Dalton Summitt’s 1970 GTO - The Holey-est of GTOs
When Steve Magnante of Junkyard Gold, posts about an auction in Big Spring, Texas, known as the “Great Mopar Hoard”, most people might scroll through the hundreds of cars drooling over the Chargers, the Super Bees, or every other great Mopar in the collection. But when you’re a GM guy, named Dalton Summitt, a 1970 Pontiac GTO is what you look at. Not just any GTO, the holiest of all GTOs. No, not a GTO blessed by the Pope, but literally the HOLEY-est GTO you’ve ever seen! The GTO belonged to a Mopar family for most of its life and it was used for sighting in the family’s guns, for target practice, and was sometimes shot at just to release some anger and frustration. By the time of the auction, the car was more recognizable as a block of Swiss Cheese than it was as an automobile!
Dalton's preferences in projects are not what most people would consider “normal”. If it has been rolled, burnt, shot, hacked up, or just straight-up totaled, these are the cars that Dalton wants. Dalton has begun documenting the resurrection process of these cars, as well as all the shenanigans that go along with them, on his YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram pages as Pole Barn Garage. Dalton’s son, JD assists with the resurrection process. “My son JD has a particular knack for all things mechanical and he loves cars. He’s 11, and we’re now building a 1959 Ford Custom on the channel for his first hot rod. He’s my number-one, go-to man for help around the shop and has assisted me with a large portion of the build. JD is every bit my equal when it comes to wrenching, he’s not just a kid.”
Mopars at the auction were going for thousands upon thousands, but when the GTO was sitting at a bid of a paltry, $7, Dalton thought hell, I’ll throw $200 at this thing. Wouldn’t you know it, two weeks later a notification popped up on his phone saying “Congratulations! You’ve won a 1970 GTO!” Many people thought that there was no way a car that far gone could be brought back to any form of life. These opinions didn’t stop Dalton from at least trying, so he and a friend drove 30 hours to pick the car up and bring it back home.
The idea for the car was never to completely restore it, but instead to “restore” its current state enough to make it driveable. This meant that the shot-up panels had to be beaten, smashed, pulled, cut, welded, and pushed out to somewhat resemble what the car once was. Most restorers or builders don’t use come-alongs, winches, sledgehammers, or bottle jacks to restore a car, but when your car looks like it got used in a demolition derby and then sold to the army for target practice, you use what you need to! Early in the build, Dalton said on his YouTube channel, “As you can see, it needs light bodywork, light interior work, light mechanical… it needs everything, but that’s OK because we can do that. We’re going to save this car, and I use save as a very, very relative term. What we need to do with this is get her to run, drive, stop sometimes, and do large burnouts, but mostly just fix it because everybody says I can’t.”
The car, surprisingly, had retained its numbers matching engine, trans, and rear end. Miraculously, the engine was not pounded by bullets and is being rebuilt to go back in the car. The trans and rear end were a different story, but being a GM guy, Dalton wanted to see these parts being used in the car once again. After using some alternative parts to get the car to some shows, the original numbers matching parts are back in the car. The current running gear in the car is a well-used 1969, Pontiac 400, the 400 trans, and a 10 bolt posi that were donated, all for the cost of shipping, by a fan of the channel. Holley has also supplied a few of the other key items for the car, including: a Frostbite radiator, Brawler double pumper carb, Accel plug wires and coil, and Proforged steering components. Roadkillcustoms.com has also helped, supplying the side pipes, and driveshaft (two of them; long story). Dalton says, “Most things that I didn’t have, were purchased generically at the local auto parts store. Other than that, the car is largely assembled from used and spare parts from my other projects over the years. The total investment, including the trans I just had rebuilt as a rush job, is less than $5000.”
What’s even more impressive is that this Hole-y GTO, held together with sheet metal screws, old road signs, and all other manners of car parts, just made a 2000-mile round trip to Big Spring Texas! That’s right, Dalton and JD drove this car back to where it came from, to visit one of the brothers who shot the car up for decades. A video of the adventure is live on the Pole Barn Garage YouTube channel.
Now you know if you see the Holey-est of GTOs coming down the road at you, you don’t have to worry because every inch of the car has been gone over by Dalton. Maybe that gives you confidence or maybe that doesn’t, but what we do know is that the car has proven itself to be a ragtag, but reliable machine, built with an extremely low budget in mind, that still seems to be bulletproof.
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