This is a very special car to me. My Dad restored this 55 Chevy Station wagon back when I was just a little kid. Obviously the car is ugly, and the body & paint work aren't that great, but both my Dad and I love this car. Its an inline 6/3 speed on the column, and the only aftermarket thing on the car is the overdrive unit on the back of the transmission. He keeps it at his beach house on the Delaware shore. Since we run a business together, he and I haven't been down to the beach together since I was a senior in high school. The thing is, he and I both love driving it, so when either of us head down on vacation it ends up being the daily driver for the week. Dad basically uses it as a truck, hauling lumber, brush, gas cans, etc... I use it as the family beach cruiser so it has sand all over the floor and beach chairs/umbrellas/boogie boards in it for the week. I've already told him the wagon is the one I want to inherit. I've got illusions of throwing a Holley single barrel tbi injection on the 6 cylinder, adding power brakes, and maybe some more modern wheels. Other than that, just leave it and keep cruising it.
This is the car I'm currently dealing with as an heirloom. 1963 Studebaker Avanti R1 (non supercharged) This car belonged to my Uncle (Dad's brother) for as long as I've been alive. When my Uncle was suffering with his cancer, I was the best match to be his bone marrow donor. Unfortunately his health got so bad so quickly, we were never able to do the procedure. He was literally laying in his death bed when he gifted this car to me. It had been sitting on jack stands in his garage for the last 30 years because he was re-doing the entire brake system, and life just got in the way and it never got done.
I managed to get the car back together enough to get it back to my house. I've done a brake upgrade to the front and got it running again (poorly). I had to build some brackets for the driver's seat so I can get my fat ass in there, and I threw a set of craigslist wheels on it. The problem is, this car leaks every fluid that it holds, and parts are non-existent. My Uncle told me the car would burn a quart of oil every thousand miles or so, and he admitted that the engine was "ragged out" and probably needed a rebuild. Right now I'm struggling with either trying to source engine parts to rebuild the stock 289 Studebaker engine, or just swap an LS in it and drive the wheels off of it.
I went to start it the other day to move it down to my pole barn and the starter wouldn't engage the flex plate, so I had to push it. Since I've been working on it, its been 1 step forward and 2 steps back. At this point, its going in "time out" for a while until I figure out what I want to do with it.