Looked at a 1965 Pontiac GTO that cost $210,000 to restore

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I dropped by Clay's shop, my friend that does high end restorations, yesterday. 

He got a call from a guy in Florida about issues he was having with a recently restored California rust free one owner low mile 1965 GTO 389, 4 speed, 3-2-V. Even has AC. 

The owner bought the car of Ebay several years ago out of California, never painted, totally rust free, one owner in great shape for I think $41,000. He then took to a shop in Greenville, S.C. for a full ground up restoration. This shop does work right there with what Clay does except for one thing. They do not build the drive trains they farm that out. 

The owner of the car is an oil millionaire and I think he said he had 14 homes in various areas of the U.S.. The beach front home in Florida he paid $6,000,000 to have it recently built is where the GTO lives. So this guy has way too much money for sure. 

He had a GTO when he was young, now in his 70's, and was disappointed with the performance of the car after he got it to Florida for his driver car there. He shipped in enclosed from Florida to North Carolina for Clay to test drive it, lol. I got there just as he was pulling the car back in. 

When the guys that built the 389 went through it, since owner wanted it to be a hot rod, they bored and stroked it to I think 451 C.I.. He did not want a cam with a rough idle so it stayed close to stock. 

Clay said the engine did pretty good until it hit 4,000 rpm and then it fell on it's face. Runs out of gas and air since they did not put in bigger cam, fuel lines, or do any head work. 

Clay is to the point on the Pontiac engines that he specs his own cams and has them custom ground in South Carolina. His GTO will do over 160 in 1/4 mile. 

The owner has lots of exotic cars and obviously has way too much money. So I guess Clay is going to tear down this fresh built car and do the engine over again.

It is a beautiful car and the work looks to be top notch for sure. No panels had to be replaced with no rust.

About the only fault I saw on the car was that the trim around windows and roof rail was not restored perfect had some ripples. 













































 
Wow, 

you can eat from that engine bay! Thank you for the photos. What a beautiful car! Well done concerning the overall view. Too bad they got the engine not right from the start! It will be a bummer to unbolt all that beautiful engine compartment again...

 
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