0Road-Race Vette

No one can guess exactly how much any car is going to cost, as EVERY CAR has different needs and NO TWO WILL BE ALIKE. I think it is strange when people quote a certain amount of hours for a restoration on a car.

More over if a shop tries to give a quote, you would figure based on their experience they will over estimate so they dont get burned if the car needs more work than than they think. (especialy since it is customer tendency to hold any quote to high regard especialy if the cost is higher than the quote) . So what happens if it requires less work???? Quoting is not a good system for anyone involved.

At our shop everything is done by the hour!!!! Only very rough estimates are given as a preliminary guide line if someone asks.Then we express to the customer that it could be LESS or more depending on their cars condition ,as well as their individual preferences.

After that it is by the hour with full documentation of the work performed in pictures.If a certain process takes longer than anticipated,then the customer is contacted and advised of the situation.I feel it is the only way to protect the customer and the shop alike!!!

PLEASE LOOK at the 59 corvette in our website for example.(RESTORATION GALLERY SECTION).This car was as battered as any vette you will find. It needed everything. When it is completed it will be LAZER straight with awesome body gaps, etc...(people who have seen our work can attest to that)The car has had a full frame off resto as you can see.So far the cost on this car is at about 40k (labor and materials).Probably another 10 in parts. I think another 20k will finish it at this point.(based on where we are at).

This is at $65 per hour and a really bad car.
It is safe to assume that a car in much better shape will be cheaper to restore!!!!!

This car had extensive body damage, and has been put back together meticulously . The body has been gelcoated etc.......

I see some 1000 hours to "start and go from there"estimates out there and I feel that even though some cars may take that to build(and maybe more), it is a pretty high amount of labor for say, AN UN HIT CAR IN GOOD GENERAL SHAPE. When you add materials and more importantly PARTS to the 1000 hours, well then the cost is very high.
An estimate like that or any other like that is not very accurate when used in general terms all across the board.

Another VERY important thing to concider that factors into labor cost is the EFFICIENCY of the individual working on your car!!!!!!
THERE ARE BODY MEN WHO ARE GOOD AND SLOW LIKE TURTLES AND THERE ARE BODY MEN WHO ARE GOOD AND FAST.NOT EVERYONE WORKS AT THE SAME PACE BUT LABOR RATES ARE USUALY THE SAME FOR THE TURTLE AS WELL AS THE HARE!!! This is where you have to trust the shop owner for making the right decisions on who they hire to work on your car!!!!!! Meeting everyone involved in your restoration should be a must.

You can use rough quotes as a vague reference in restorations, but if I was the customer I would want my car to cost EXACTLY what "my" car is going to cost not an average of all the rest and i would demand that from my restoration shop.

Again, EVERY CAR IS DIFFERENT so what it is going to cost DEPENDS on your car, your self and the ability of your restorer.

Regards,Stan
http://www.2ndgenrestorations.com

Tintin

and always multiply the $ by at least a factor of 2.5

kenba

And the timeline X 4 I have done it too many times. I never learn.
KEN

BADBIRDCAGE

On the sister thread to this one I saw one person (who admits they have never done a body off frame restoration) question the amount of time required to perform the services. They also wondered if time spent ordering or picking up parts is included in the hours.

When you figure a full time employee works 2,087 hours per year then you are estimating that one full time employee can perform the restoration operation in less than six months. Ever tried that one?

And the answer to his question (are ordering and picking up parts included as working hours) the answer is YES. They have to be included.

Operating a shop includes costs of rent/purchase of the physical facility, utilities, materials, payment of salaries to employees, insurance, etc. If a shop does not charge for time ordering and picking up parts the shop loses money. That shop goes out of business. That is not the shop you want working on your car.

Rich

0Road-Race Vette

Let me elaborate a bit more on at least what I think about :
Can a restoration be done in 6 months(as long as the hours rquired to do the job fall within that time line)????
YES IT CAN AS LONG AS THE CUSTOMER IS WILLING TO PAY EVERY WEEK UNTIL COMPLETION!!!!!!!!
That almost never happens, as customers usualy follow a schedule that meets THEIR FINANCIAL REQUIREMENTS.
It is the truth folks. That is the biggest factor that affects how fast a restoration can be completed.

I have had many customers ask me "how long will it take for this car to get done" and I reply : AS FAST AS YOU CAN PAY. Most people to date have not been able to keep up with us if we stay on a car full time.

At our shop where we have many projects going on at once,it is my job to schedule the work with the time schedules of customers.Some are in more of a hurry and some less. My object is to keep my guys working at all times as well as keeping my customers happy with their progress.

