1962 Buick Skylark - progress and no progress...?

Gents,

Just wanted to bring you guys up to speed on my 62 Turbo Skylark project.

So, after too much time passing, excuses, and damage, I have decided to pull the car from my buddy's shop.

I went down there unscheduled this past Friday to check on progress being that he hasn't responded to my texts in over a week. Definitely tell he was super surprised to see me. I immediately look to the lift where my car was the last time I was down there (over a month ago) and its not there. I look to the right and there it sits; with about 1/16" of dust covering the entire car. Ok, dust cleans off.. even if its in the engine bay; where I had it spotless.

Then I look closer at the car, and see a chip out of the nose of the fender on the driver's side. Are you kidding me!?! I immediately question him about this and he had no clue it happened. Of course, he has 2 people working down there that don't give two $hits about other people property.

At that point, my mind was made up. No work has been done on the car in nearly 6 weeks. It was only there to get the hot side and down pipe for turbo done, cut the driveshaft floor and dial in rear pinion angle.

The work was supposed to take 2 weeks. I had the car towed to his shop on 3/16/16.

I will be bringing the car back to my shop either today or tomorrow and continuing with the work that should have been completed by no later than the beginning of April.

Hope to bring you updates of positive progress in the near future!

Thanks for listening to my rant.

Chris

lol

Bummer dooder!

woody1640 wrote:Chris: Sorry to hear that, but yeah theres way to many people in this world that don't give a hoot about someone elses property. I have been there. I try not to depend on or ask others for help.

Keith

Keith,

Thanks. I usually never depend on anyone to do my stuff. If its something I haven't done before, I will ask questions and do it but my buddy persuaded me to do the work.

He is a much better welder than I am so I figured why not. Knowing all well that he tends to be "all over the place" instead of having direct work flow. Figured Id give him a chance. Boy was I stupid.

regal81455 wrote:Bummer dooder!

I hear ya Josh. It really sucks. Hes a good guy, just not real good at time/project management.

And to boot, his main mechanic is a d%$k and doesn't care about others cars.

He destroyed my buddy's kick panel on the drivers side by just sliding in and out of the car to move it.

Sad thing is my buddy could really go far in the "hot rod" world if he just got his $hit together.

Well, she's back home in my garage... with yet another chip. Yup, another chip that wasn't there on Friday when I was at my buddy's shop. At this point, just another spot I have to touch up but super glad its back in my possession.

Now I will start pounding on this car so I can get it done and driving. :-)

will keep you guys posted on my progress. Working on my 72 as the same time as this one.

Chris

lol

woody1640 wrote:I really hope for your sake you did not give your buddy any money. Sounds to me like he owes you for paint repairs and clean up and etc...

In my opinion you guys do some things back wards. Why paint the car 1st and then redo the motor?? Your just asking for problems doing things in that order, but I suppose its the "NEW WAY"  

I used to watch the real restoration shows on tv back in the 80's & 90's, when they did "REAL RESTOS", not the stupid junk they show today that they call real! Everything was prefitted and mocked up and then the body was painted.

I'll stick to my "old school" ways .. lol!


Keith

I have not given him anything as of now. I offered to pay him for what work was done but now the more I think about it, I may tell him that were even since the car was damaged.

I painted the car 1st because I was only planning on dropping the 300 in and keeping it N/A. Then, I decided to go forced induction.

The one thing I like about doing paint 1st and then doing motor is that your motor isn't covered in $hit from the bodywork process. Usually no matter how well you cover the motor, all that dust gets on it somehow.

lol

woody1640 wrote:Chris: After the motor and tranny and all the odds n ends upgrades etc associated with it are prefitted and mocked up, its all removed (engine, tranny and all pulled back out).

Then I would do all my body work and paint it and reinstall the motor, tranny and all.

This is how I am doing mine. I know it takes a lot longer and a lot of extra labor (I've had my motor & tranny in n out 5-6 times now fitting everything and mocking it up), the result should be awesome!

Keith

I gotcha. Definitely way to do it but with all my intercooler piping and other silliness in my GN, it just made more sense for me to get car painted before I did engine work.