Well this has been a driver for me for a couple of years. I put almost 12k miles on it in 1.5 years. It was time to fix it. Not a full blown show car, but much better than I ever expected. The painters did a great job! By the way, if I was good at photoshop I would remove that big piece of grass LOL.
The engine is a 1970 rebuilt bottom end with a small TA cam topped of with a set of mildly ported set of 70 heads, Performer and Osborne Q-Jet. Pretty strong for a boat.:3gears:
Interior is about 70% original. A few panels on the seats have been replaced. Carpet is new. I replaced the dash pad with a non cracked one. I custom mounted gauges in the console, but kept a non-cut one for the future. I also have a dash bezel for the future since I cut the original for a modern radio. I have to have my tunes.
I found this car in NC about 3 years back. It had spent much of the last 10 years in a barn. The owner was an old man who bought it in 1972. He started trying to get it running again with help from his son. The father died before the car was running. The son lost some interest but tried to do a little work on it. He then came down with throat cancer. When I met the man he could no longer talk. His wife and him sold it to me for $1000. The man wanted me to bring the car back to his house when I finished restoring it. But, he died 3 months after I bought it at the age of 55. I really appreciated getting a 2 owner car with less than 70k miles on it for a grand and hate I couldn't let him see it like it is now. So, I will let my fellow V8'ers see it.
Looks great John! I like the absence of wheelwell mouldings, trim and rocker mouldings. The gauge placement in the console is a new one, are they hard to read while driving though?
Hey Rob, It still has wheel mouldings. They are hard to see in the pic. I removed the rocker trim and decided to leave it off. As for the gauges. I kept looking for a good place for them without doing major damage. So, I had an extra center piece for the console and it was a very easy cut. 2 1/8" gauges work great in there. They are not hard to see. You do have to take your eyes off of the road, but you have to do that with all gauges. Thanks for the compliments.
Something about that color on that body style does it for me...I don't think that it would look good on anything other than a Riv or maybe a 66-67 GS..Thats a sharp car!!!!
John, Great looking car. Nice personal touches you've added. I'm with you Jim. I've taken quite a shine to them recently. As soon as I make some room in my stable I'll get serious about looking.
I'm taking it to the beach in a few days. Can't drive it since the wife hates it not having shoulder belts in the back for my boy, so I am hauling it. Anything going on at Myrtle Beach around the 4th? What's the chances of someone from that area reading this thread??
The ROA was a little let down. I worked on this Riv this spring just to have it ready for the show and didn't get to bring it. Once we got their with the first load of cars, we were told they probably wouldn't have room for anymore cars. So, I didn't go back for mine or the other 2. The hotel was remodeling and didn't have much parking. They didn't even want the ROA to block off the back parking lot for the show. They threatened Mr. Knott with the police if he blocked the parking lot. He did block it!:Brow: Some nice cars there. The Blackhawk, Silverarrow 3 and the vert. pace Riv twin turbo made it worth the drive. We did win our class with 2 cars too. I may run this baby down a track. It ran a 15.2 on a Gtech before so I hope it will run low 14's now.:3gears:
All those boattail pics being posted here are doing nothing to help me stay the course with A bodies.:laugh: :laugh: Nice looking Riv John.:TU: I know of a 71-73Riv GS (I think) that's been sitting for some time. I keep looking it over while driving by every week or so. One of these days, I'll have to check it out.
Nice Car! Thanks for the inspiration. I'm trying to get my 72 on the road but it's taking soooo long. Sigh... It helps to see yours turn out so well, and I'll never question the lines of a boattail from some angles again. The monochrome and lightly modified look works so well. May I ask what TA cam you have? I'd love to hear what time you rip off once you get it on the track. I've got a new TA284-88H and I'm hoping my re-build nets me a decent performer.
Although, I guess it's not really monochrome... the pics kinda make it seem that way from the front 3/4 view.
