Quote: OK, i took this approach with my Challenger.
if the NOS part was obscenely expensive, i used repo parts.
if it's visible and you can noticeably tell the difference between the two, I went with NOS
i looked for a lot of original parts, cleaned them up and they looked and are correct.
i wanted to drive my car, so ALL NOS parts would be a waste of money for me.
i only had two frivolous NOS buys so far
NOS left fender - $700 NOS 14" trim rings - $600
as for the judging thing, i can give a rats a** what people think and say about my car. it's mine and not theirs. if they have a negative comment then go build you own. judges can keep all the trophies, I'm out to meet people and have a good time!
That's great, everyone should enjoy the hobby and thier cars to meet thier personal level of satisfaction.
That being said, if you bring your car to be judged (meaning that nobody is "judging" your car unless you asked for it to be judged), don't blame the judges for pointing out things that are incorrect due to the personal choices you made in restoring your car.
Bluestar, I agree with you, cars that have correct parts (NOS production line correct parts, properly restored original, etc.) should recieve higher scores than those that have the same parts replaced with a reproduction or incorrectly restored original parts.
The ICCA OE Gold judging body is developing a system which leaves room for both types of cars, those restored with a high number of reproduction parts, and those which have a higher number of original/NOS parts used in thier restoration. I won't go into depth here because detailed perameters have not been set in stone yet. Basically what is done is that there are colors assigned to the points.
For example a black point would be for an original componant, and a red point is assigned to a reproduction componant.
At the bottom of the score sheet the black and red points are totalled seperately then combined for a total score, a car using a high number of correct original parts might have a total of 96 percentage points (most cars have 2-3,000 total points possible) which would make the car an "OE Gold" scoring car. Since most of it's componants are originals, most of that 96% (say 80%) would be "black" points, and the remaining (16%) would be red. Where as the car using more reproduction parts might have the same 96% OE Gold score but that score would have a larger number of "red" points, say 56% red and 40% black.
In the above scenario a hobbiest could still build a car to an "OE Gold" level, but do so affordably using less expensive/available parts. This system is also fair to the other person who went the all out and spent the time and money to do his car using as much NOS as possible because the ICCA keeps permanant records of how each car scores. The higher "black" point cars will always be recognized as being more historically correct.
Two scenarios for the above owners:
Reproduction parts user: "I have a car that scored 96% OE Gold in ICCA show judging, it's a 56% black point car"
OEM parts user: "I have a car that score 96% OE Gold in ICCA show judging, It's an 80% black point car"
Both people have bragging rights to an OE Gold car and a person considering which car to use as a reference restoration model would then have a clear understanding of which car really was more accurate to what rolled off the assembly line when doing his own car. Personally I see it as a win/win for all involved.
