than 100 of these were ever made and they were all sold out of Kansas City as promotional vehicles

words like first will also get you a seat at the Forge Invitational

the 69 Camaro. It's the first coo

zeal one car that Chevy ever rolled out the back door.

Now, here's an oddball for you. A coo

Cove.

These are what gave Don Yanko a

start and Casey's Brandenburg is the owner of this one of three stinger.

Most people never do. Jinko

had anything to do with Carves.

That was his first love. All right. A Ford and GM. Aren't your thing. There's plenty of eye candy for you Mopar guys as well.

This year we're uh focusing on the hemi

six pack cars from the sixties and the seventies

bars had anything but a short showing at this year's Invitational

hemi

Kas

hemi challengers Chargers. They all showed up. Even the birds and the bees. Don't forget the beep, beeps.

Tim and his family have already started working on next year's event. And if you want to see what they have planned, check out the link on our website Power block, tv.com.

Hang tight. More muscle car coming right up

up next. Old blue hair gets a new coat.

We've been taking a look back at a project that. I've got a ton of time in now. It's Rick's Turn. Hey,

what do you got over there?

Well, lou, we all know that you are definitely no body guy, but that's all right. But I've got this one covered.

Our sleeper, Nova

was looking pretty tired. So we're giving the old girl a face lift. Now, I know not every guy out there has $10,000 in his budget for a top end paint job.

It's not that big of a deal. What we're doing here is showing the average guy how he can get it done for a whole lot less.

Last week, we pulled all the trim

knocked out some dents took care of some rough spots and spent a lot of time smoothing out all of our imperfections.

There's still more sanding to be done. Now, I could spend weeks blocking, insane in a car. But dude, this is no show car. So we gotta keep it simple. But you also have to keep in mind the more time you spend with this in your hand, the better your paint job is gonna look

once our blocking was done, we used ad a sander with 180 grid.

The lacquer would jam up a finer grip paper and a coarser grit would leave deep scratches that would have to be smoothed out,

just be careful here not to dig into the surface with the edge of the disk.

Ok. Now, this is the point where most of you guys are probably gonna have to turn it over to a paint shop. If you've done your prep, work correctly, even an inexpensive place will give you great results. Just make sure that they use good materials and you get a warranty.

If you're lucky enough to have access to a spray booth,

now is the time to roll it in.

Whatever you do, don't try to paint this at your house. The chemicals and materials used are not only bad for the environment,

they'll use your lungs as punching bags.

One of the problems with painting over original lacquer is that the solvents in your new paint can attack it

and it could soften it which will cause wrinkling and peeling and that type of thing.

That's why we're using the rusty fender. This is a zero Voc primer. So there's no solvents in it that's gonna attack our original finish. Plus it'll give us a nice even hue to apply our solvent based urethane. On top of

this is my first time using this primer and I've noticed something. It's pretty transparent for a high build primer. So don't be surprised if you can still see through the first coat

three are actually required for full coverage.

We're using a guide code to show high and low spots. There's a lot of different types out there, but we're using powder

a rub down with a long block and 180 grit comes next. If we weren't on a budget. A urethane primer would smooth out the texture left from the blocking, but to save money, we're skipping it.

This paint will last for 10 or 15 years. No sweat, but it's no high end paint job either now. Rather than dropping into the 300 bucks and the prime and re blocking. We're going to paint right over our first layer of primer. But before we can do that, we need to wet sand it with 400 grit to smooth out the scratches left from the 180 block

wet. Sandy can make a big mess, but there's really just no way around it. We'll worry about the floor later, but the car needs a wash. Now,

make sure to use a soap that doesn't have any sealers or wax in it just pure soap.

Uh old blue hair's getting a sponge bath.

That's good.

Now, the good thing about washing the car down like this, other than the fact that I got to get Brent wet Ha is that you can look down the side of it and see how straight your body work is

on a job like this. A painter can spend more time masking than actually painting.

I'm using a foam tape to mask this door jam. It's faster, but it is a lot more expensive. Brent on the other hand, is using masking tape. It takes longer, but it's a whole lot cheaper.

Either way it'll get the job done.

Think of your sealer as an insurance policy since we're painted over mismatch materials, Lacquer,

Bondo, bare metal and high build primer. The sealer will create a barrier that locks everything down and it gives a uniform surface for the paint.

All blue hair is keeping her original color an age appropriate shade of aqua green metallic with a paint to reduce a ratio of 1 to 1

the color up slowly with 50% overlap. This will prevent the tiger striping. You can get when you spray it on, too heavy.

If you spray it on, too light, you'll get modeling

lay down your base until you have good coverage. Now, this could be anywhere from 1 to 8 coats depending on the color, let it flash or dry until it's dull to allow your solvents to evaporate between coats. A final dust coat will make sure that the metallic is even

three coats of high solid clear, will protect that fresh color and give it plenty of shine final step reassembly. Now, this is where the organization you did taking it apart will really pay off.

The paint is still soft and it won't be fully cured for about 60 or 90 days. So you gotta be careful during that time, you can wash it.

But again, don't use anything with sealers or wax

and don't throw a car cover on it. This thing needs to breathe

while our operation was

success. It's amazing what a face lift can do. Now the key to making a low budget paint job like this where great is taking your time on the prep at a shop time is money. So even if you send it out for paint, the more prep you do yourself, the more green you're gonna keep in your pocket. Hey, Lou, what do you think?

She's looking 30 years younger? That Nova is so hot. I think I'm gonna take her out, take her for a night on the town, buy her a bottle of octane booster

and see what happens later.