This is the first installment in what will be a hella cool build from the boys at American Powertrain. Gray Fredrick, who is the CEO of American Powertrain scooped up a 1966 Dodge Coronet off of eBay prior to telling his wife and the proceeded to drive it home in the dead of winter with the top down. This is a man and a car that is 100% BangShift approved.

We’re going to let Gray introduce you to this project in his own words. Scroll down for the photos, and a rendering of what the finished product will be. Keep and eye out for the bad ass manifold and throttle bodies from the BangShift approved F&B Performance! One of the reasons we love the companies that support us here at BS is because they are as whacked out and addicted to gearhead experiences as we are! 

I was looking for a B-body convertible and came across this one 1966 Dodge Coronet on eBay.  The owner had spelled Coronet wrong on the listing and there were hardly any watchers (back when you could check that on eBay) and only ten minutes remained on the auction.  I’m a sucker for three box B-bodies and convertibles, but didn’t have a lot of time for any hard consideration. In fact, all I had was the description and a few pictures.  Custom yellow paint, black top, fresh 440, torqueflight auto and a 3.23 light duty one legger in the back.  I took a shot and pulled the trigger, won the auction and then broke it to my wife that I had just bought a car on eBay.  She was, shall we say, less than pleased.

I picked the car up at Monster Mopars and drove it home with the top down wearing two coats, a ski cap and gloves.  A convertible’s top gotta be down!   On the way home I almost killed myself throwing the screws to four pathetic drum brakes trying to stop a 4000lb monster, but I made it home with just a huge fuel bill and some fresh underwear.

The car got a brake upgrade, a 3.54 Sure Grip HD rear end and some mild engine upgrades before being driven again.  Drove it to a park to take pictures of the kids, drove through a shallow ditch at the park and broke loose about 1000lbs of Bondo.  Heartbroken I put the car up and didn’t drive it until I needed a ride for the 2009 Hot Rod Power Tour.  I dusted the car off, put a battery in it and did 2300 trouble free miles.  I should have been happy, but being the perfectionist I am, the paint problems were driving me nuts. NUTS I TELL YA!  Plus, being one of the biggest TREMEC dealers on earth and driving a car with a 3-speed slush box just didn’t fit my hand-shaker image.  One day I went out in the warehouse and scraped some paint off where the moron that had owned the car before me had filled a trim tab hole with filler and was popping out.  A little more scraping and grousing later project 44 Magnum was born.

It started as a simple paint job.  Strip the paint, get rid of the Bondo, re-spray it the same color and drive it.  Simple.  But, you can’t re-spray the body without cleaning up the underside.  So up on the lift it went, and while taking out a half inch thick coat of undercoating I noticed some cancer.  And so it went.  Before long the car was down to every component part that Mother Mopar had assembled at the factory, parts were on the way, a rendering and then another were done and the 44 Magnum project was well on its runaway freight train path downhill.  440 cubes became FIVE HUNDRED TWENTY EIGHT. With a MAHLE/Eagle stroker kit, pistons went from cast lbs to forged ounces, OE cast heads became Mopar Performance aluminum, the Holley 4-bbl became a super trick F&B Engineering built  6-pack EFI system and a custom grind COMP Cam with rollers. Milestone Custom Paint and Body came a dragged off the stripped uni-body to start the process of making the old car look like the rendering, pulling out a patchwork quilt of Bondo and sheetmetal.  Now a TREMEC Magnum 6-speed is waiting to be bolted to the block with a QuickTime bell and American Powertrain installation and clutch equipment, a new EZ Electric power steering system is being designed to mount on the RMS Alterkation K-Frame and rear suspension. The list goes on and on… ARO 2000 custom top with a GLASS rear window, the deepest most beautiful PPG Viper Blue paint ever, Milestone custom hood scoop, HiTech custom aluminum radiator and fan assembly, Painless wiring, Howell EFI control system, Rick’s gas tank, LED headlights, tons of 3M prep supplies, Wheel Pro and American Racing helping with the wheels.  Brakes and tires are next on the list, along with other various things we haven’t even thought of yet.

It’s never, ever a simple paint job.  And I couldn’t be happier.

Scroll down to see photos of the car, the rendering and the badder asser F&B intake and throttle bodies!