New to the club
 

Hi everyone. I have long wanted to get a Chevelle and finally my time has come this week. I am picking up my 1972 Malibu this coming weekend and the resto project can begin. Managed to find a running car that has not been worked before, all numbers matching. It has rust in all the usual places and is a vinyl top car (not sure i'm going to leave it as one).

Welcome to the site, post some pictures when you get it home. Vinyl top car can mean a lot of rust under it. Hard to find a number matching car anymore that not a fortune to buy. Couple of others have 72 chevelles on here so you are right at home here.

Welcome from Ga ,tell us a little about yourself and your plans for your car and show us some pics .

Welcome to the site! As the others have stated, lets see it..... we love pictures!

Welcome to the site and congrats on the new car.

Welcome V. My name is Nancy and I have a 1972 Malibu. I too had a vinyl top at one time. Unfortunately like Ray said, I had a lot of rust under it. I ultimately replaced the whole roof. I look forward to hearing all about your Malibu.

Thanks for the words of welcome. I live in Richmond Va and I am supposed to pick the Chevelle up Thursday night, provided we don't get buried in snow tomorrow. I'll get some pictures up this weekend. I plan to keep it as a driveable car as much as I can. As this is my first one i'm going to take my time and try to break a big job into little parts. My end goal is not really to make this a show car but something to be driven and enjoyed. I plan on it being a grandfather, father, son project with my dad and my 10 year old.

Well we got buried with snow and ice so I couldn't pick up the car last night. Tomorrow is the day, the previous owner is going to drop it off at work for me. I should have some pictures to share very soon.

We have had our share of snow too ,looking forward to pics .Do you plan to change anything on it or leave it as is ?

Keeping my fingers crossed that you get your car soon.

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I think I have all the lights working except the dome light, going to have to replace it anyway. No radio but that's what the flowmasters are for anyway.

Going to tackle an oil leak next so I can put off the motor rebuild for a little while then upgrade the brakes.

Looks like you are off to a good start. Congrats

I like it ,need more pics though . It looks pretty solid ,looking forward to seeing more.

That's a pretty good starting point! What are your plans with the car?

Going to start with safety improvements, disc brakes all around is the first major upgrade. Going to pull the 350 but havnt decided if i'm going to rebuild and leave it numbers matching or if I am going to put a new crate engine in.

My plan is to make this into a car I can drive and enjoy, not really looking for a show car but something I can enjoy. I figure a newer motor with tighter tolerances might be more reliable.

I'm going to ditch the vinyl top and put in an all new interior i'm thinking of pulling the bench front seat and switching to buckets. I'm going to leave it as a Malibu.

I went to VA Tech so will probably paint it Chicago Maroon with some orange pin stripes, best I can tell the car was originally green, or white, or maybe tan.

May be a few suprises under that vinyl top. Keep the pictures coming of your progress

I agree with Ray. You have a great starting point but sometimes the vinyl top holds many surprises. I hope it is better than what I found underneath mine.

There is no doubt some rust under the top. I hope its not bad enough that I have to replace the roof. It feels solid enough but won't know until its gone.

Working on safety upgrades first, car had been neglected so the lights were almost all non-functional. Few bulbs and a little wiring and most everything is good to go. Headlights went out on me on a test run, wiggled some wires and got them back on so that is my next challenge.

If you decide on a crate motor ,check out JEGS from time to time they have sales on them. I just recently bought a 260 HP crate motor for $1207 shipped to my door from there and it will move my 72 truck really well.

Old wiring can be a pain, Be careful it's not drawing to many amps. If you start to blow fuses you might have a problem. Alot of the time the fuse box connections get rusty causing some of the problem. If the circuit draws to many amps, then the wires start to melt and you will have a fire.

Check the data plate under the hood on top of the firewall for the original color. I'm working on a four wheel power disc brake conversion on my 70. It's all going good so far, the right stuff detailing kit is very nice from what I'm experiencing.

Good luck and have fun! Nice looking car.

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Nice to have you here welcome!