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I bought a 76 corvette to restore/rebuild earlier this year. But wait, you say, the title says 75! Thats right. Because I didn't find this website until AFTER the purchase, and didn't read the 10 rules! So with that car, I was way in over my head.
However, I did find someone willing to tackle that job, and ended up basically trading it plus a few extra parts for this:
I went with 1975 because I liked the vents in the hood and scoop area, I wanted a sugar scoop car, and I liked the wood accents in the interior. As an added bonus, the cars build date is within one week of my birth! Hows that for fate?
Story behind the car is it was driven by its previous owner up until 2001, then was in a minor accident that tore the rear bumper off. He parked it in the garage, and it ended up sitting there for 15 years. Until he traded it in on a motorcycle. Which is where I picked it up.
Interior could use some love. Drivers seat is shredded, there is a crack in the bottom under the drivers foot area that has a plate over it, and the wood needs restored or replaced. The main parts (dash pad, console) are in good shape, and everything is there.
Engine, to my newbie eyes, looks pretty untouched. AC is still there, smog pump is there, everything has a nice coating of dirt and dust. However, it DOES run. We poured gas into the carb, and it fired right up. Didn't want to fill the tank until I had it cleaned out, who knows whats in there after 15 years.
This part surprised me, no "D" on the PRNDL? Weird.
Hope I don't need to turn the lights on anytime soon...
I plan to pull the interior out, fix the floor, replace or repair what needs fixed. The frame appears to be very solid, lots of surface rust and some scale back in the rear, so I will need to pull the body off and have it blasted and coated, all new suspension parts, then drop the body back on.
This is the only part of the body I could find that needs fiberglass repair. I have some broken body parts from my parts vette I want to practice on before I tackle this. Having the back bumper off already I guess is a bonus, easier access.
I plan to update this build weekly on Sunday night to chronicle what I got done that week, current plan is to have the car drivable by May. I'm sure Ill be asking lots of questions, Ive already found a few switches that I have no idea what they do. I think I have a good starting place, especially since at this point I am only into the car for $1700
Ak,
Congratulations, over all does not look that bad. Our white 75 looked similar, it sat for almost 20 years before we bought it. I put it on jack stands for 4 months before drivable, replaced everything, nice car now.
Good luck
Spent some time crawling around the interior, making a list of what I'm going to need to bring it up to driveable condition. Looks like the floors are in pretty good shape, though there is a poorly repaired crack on the drivers side that they patched with a steel plate that is now thoroughly rusted. Time to tear that out and patch it right.
Started taking stock of the engine compartment as well, found that one of the hoses for the AC has been sheered off. Shouldn't be too hard to fix.
I have two parts cars I bought on the cheap for this build, 2 77's. Spent part of the day Sunday stripping one of them down, got everything except the rear bumper cover and the rear end out of it I plan to keep. Also spent some time pulling the fuel tank out of the other one, it was on the road this spring, so the tanks nice and clean where the 75 has been sitting for quite awhile, 15 years apparently. Seems like a good idea to swap them out.
Which brings me to the two questions I've been wrestling with: Interior and powertrain.
I have an excellent set of 77 seats, and a set of ragged out 75 seats. The 75 seats were leather, looks like the passenger side might be salvageable. Drivers side is a wreck. So, do I sell the 77 seats to repair the drivers seat, or sell the 75 seats as parts and put in the 77's?
I plan to use this car as a 3 season daily driver. Long term, I'd like to do something really crazy, like a supercharged 3800 build for it. For now, my options are to rebuild the base engine and trans in it, or I have an LT1 and 700R4 out of a 95 Formula I could drop into it. I have the complete car, so wiring and ECM are not an issue. Thoughts? Has anyone done the LT1 swap before on here? (I'm sure its been done).
Week 2 update:
Worked this past weekend, so didn't get too much done. I did get parts car #1 almost completely broken down, not that there was too much to start with. Pulled the front clip off, removed all of the under hood odds and ends, the hood, T-tops, master cylinder, brake booster, etc. Sold the doors already, made my money back just off those. next step is to pull the back bumper cover to put on the 75 and pull the rear wiring harness just for parts. Then its time to break out the sawzall and cut whats left up for scrap.
What is a mid life crisis really. The realization that most of your life has been wasted and now's the time to do something about it? To buy a project like this as a middle to old aged man without the experience and knowledge to fix it yourself, to farm out the work no less. Sounds more like a mid life nightmare to me. You would have been far better off buying a finished car for so many reasons. I don't no how nice you want the finished product to be but your looking at easily $40K to have a car that I would call done right. You could buy a really nice Vette for that kind of money and a year that you could actually get your money back on.
Well, number one, the "mid life crisis" was a joke. Number two, I already own a finished car, my 79 Trans Am. Number three, who said anything about farming out the work? You do realize the above rust bucket was a PARTS CAR, not the one I'm working on? Its called a hobby, I enjoy working on a car, its relaxing, and at the end, you have something you can be proud of because YOU did it. Do I know how to do everything my 75 will need? Well, no. But I will by the time I'm done.
As for what I expect to have when I'm done, I'm not building a show car. I'm not building a race car. I'm building a car I can commute in daily that I will enjoy driving. It doesn't need to be perfect, year specific, NOS parts. I already have that car.
Well, number one, the "mid life crisis" was a joke. Number two, I already own a finished car, my 79 Trans Am. Number three, who said anything about farming out the work? You do realize the above rust bucket was a PARTS CAR, not the one I'm working on? Its called a hobby, I enjoy working on a car, its relaxing, and at the end, you have something you can be proud of because YOU did it. Do I know how to do everything my 75 will need? Well, no. But I will by the time I'm done.
As for what I expect to have when I'm done, I'm not building a show car. I'm not building a race car. I'm building a car I can commute in daily that I will enjoy driving. It doesn't need to be perfect, year specific, NOS parts. I already have that car.
Concentrate on the positive and don't let people that can't read get under your skin it is obvious to anyone that read the posts what you are doing. When you are done you will have exactly what you want, a car you can enjoy and be proud of. Keep up the good work.
Way to go ! your doing exactly what I would be doing if I lived in the land where these were made . To say "I did the build myself " just makes it so much better ,also you end up just knowing EVERY nut and bolt in them .
BTW the $1700 car you have , if its running just OK and with a nice coat of paint and rear bumper , cleaned up. It would be selling here for around 10-14K easy.
Didn't get too much done this week due to Halloween parties and trips to Marshall to supervise a project build. Did pull a few more pieces off of the parts car, looking to get it completely broken down during my vacation next week. So if anyone is looking for 77 suspension or interior parts, let me know!
Week 5 update:
Its alive! Well, sort of. Charged the battery up, dropped it back in, poured some gas in the carb, and she fired right up. Ran smooth. Gas gauge says there is 1/2 a tank in it, but nothings getting to the carb. So I popped the cap and dropped a line in. Yep, shes got about half a tank. Of 15 year old gas? Yeeesh. So next step is to drain that, blow the lines out, and swap the fuel filter. Worst case, I may need a new fuel line, or a new fuel pump.
Also pulled a bunch more parts off of my parts car for it, trying to get it completely stripped before the snow flies.
Also sold a T-top on my business trip, used the proceeds to buy some sweet new wheels for it. Guy says they were 1977 Appliance wheels, very good condition, just need a little polish and good to go. Well, and new tires, the date stamp on these is 1994, I think. Though I do have the matching fronts. Is there a market for vintage tires? They all hold air, have good tread, and would make good show tires I guess.
10-11-2016, 08:27 PM
Mid life crisis: 1975 Vette build thread
