Potential purchase opinions needed

I am looking for some opinions on a 1955 Buick I am thinking about purchasing. Its a 1955 Buick Special 4 door. 264 Nailhead and Dynaflow.

The Good: Frame and body seem very solid, heads rebuilt, trans rebuilt, runs drives. All trim is available.

The Bad: All chrome has been painted silver, interior is trashed, wiring is sketchy. Poorly painted flat black.

Seller is asking $2500 and I'm sure I could get it for less. What would you do? I am considering buying it... Usually cars this age are heavily rotted in this area.

 

If you're good with a 4-door, then the other stuff doesn't sound too terribly difficult to fix up.

 

Doesn't sound bad. painted over chrome can be cleaned up.

 

I want a 4-door to haul the family around. I know nothing about the nailhead though... makes me a bit nervous.

 

The items that need to be addressed are relatively inexpensive (excluding paint). Go for it!

 

pic's would really help'

 

I know nothing about them either. Have you test-driven it? You might want to start a new thread asking about nailheads if someone doesn't answer in this thread.

By "interior is thrashed" I ***ume the soft parts (seats, door panels, damn carpet) are thrashed, not the hard parts (dash, what else?).

 

Yes seat and door panels are trashed. Has cracked door gl*** too. The hard parts seemed ok. I cant post pictures from work but will tonight when I get home.

 

Painted over chrome would kill it for me. I would ***ume that if he painted over it, it looked like **** to begin with. And all of the chrome on that car is going to be very expensive to rechrome or replace. Chrome is one of the big deciding factors in project cars that I buy, is it useable or can it be replaced easily. I hate painted trim.

Personally, a 4 door with painted chrome, bad paint, a trashed interior, and cracked side gl*** is not worth $2500 to me. I know you can get it for less, but personally for me it would have to be a lot less.

If most of the chrome was decent/useable I might be singing a different tune.

 

Check it out closely. But from what you are saying it sounds good. Think of it. If a person would paint the Chrome Silver. What else did he do? Look Close. But again you are talking about a Running and Driving Car. Its a good start for 2500 or so

 

I am ***uming the same and since it's a Buick used chrome will be much harder to find. I was thinking about abandoning the purchase all together... but I can't seem to get it out of my head for some reason. I had $1800 in mind when I went to see it last night and if I could get it for that I might do it.

On the other hand I've got a lot of other project going on so maybe I'll wait and find something a bit more presentable.

 

You make some good points here. To tell the truth though, It is hard to find any kind of good running and driving car for $2500 today. I say test drive that Buick and if runs out ok, buy it. Seems like a '55 Buick with a nailhead would be easier for me to trust than a $2500 Asian POS . At least I could work on the Buick if it broke.

 

It'd cost a FORTUNE to do all the chrome on that Buick, so unless you can live with trim that looks like ****, it sounds like a p***. Add up what it'd cost to make YOU happy with the way it looks, if that's more than you can buy a decent car that doesn't need EVERYTHING, p*** and shop for one that is done. Somebody posted a '58 Ford 4dr sedan that could have bought for 8500 a while back, certainly that's less than chrome, paint, interior would cost on a 2500 Buick, so shop around.

That's my free advice for the day!

Brian

 

Post some pics if you can. Its' tough to find a decent car for $2500 now days.

You have to like it, you have to drive it, you have to fix it, you have to put your money into it & you have to make the decision..

 

Here are some pictures:

 

looks clean enough.
if the chrome trim work is stainless, maybe it can be stripped and polished?
if its chrome and ****py, you would think it could be seen through the paint, via peeling edges of chrome that may have been sanded and feathered in. Its hard to get the "edge" of chrome feathered, i'm saying this so maybe you could look at it closely and tell the real condition of it. maybe it was all sandblasted naked and painted.
either way, the car looks ok, especially if its 1800, instead of 2.5k.
I'd get it, take all the trim and go a powdecoater and have em do it in the powdered chrome and then powdered clear, it would look like polished stainless, not as bright as true chrome, but very clean and nice and ***loads cheaper than a chrome shop. It all depends on the level of restore or redo you want in the end.
the bumpers painted the same way, you would think it would be easy to see if the chrome was peeling or was stripped to bare metal and done semi correctly or if its **** under the paint.