Charlotte The 66-67 Belvedere II Build By Cara Mackenzie

Sometimes when a project car is completely totalled, it’s the end of the ride, move on. Not the case with this 1967 Belvedere II owned by Cara Mackenzie. As you will read below, the rebuilt wasn’t just a quick respray or even a barebones restoration. The process also involved swapping out part of the whole chassis.

Much toil, sweat and years/tears later, the Belvedere is now a mashup of the best bits their could acquire. Read on for the full story…

‘The car was originally a 1967 Belvedere II. I owned her for about 7 years. We fixed some body work got her a new carb., an ignition setup, new rims and paint. Drove her almost everyday.

In early December my brother was driving her home when rain turned to a bad ice storm. He came over a hill when another car lost control and crossed 3 lanes before smacking into her. The damage totaled her out.
On the inside the dash was completely smashed from my brothers knees an the steering wheel broke in half and the windshield smashed. One of the torsion bars busted through the floor pan which split the firewall and busted the tranny. We saved the engine and most of the interior which then went into a ’66 Coronet.

After fighting with the insurance company and finally settling after 3 months, I got some cash to build her again. We found a 4 door donor car that had almost all we needed to fix it. So the chopping began.

After we got all the bad out we cut the two cars down the factory weld seems and then started piecing everything back together. Then we put in a big block K member and manual gear box. After that we put back the suspension and moved her out of the pit and over to the garage for the engine install. Amazingly, the doors closed perfectly on the first try!

She now has a 383 that’s been ported, deck with roller rockers, electronic ignition, aluminum intake and lots of other goodies. Still had some issues though. I wanted to keep her with the ’67 grille so we had to change the fenders. We had the left one still but had to find a right one as a replacement. I also went to a Mopar swap meet and got her new carpets and a console. Later we found completely redone bucket seats for her in a nice dark blue.

It’s been a ton of blood sweat and tears to get this far. After 2 years finally came time to turn the key again! She’s started up first time and sounds really, really good! The final bits will be installing the drive shaft and windshield and then she will be ready for a test drive.

Cara Mackenzie https://www.facebook.com/cara.mackenzie.98

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