We all like to be able to run a quick quarter mile, along with being able to carve the corners at the same time, I’ll be the first to say that middle ground is hard to achieve, usually quarter male cars are built to go in a straight line very quickly, but the deign of there suspension doesn’t make for good handling.

For a car to carve the corners it’s best for it to remain low to the ground, and as wide as possible, not to mention the more rubber you put to the pavement, the better your handling is going to be, usually on a quarter mile car you want to transfer as much weight to the rear of the car as possible.

By the same token if you want to carve the corners you need a good even weight distribution to keep the car form sliding off of the road while you accelerate through the corners, you don’t want the rear of the car to bear down and pull your front tires off of the ground.

You can see here that there really is no way to get a comfortable medium, a place in between where it does both things very well, this is just one man’s opinion, but I’d say the best way to go is to set it up for the corners, and if you want to go drag racing just do it on the handling suspension.

The next thing that I’m going to discuss is braking, this is a very important parts of your performance car, brakes will either stop you from dying, or they will allow you to die, this is why I can’t tell you enough not to try to save money on your brake system.

You should set your car up with a good three, or four piston caliper on all four wheels, this is likely to save your life at some point in time, go with a name brand like Brembo, or Wilwood, you can’t go wrong with either of these brands, I know they are not cheap, but they will keep you alive.

Make sure that the brake system matches your choice of calipers, because if they don’t there is no point to put the high quality brakes on your car, most of the bake companies carry kits so you can be sure that all of the components in the system match perfectly.

Now you’ll need a rear end to match the rest of what you have done, at this time you really need to think about it, will this car spend a lot of time on the street, or is it mostly a race car, and if it is mostly a race car, what kind of racing do you like the most.

Most people want to drive their car on the city streets, let’s face it, where else are you going to go show your street prowess off, if street is the main use for the car I’d say absolutely no full POSI rear ends, they really aren’t the best idea for street use.

If you plan to be able to hit the high way every once in a while, you should not put a gear lower then 4.10, even at that you’ll end up running you engine pretty hard at 60 MPH, I’d say a good all around gear is about a 3.73 ratio, it works great on the high way, or the city streets.

I’ll continue this in my next article, we’ll get down to the engine, and transmission, it will more then likely be about the same length as this article, I hope it helps some of you with you questions about the performance of your cars.

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Over the years I have loved the Chevrolet camaro, it’s not quite like any other car ever built, my first muscle cars was a 1969 Z/28 camaro and I loved that car, I hope to help some one else find their perfect muscle car by writing this article.

In this article I will discuss some of the things that you should look at when you go to buy a classic camaro, we’ll start off by checking the numbers on the car, and look at body, mechanical, electrical, and every other system that I can think of that will help you in the right car.

Let’s dive in to this head first if your looking to restore the car, you should never fail to decode that numbers on the car, you’ll have vin codes, RPO codes, casting numbers, and all of these numbers need to match up just right, unless you don’t care about authenticity.

The Numbers To Decode:

1.The Vin Tag
2.The RPO Code
3.The Casting Numbers
4.Engine Date Codes

Next we’ll move on to the body work on the car, you obviously want to get a car that is in the best shape possible for the amount of money that you have to spend, this is where you’ll begin to need the patience, this could take a while, you may have to look at a lot of cars.

Body Work:

Well do a general inspection of the outside of the car first, during this inspection you’ll bee looking for the tell tail signs of rust, and bad body repair work, these things should not be that difficult to see, you’ll be looking for bubbles in the paint, wavy body work, or cracking plastic filler.

Panel Alignment:

1.Gaps should not be wider then 1/16 – 1/8 inch.
2.Misaligned panels indicate that the car has been wrecked.
3.Check the hood to fender alignment.
4.Check the hood to header panel alignment.
5.Check the hood to cowl panel alignment.
6.Check the fender to door gap & alignment.
7.Check the door to quarter panel gap & alignment.
8.Check the deck lid rear & side gaps for alignment.

