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Amazing how great this car's appearance improves without the running boards.

Jess, yes, thanks I have found those! New valve cover gaskets were ordered and I will reassemble it correctly when I return home from my travel.

West it's for sure growing on me!

Planning on doing an inside-out resto on it. Mechanicals and interior first. Then we can drive it as it. Cleaning up the dash board now and completely rewiring it is stage one. Also, I have a complete brake kit from kanter sitting at the house waiting for my return.

Big part we are still trying to source is a top mechanism. It totally missing, so that is the unicorn right now.

Almost as rare as the V12 windshield trim I just found for Pat Aldrich!

Long term exterior plans are unknown. But I do want it painted and some point. No offense to the rat-rod lovers, but I like things clean and tidy and less likey to continue to rust.

My wife is pushing for a trunk rack instead of the folding tire.

We shall see.

Looking for a good set of dash panels, that are not pitted which I can send out for wood graining. The current ones are pretty crusty and I'd probably need to bury them in high build primer and possibly skim coat to get them smooth enough to look decent for wood graining.

So I'd rather find a better set (speedo panel, center panel, clock panel, radio delete panel and ash tray panel) which can go off to wood graining.

In the mean time, I'll clean up the existing ones and repaint them the same color as the dash structure so I can get the dash back together in the short term and complete the wriring.

David Flack and Will Rose are probably your best bets.

You might want to check with Penn-Dutch Restorations in Pennsylvania. They make top bows.

The Toe board from Ulrich has arrived to replace the swiss-cheesed one that I pulled out. Also, that brown box contains the complete brake kit I ordered from Kanter.

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Managed to get the toe board painted. Also stripped and got a coat of paint on the dash panels. Eventually they or better panels will go out for woodgraining. But for now they need another sanding as they still look too rough. I was hoping the paint would level it out a bit, but nope. So I'll probably sand them again and switch to come highbuild primer.

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Don’t forget the super cheap and very effective woodgrain vinyls on the market. I fool people at pretty much every show I go to. Slap some clear over the vinyl and bingo good enough for a driver and you save hundreds.

Noted. Flackmaster knows a guy. So I have someone lined up for the wood graining. But that will be into the new year.

Want to get these panels cleaned up enough to use, so I can start the rewire and hopefully get the car running.

The paint on the panels looked like crap this morning. I think it was just too cold in the garage last night. I need to bring the rattle cans in the house to warm up before I attempt a redo. I'll strip the panels again today and then hit them with some high-build primer to hopefully smooth them out better as well. All are part of the learning process. I was hoping to skirt, but like I did on the dash structure and garnish molding, these panels were much rougher.

I need to retest the fuel gauge as well. It wasn't hooked up per se but had 2 inch remnants of the corroded wiring still attached to it. Looked like it had been out in the elements for a while. I tried testing it on 6v, and if I momentarily grounded it, it jumped to about 1/4 tank, then quickly falls back to empty. The funny thing, even if I don't ground the other terminal, when I turn the power on, it jumps. So, not sure if it is shorted internally or what.

I'll investigate more. At some point, I'll try to track down the tank wire and try to do a resistance check on that. From moving the car around, I know there is at least 1/2 tank of old fuel in there. So I'll see what the resistance value read between that wire and ground. There was a note in the glovebox about Stabil being added to the tank, but even with that, I am sure the fuel is well past its "best-buy" date.

Now I need to figure out how/where to dispose of that much old fuel.