This all started late in the summer of '06. I was just driving through town when I spotted the car. I didn't know the exact year, but I knew it was a late 60's Impala. I had only recently become a fan GM muscle cars. I liked the aggressive styling that almost all GM musclars had, but the Impalas seemed special to me. The car was for sale, but I didn't stop right then. The next time I passed, someone was looking under the hood and the the time after that, she was gone. I figured I missed my opportunity, but I kept a look out for over a month and then suddenly there she was again. I stopped immediately and started looking it over. I was a novice and really didn't know what the areas of importance were on a 40 year old car. I noticed te drivers quarter sculpted out of bondo, the missing front floors, and a couple small holes in the hood. These things didn't seem so bad (yeah right) and I wanted it badly. It did have a V8 and it did run. The owner was asking $1200 and that seemed alright. When I spoke with him he didn't budge on the cost (I didn't try very hard) and eventually I agreed to his asking price.
When I got the car home I was very happy with it. My original plan was to redo the blue interior and paint the car white (it was blue/primer.) I started stripping the car down and sanding on some spots that looked suspicious. I discovered bondo in all of the doors, a lower passenger quarter creat from bondo (massive hole), and small holes all over the bottom half of the car. This is when I first saw 'Supernatural'. I was amazed that I had bought random 60's car (of a relatively unpopular year and body style) that was featured on a weekly series. The Winchester brothers car on Supernatural is a beautiful jet black 1967 Impala 4 door hard top big block car. After watching the show for a few weeks I really fell in love with that car and with my car. My original plans for the car were dumped in favor of building my own Metallicar. During that winter my job at the time tought me the basics of sheet metal fabrication and bodywork. What I learned that winter will be the foundation of my restoration work.
During the spring and summer of '07 I my job tought me a little about engines and my friend Co's car would also be a way for me to finally get my feet wet. He has a '79 Olds Cutlass with a worn out Chevy 305. So far we've replaced the timing chain, water pump, fuel pump, radiator hoses, and rebuilt the distributor. These things might seem trivial to some people, but it was very important for me to get in there and see how these parts worked, looked, and fit together. During this time I was also tearing my Impala down. First came the interior, next the exterior trim, and then a little sheetmetal. I got the car to a fairly well stripped stage (or so I thought) and then I put it at the edge of the yard for storage. Shortly after I left home for a little while to work in Kansas and after returning home my new job kept me very buisy, so the Impala remained untouched until Jan '08.
I've moved out recently, I now have a good amount of space to store and work on vehicles. My new house has a nice carport area and a separate garage. Things are coming together to allow me to use an industrial size sandblaster, so once again its time to work on the Impala. We brought it to Karr Industries to have access to some tools and began the total strip down. Co was helping me and we managed to remove the rear glass, the inner fenders, core support/radiator, front bench seat, dash, wiring harness, gas tank, driveshaft, Engine and Transmission. Woohoo!!! What an accomplishment!
BAD NEWS:
After the final strip down, the upper and lower cowl are now visible and its obvious that there are serious rust problems to some important structural areas in the front of the car. I think a lot of people would sandblast the surface, paint it and continue on, but I feel that would most definitely be the wrong way to go about this. I have full intention of disecting the 'A' pillars and lower cowl to completely eliminate all traces of the cancer and to fabricate any necessary pieces. Once this is done I'll be able to install the floors and begin work on the quarter panels.
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