1981 Chrysler Imperial

Coupe

318 (5.2L) V8

Automatic

2A3BY62J9BR133177

Clear

Gasoline

*Please note, I am not one of those sellers who put up descriptions which lack detail and leave you disappointed. Read the feedback that others have left for me... Many of them are sales of complete cars. I try to have a little fun writing the ads, but I also make sure you have the facts you need to make a bid. I have reason to believe this car is originally from Texas (although I haven't researched it). The car has zero rust, and still displays a Houston Yacht Club parking sticker... That's right buddy, a yacht-club. That should be a clue it was treated better than a car displaying a Bumtown Landfill Employee Parking sticker. When I bought the car (on eBay) in 2007, it was without a speck of rust or serious body damage. I drove it to cruise nights for a few years in its original paint. During that time I installed new valve stem seals and fixed a few minor mechanical issues. I reluctantly decided to repaint it for the first time in 2010 because of fading, door-dings, etc. I've owned dozens of collector cars, and don't waste my time restoring junk. All trim was removed and polished. The new paint was matched to the original "pearl white", but is now a modern single-stage urethane. Enough paint to re-spray the entire car will be included. You should never need it, but it will look better on a shelf in your basement than mine. I also re-did all of the interior soft trim (Headliner, A/B/C post trim) with new material. The fabric match to the sunvisors was so dead-on, their was no reason to recover them. Most people enter the car and the first thing they want to do is touch the soft, white trim. You'll need to develop fast reflexes so as to smack down their grubby paws. The white leather interior is near-perfect, about what you'd expect of a year old car, not a 32-year old car. The car still has the original thick carpet floor mats. It's so beautiful inside you almost want to drive it naked, but I promise you I have never done that. The chrome-plated aluminum bumpers each have minor spots where the chrome started to bubble. (electro-chemical reaction to any unprotected edge) While the car was being painted both bumpers were disassembled, cleaned and treated with a modern anti-corrosion paint on the backside. The damage is so minor it's nearly impossible to capture on film. In fact, I had an extra set of bumpers from Arizona with no damage and didn't bother to change them during the restoration. Two years after this minor cosmetic restoration, this car was displayed at the Walter P. Chrysler museum on the Chrysler Tech Center campus (January-March of 2012). If you didn't know, this building is sometimes used to hold high-level executive meetings. A museum volunteer told me that Sergio Marchionne offered to trade his customized Dodge Challenger SRT-8 plus a bucket of cash for my car. Knowing that I already had a Challenger plus a bucket of change, the volunteer told Sergio to "fuggetaboutit". Ok that's not true, but they do use the place for executive meetings, and I imagine Sergio probably saw the car. Good enough? The sale will include many of the rare and interesting items displayed with the car including factory letters about the Imperial in its planning/development stages (they are even stamped CONFIDENTIAL). I am also including the original steering wheel (the horn buttons are notorious for not working after all these years). For honking at people in modern traffic, I've installed a 1985-vintage leather wrapped wheel. I have a great deal of historical knowledge about these cars, and will mention that the original intent was to offer a Citroen-style one-spoke wheel. The budget wasn't there in 1981, so a more conventional style wheel was used. The style which I've installed is about as close as Chrysler came to the one-spoke wheel; plus the horn works. I wish I had a huge warehouse to keep all my beloved Mopars, but alas, I do not. (Someday I'd like to win the lottery and become known as the "eccentric fool who keeps all those Mopars in a huge warehouse".) so I must sell what is probably one of the best remaining examples of its kind, in a highly desirable color combination. Hell, someday I might want to buy it back... Maybe I'll get that warehouse. I wouldn't hesitate to drive this car anywhere, and I often do! Hey, thanks eBay: eBay no longer permits URLs in item descriptions, payment instructions, return instructions, etc, regardless of where they link to. So you know what that means... If you want to see the 60 photos I have hosted online, or watch a test-drive video of the car, contact me and I'll tell you how to get there. You may also contact me through email or by phone @ 586-Eight Zero One-4732 if you'd like me to answer more questions or photograph something specific. Good luck and happy bidding.