Let's face it . For the middle class guy to have a high quality car with no skimping he has to be a little more patient than the very weathy guy as it will take him a little longer to come up with the required funds.

As far as I am concerned that is perfectly OK in my book as I believe all cars are to be done RIGHT.

Something else on that subject::
EMPLOYEE BURNOUT.
One reason that rotating many projects works great for a customer aside from the fact that they arent financialy bound to the project full time is the fact that I believe that an employee can only do his or her best work when they are fresh,and staying on a project for 6 months straight it is hard to be fresh. As a result your potential falls off a bit.
I try to make sure my guys are always sharp and excited about their work and that is how i get their best out of them!!!(and that is why they get paid the BIG BUCKS)

My customers depend on me for that.

Bottom line is there is a lot more to labor hours than just how much and how long. THE CUSTOMER NEEDS TO KNOW THA THEIR DOLLARS ARE BEING USED WISELY.
Cost can be affected in many ways so hopefuly this thread will give everyone something to think about as I think about these things every day!!!

PLEASE GIVE YOUR IMPUT ON THIS AS I FEEL IT IS AN IMPORTANT TOPIC

1955 copper

When it is completed it will be LAZER straight with awesome body gaps

Unfortunately that what people wont and many Corvettes look like when restored. Not the shops fought. But there goes another real Corvette lost to history. And judging now days demand it . Find a real Corvette stored in a box never touched and it's a piece of s**t in todays terms. Would BJ buyers wont a NCRS founders,Bowtie,Crossed Flags or Sportsman award Corvette. DA!

prestige6

I,ve been working on my 58, doing a body off rotissere restoration,I have almost 2 years and 2000 hours into it. From start to finish....

Frankie the Fink

Nothing new here - its the old debate about 'firm-fixed' pricing versus 'time & materials'. Firm-fixed pricing is for absolutely known deliverables (e.g. I am selling you 50 Snicker's chocolate bars for $.75 each and will deliver by next Wednesday). If you were sure putting trunk weatherstripping on a reasonably sound trunk lid could be done in two hours you should be comfortable quoting some sort of firm-fixed price.

However the risk is on the vendor if they commit to a price and the work is more extensive than first thought -- so most vendors charge a premium to assume that risk (in software I charge 18% more for firm-fixed work cuz I know the customer will change the requirements and not want to pay any more for the change.)

Conversely, time & materials is great for the vendor but bad for the buyer if the project is managed inefficiently. I've seen software contracts padded with low-expertise types on gov't contracts just to run up the hours and increase profit. You had d@mn sure better know the vendor and monitor progress like crazy and have a 'weasel' clause to end the project early if you are the buyer and things go South.

I've managed 70 million dollar gov't contracts some firm-fixed and others T&M and this is my take on it.

I wanted my '61 vette seats redone and had bought the covers, foam and new springs and verified the frames were sound and asked a local resto shop with a hot rep how much and the guy would only talk T&M so I ran. A Latino gentlemen down the street took one look at all the pieces and told me $200 with no hesitation and he got the job and did beautifully. To me a competent shop should have been able to give me a firm price for a well-defined small job like that.

0Road-Race Vette

That is a bit harsh but i get your point. I certainly would not call any corvette of the sort that.I have respect for the cars at any level.
The stock(as it came from the factory car) has its own beauty
I also have respect for craftsmanship.
WHEN I DESCRIBED THAT VETTE THAT WAY IT WAS INTENDED TO SHOW THE AMOUNT OF WORK I WAS DOING PER THE DOLLARS SPENT AND NOTHING MORE.

This is a completely different subject all together and has nothing to do with what we are talking about here.

If a customer asks me to do my best work and build a car that will be better than it was new, I am happy to do that.
That being said, an over restored corvette IS NOT A REAL CORVETTE????
I dont think so.

There is no need for hating. It is all good!!!!

bigearl56

Stan, I like your approach. In 1988 I purchased a '57 Nomad in a basket. Being new at this I talked to a couple local body shops and they wanted no part of working on a old car. When I found a guy he said he would work on it for nineteen bucks an hour. I said could you give me an idea of how many hours it should take. He said around five hundred to seven fifty. I said OK, lets get started. Well he had never done a Nomad before so in the end he charged me three thousand hours. Any one who does tri-fives will tell you the Nomad is the hardest of the tri-fives to do. After some bickering I paid him thirty nine thousand dollars labor as I had paid for the plating, polishing and parts. Keep in mind he had the car over three years 1988-1991. My point is we failed to have good communication during the process so we both had a surprise at the end. We both agreed we were both at fault. Good news is we are still friends and I would recommend him to others as long as they understand the rules. This is not a cheap hobby and good work cost money.

