Ruben Holguin kept his brushes...
Ruben Holguin kept his brushes busy, adding pinstriping all over the Olds.
Although Jared envisioned the Olds with satin paint, Dillard convinced him that the amount of bodywork that he was doing on the car deserved a shiny finish. Jared’s choice of blue is a Laidlaw Trucking fleet color. “Rotten” Rodney Bauman did the filler work, aligning the panels, and shot and buffed the paint.
The Olds rolls on P205/75R15 Diamondback radials from the Whitewall Candy Store in Orange, California. The 15x7 Wheel Vintiques steelies wear ’54 Olds wheel covers.
The interior is appointed with mid-’60s GM bucket seats in front and mid-’60s Cadillac seats in the back, upholstered by David Galindo at House of Trim in Paramount, California. The stock dash and instruments were kept and the original clock pod was reworked to house the gauge for the front airbags. Airbag switches were located in the original air vent lever locations. Instead of a stereo head unit, the Olds features iPod jacks in the center console, plus a Kenwood amp, Clarion equalizer/crossover, and front and rear Pioneer speakers.
Three years is not an unusually long build time for a custom like this, but the desire to drive the finished car requires some patience. “The first time I saw it put all back together, I wanted to slap some primer on it and drive it,” Jared says, “but I knew that there was a long way left to go.”
His patience paid off when he was able to enter his ’51 Olds in the Grand National Roadster Show in Pomona last January. It can be an intimidating feeling to see your own car on public display amid hundreds of the country’s best, and an exhilarating feeling to realize it belongs there.
The trunk floor was modified...
The trunk floor was modified to fit a ’65 Mustang tank. Like the ’55 Chevy radiator underhood, these tanks are cheap and readily available. The filler was moved to the side where an Astro van filler was installed behind the stock filler door.
The top cover of the ’63 Galaxie...
The top cover of the ’63 Galaxie console was modified for the Gennie shifter topped by a glass door knob. The restored steering wheel once steered a ’53 Bel Air.
George Hoy of Exeter Truck...
George Hoy of Exeter Truck & Auto Glass, cut the original windshield and all of the new tinted side glass, and installed all of it, including the original uncut rear window.