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A year ago I completed the restoration of a 67 Mustang that I intended to keep to my death.  Only problem is that once I completed it I wanted to restore another car and I have only a two car garage for space.  Half that garage is used for my tools.  So I rented a storage barn and put the Mustang there and acquired a 68 Chevelle shell to restore.  While doing the restoration we rarely drove the Mustang, it would be weeks between driving, mainly because it was not "handy".  I believe I only put 300 miles on it in a years time.  So as my Chevelle project moved along I'd often wake up nights wondering what to do about the Mustang.  Its a car that needs to be driven my someone who wants to drive it.  

My Chevelle is done now except for some minor adjustments .

Here it is:

So I began looking for another project.  I found one in California.  Its another 68 Chevelle, just like mine.  I intent to keep mine until the day I die so again, I have no space for the new project.  To solve the problem I decided to give the Mustang I intended to keep, to my daughter Jessica.  I remembered while I was building it she implied she wanted to be on the recipient list for the car somewhere in my Will.  So I called her and asked if she was still interested and she said "Sure".  I said, "OK, when can you pick it up?", she said, "You mean NOW?".  It was kind of funny because usually people don't give classic cars away, but I decided it would be nice to get some use out of the car for a while and I can't store it so why not.  She took the car on the 14th of March 2023.  A week after her birthday so I got out of getting her a birthday gift.  So now I have space to store my Chevelle I'm keeping until I die!  But its back into storage and a pain to get out but I will have to make a special effort every week to get it out.  Maybe for date night.

I will be in this situation until I get the new Chevelle completed.  Then, because I want to get my Chevelle back into my garage so I can put some miles on it, I am giving the new Chevelle to my other     daughter Lee.  This will be my last car project.  I'm 70 years old and these restores are very intense and demanding and this one is going to put all my skills and patience to use.  This will be the first car I restore where the bodywork is not already done for me, and on this car there is a lot of bodywork to do as you will see in my next post.

There are many sheetmetal panels and parts that are rusted out and need to be repaired or replaced, including the entire floor of the car!  I am comitting a huge investment in this car and then am going to cut it all up and try to put it back together...very stressfull.   But  also extremely rewarding and challenging to me and it will keep me busy with also something to do.  Can't wait to get started.

I am expecting this project to be a minimum of 18 months and possibly 2 years because of all the work to be done.  Lee and I are working together to design the car how she would like it and also fit into my budget.  This is a difficult task due to the cost of parts since Joe's inflation but we have gotten much of the planning done and have agreed on somthing we will both be happy with. 

I'm hoping to be able to do a new post every week.  Stay tuned, it should be a fun experience to watch and feel free to participate with any feedback you would like to provide.