Question for all you corvette aficionados. I own a 1975 I bought last year. It's torch red and repainted about 13 years ago and on a scale of 1 to 10 I would say it's a 8. Hot looking C3! It's a L48 small block with a manual transmission. It runs strong. But, the interior is shot. Needs everything. I have two options. Take it to a corvette restorer and spend anywhere between 10 and 12k and be done with it or order the parts myself from corvette America for about 5k and "try" to do it myself. Now my wife says send it out but I'm thinking if I paid $6500 for the car and invest 12k not counting needed tires your looking at almost 20k and that seems to much to invest in a 75. Mind you, I have no emotional attachment to the car so should I just slap it together myself or have a professional make it look new? Appreciate some expert advice. Thanks

 

hello I am starting to redo my interior in my 74, so far i have bought carpet, and seat covers. these are after market and so far have spent about 650.00. still need to buy door panels but hope to have 2500.00 or less invested. i will be doing all the work myself and want it back on the road by spring. my car is far from original so i dont mind after market. Maybe post some pics of yours so we can see how bad it is.

 

• Welcome to the forum to you both.
• The hardest part about interior replacement is the carpeting itself. You need to get premolded carpeting first of all. But even then you'll need a heat gun to get the pre-molded part to really fit in the tight contours of the back compartment and into the foot wells. The dash pad is also hard to replace because you have to take out most of the hard plastic and in the roof and windshield header area before you can get the dash pad out.

 

Well good to know, my dash pad is still in good shape so i dont have to jump through that hoop just yet

I painted my 74 25 years ago still not to bad

 

Looks good! How are the bumper covers faring? Did you use two stage polyurethane?

My front cover got so brittle that it just started to break apart about ten years ago. Got an OEM one several years ago for when I get it painted. Painted it (lacquer) back in '86 but didn't heed advice to strip so it started to spider-web on the horizontal surfaces, mainly the rear deck. Still looks good at ten feet tho.

 

I replace the front and rear pieces with fiberglass ones when i painted it, the front was warped and the back had cracked. I replace the back with a later model because i wanted a spoiler, paint is single stage urethane

 

Good idea with the rear cover. Never cared much for the original '74 style. What's that classic pickup over to the right?

 

Thats a 42 Studebaker 1 ton, as far as we know last 42 survivor, they only made trucks for one month in 42 then shut down for war production, they only made 8 1 tons this one was 5th from then of the line , no heater , 1 sun visor and 1 wiper .. It is a black out model, / no chrome/ found it in a field in Montana with a 1957 licence plate on it that is stamped prison made on the side.

 

By the way sorry for hijacking this thread

 

Maybe John B will come back and let us know which way he decided to go on his interior restoration.