Earl

BarryK

I'll agree 100% that a Corvette that has perfect gaps is not "correct" compared to how most came out of the factory and restoring them with perfect gaps would be considered over-restoring them.
At the same time the factory didn't care that much as they were simply mass-producing a car (not a classic, collectible car at the time) and wanted that car built as quickly as possible so they were willing to live with certain flaws or things that weren't just perfect.
Another example that quickly comes to mind is overspray on exhaust manifolds and intakes. The production line workers couldn't care less at the time.

When restoring a car we have to make decisions what we want as an end result on that restoration. Do you want it as accurate as possible how it was or most likely was when it rolled off the end of the production line including such common "flaws" such as uneven panel gaps, overspray on the engine parts, less than perfect paint that includes too thin of coverage along the lower panels, orange peel, runs, etc or since you are spending probably a small fortune restoring this now classic and collectible car do you want to take the opportunity to make the car as perfect and nice as possible since that opportunity exists? Face it, most restorations run a year, two years, and in many cases even a lot longer compared to what at the time these cars were built? an hour or two on the production line?

It's a decision that you make because it's YOUR car and it's how YOU want it to be as a finished product. On my '65 I try to keep it as original and correct as possible but within reason and what MY tastes dictate to ME. When it was in for body and paint work 3 or 4 years ago I made the decision that i wanted the panel gaps as perfect as possible and the paint to look as good as possible without normal factory flaws such as orange peel, etc. I knew at the time it made the car somewhat "overrestored" but it's my car and that was what I wanted.
I made the same decision when I was cleaning up the engine bay. As I was painting engine parts I choose to not replicate factory overspray on exhaust and intake manifolds. I felt that since i'm not rushing the car down a production line and I have the ability to make it look neater (and in MY opinion, nicer) without the overspray than that's what I was going to do.

I don't have my car judged and that was another reason for my decisions that I made. I wanted it to look nice and I wasn't worried about losing judging points because I didn't have certain characteristics that would be judged "typical" of factory production.
On the other hand, if my goal at the beginning would have been judging purposes and therefore judging points important I would have had to reconsider my choices and probably have changed them.

Just because a Corvette doesn't have certain factory "flaws" I think it's a bit extreme to say the car is "lost".
Bowtie or Survivor cars are great, and they are a wonderful source to see how these cars really were originally but most cars of this age of C1's and C2's have had so much work done on them over the years between parts exchanges, paint and bodywork, engine work, etc that I'd venture that very, very few actually exist that still have most of these original factory flaws left anyway - they were probably removed, repaired, fixed, etc at some point in the cars life before we bought it.
How many quality paint shops would paint a car and deliberatly leave a poor panel fit and since most cars had been repainted at some earlier point in their life the chances of a factory gap that was really bad having been fixed is probably pretty good. Would you than go back and unrepair that and make the gaps bad again just so you can say that it's factory correct?

Everyone is different and wants a different end result on their car - some want as accurate as possible as it was and some just want a really nice car that looks great without the typical factory flaws.

0Road-Race Vette

Barry, that was very well said and thanks for taking the time to write it.

We have gotten off the restoration cost subject and on to the "type" of restoration but that is OK.

On the members post about the "judging" :

NCRS type restorations present certain challenges and are judged on the ability of the restorer to bring a car back to a "as new" state.

"show car" type of restorations have their own challenges and are judged on the ability of the restorer to make a car "AS NICE" as it can be.
Both types of cars have an important place in the car hobby and both types of judging are EQUALY important.

NCRS Judging isnt the only type of judging that matters and vice-versa.

IT IS APPLES AND ORANGES.

An NCRS type car would not fit show car criteria and an over restored show car would not meet NCRS standards.

ALL ARE EQUALY GREAT IN THEIR OWN WAY should be appreciated as such!!!!!

We are all going to have our favorites, but that should not DIVIDE us into opposing sides. We are all involved in the hobby for the same reason: WE LOVE THESE CARS

AZDoug

Thus the reason for trying to make my 22 year old paint job last as long as possible.

At one time, when i bought the car from it junkyard home, anything that was all one clor, and not primer color would have been OK, as long as it was shiny and not orange peeled, runs, sags, etc.

I stripped the car, did all the major fiberglas work, etc,a nd got it painted for $950 in 1977, the painter finished the body work where the repairs were made, but didn't do anything about the stress cracks, or paint the door-door jams, or under the hood, or inside the trunk. But the paint job was nice paint job on the outside. I of course, had to put all the chrome back on.

