This car was gifted to me by an old farmer who had it sitting out in a field for a year or so cuz he had given up on it. It had 200k and wouldn’t run.
I got it running well again and sold it to an acquaintance. When I sold it to him, I told him to change the timing belt asap cuz it probably had the original one in it.
About two years and 40k miles later, he gave it back to me because the timing belt had broke and it needed a new exhaust. Actually the timing belt hadn’t broken... at first. The idlers bearings had run dry and bent and half tore its mounting bolt out of the block, and that had shredded the belt.
I figured that having been given the car twice was a sign that the abused rust bucket was meant to stay with me. I didn’t need another car though, so I decided to take it off road.
Now to answer your question, yes, I cut the back to give myself better clearance and increase my angle. I have a lot of other ideas and things I intend to do to it, just a matter of time and luck.