Route 66 Texas

I have at least 95% of the trim, including the hood spear with the flat emblem. Missing the original radio though. Except for the shot engine, and no brakes, the ride and handling are like new. I think the hood , trunk lid and doors were removed and primered off the car, that's the reason for the different colors of primer. I've never seen doors on a car this old close so effortlessly. So I think my options are -> 1. Full restoration, finding a console, a nailhead, and the original transmission. Based on looking around at whats available on the internet, this would be really tough. 2. A partially restored, rebuild the engine, probably with a little extra oomph, maybe/probably rebuild the transmission, re-do the interior as is with it's odd modifications, nice paint job, all trim reinstalled and where needed re-chromed. 3. Make it into a hot rod, a really built engine and transmission, raise it up a little in the back with some fat tires and paint it black and redo the interior black with bucket seats in the front, with most of the exterior trim re-chromed. Having a tough time with this. Its hard to start before you know where you want to end up.

Does anyone know what trim belongs on the top of the trunk lid? Not sure if I have that piece?

Thanks for all the information. I finally pulled back the carpet where the console would have been and found a piece of sheet metal riveted over the hole where the original shifter was. Someone surely went to a lot of trouble to make a change that I would never even have considered making. Now very torn on which way to go with this. Finding all the pieces to go back to original would be nearly impossible. I got some more pictures.

I will get some more pictures tomorrow. It has the twilight sentinel on the dash, though I have no idea if it works. It has power seats, and windows, that do work, and another pot control on the armrest, not sure about that. Also has the power trunk release. The body is very straight and solid, but the engine will need a rebuild. Barely made it home, also barely has brakes, very scary ride home. The paint, where it still exists, is blue even in the most obscure places, so it must have been a very well done re-paint.

It's interesting that the codes show a silver interior, even the vinyl on the door panels is blue. If it's been modified that much, it would be difficult to bring it back to original, so I may just have to make a mostly original hot rod out of it. Fortunately it came with all the trim, even the wheel centers.

Hi. New member, just joined today. Will be starting the restoration of my 1963 Riviera and I'm running into things that don't make sense. The car I got was from the son of the original owner, it's a local car from our small town in Texas. The engine isn't original, it's been replaced with a Buick 350. The weird thing is it has a front bench seat and a column shift, but that doesn't seem to be possible for this year. Also the shift pattern is P R N D L2 L1, which also doesn't seem possible. From what I can find those don't seem to have been available options, but I see no indication that it's not original? Here are some pictures.