1973 corvette

[Kim F.]

I purchased a 1973 350 automatic air conditioned coupe. The car has 100,800 miles. The engine has been rebuilt along with the transmission. The interior appears to be original. The seats and door panels are very worn and cracked. I want to take the car to an NCRS event to be judged. I have the judging book for the car but I have no experience with having the car judged.

I do not know weather to replace the door panels and seats. I am looking for some opinions from others that have had similar situations.

Thanks

[Peter G.]

Re: 1973 corvette

Kim, congrats on your purchase of your '73 Corvette.

Replacing door panels and seats? It all depends what you want to do with your car and how badly worn these items are? Is there missing hardware on the door panels etc. Do the doors open from inside?

I would first take the car to a NCRS Chapter Judging Meet and see what you have. Original parts can be replaced and if you use good replacement parts or other original parts the car will do fine in judging.

If you are going for a NCRS Bow-Tie...don't do anything until the car is looked at.

Too bad your so far away..The Rocky Mountain Chapter Judging Meet is tomorrow Sunday October 24th. I am already judging one '73 Corvette for Flight and possible Bow-Tie.

Another time.

Good luck.

[Kim F.]

Re: 1973 corvette

Thanks for the information. I will look for an upcoming event.

[Edward J.]

Re: 1973 corvette

I purchased a 1973 350 automatic air conditioned coupe. The car has 100,800 miles. The engine has been rebuilt along with the transmission. The interior appears to be original. The seats and door panels are very worn and cracked. I want to take the car to an NCRS event to be judged. I have the judging book for the car but I have no experience with having the car judged.

I do not know weather to replace the door panels and seats. I am looking for some opinions from others that have had similar situations.

Thanks

Kim, As Pete says I would just take the car to a chapter level meet and just get the laundry list of things that need to be addressed to make it a top flite car.That way you know where you stand with your car.

[Michael W.]

Re: 1973 corvette

Kim,

The 'toss up' in flight judging is orignality versus condition. Your door panels etc. might be the ones fitted by the factory (can't get better than that!) but would suffer in the 'condition' side of things due to wear and tear. On the other hand, new reproduction panels would have no deterioration, but may not score well in the originality side since most are not 'perfect' reproductions.

It's hard to say what to do at this point, taking the car as-is to be judged is the best strategy as suggested by others. Think twice before you restore, they can only be original once.

[Kim F.]

Re: 1973 corvette

Michael and Edward,

Thanks for your comments about taking the car to be judged. One thing that I forgot to say in the first post is that this was a one owner car. I have documentation for the major (engine and transmission) repairs. So the judging of the original car will help.

Thanks