Body Surface:

1.Check the body of the car for wavy body work.
2.Check for cracking plastic filler.
3.Check for bubble in the paint work.
4.Check for obvious dents.
5.Check for dull or faded paint.
6.Check for rust in the wheel wells.
7.Check for rust around the wheel wells.
8.Check for rust in the rocker panel.
9.Check the firewall for rust, if you can see it.
10.Check the trunk floor for rust.

Check The Bumper Height:

1.Make sure that the bumpers are not touching the body of the car, or sagging.

Under Hood & Engine:

First you’ll want to check the general condition of the engine, and engine compartment, check the condition of the paint, and also check the chrome surfaces for peeling, dulling, or bluing.

1.Check for originality, if your a collector looking to add a new car to your collection, this might be the most important part of the process, basically you’ll be looking for things that look out of place, or things that look like they don’t belong.
2.Check the maintenance of the car, look at all of the hoses, electrical connections, belts, gaskets, fluid levels, engine oil, brake fluid, water in the battery.
3.Check the condition of the engine, if saving money is a concern to you, you should pay close attention to this step in the process, have the owner of the car start the engine, check the tail pipe for smoke when the car fist starts, after it warms up, and when it’s revved up, listen for knocks, clunks, clicks, and rattles.
4.Check for leaks on the car, be sure to check the valve cover gaskets, check the front, and rear of the intake manifold for oil leaks, check the brake master cylinder for leaks, check all hoses for leaks, check the rear main seal this is a lot of work to fix if it leaks, check the oil pan for leaks, this is also a huge ordeal to fix, if you pay attention you can save yourself a lot of agony.

Interior Check:

1.Check the interior for obvious rips and tears in the fabric on the seats, and the doors, look for chrome peeling, light bulbs that no longer work, gauges that are so foggy that you can’t even see them.
2.Check the center console for cracks, and mounting ears that have been broken.
3.Check all plastic items for cracking, and general sun rot, and exposure.
4.Also you should always check the rubber seals around the doors of the car, these should always be checked, I’d just replace them if it were my car.
5.Check the steering wheel for wear, such as cracks, missing areas of plastic, or it the car has tilt, or telescoping steering you need to make sure that all of those things are working right.

The Road Test:

1.Unless the car doesn’t run, you should always road test it, no matter how much the owner wants to get out of it, during this test you should check the wipers, turn signals, gauges, lights, and don’t forget to listen for bumps, knocks rattles, clanks, clunks,and the like.
2.Check the gauges for accuracy, lighting, and general appearance.
3.Mechanical check, during this check you’ll be testing all of the mechanical areas of the car, you should check all of these things first in place, and then as the car is moving.
4.Check the park brake to see if it holds on an incline.
5.Doe’s the manual transmission pop out of gear, this means a transmission rebuild, or at least replacing the synchros, does it shift smoothly, or is it hard to move between the gears, this indicate either a linkage problem, or low transmission oil, also if it’s hard to pull in to gear, you probably need synchros replaced.
6.Test the clutch to make sure that you can get it to hold the car on an incline, if not this tells you that you need a new pressure plate, at which point you should just change the clutch, pressure plate, and through out bearing, this is a big job.
7.Also check the automatic transmission if it has one of those for slippage, give the fluid the old smell test, if it smells burned, you can count on a rebuild.

Braking:

This is truly one of the most important parts to your safety, you should never overlook a brake check, or think that the signs don’t mean anything, if the brake do a thing other then stopping the car, you should be worried.

1.Make sure that the car doesn’t pull to one side, or another this indicates that you have worn brake pads on you disc brakes, or a bad caliper on the side that the car pulls to, you never want to discount anything.
2.Listen to the brakes for noises, such as squealing, rattling, grinding these are all very bad sounds to have coming fro your brakes, personally I just rebuild the entire braking system on any old car, it’s just the safest thing to do, this is not an area to save money in.

