So, my father in law gave me his 1965 Buick Riviera. "Some assembly required" as in the car is in a billion pieces all over the basement of his house... body is in decent shape without rust. Body was painted after disassembly (expect this was to repair some minor rust spots) but the other pieces (hood, doors, fenders) were not painted.

Along with the car came a pair of 425 Buick nailhead engines. One of which is numbers matching to the car body. Looking at these things they aren't really "hotrod" engines but are very desirable with the hotrod crowd.
The engines unfortunatly are stuck solid. One was sitting outside for a number of years. while the other was sort of under cover. Either way both blocks would be an overboar with new pistons etc.

This is an example of what the assembled car would look like (shamlessly stolen from the web)


So A poll is in order...

edit:
D'Oh!
Wrong title...!

 

That Yellow is horrible........

But you gotta do it man, those are way cool rides, and the 425 was righteous in its day.

Do it or sell it to someone who will do it, not too many left.

 

I have always liked the Riviera's from that time period . If the body is good shape thats half the battle right there

 

I have a friend with that exact car in the picture....color and all. Just picked it up for around $17-$18K.

 

I voted to stimulate the economy and rebuild it.

 

An old bud o' mine liked his 425 so well (TONS of torque) that he stuck the nasty beast in his '69 GTO. Ripped a few Chevelles a new one! Offy dual-quad intake and a switch-pitch Turbo 400 helped...

 

Pull plugs, pour some kerosene in each cly, let set
for a couple days. Use a socket and long pipe
on harmonic balancer. they will brake free.

 

Nope, both motors are waaaaay beyond that...

Had a look at it again today and did a bit of poking about. Leading edge of the hood is rusted through, rusted out battery tray. He had it in to a body shop where they pulled the body from the frame sand blasted the frame and painted. Fixed up an bunch of rust holes on the body.
Still a strong odor of rat/mouse urine on the drivers side. I suspect that is coming from the wire harness.
I will need to come up with something to get rid of that smell. Then there is the rusted parts... What used to be shiny metal (fuse panel) is now rusty.

It's been apart for at least 5 years now but I would guess probably closer to ten. Found out he had sunk at least $7,000 in body work only to leave it sit there to rot again.

 

My neighbor has a 64,I would love to have a 71-73

 

I would scrap the oe wires and get a painless kit of something comparable, labeled, modern fuses, etc. One to two years and you will be cruzin, do it all yourself.

 

If you have the desire...rebuild it. Bad ride. If you dont, sell it to someione that will. If you dant find one, the hot rod guys will definatley take those nailheads.

My flathead came from a yard and was frozen tight. Kroil, AFT, pateince and a lot of barley hops and they'll eventually come apart....

Good luck