The Official 356Talk Forum

Hey everyone,

I am about to purchase parts to begin restoring my 62' S90. The car needs floor replacement and probably the jack spurs. With the floor pans the seat mounts should be replaced as well. So far so good, but even after doing my homework and reading a couple of articles and the particular section on this subject in Ron Roland's book, I'm not sure if I should replace any other parts.

Front and rear wheel well braces are in bad shape as well as the diagonal cross member. Other than that the car is in good shape. Any special recommendations of any other parts that should be replaced?

After doing some research, I've looked for the parts and due to the huge difference in prices I am a little confused. Would really appreciate it if someone could give me some feedback on the quality of each supplier.

Options I've seen:

Restoration Design has the least expensive parts by far! (deluxe floor kit for 450.00)
Stoddard is offering a good deal on a kit (floor pans, seat mounts, jack spurs and perimeter kit (750.00)
Torsten Waldorf / Simonsen 356 panels (These are sold on All Zim's store)
Sierra Madre (don't know where they source their panels, but are a bit expensive)
AASESales - Looks like they source from Restoration Design

I read a post where Mike from RD, Bruce from Stoddard and Al Zim all contributed. Apparently differences are not that big and both Stoddard and RD offer Galvaneal floor pans, so I guess that due to my limited budget I will be buying from RD. If anyone's got another piece of advice on this matter I will be very thankful!

Best,

Pablo

Outside rockers; last week I dropped of a C to Dave Miller to finish work on the body. The first thing he did was straight edge my rockers and found them to be flat ( Stoddard ), he thought zim might have the correct rocker with a bit of a curve. Just thought if you are buying you might ask the supplier.
Rusty

The reality is that there are big differences in the quality of the replacement panels out there. There is not one to go to source. I have to say that RD and Simonsen put in the biggest effort to make their panels as close to original as possible. They would be my first stop.

I am in the midst of doing a '56 coupe and my metal surgeon is using panels from Simonsen, RD and others. We select a different vendor for each panel based on who has the best fitting and most authentic piece.

Palbo, Have you met Juan Badel in Bogota. I've been following him on facebook.
Every car he builds is getting better.

https://petrolicious.com/articles/this- ... n-colombia

Guys thank you for the feedback.

As I only need floorpans and longitudinals, I'm pretty sure I'm going to go with RD due to their pricing.

Martin, yes actually Juan and I are good friends. He's pursuing a very interesting project right now! Follow him on instagram as well, his account is @estudiobadel or something like that.

Great guy, lives in a couple hours away from Bogota and does everything himself. Really looking forward to seeing the results of his latest project!

I'm in the middle of restoring a 64 coupe, starting a 61 roadster. My garage is full of parts that are not up to quality. What I've found you can get a great part from whoever and when you order the next phase part its crap. What we need is to compare specific parts thru the various vendors. It would save a restorer a lot of money and hassle. Often its not worth returning the part with freight and restocking fees. I now spend more time calling the vendors trying to find out where their part came from and so on, generally its not successful. The end result is you order it, pay 20-25% freight and see. I have hanging on my wall 2 sets of longitudinals that are 21 gauge, I found 18 guage instead. So it goes on and on. Like I said it would be nice to compare special pieces from various suppliers.