At Normal Driving Speeds:

1.Listen for noises that don’t belong such as, a clunk as you go over a bump, a knock when you turn the steering wheel as you go over an incline.
2.Listen for wind blowing through the car, this always means that you need new rubber seals, this is something that I just plan to replace when I start the work.
3.Does the car shake, or shimmy while driving high way speeds, this indicates an wheel balancing issue, a bent rim, or the drive line needs to be balanced.
4.After a turn does the steering wheel return to center, if not this indicates an alignment issue, you could have a steering box on the way out, a steering wheel to shimmy can indicate suspension problems as simple as bad shocks, to much worse issues, this is not a good thing.

That’s about all for this article, I hope it helps you find just the right camaro for you to restore, you’ve got to remember I write these articles to help you find your perfect car, and to get it restored, please stop in and comment on our articles if they help you.

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1.Rivet center grille to upper grille, and lower grille.
2.Rivet valence panel to lower grille.
3.Nest grille assembly in fixture, and attach the grille to the header panel with screws.
4.Attach parking lamps to grille, or valence depending on the year of the car.
5.Attach hood lock support to the grille, and then to the header panel, and also the valence panel.
6.Attach catch assembly to the hood lock catch support, and to the grille, and header panel.

Radiator Support:

1.Attach radiator, shroud, and all electrical components.
2.Fenders will also bolt to the top of the radiator support, fender skirts, bumper brackets, and fender extensions.
3.Head lamp housing sub-assemblies, and then head lamps, and retainer rings.
4.Hood and all related components.

Final Sheet Metal Assembly:

1.Loosely attach the radiator support to the frame.
2.Loosely attach the fenders to the radiator support and the cowl.
3.Introduce grille cube and pin catch assembly to support and drive bolts.
4.Drop in squaring fixture to establish body and frame sheet metal locations.
5.Drive the valence panel in to the fender, and fender extension blots.
6.Drive header panel between fenders, and tighten the bolts.
7.Adjust the front end to door gaps, and hood to fender, and header panel gaps.
8.Remove the squaring fixture.
9.Drive the remaining front end attachment.
10.Install radiator support to fame mounts, and tighten them down.
11.Install head lamp assemblies, and drive the bolts in to the fenders, the drive the bolts through the radiator support.
12.Drop the hood, and make sure that all the gaps are correctly set, and then tighten the hinges.
13.Adjust the hood striker, and the hood bumpers to obtain a correct form and fit.
14.Adjust the cowl vent and grille to provide uniform gaps at the rear of the hood, and then tighten it all down.
15.Aim the head lamps, and attach the bezels.

After you have completed this procedure your first generation camaro front end should be together, and looking pretty good, of course this is not the only way ever created to assemble the front sheet metal on the first generation camaro, but I know the this works the right way.

I hope that this will help you with the restoration of your first generation camaro, I have built quite a few of these cars over the years, and I plan to build a few more of them, I will keep bringing you the information that you need to get the job done right.

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There are a few options when it comes to doing this, you can either have a, electrician come in and build you a custom harness, or you can go to a company that builds replacement harnesses for your car, like painless wiring harnesses.

No matter how you choose to look at it, the wiring in your classic car is one of the most important systems in the car, no it’s not a cool custom part that you can show of, but it will sure save all of those custom parts, and your restoration from going up in flames.

I always suggest to replace your wiring harness when you restore a car, I look at safety as the most important thing in a restoration, I want you to love your car when the restoration is complete, but I always put your safety a head of everything else.

Sometimes you may be able to repair the wiring in a car also, but this is usually not going to happen, as people over the years of the cars life will hack in to the wiring to install one thing or another, and every time they do this it degrades your harness a little more.

You really are playing Russian roulette with your classic car if you don’t pay close attention to the wiring in it, I know that it can get expensive to play with the wiring, but it will save your car, and possibly your life.

If you decide not to replace the wiring, it can take hours, if not days to track down problems in the electrical system, and that will with out a doubt cost a lot more then just replacing the entire wiring harness, although there are some cars that you can’t get a wiring harness for.

If you have one of these cars, you may have no choice but to repair the harness that came in the car, or have an electrician build you a custom one, even if this is the case, don’t let it stop you from being safe on the restoration of your classic car.

