Detroit_Lives
Member
I have a 65 Polara 2 door that is complete, it was running and driveable when I parked it in my garage...years ago. Its a Michigan car and there's some rust at the rear wheel openings and rust to the rear of the wheel opening, some of the trunk side drop panel. The floors are still there and look solid underneath without pulling the carpet up yet. The dash is good, the headliner s good, rest of the interior is fair to good. bench seats. So I cut the rusted areas from the drivers side, havn't got to the pass side rust. So that was when I stopped and it sat there while I finally started to look for real quarter panels cut from a donor car. I found a 65 2 door in Arizona no drivetrain, good metal, some collision damage. So the plan has always been to cut the rear quarters, not the entire quarter but patch panels around the wheel openings and back, planning that I will be doing some inner wheel house work with it although they look pretty solid on ol blue, I imagine they've got some rust up in there. I had the donor hauled up here and now its been sitting in my driveway for 2 yrs. I was getting ready to measure, mark and cut the donor, I plan to drill the spot welds around the wheel opening first. I got under the donor and got my first good look at the underside of the donor and now I'm having secod thoughts. Maybe I should restore the donor car instead??? use ol blue as a donor? the metal is in better condition in terms of rust. There's collision damage at the passenger tailight that has crumpled the metal around the tailight bent the bumper also caused some wrinkle in the quarter. Passenger door is dented in. I need ideas, how to decide what car to build and what car to use for parts. its probably obvious to an experience restorer but I'm not and I'm not sure what to do. I dont want any regrets later shouda woulda coulda. I found an interior on ebay, factory buckets with rear seats and console, misc parts new in box that came with the donor car, brake parts, new carpet. I bought new brake lines and fuel lines from Inline tube, new in box.
Basically I don't have a huge budget for restoration. I do have tools tho. I enjoy working on it but I don't have tons of free time.. ugh. Here's pic of the AZ. donor car. What should I consider to make this decision? Thanks for your comments.
Basically I don't have a huge budget for restoration. I do have tools tho. I enjoy working on it but I don't have tons of free time.. ugh. Here's pic of the AZ. donor car. What should I consider to make this decision? Thanks for your comments.