The current paint job, which i removed all the bumpers and side trim,a nd reinstalled same, cost me $1200 for labor, plus the paint, which was $400 or so, in 1986. Of course, it isn't a perfect paint job with some errors here and there, and I repaired the stress cracks I could find, grinding the glas, laying the glas, surfacing the glas, in the painters shop.

Now, people, including me, go to car shows and see all the absolutely flawless, mile deep paint jobs, like on the Detorit/LA Autorama, shows, where GM, Ford, tec, trot out there best, or at the Coliseum Hot Rod shows, where, some body shop owner put 2000 hrs into his 1956 chebby car, and now I want my car to look just like that.

What I thought was OK, 30 or 20 years ago, before I started showing my car, isn't OK anymore. And I can see why people quote $15K for a paint job, if you have to strip the jambs,and sand and prime all the edges,a nd reinstall the doors/hood, etc,after painting,and wet sanding and buffing all those jambs, hood runnels, etc.

That being, said, i still want to find a perfect paint and body job for $5,000, and I would still install the trim and bumpers.

Doug

aworks

The word restore is way over used. If the car is a custom or retro rod, whatever. Then I can see going for the more perfect side. When a car like my 66 for instance is a nice unhit car. I like the lines to stay more on the orig. side. And paint should not be so flat and glossy. Paint on these old cars should have some texture to them. Anyone can sand a paint job flat and buff it. The real trick is to have it come out of the booth and need a slight scuff and buff. It took me all of 3 hours to buff my 66 coupe. I also think they should be painted in one piece. If you look at an orig. paint car you will see there is no paint way inside the doors and up in the very front of the hood. Not much on the lower rocker area either. But there are few people that will let that happen. If I where the to do a point car for myself it would be done the way it was done the first time. Some may think it is sloppy but thats the way they where. Even the NCRS pulls points for paint being way to flat and nothing like the orig. thing.To me most cars a way over done.

0Road-Race Vette

Brian,you being a respected knowledgeable person in the bussiness should also be able to understand that different customers want different things(aside from our personal taste).
Also, anyone can cut and buff a paint job but NOT everyone can get a car straight enough to make that flat paintjob look nice. That is why there are a lot more wavy cars out there than straight ones.(I am including all cars not just vettes)
It isnt how flat the paint is, it is how straight the car is that makes a flat paint job look good.

jcapps

As a business man I can quote my trade pretty effectively and having done a number of restorations as a hobby I can pretty much be spot on to what it takes to build a car. I also am not talking hack work, I have built ISCA cars like the one in my avatar

I have a friend of which we used to build cars together, he did it for a living and me as a hobby. We are equally skilled however he has opened his own restoration business a few years now. A businessman he is not. When I visit his shop I see his $65 hour employee conversing with visitors and others chatting about sports. I don't think this is proper. My crews know there is a time to talk and a time to work.

Fortunately for me, my customers see our progress on a daily basis and compliment me on my employees all the time. However those tucked away in a restoration shop are out of sight of the owner and the owner cannot see the progress on a daily basis.

I remember years ago I had some work done by a pro shop. He was a 2 man shop. He had five cars in his shop. Somehow he billed all 5 cars for an eight hour day. Don't ask how I know, I just know.

How can two men work 40 hrs in one day when they start at 8 am and leave at 4:30?

That is when I decided that if I can't do the majority of the work myself, I better get another hobby

aworks

Your right and thats my point. Most guys think thats how the cars should be. Even steel cars where not that great. Most owners are looking for that poker straight finish. All I'm saying is that is far from correct. A correct restoration should be just that. Not what we think it should be.

Ron Champe

I believe that far too many people do not understand what is involved to correctly build or restore a car as it relates to time, money, craftmanship and soooo important the theme of the build. I still see many folks going from shop to shop wanting a $15000.00 paint job for $4000.00.....it just doesn't work that way. Then, there is that one shop that makes soooo many promices for so little that the outcome is just pitiful. One must first establish a budget that is realistic and "attempt" to restore the car around that budget. Again, don't expect a high end restoration if you can't afford it.
When I had chosen a shop to perform their magic, I chose a small independent 2 man shop on reputation, craftsmanship, knowledge and a full expectation of what I wanted and the intended use of the car. I even inspected numerous high end cars that these 2 had built over the past few to several years and if they were easy to work with. Now, having said all this, I knew the end results were not going to be inexpensive. The shop worked on time and material and was the best decision. As they requested, every Friday was payday. Every Friday I would show up around 3 pm and they would take about 30 min. and explain to me what was completed and the total hours involved. With this payment schedule it was best for the both of us....no work...no pay. My car was completed on time and exceeded my expectations.