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If a guy want to gold plate his car, cover the chrome in diamonds and than put flames down the hood more power to him.

That $750,000 made it into the economy, and no doubt trickled down to vendors, restorers, carpet makers, dentists, restaurants, etc.

It looks like a beautiful car. The owner is a hero for fixing it up from a basketcase.

I agree, it's the guys money so he can do what he wants with it. I'm trying to argue the point that just because you spend a lot of money on a restoration, or anything for that matter, doesn't necessarily mean that every dime you spent was worth it or made a difference in the final product. I reread the original post. If the guy wasn't proud of the fact he spent so much money, why even mention it? Why not say he spent what he thought was necessary to get what he wanted and leave it at that?

Could someone else have restored the car to that level for a lot less money, I would say yes. That is my point. I don't know this guy or care how he spends his money. If his restoration should have cost 450k, 500k, 600k..is it so much better since he paid so much more?

"That $750,000 made it into the economy, and no doubt trickled down to vendors, restorers, carpet makers, dentists, restaurants, etc. It looks like a beautiful car. The owner is a hero for fixing it up from a basketcase." Really? Or did it just go to an overinflated restoration bill?

For the one who said it sounds like people are jealous and don't have the money to "play with the big boys" is an ignorant statement. There are others on this board who could afford to pay that much, but that doesn't mean they should and because they wouldn't doesn't make them jealous.

HOW MUCH TO SPEND FIXING UP AN OLD CAR

True, Ed spent a lot of money fixing up that '38 Twelve. As some have pointed out, WAY more than it is worth. WAY more than he could have bought one on the open market (probably not anywhere NEAR in that well-done condition tho).

All this goes to show the truth of that well-proven saying in the old car hobby - it is always cheaper to buy a really nice car in top shape, than to try and re-habilitate some beat up mess that had been abused.

That is not exactly late news. I have in front of me a book by my old friend (and now very dead) Robert J Gottlieb. Let me waste a bit of your time with some background, to put all this in perspective.

For those of you who do not know, or are too young to remember, the classic car hobby got started at the same time, separately on the west and east coasts - Turnquist and his buddies in New Jersey/New York, and Gottlieb and his buddies in So. Calif.

Bob Gottlieb's 1952 book "CLASSIC CARS AND ANTIQUES" was probably a MAJOR factor in getting the "big old" car movement going (at that time, as now, HCCA couldnt have cared less about "modern" (meaning post 1920) cars, and the AACA classified the big super-luxury post WWI pre WWII) cars as tow vehicles!

In Bob's book, there is a picture of my '34 Super Eight. A few pages away, he tells us "it is always less expensive over-all to purchase a classic that is in good condition, rather than try and restore someone else's heartache....for example (Bob continues), why purchase a classic needing work for seventy five dollars, when a mint original can be had for $150....".

See - nothing changes - only a few decimal points !

I'm neither pauper nor prince, but people with lots of money have no influence on me. (BTW, envy is wishing you had what someone else has; jealousy is fear of losing something that you already have to someone else.)

So, how much someone spends on a restoration means little to me; I'm all about the results of the finished product. Heck, I've seen paint jobs done in a home garage that look every bit as good as those by a professional shop.

Yet, if someone wants to drop six-figures or more into a restoration, it's their money and their vehicle to do with as they see fit - as long as they don't whine to me about it. Personally, I have more admiration for those owners who put as much sweat equity as they can into their vehicles, as long as it's done in a safe and craftsman-like manner, so their discretionary funds are available to cover the work that they cannot accomplish themselves and have to farm-out.

Now, I don't know jack squat about a 1938 Packard, but if:

- a woodgrain finish was what the factory applied as a matter of production for that year/series/model and...

- there was no regular production option available as an alternative...

- then it is only logical that any other finish is not authentic, UNLESS the owner can provide bona fide documentation showing this was accommodated by the factory at special request.

In this case, any photos showing the dash in woodgrain finish prior to restoration don't work in favor of the vehicle.

If the judging criteria is one of authenticity over workmanship, then it's up to the judges to decide just what is a bona fide exception. If an item is deemed "incorrect" for judging purposes, then how many points do you wanna knock the vehicle for this ONE thing out of so many others that ARE correct?

Frankly, I don't think there are enough objective points to cover every aspect of a vehicle - even in a 400-point system. If someone doesn't like the way it was judged, perhaps they should get involved in judging, but know that you'll never please all of the people all of the time.

I wasn't there, but it's hard for me to imagine that the "best of show" trophy would have been lost merely on account of the dash finish.

That's just my $0.02 on the matter.

Now I need to learn to use the word "except" when I get judged. reminds me when I got my T-Bird job judged at a T-bird meet. It was very stock car EXCEPT it was painted a bright Ferrari red. Wish I had my new found wisdom regarding the word "except" when I had that car judged. I was asked by judges why it was not in the stock class and thereby ineligible for the best of show award, but I did not know the correct usage of the word "except". And then if they found anything else incorrect I could have used my other excuse, the Ford dealer could have done it

Here is my thing about the standby that the factory (or dealer) would do whatever the customer would want. To me unless it was an option that appeared on a price list somewhere then it's just a custom modification regardless of who did the work. What the difference between the factory painting a car a custom color, vs the dealer, vs taking it to a paint shop after purchase. No matter who did the work, it is still a custom modification to the vehicle. It doesn't represent how these cars were normally delivered or optioned.

Now if the factory had a documented list of special order paints that was available, and a car was painted one of those, then fine.

As much as I would like to convince people that Mexican blankets that cover the rodent chewed seats in my car could be factory installed in '54 if I had deep enough pockets, it's not going to happen.

Just my

Seems to me that judging at most shows is done from the perspective of how the car looked as it came from the factory, with some provision for bona fide factory-approved and factory-supplied, dealer-installed accessories, as well as dealer pre-delivery inspection and adjustments and any needed corrections. Thankfully, PackardInfo has a growing collection of factory material to help document that, and is hoping to add more to help Packard owners.

Kudos to PI, also, for working to compile a manual of objective judging criteria for these cars, when other clubs have only vague rules like "chrome parts shall be finished in chrome" ehich leaves too much to the judges discretion. I've seen, first-hand, where judges were selected for some shows, even Packard-specific, without much regard to their level of expertise.

Meanwhile, there's a problem because there ARE reasonably documented cases where the factory did perform modifications to make the sale, but I'd wager that it took a lot of persistence or clout to get that accomplished. Unfortunately, decades later, some people let wishful thinking take over and extend that to their heart's desire, without any documentation. Just because some previous owner sez it was "factory" doesn't make it so.

There's also the gray area between factory modifications and those done by the dealer or even the original owner. For example the '53 Derham Formal discussed in another thread shows a serial number that indicates it was NOT a factory order. Though it might still be an attractive and desirable car, perhaps even equal in every other way to a factory-ordered example, it's not the Real McCoy.

More likely that car was commissioned by a dealer who couldn't get one of the factory-ordered jobs. Based on my experience in with dealers (not only as costumer, but as an employee and even as a district manager for an automaker), I can envision where a dealer back then would try to cut the factory out as a middleman in favor of some additional profit.

Bottom line: I can accept a modified vehicle as a factory one-off, provided it is well-documented as such.

Now, where did I park my 1965 Packard V12 prototype?