David Powles' Dreamy Dodge

The story of this Dodge sedan dates back 34 years to when David Powles was working at a joinery shop. The vintage car enthusiast bloke who owned the place knew of a guy that had a number of cars in storage and put David in contact with him to see if he could procure a project car for himself. He did buy a car but it wasn’t an ideal starting point for a first build and later purchased this ’36 Dodge sedan.

- AL O'TOOLE

“We had bought a ’36 Dodge coupe that had the back cut out, then when we found out that the sedan was up for sale we decided we might restore it. We rebuilt the diff and did a few other bits and pieces on it, and then the kids came along, so it was put on hold for a little bit. We sold it to my mum and dad and he was going to do it up but never really got the chance. My youngest son asked if we could have it back and do it up, but didn’t tell him we were going to build a street rod out of it!”

Ten years ago David brought the car home and started pulling it to pieces but didn’t really get serious about the build until around 2014. David took his original chassis to Ian Eliason at Lilow Auto Tech where the rails were boxed and a Rod-Tech independent front end assembly was fitted along with four-bar and coil-over rear suspension for a nine-inch diff. Ian was a great help with his skills and information, pointing the Powles in the right direction for other aspects of the build.