Friday in Carlisle, PA was promising to be a beautiful day, 70 degrees and sunny. I had to take the day off to go since rain was in store for Saturday and Sunday.

The line down the west bound side of I-76 leading up to the Carlisle exit was over 2 miles long. This is the first time in years I’ve had to sit in a line that long so I was anticipating the grounds were going to be packed with people.

I was right. The place was jammed. Every year I usually park at the house on the corner of Cavalry rd and Cavalry st, but this year they were sold out. I had to park an extra block away from the entrance in someones driveway who was all too excited to take my $5 to park for the day.

Even though I left Baltimore at 7:30 Am, I still didn’t walk thru the gates at Carlisle till 11:20AM.

The crowd was thick with the usual classic car guys, as well as girlfriends and kids. You usually see girlfriends on Saturdays tagging along with their boyfriends looking or hubcaps, fuzzy dice, and chrome valve covers.

There were a lot of cars for sale this year. Far more than there were last year. In fact it looked like an ocean of classic cars for sale, and project cars too. I don’t think anyone was there to blow off their cars if the price tags were any indication.

Classic cars for sale

Classic cars for sale

Classic cars for sale

I saw a couple of 55 Chevy project cars for sale. One was mostly a shell claiming to be a rust free California car going for $5000 with a sold sign on it,  and the other was a “barn find” they were asking $16,500 for. Apparently the barn find was drivable.

My mission this time wasn’t parts. I was looking for tools, mostly metal shaping tools. I found a lot of small hammers that would be perfect for work in confined spaces or for working on trim. They were so cheap I can grind any shape I want on them to suit the job at hand, and not feel like I was destroying an expensive body working hammer.

I got the idea from watching one of the video rentals from Smartflix called Metal working basics: Hand tools where Ron Fournier was showing the different hammers he used for different types of metal shaping work. This is a beginners DVD, you won’t find much advanced information in this but it’s a great primer for anyone wanting to equip themselves to get started.

So at the end of the day, I’d spent $260 on tools, 64 Impala show room sales literature ( in really good shape), and an intake manifold, and of course food and gas.

The sun burn was free.

Here’s a story worth reading. It’s about an 84 year man in Kansas who has been building old cars since 1976 and has built nearly a car a year since then.

Some of them are replicas,  and some are originals.

http://kansastravel.org/grandpasoldfordgarage.htm

I love it when a plan starts to come together. I don’t need a lot of parts for my 64 Impala anymore since I’ve been on the hunt for the last 3 years or so. The parts I’m looking for now are the nice to have parts.

I found someone on Craigslist last week who was parting out a couple of really badly rusting 64 Impala SS and he had a few common parts listed for sale. He didn’t mention the 64 Impala SS door panel trim until I asked, but he had the 64 Impala SS dash bezel I was looking for.

He didn’t have the SS style trunk cove inner and outer edge pieces I was looking for either.

He turned out to be from Newark Delaware so I decided to meet him halfway. It made more sense since I could see the parts first before buying them.

We met at the Maryland House rest stop. He brought a few extras so I could pick the best of them all.

Finding nice original parts like this can be hard, in fact it can be impossible depending on what you’re looking for.

I’m one of those guys that prefers original, even if it’s not perfect. I can usually clean them up and restore them though. I’ve settled for “repops”, or reproduction chevrolet restoration parts when the price is right however.

Not everyone has the kind of patience or time to locate parts like that though. True, it does a lot to slow down the restoration. I think I must like the process of locating parts and restoring the car more than the objective of restoring the 64 Impala so I can get in it and drive.

For anyone who wants to just get the car done and get in it, picking up the reproduction  chevrolet restoration parts is the way to go.  Being a stickler about factory original 64 impala parts WILL definitely slow you down.

I would know.