(Words and photos by Doug Gregory) –\u00a0<\/strong>I will state again for the record that I am not a Mopar person. I\u2019ve been playing with Chevy for a long\u00a0time so its what I know, but I like virtually anything done well. For some strange reason I am drawn to\u00a0Mopar muscle whenever we are at an event. Maybe it\u2019s a fascination with something I don\u2019t\u00a0understand. Whatever my problem is, this feature is a result of it. We first met Omer Fowee at\u00a0Thornhill Dragway back in September at the Battle of the Bluegrass event. The whole family went to\u00a0pretty much enjoy the race and not have me running around snapping pictures and talking to folks all\u00a0the time (my normal routine). We still managed to take some pictures and chat. My 14yr-old son and I\u00a0noticed this sweet-looking, wheelie-launching Dodge Dart making passes and decided we wanted to find\u00a0it in the pits to ask questions and get a few still photos. Before we took a short walk to find it the car\u00a0spit out a u-joint and had to be pushed off the starting line. When we finally found the car it was\u00a0already loaded up, but Omer was kind enough to chat with us as he vacuumed the moisture out of his\u00a0alcohol-fed monster. We let him know we\u2019d try to catch him another time to shoot some photos of it\u00a0and he told us of a \u201970 Coronet R\/T he had sitting at home as well. Note that.<\/p>\n

Fast-forward to November 22nd and our picture date with the cars and Omer. Omer warned us not to\u00a0bring the Nova because the roads were slick. I was sure it would be okay and really wanted to drive the\u00a0car since it hadn\u2019t been out in a few weeks. Likely I should have listened. We hit several patches of\u00a0black ice on our way up to Williamstown to make a stop at Lilly\u2019s Auto Care to chat and pick up some\u00a0goodies. We found out from Larry (Lilly) that some roads had even been closed and it was clear they\u00a0were still out salting the roads trying to make it safe. So the car got a white coating of stuff on it. It\u00a0washes.<\/p>\n

<\/a>We arrive at Omer\u2019s and he is super happy to see us and more than a gracious host. He\u2019s already got\u00a0the Dart out of the trailer and the R\/T out of the garage. After chatting a bit I\u2019m looking around the\u00a0garage and see all kinds of die-cast muscle cars covering the shelves. Most are Mopars, but Omer is an\u00a0equal-opportunity muscle car guy like me \u2013 all of them have a place. Omer\u2019s owned a bunch of different\u00a0makes too \u2013 from an early pony mustang (first car) to a Buick Special to a handful of Road Runners.\u00a0His most-recent Road Runner was a blue dragstrip beast of a 1970 vintage. Omer campaigned the car\u00a0for 9 years before is was sold to a guy in Switzerland via a cold Racingjunk ad. There\u2019s a picture included\u00a0of how the car looks today in its new home across the pond. When Omer herded the barge it carried a\u00a0515-inch stroker in its round-tube, 4-linked chassis. The car was all steel and tipped the scales at\u00a02,640lbs. It used a tried-and-true 727 trans with a 5,500 stall. Between the huge slicks spun a 4.10-\u00a0geared Dana 60. This combo was good for 1.20 sixty-foots and regular 5.70s in the 1\/8th mi. From some\u00a0video I\u2019ve seen it hiked the front tires up pretty good.<\/p>\n

Omer has had some health problems and not long after one particularly-long stint in the hospital he\u00a0went looking for another drag car and found this sweet, unassuming \u201973 Dodge Dart. He\u2019s had lots of\u00a0fun with it and has had some pretty good success as well \u2013 such as his win on the last night of racing this\u00a0season at Thornhill. The car sports a \u201968 vintage 340 stroker with aluminum rods. Its got a .620 lift full-\u00a0roller valve train. He runs it on alcohol in the warmer months through an 850cfm carb then switches to\u00a0gas via a 1050 dominator when it turns a bit cooler. All the fuel is pushed upstream through a pair of\u00a0Holley black pumps. If the alky ever gets some heat in it the CSI water pump and aluminum radiator are\u00a0sure to keep that in check. The potent small-block is backed by a 727 and 5,500rpm converter sending\u00a0torque to a 8 \u00be rear filled with 4.88 pro gears. All that twist gets sent to the track through gummy MT\u00a029.5×12.5 ET Drags on some cool, throwback Centerlines. It regularly hefts the front tires a good bit\u00a0pulling 1.4x 60ft and zips to the 1\/4mi stripe in 10.88 seconds pushing 122mph. The car runs in box and\u00a0no-box classes all while still retaining all its street-legal equipment. This is not some stripped-down\u00a0lightweight. It came with an old-style stereo and a Kraco (remember those\u2026?) equalizer\/Amp combo\u00a0straight out of the \u201880s. The fiberglass, lift-off Hemi-style hood is the only real weight-saving measure\u00a0which also helps in the servicing arena. The car is bathed in 70s-80s era-correct stuff and really couldn\u2019t\u00a0be much cooler than it is. I\u2019m thinking drag week daily-driver candidate.<\/p>\n

The car that has been in the Fowee stable the longest is this pristine, numbers-matching \u201970 Coronet\u00a0R\/T. Its one of only 109 said to leave the factory with a u-code, 833 four-speed. Omer picked<\/a> this car up\u00a0in 1989 and started the spit-and-polish routine right away. It was painted Rallye Red in 1995 and every\u00a0piece of the under-carriage was removed, blasted, primed, painted and replaced as good as new or\u00a0better. The car features its original 440-4 and still runs its stock bore after the rebuild. The only\u00a0deviation from stock is a mild camshaft and a 3\u201d exhaust system. The rear is a 3.54 gear Dana 60 with\u00a0the Sure-Grip limited-slip. The interior is nearly 100% original to the car and it sports a lot of neat\u00a0options including the in-dash 8-track tape player. The car rolls on Coker repop Goodyear Polyglas tires\u00a0that never see the rain. Omer shows it and drives it, but it doesn\u2019t get beat on too hard as this is one\u00a0gem of a musclecar.<\/p>\n

When it was time for us to go I asked Omer if he knew the owner of the recreated \u2018Instant Karma\u2019\u00a0Duster. We\u2019d ran into him at Thornhill and I got a ton of details about the car, but somehow misplaced\u00a0the owner\u2019s name. Not only does Omer know him (and he owns a Road Runner too), but they are\u00a0buddies and wrench each other\u2019s cars. Additionally, they are friends with the folks who still own the\u00a0original Instant Karma Duster. Add to that another pair of guys that have two Dusters (one of which was\u00a0purchased from Omer) and it looks like I will be busy shooting pictures of Mopars for a while. I\u2019ll need to\u00a0take some Chevy pills to keep from getting infected with this stuff. Maybe its something in the water\u00a0around here\u2026.<\/p>\n

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<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(Words and photos by Doug Gregory) –\u00a0I will state again for the record that I am not a Mopar person. I\u2019ve been playing with Chevy for a long\u00a0time so its what I know, but I like virtually anything done well. For some strange reason I am drawn to\u00a0Mopar muscle whenever we are at an event. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":120008,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1267,1266,1255],"tags":[1171],"class_list":["post-120007","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bangshift1320-door-car-feature","category-bangshift1320-drag-racing-feature","category-bangshift1320","tag-spotight"],"yoast_head":"\n