07/24/2026
This week's What are you workin' on? comes from Chaz in Ford City, PA!
Chaz says, "As a kid in the 1970's, I grew up surrounded by cool cars. A guy in my neighborhood had a 71 or 72 Riviera and man I thought it was the coolest! Different than everything else and it sounded tough. One day I was driving through a small town and found this 1972 Riviera in an abandoned car wash. I went home and told my wife what I found; she had no idea what I was talking about. Every time we drove by, I pointed it out and said I would love to have it. One day there was a for sale sign taped to the bumper.
I stopped to look at it. It had been off the road since 1989 and was FILTHY! There were lots of dead mice and the driver’s side window had been down for a long time. Underneath, the car looked pretty good except for the trunk, and there were no keys. I made a deal and had it flat-bedded home. My experience in working on cars before this was limited to general maintenance and minimal body work.
I got to work gutting the interior and found that the only thing holding the floors together were about 10 layers of undercoating. Once I got into the trunk via 1/2-inch drill bit, I found out the trunk had been patched with roofing shingles and more roofing tar than I care to talk about. I bought some steel and got to work making floor pans. It was a learning experience for sure.
The trunk was rusted to the point that the body mounts were unsavable, so I went back to the metal supplier and bought some 1x3 14Ga square tubing and made a new subframe to attach the body to the frame with new mounts. I did all this work with a measuring tape, speed square, grinder, and 110v MIG welder. I probably have about 10 pounds of MIG wire in it.
The floors and the trunk are done, I installed new fuel lines front to back, and it is running on its own fuel source. I've been working to bring the old paint back to get some shine and it’s coming along pretty good. The next steps are to completely overhaul the brakes and install the interior. This is going to be a fun car to go to car cruises and take my wife for ice cream!"