You make sure that everything else is done exactly the way that you want it, your wiring should be no acception to the rule, you need to make sure that it’s done the right way rather your doing the restoration work yourself, or your having a shop do it for you.

This is an area where a lot of people try to save money, do yourself a favor and don’t do it, you can didn’t come form the factory with cheesy wiring harness, and it should not have one after you finish restoring it, everything should be perfect when that job is done.

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Back in those days there was no after market, these people had to build most of their own performance parts, and mods for their cars, and a few of them enjoyed it so much that they turned the idea in to a business, one of them was Vic Edelbrock, as in Edelbrock performance parts company.

Vic senior was one of those guys, and you see what his home garage turned in to, this is proof that the hot rod, and restoration businesses are not a fad, and proof that they are timeless, as long as they are good at predicting what’s happening in the industry.

Auto restoration provides a way for car lovers to restore a little of this countries automotive history, and at the same time build a car that they love, a car that they can take to the shows and brag about, restoration offers these people a way to get their families involved in their car hobby

Their are a lot of people who enjoy old cars, for one reason or another, I love them because they are different, they don’t look like the boring bland new cars, you know the ones I’m talking about, the little import tuna cans that the kids of today like to build.

The old cars have long sleek bodies, with high body crowns and long rolling side panels, they have a class and style about them that no new car could ever have, a timeless quality that can never be repeated again, the new cars will never be the same.

So when people ask questions like do I think that Auto restoration is a fad, and will it eventually go away, as long as people like exist on this planet it can never go away, as you see from the articles that I write, I do everything that I can to see that it never fades away.

That is one of the main reasons that I write these articles, if I continue to do so people will read them, and it will spark an interest in old cars, and their is one thing that I have always said, once the old car bug bites your their is no cure.

Over the years I have thought that I found the cure, and moved on to get certified in computers, but quickly discovered that it is not as much fun as cars are, I even put the same philosophy in to building computers as I do cars, big fast processors, a lot of ram, and the meanest video card I can get.

This is the equivalent of building a hot rod in the cars world, a custom go fast car that is just the absolute coolest car on the street, classic cars just seem to get my blood pumping, and I am not the only person on the earth that feels this way.

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You want to make sure that you subscribe to Hemmings Motor News, this is a publication that will make your life a lot easier in the end, Hemmings just seems to have unlimited resources to help you achieve your goals with your car.

If you already have the car in your garage you can begin the first step of the restoration process, which is what I like to call a walk around, no matter how unneeded this may sound to you, it is one of those things that will save you a lot of agony in the end.

The Process:

1.The walk around, or the inspection of the car, this is where you do a visual inspection while taking notes in a notebook, during this stage your looking for parts that need to be replaced, or repaired, your looking for mechanical issues such as leaks, bumps, rattles, knocks, well you get the idea here.
2.Make a list in your notebook of all of the things that you found on the car, I usually split a page in to three columns, naming one column good parts, one column repair parts, and last but not least a replace parts column, and add the parts accordingly.

3.Make a inventory list of all of the parts on the car, so you know what’s there, and what you need to buy.
4.Dis-assembly, this is the process of tearing down the car to begin the restoration work, make sure that you have a lot of boxes to store the parts in, and also be sure to have box of plastic baggies for the small parts, and a sharpie to label those baggies.
5.During the dis-assembly process make sure you take a lot of pictures, this will help you remember where the parts came form, I’d suggest that you take two pictures of everything, and keep one for you picture book, and the other should go in the plastic baggy with the parts.
6.I usually work from the front to the rear when I tear a car down, but this is completely up to you, do it how you fell comfortable.

The list above takes us through the dis-assembly process, the next step in the process would be to send the car out for media blasting, this is a process that you can’t control, since it’s not you doing it, so be sure to ask a lot questions so you get a professional outcome.

Once the car, and parts are back form media blast, you can begin to look for body damage to the car as a result of being in an accident, or rust from the salt that the state puts on the road during winter to melt the snow and ice, I suggest that you use a sharpie to circle all of the bad spots that you find.

