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The Yankee Express, a Vermont Rat.

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Ghostridersixseven:
Beginning from the front I sectioned the front bumper into five pieces. The idea was to remove the curves on either end and to reimagine the ends to match the newly modified front fender noses.
Let me back up, the fenders had been both hit at some point and while looking them over initially I tried to think of ways to turn that to my advantage. I never liked the way the front corners angled forwards so the contour line angling across the hood to each corner would flow out to the point. I decided to sweep those back to 90* with the hood front lip. Much like the look of a 1970 Plymouth Road Runner front end. This solved both issues nicely.
So, having done this the front bumper ends now were hanging out in thin air. The pocket on each fender front lower section that the bumper end is supposed to set next to were now different. The bumper would need surgery to correct this mismatch. In addition to these reasons there was also the mod where the front Coronet grill and headlights would be swapped for a 67 Charger grill and revolving headlight buckets which also had the turn signals up on either end above the bumper rather than in the bumper face, as the 67Coronet has them. So those rectangular turn signal mounting holes would need to be 'shaved'.
The front bumper mounting brackets would also need to be modifies to make the newly positioned outer two mounting holes line up. So I sectioned those as well.
I had discovered a set of pictures on line of a 1967 Coronet that had been massaged to within an inch of it's life that I really liked and it had the same things done to it as far as the front bumper and the rear corners. It was inspiration.
 I trimmed and cut and 'pasted' steel for a few days till I got the shape close to what I needed over all and tacked up what I had to see where I was. I needed to fit the ends together still and that was intricate. I had rebent the bumper body a bit to get it straight and now needed to position the ends rear edges close to the pockets in the fender sheet metal. It all came together with a little fooling around and I trimmed the trailing edges to mirror those pockets.

Pictures, or it didn't happen...

Ghostridersixseven:
A few more....plus another small mod where I widened and increased the height of the front license pate holder opening, turning it into a ram air duct. Here's a few pics of the inspiration car.  Very tidy and tasty.

Ghostridersixseven:
Cut & paste, cut & paste...lol.

Next up on the chopping block was the set of fender top mounted turn signal indicators, Grandma may of needed them but I did not. The radio antenna also was shaved.  Following those I turned my attention to the engine bay. I wanted a smooth firewall and inner fenders. The firewall has a windshield wiper mounted in a big divot along the top left edge. The divot needed shaving. I cut away all of the firewall portions that extended forward of the base plane. This left as much as possible still attached with factory welds. I fabricated a one piece panel with the correct contour bends and fitted it in front of the remaining bits and welded it in. I fabricated a patch piece for the divot and welded that in. While I was up there I cut out the bumpy surface of the cowl front on each corner and replaced with smooth metal. Then I made templates for each side inner fender and cut them out of 18 ga sheet metal and bent on the brake to fit snug. They sit 1/4" up off the fender surface so I can hide stuff underneath them.
Once the the fenders are on again I'll fab a radiator/ front grill top cover that looks trick. The inner panels are bolted on with chrome Allen head bolts down through the panels and through hard nylon bushings for spacers.
The front clip is painted in these pictures.

Ghostridersixseven:
 ;D Backing up again.... The 67 Charger grill & headlights swap.  The 67 Coronets sold in Mexico came with the Charger front end from the factory. Weird. So, I knew it was a simple swap. The lower grill support bar was different due to different trim and the Coronet headlight mounts would need to go. The wiring was different too. But the biggest deal for me was the desire to NOT use the big clunky bucket drive motors from 54 years ago. I searched around for awhile before finding a set of 12 V motors with three point mounting bosses to counteract the rotational torque of the heavy headlight buckets. I had to fool around a bit to fabricate mounting plates and positioning of the motors on the plates so that the drive shafts would align with the buckets center axis AND the motor bodies would not rub against the support bar OR the transmission cooler on the front of the radiator.
Next up was connecting the two foreign bodies together so they would play nice. I had only a few inches of space to work with too. The buckets have a circular plate with a post in the center, with a 3/8" set pin hole through them, that protrudes through a captured metal 'donut' that the old clunky motors mounted onto. Those motors have a 'neck' that enclosed the drive shaft and had a corresponding hole through for the locking pin. Absent those motors there was now no way to keep the rotating axis centered up. I needed to fabricate a connection that fit over the electric motors small D shaped shaft, have a threaded hole for a set screw to lock it down, have the other end fit over the post coming from the buckets center axle plate and have a hole for a set pin to lock THEM together.  I didn't have the technology to make this in one piece so I also needed the two to have an ability to have the center ends slide within each other with a threaded hole aligned in both to lock them together as well. Whew!

I like to try to use what I have in the shop rather than buy more crap. So, I looked around and found two pipes that slid within each other and were thick enough to drill out the centers to fit. I cut them and drilled and tapped them and then kept trimming until the length over all was correct to connect without binding either end. Next up was finding a way to keep the bucket posts aligned with the rotational axis. I decided on using hard nylon bushings for this. They are easy to drill out for ID and easy to trim for thickness. One sits around the center post between the bucket inside face and the side of the 'donut' to establish the distance between them so that once assembled the bucket face contours would align seamlessly with the grill ends and be spaced correctly. Another was hammered into the center of the donuts and drilled to allow the post to go through smoothly but not wiggle. Solved. The Charger set up is a pain to align properly to get that 'One Piece" look though.

Ghostridersixseven:
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