Most of us have a kind of love-hate relationship with the project vehicle. There is the beginning, where everything is perfect and wonderful, and as time passes on, flaws start to make themselves known. Some flaws can be ignored, some can be fixed, and some just piss you off. Joe Haber knows that last point very well.

In 2006, Haber spent $2600 to buy this 1966 Plymouth Sport Fury. The body style is one of his “must haves” and the car appeared to be in good condition. The paint was desert-rough and it had been treated to some minor modifications, but those were things that he didn’t mind working on. It came with a 383ci big block and a floor shift automatic, and a set of Keystone mags. He was hooked.

Unfortunately, if there is one guarantee with a cheap ’60s Plymouth, it is that you will find something that was hidden that you did not want at all. In Haber’s case, it was Bondo by the gallon covering poorly done repairs. The more he removed out of the car the more irritated he got, especially when large gaping holes in the body started to appear. Items needing attention started to get neglected as he pushed on, and with the list of needed fixes growing by leaps and bounds, it became more of a stress than it was a hobby. When the distributor and ignition module quit working on friendly terms, he parked it in front of his house and left it alone for a couple of years.

Fast-forward to last year. I had seen the Plymouth make the trek from the “lemon lot” on Davis-Montham Air Force Base to Haber’s house…and had not seen it move much since. I was in the middle of doing my road-tests on the Imperial and realized that the mag wheels that I had weren’t going to work on the Imperial anymore. Once they were replaced, I offered up the wheels and tires to Haber, who accepted them. He put them on, and noticed an improvement in ride quality over the Keystones that had been on the car since purchase. I had mentioned that the car would look better in primer black than primer red, a color that just screams “rust” to me. Shortly after putting the wheels on, he tested out black on the passenger front fender. The next thing I know, with help from his kids, the entire car is black.

From there on, the Fury started taking on a new life. Joe broke out some paint brushes and did some pinstriping and a few custom touches on the car, cleaned up the underhood area to look respectable, got the 383 running better and after a small wire fire that almost roasted the Plymouth, cleaned up some of the spaghetti under the dash. Since then he has been performing small things here and there to bring the Plymouth back to a respectable level.

This is what makes a cool project car in my mind. When the car was at it’s worst and he was ready to just be done with it and sell it, something, even one thing, reignited the passion to do something, anything, to make the car better in some form. Seeing the Plymouth at it’s roughest, I can attest that the changes that have occurred since last fall are far and away dramatic. Now, instead of looking at the car and sighing, he’s working on it with his sons and daughter, enriching their relationship. The pin striping was something that he had an interest in and decided to try out. It’s these little things that add up to a satisfying experience working on a hot rod, and isn’t that why we do this in the first place?