We are currently working on a 55 Chevy Bel Air four door sedan. My client wanted to put a newer look on the old sedan and make it into a road trip car with a few creature comforts. “Gentleman's touring sedan” is the theme.

We started by completely disassembling the car down to the last nut & bolt. Then every part was media blasted to bare metal. There was a lot of rust. We replaced the whole floor including the trunk, all body braces, inner and outer rocker panels, lower quarter panels and dog leg panels with new parts from Cars Inc.

The car is getting a smoother look. We got rid of the exterior trim, removed the rain gutters and shaved the door handles. The original bumper parts were stripped of chrome and welded into custom one piece bumpers to be replated. All the suspension parts were completely replaced and the car was lowered 2 inches.

Its gotta have some balls. We are replacing the whole drive train starting with a new 600HP blown small block, TCI 700R4 Trans, Ford 9inch rear-end and 4-wheel power disk brakes. It's a touring car so power rack and pinion steering by Flaming River and air conditioning by Vintage Air will also be going in.

The finished car will be black with two tone tan leather interior. Bucket seats, floor shift, center counsel, after market gauges, new stereo with satellite navigation and DVD player are also planned. “What, no refrigerator in the trunk?” Yeah we got one of those too. “Can you get a chrome refrigerator?” Yeah Tom, I'm working on it.

Here are a few pictures of what we started with. These pictures will be updated soon.