Project name: Valiant Efforrt
Car: 1967 Plymouth Valiant
Timeline: July 2002 - August 2005
Over the years, Mopar Muscle has done many project cars. While we appreciate these great machines, we wanted to do a new project that was affordable. Enter Project Valiant Effort. It all started when then-editor Geoff Stunkard and I decided we needed to do a project car in-house. Actually, I wanted to build a car, and he let me do it in the magazine. The criteria was this: it couldn't be an expensive car to start with because let's face it, us magazine guys don't get paid much, so that dictated at the very beginning that the car be cheap; second, we had a limited budget to spend on the car (again with the money). We initially decided we wanted to build a running-and-driving car for no more than $4,000. Just a mention of this small amount of money had people laughing at us. But that was the plan--a cheap, enjoyable car that anyone could build and drive on a regular basis.