Oct 7th 2009 - Finally done!  After 14 months and way too much money... 

We painted it the original white, but added a little bit of red pearl to accent the interior.  Looks so nice in the early and late part of the day.

Here we are cruising home from paint on Oct 5th, 2009!

Here is a preview from page 2 - Roll back to the restoration on Oct 12th, 2008 - fired up the motor!

Oct 1st 2009, prepping for paint, top done, interior done, trunk done, rust fixed.

But how did this all start? on to the whole story...

Thanks Mobil 1, and thanks to Cardomain for choosing me as the winner of the first month of the Mobil 1 challenge. Within a few weeks after the month end, I had $1,000 bucks in my pocket, and I just couldn't decide what to do with it.

While cruising to a wedding in June, I saw this 1968 Buick Electra Convertible in Campbell, and I thought to myself "hmmmmmm".

After stopping to talk to the homeowner who was outside at the time, I found out this sweet ride has been sitting since it was parked there 15 years ago.

 
The previous owners brother drove it until the brakes were gone and he didn't want to put any more money into it, so he parked it there. He said his brother wanted to get rid of it, and was going to sell it for scrap to the junkyard. My interest level went up, I might be able to get this for cheap!

 So lets look a little closer here. The Odometer said it had about 78k miles on it. The owner said he didn't know if that was the original mileage, it could be, but more likely 178k by the looks of it.

I made the guy an offer, based on the car at least running. We went back and forth a while, eventually settling on a price of $800. (and he promised to help me get it out of there)

So first we decided to see if it would work. Put in some fresh gas, checked the fluid levels (adding all fluids) and installed a new battery.

After spraying some starting fluid, it only took 2 turns of the crank and it roared back to life. Pulled it out and gave it a test drive around the block. It felt good so I snapped the first picture after I parked it. That's when I realized, I need to document this whole process of turning it into a sweet beach cruiser.

      So the lesson learned is that while $1,000 will pick up an old car, it will take hundreds of hours and thousands more to bring it back to life.  So back to my original opening line - thanks Mobil 1?

Check out the next several pages where I document the various steps in the restoration.

More to come...