After Media Blast:

1.Give a car a good though inspection, looking for body and frame damage collisions, or from the state salting the roads, and causing you car body to rust.
2.Use a sharpie to circle the problem areas on the body, and frame of the car, if you don’t do this, you will end up missing something.
3.Next you should decide what is the first most important thing to repair on the car, and plan how your going to repair it.
4.If the car has rust in the body, or frame this is where you should start, rust weakens the structure of the car, and is of utmost importance to your restoration work.
5.After the rust is repaired, you can move on to the dents and collision damage that the car might have, and I don’t mean to fill them with mud.
6.You should use a stud welder to pull the dents as straight as possible, you should never use more that 1/16 – 1/8 inch of filler to repair a dent.
7.Of course make sure tat you have the tools to preform the restoration work before you start.
8.I usually put a coat of etching primer on the car after the initial body work is done, etching primer will etch in to the metal on the car, and create a very good bond, etching primer is not a filling primer.
9.At this stage you should be ready to spray an epoxy primer, or a urethane type primer, this is up to you, they both have advantages, and dis-advantages, you should never use less then 3 coats, it’s up to you if you want to use more.
10. Do not ever think about using lacquer primer to save the extra cash, it will never turn out the way that you want it to, it like to shrink and wrinkle.

The list above gets us to the primer stage, at this stage all of the body work is done, keep in mind that this is a very condensed version of the steps in the restoration process, the UN-condensed version is much longer, this is just the basic idea, it’s enough to get you in to the work.

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You should also take a tour of the shop, look at how clean it is, look at the tools that the techs are using, make sure that the equipment in the shop is up to date, and ask the owner if his shop has any cars in the shows at this time, if it’s in a show at all, it’s a great indicator of high quality work.

By all means you should not go in to a shop with $5,000 to spend and think that you can restore your car for that price, be prepared to get what you pay for, and remember quantity is not equal to quality, this kind of work takes a lot of time.

Spend time at the shop that your car is getting the restoration work done at, this tells the shop that your interested in the process of a restoration, and most shop owners won’t mind if you hang out a bit if you have an interest in the process, other then to just put a foot up their ass.

A little bit of nice will go a long way with most shops, the outcome of the restoration work is really up to you, if you constantly on the shop, pushing them to go faster, you’ll make yourself have a bad experience with that particular shop.

The biggest that seems to affect people before they come to a shop to get their car restored, is when the owner tells them that he can’t estimate a restoration job on a car, they are not lying when they say this, they are being 100% truthful.

This is not collision work, where you have a book, and a computer telling you a definite price for everything, that does not exist in a restoration shop, because it can’t, there is quite literally no way for the shop to estimate a job without starting on it first.

So what I’m saying here is that you should be prepared before you take your car to get it resorted, you should always ask a lot of questions, you not stupid for asking questions, you stupid if you don’t ask them, so write them down before your go to the shop.

Ask the shop questions about the restoration process they they will use to restore your car, and them if they have restored a car like yours in the past, ask them about the paint process, and the body repair process, and any other questions you can think of.

Doing these simple things will help you to get what you want in a restoration on your car, when it’s done you’ll love it, because you took the time to get involved with the process, you took the time to show the shop how much you love your car, and that it all it takes in most shops.

Technorati Tags: car restoration, classic car restoration, muscle car restoration, custom car builder, hot rods, street rods, muscle cars

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If your working with a budget that may help you to make your decision, there are a few things to consider if your going to run on a budget, first of all the most expensive cars to restore are Mopars, the parts are hard to find a lot of the time, and people know what they want for them.

I restored 1970 Dodge charger R/T for a client some time ago, we needed upper and lower control arms for the front suspension, it turns out that at the time nobody was selling them in the after market, so we went looking for some used ones, and we found them at a price of $800.00 a piece, that is $3,200.

They just didn’t build a lot of the Mopar muscle cars, and they got in to the market late, so they are very rare and hard to find, and this means more money to restore, but that about enough of that, I’m going to talk about some other key points to think about as you look for your muscle car.

I’m going to look at some issues that may be good for a first time car restoration experience, these are things that may answer some questions about which cars are harder to restore for a first car restoration, these things will be to do with the body restoration.

