Update 1
January 15 2000
Here is the first update, I have found a shop to do the paint and body
work on the car. The Shop is Carrera's auto body in Healdsburg. It was
surprising to me how much trouble it was just finding a shop to work on
the Nova. most of the body shops around here are just doing collision work
paid for by insurance companies, and have no interest in restoration work
or full paint jobs. But I am happy with this place, they seem to be a good
shop and know what they are doing. And they seem enthusiastic about this
project too.
The car is going to be completely stripped of all old paint, rust all
repaired, and repainted. I have decided that it will be Orange with a White
roof, just like the one in the 76 Nova brochure, shown on the first page.
Thanks to Jeff Moore, who supplied the chrome trim for the quarter panels
to help with the two tone finish.
The first part of the job was to find a better right front fender and
deck lid than what was on the car, as you can see from the photos. The
fender and deck lid on the car were too badly rusted to be re used. I have
a deck lid from a Buick Skylark, which was not much trouble to find, and
a fender from a Nova Concours, which took three weeks and trips to a half
dozen junkyards before I found a good one. Surprising how tough it was
to just find a fender, and even the one I selected is going to need a little
bit of work before it goes on the car. As you can see, Carrera's has gotten
started with the disassembly already. By the way, these photos are the
first ones from my new digital camera. I am very happy with the quality
that I am getting, just compare with the first two photos above (from my
regular camera and scanner) to see what I mean.
January 28 2000 Update
I have picked out some wheels for the car. I like these wheels because
they bear some family resemblance to the original wheels, but they are
15 inch instead of 14. This will hopefully allow me to get more rubber
on the ground, with shorter tire sidewalls for improved handling. I need
to do some experimenting to find the best tire size, I will use 245/50R15
tires if they will fit. If not then probably 215/60R15. These will be about
the same overall diameter as the stock tires.
These wheels were a little tough to locate, since they were only used
on one model and year, the 87 Camaro. I will need to do something about
the center caps, since they still say Camaro now.
In other news, the interior is stripped out of the car, and the seats
are all in the upholstery shop. The shop is Minaglia's, in Healdsburg.
There are no reproduction seat covers available for this year of Nova,
so I am having the originals used as a pattern for the new covers. The
original vinyl pattern is called Rattan, and is hard to find. SMS auto
fabrics in Oregon has it available though. If you need some hard to find
vinyl or cloth, give them a call at: (503) 234-1175.