Login to Add FriendVehicle Info
I've owned this '55 chevy since July of 1982. It was a one owner car. The wild thing was the person I bought it from knew my grandparents and they rode in the car. It originally had a 236 c.i. 123 hp inline six with 3spd OD. The car was in very good condition when I bought it and I showed it for a couple of years before beginning restoration. The restoration started with a simple paint job, but when I started removing all of the trim I
saw more work was needed and didn't want to skimp on the restoration so I completely disassembled the entire car and took the body of the frame. This was June, 1984. The car came with a seamless frame so I spent a considerable amount of time smoothing out the welds. Of course, I rebuilt the front suspension with all new parts and installed new leaf springs on the rear. The rear axle assembly was rebuilt as well. Wanting just a bit more power, I located and rebuilt a 1965 283 power pack small block. It has the correct rabbit ear heads and was complete except for air cleaner. My original goal was to replicate to dual quad 270 hp 283 that was offered in the 57's
but when I tried to run the dual quads on the motor in the chassis, they kept trying to load up. I decided to replace the dual quads with and dual plane aluminum intake and bought a new
Edelbrock performer carb. I found the louvered air cleaner at a swap meet. It reminds me of the early 'vette engines which I love. My wife bought me the 'vette valve covers new from a local Chevy dealer. Unfortunately, they were pretty rough when I opened the boxes. I spent about a week filing, sand and buffing them to get them right. The car is pretty much stock except for the engine, conversion to alternator, roller front wheel bearings, wheels and tires, and AM/FM cassette and CD changer. The body was in pretty good shape for a midwest car and had the usual rust in the lower front quarters, tailpan area, and headlight caps. The exterior sheet metal was stripped to bare metal using aircraft stripper. the remaining areas were sandblasted. A new hood from CARS was installed because the original one was oil canned in the center and wouldn't stay flat. All bodywork finishing was done using aluminum based body filler after many hours of straightening to limit filler use. After all body work was completed, a filler surfacer primer was used and was followed after many hours of block sanding. The car was shot with the acrylic lacquer I bought in '84 when I started this project.
The colors are the original india ivory over regal turquoise.
The paint was color sanded and hand buffed. All stainless trim was restored by removing all dents with hammer and dolly, sandpaper and finally buffed using a buffing motor and buffs I picked up locally. All trim was installed using all new hardware. New bumpers, grille, emblems, and zinc plated trim were installed.
The interior sports the original seats which have the same covers when I bought the car. My wife sewed the pleats for the doors and inside qtr. panels. The materials for the door panels
was bought at a local fabric store. The turquoise fabric on the door panels is a bit darker than the original, but still looks pretty good. The wheels on the car were bought in '84 also and were kept in their original boxes until this year. all new glass was installed except for the rear window. All work on this car was done by me except for the engine machine work and the headliner install and sunvisors. The car was just completed 3-9-07 after being apart since 1984. My wife, daughters and friends helped with putting the body on the frame, front sheetmetal assembly etc. My wife and sister also contributed to this project by buying me tools and parts over many xmas holidays and birthdays. Future plans include recovering the seats because they don't match the new door panels as well as I hoped.
Obviously, I'm looking forward to attend as many car shows and cruise-ins as possible. Thanks for looking.
Bookmark this Ride