Modern Rock

SCOTT LAWRENCE CATAPULTED HIS 1972 CH VALIANT INTO THE CURRENT CENTURY WITH A BLOWN GEN 3 HEMI POWERPLANT

- CARLY DALE

SUBURBAN Australia in the 70s and 80s was awash with locally manufactured daily drivers. So it makes sense that as the young ’uns of that era went on to score their paper licences, they would acquire the cars they’d grown up around. Adelaide’s Scott Lawrence was one of them.

“I have loved muscle cars since I was a kid, but I swayed towards Chryslers,” Scott says. “I was 20 years old when I bought my first Chrysler – a V8-powered CL Sports Pack panel van.”

Over time, Scott bought and sold a few more tidy chrome-bumper rides before eventually nabbing himself this 1972 Chrysler By Chrysler in the early 2000s. “I’d wanted one for a while and would check the Trading Post each week,” he says. “When this came up, I thought, ‘Holy shit, it’s a Chrysler By Chrysler!’ I recognised the phone area code and figured it must be the CH I’d seen parked nearby. I bought it that night for $2500.”

For a then-30-year-old car, the CH wasn’t in bad nick, sporting the original interior and vinyl roof and showing only a slight bit of rust beneath the mediocre paint. However, the hefty beast was barely motivated by a tired 360ci backed by a three-speed manual. It blew a head gasket only a few months later.

“I gave it a mild rebuild and added a shortened nine-inch. It was a cruiser, although I gave it a shot of nitrous and took it to the Tailem Bend eighth-mile,” Scott laughs. “It didn’t run great times, but it was good fun.”