First of all if you want to start out with the cat that is the easiest to restore I would say that you should be looking at a first or second generation camaro, let me explain why I say this, first of all when you restore a car, that first thing you do after you get it, is to build a list of the parts that you need.

The first thing with the camaro is you can get almost every part you need from the after market, most of them are readily available to you, and because of this you can get parts for great prices, so it may fit your budget a bit better.

Just in case a camaro isn’t your idea of the perfect car to restore, I’m going to cover some body problems that Ford, Chevrolet, and Mopar all had, and this should help you to decide on you idea of the perfect car to restore.

Up first is the camaro, this will apply to first, or second generation camaros, you should always inspect the body of any classic car before you buy it, especially if it’s your first restoration job, what I will do here is explain the problem areas on each car.

First of all I’d look for bad body work, because this is one reason why a car will rust, make sure that you have a note book with your, so you can document what you find on each car, and use your note to compare that cars to find the best one for you to start with.

Camaro Problem Areas: This is a general Chevrolet problem area, as with most classic Chevrolet’s the camaro like to rust in the rocker panels, and these are a major structural part o the body, if you see any rust you should replace them.
The rocker panels can be found just below the doors on any car, take your time as you inspect them, make sure that you don’t miss anything, next we’ll move to the front end of the car, and take a look at the sub frame, and engine compartment area of the car.

Sub Frame & Engine Compartment: The sub frame of most camaros really isn’t that prone to rust, but I would still inspect it to make sure, the area that I would concentrate is the radiator support, and the firewall, you should also look at the wheel wells, although I have never found them to be a problem area.

Floor Boards: This can be a problem for any classic car, but it seems to affect the camaro less then the mustang, and most Mopars, although I would still put the car up on a hoist and look at the floor boards, these are areas that can make your first time restoration a pain in the butt.

Rear Wheel Wells: This is another one of those areas that you should look at on all classic cars, the rear wheels drive the car, and therefore tend to throw more rocks in to the wheel wells, this chips off the undercoating and causes them to rust, so you should always look at these.

If you look in wheel well and can’t see any problems, be sure to open the trunk and look at them from there also, the rust can’t hide from you in there, will will see it if it’s there, take you flash light and make sure that you look at this really thoroughly, these can be another problem for a first time restoration project.

That covers the major stuff on the camaro, for both the first generation, and the second generation of them, now for the reason other then parts availability that I say that the camaro is easier for the first time restoration project.

Plain an simple the camaro has a removable sub frame, technically the other do to, but you have to drill out the spot welds that hold them in the car to remove them, the camaro sub frame is held in by four bolts, and is really quite easy to remove.

Up next the Ford mustang, this is probably one of the most popular muscle cars ever built, and it has some areas that need to be looked at before you buy one , it’s no better or worse then any other choice, you just need to think of your skill level, but this applies to all of them.

Mustang Problem Areas:

Sub Frame & Engine Compartment: Mustangs are notorious for rusting in the radiator support, and if you can’t just patch the rust and leave the original part in the car, you’ll be spending time drilling spot welds to remove the radiator support, this in my opinion makes it harder then a camaro to restore.

You also want to pay close attention to the side skirts in the engine compartment, this is where the fenders bolt to the car, the mustang loved to rust there, and there again these are not removable without drilling spot welds out, this is why I say to take you skill level in to consideration.

Floor Boards: Moving on back, the floor boards are a problem area in most classic cars, you should always look at them, I do find the mustang to have a worse problem then the camaro when it comes to floor board rust.

Rocker Panels: Over the years I have noticed that these aren’t really a huge problem on the mustang, but you should still look at them, and just like the camaro, if you find any rust at all, you should replace them without question.

Rear Wheel Wells: As with most cars these are a problem, you should always look at them, if you can’t see them very well just looking in from the out side, open the trunk and look there, the rust can’t hide from your eyeballs there.

Trunk Floors: This is another area that seems to be pretty solid on the mustang, I don’t see them rust here a lot, but it does happen and you should inspect it, this takes care of the problem areas on the mustang, and it should help you decide what car to buy.

