Is The 1970 Plymouth ‘Cuda The Most Famed Muscle Car That Never Was?
Documented for Big Easy Motors on History, this muscle car is painted 25 colors on the passenger side while the driver’s side appears completely factory.
Paint-chip ‘Cuda striped with 25 colors was documented and filmed for Big Easy Motors on History with a plan to be displayed at SEMA.
A Mopar enthusiast for a few decades, Tim Wellborn was just 12 years old when he remembered joining his dad on an adventure to the local Dodge dealership in Talladega, Alabama. Tim’s dad Doug was looking to trade in their 1967 Charger for the all-new 1970 model, but a salesperson mentioned that the 1971 model year would be completely redesigned. Doug decided to wait for the ’71 Charger model.
During this dealership outing, Tim stumbled across a brochure that his father had picked up for the Rapid Transit System. The brochure read, “Anybody can offer a car. Only Plymouth offers a system.” Plymouth was showing off their high-performance muscle cars along with accessories to add to really up the ante.
A photo of a 1970 Plymouth Barracuda featuring stripes with 25 different colors of paint, a wheelie bar, zoomie headers, drag racing slicks, and a roll bar jumped out at Tim from the brochure. Even the smallest things can have the biggest impacts, and that brochure photo definitely made an impact on Tim, but he wouldn’t be aware of that until years later.
Tim and his wife Pam opened the Wellborn Muscle Car Museum in Alexander City, Alabama, about 40 years after that day at the dealership. With quite the extensive Mopar collection nowadays, Tim has collected brochures and literature for Chrysler, Plymouth, and Dodge over the years. One day, Tim was thumbing through the brochures for the museum’s archives when the original brochure to Plymouth’s Rapid Transit System from decades prior caught his eye yet again, taking him back to that day when he was mesmerized by that ’70 Plymouth ‘Cuda that graced page 11. Again, he turned over to that familiarly mesmerizing striped ‘Cuda. While experiencing some extreme de ja vu, Tim was wondering if this car was actuallly ever built.
With the striped ‘Cuda fresh on his mind, he was on a mission to see if this car was actually built by Plymouth. As it turns out, Plymouth never built such a car and nobody had ever attempted to build it for themselves either. With that answer, Tim decided that this multicolored Plymouth ‘Cuda needed to be built, and that he was going to be the one to do it.
With the plan in motion, Tim and Pam started searching for a southern rust-free 1970 ‘Cuda that would make the perfect candidate to make an exact twin to the one in the Rapid Transit brochure. This also meant period-correct speed parts for the car.
In July 2016, a perfect example was discovered in a warehouse in New Orleans where it had sat for two decades and still retained its original drivetrain. In remarkable condition, this was the car. After recovering the car, they took it to The Bomb Factory restoration ship in New Orleans to begin its lengthy transformation. A new automotive show airing on the History Channel called Big Easy Motors started documenting the hands-on work by Charles Handler and Trey Hansen.
Daniel Boshears was the master mechanic behind the scenes, and he was faced with the task to get the car running solid. It wasn’t long before the Mopar was brought back to life, started and running idle under its own power for the first time in two decades. The mechanic for the Wellborn museum, every vehicle in the collection is tested and tuned by Daniel.
“This is one of the best handing E-Bodies I’ve ever driven,” Daniel told Tim and Pam. “It’s solid without a rattle, rolls down the highway straight as an arrow, and takes a corner with ease. The engine is strong, and the four-speed transmission goes through the gears like it’s new.” After hearing that good news, the pair paused for a moment about the paint-chip vision, but ultimately they decided to keep trucking forward with it.
Handler and Hansen were working to preserve its original sheetmetal and trim, and a process would be used to apply the 25-color paint scheme that would protect the original body of this unique ‘Cuda. Also, Tim wanted to confirm that the car could easily be returned to its stock state if need be. Moving forward with utmost care and skillful craftsmanship, a white plastic wrap was applied to the body which was used as a base-coat layer for the car, much like a body sealer paint. In fact, the wrap was only added to half the old-school Plymouth.
After that, the different colors with 25 shades of paint were all applied one by one using special paint by BASF and RM brand, and only to half of the car. Almost like a Jekyll and Hyde, glancing at the driver’s side profile and you’ll see a beautiful factory ’70 Cuda in Ivy Green (EF8), but take a look at the passenger side, and you’ll see a psychedelic race car that looks as if it’s ready to throw down on the quarter-mile. Black tape stripes were used to cover the seam breaks where the colors meet around the body. In immaculate condition, the Ivy Green factory paint remains untouched beneath the array of colors.
Still going with the original plan as to not change the ‘Cuda where it couldn’t be returned to stock, the extra items needed to be installed with a way that no damage to sheetmetal, trim, or paint would happen if the parts needed to be removed. In a meticulous manner, the wheelie bar, four-tube header exhaust, and half roll-bar on the passenger side were all installed on the classic Plymouth.
The original hood was taken off and stored for safe keeping, and the Shaker hood was installed for this project. Even the front grille was freshened up and slathered with new paint. Tucked inside the bay is a numbers-matching 383-cubic-inch V8 engine capable of 335-horsepower and mated to a 4-speed manual transmission that is shifted via a Pistol-Grip shifter. Power is shifted down to twist a 8 and 3/4-inch rear end housing 3.55 gears.
With the build being featured on Big Easy Motors, it will be documented for anyone interested in watching. Also, we hope that this seemingly never-ending pandemic doesn’t disrupt plans for this year’s SEMA show as Tim has plans to display the car at the Las Vegas Convention Center in a sea of insane builds. We can guarantee that this ’70 ‘Cuda will undoubtedly stick out. After that, it’s MCACN in Chicago where The Bomb Factory’s Charles Handler and Trey Hansen will sign autographs for fans.
Here is a little more about the build itself. The inside of the car is black vinyl complete with bucket seats, and the exterior features two 15-inch Rallye wheels (driver side), and Rocket Fuel wheels (15x4) in front with Rocket Injector rear wheels (15x10) out back on the passenger side. The Rallye wheels come wrapped with G60–15 Goodyear Polyglas GT rubber, and the passenger side Rocket Fuel wheels up front come wrapped with 5.50–15 Pro Trac tires along with Towel City Cheater Slick rubber on the rear passenger side.
Nothing was disturbed for the racing parts to be installed, and the factory axle remains the same. Even the wheelie bar was added with utmost care and can easily be removed if the car should go back to factory specs. On the exterior among the paint-chip stripes is a Hemi decal on the passenger-side rear fender with a “383” on the outside of the driver-side fender. Installing half a roll-bar at the Bomb Factory was certainly credited to some creative engineering. The interior is stock besides a few gauges that were added.
What do you think of this colorful creation of a 1970 ‘Cuda?