Dodge Charger Problem Areas: As for as rust in the body the mopars seem to have a worse problem then any other make of classic car, this isn’t by any means bashing on mopar, I love them, these are just observations from the cars that I have restored.

Mopar Problem Areas:

Sub Frame & Engine Compartment: In the charger the battery sits on the passenger side of the engine compartment, and these cars always rust where the battery tray is, they also rust on top of the fender skirts where the fenders bolt to the car, and moderate in the front wheel wells.

The radiator support seems to be pretty solid, most of them have a small patch-able rust hole or two in the radiator support, and after you fix them you usually don’t find any more problems in this area, mopar seems to have done a good job of protecting the radiator support.

Floor Boards: These are a huge problem on the B body cars, on the charger that we restored, it came in with no floor boards left in it, this seems to be a pretty normal thing, so you must look at the floor boards on any mopar muscle car.

Rocker Panels: I didn’t find these to be a big problem at all on most mopars the rocker panels seem to be quite solid, but as I keep saying, it doesn’t mean that shouldn’t look at them, and like the other two cars above, if you find any rust, replace them.

Rear Wheel Wells: These are an area that should never be left out in your inspection of a mopar muscle car, I have found these to be a big problem over the years of restoring cars, and I think that you will to, so please look at them closely.

Trunk Floors: These are in my opinion the worst part of a mopar muscle car, and should always be replaced, you should inspect them to see if they have been replaced already, and if no you should plan on doing it when you restore the car.

Tail Lights: These cars also seem to have a problem with rust in the tail light area, usually in the curved area below the tail lights, but you should inspect very carefully around the tail light area, and plan on some repair work there also.

Well that’s about it, I truly hope that helps you make an educated decision when you go shopping for your first muscle car restoration project, I really enjoy writing these articles, and I hope that they help you in some small way to make your classic car dreams come true.

Technorati Tags: muscle car restroation, classic car restroation, buying your fist muscle car, restoration projects

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Does it have excessive body damage, electrical damage, interior damage, or mechanical damage, all of these things weigh in to the cost of getting your car restored, most reputable shops will have a shop labor rate that is high, if you locate a $25.00 per hour shop beware of what might happen to your car.

You might think that this sounds unfair, but your paying for their knowledge, not for their time, most reputable shops have owners that have spent a lot of time learning how to restore cars, and they should get paid for their knowledge of your car.

This is not collision repair, it’s nothing like it, we have no book to go off of to estimate the cost to restore your car, we have our knowledge of of your car, and the restoration of it, people often ask me if they can restore a car for less then it would cost to buy a fully restored one, the answer is no.

It will always cast more to restore a car then the blue book value of the car, so restoring them to resell, and make money off of is not the answer, you need to restore the car because it holds nostalgia for your, it brings back memories of the good old days.

There are just way to many factors to look at, factors that require us to begin work on the car to know what’s going on with it, a car can have a lot of hidden surprises, things that you’ll never see from just an outer inspection of the car, we need to get deeper then that to know about that car.

I know that to you this sounds like an excuse to get started on your car, but there really is no way for a restoration shop to know what’s in store in the restoration of any car, it is 100% impossible to estimate the cost of restoring your car.

An average restoration can, and will take a lot of time to complete, even if the car is in excellent condition, it will take at least 1,000 hours to complete the restoration of your car, so let’s take my shop for example, the shop labor rate is $75.00 PHR, this means at least $75,000 in just labor.

It does not include parts, or supplies, it does not include any custom work that you want done, nor does it include any high performance work that you want done, this just gives you an idea of why a shop would say that they don’t estimate restoration work on any car.

If you want the car restored faster, all the shop can do is to put another tech on your job, and most shops won’t do that for free, they’ll charge shop labor rate for each employee that works on your car, so you should also keep this in mind when you want to push the speed.

This is not the first article that I have written on this, and I’m sure it won’t be the last, I seem to keep getting the same questions, a professional restoration shop is not in business to rip you off, they are only charging what it costs them to do the work.

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