Following last week's post on the eBay auction of a replica 1963 Corvette Grand Sport, the mail came flooding in. Actually, it was just one really good e-mail message, but it flooded our inbox with the extent of its coolness. It brought to our attention one of the best restoration jobs we've seen in a while.
Racing Icons, a high-end resto shop, chronicled its restoration of an original Grand Sport Corvette, from aging superstar to reworked legend. Car owner, Jim Jaeger had wanted to race his original Corvette Grand Sport on the vintage circuit, but it just wasn't up to hauling its 40-year-old self back out to the track. Jaeger decided to rebuild GS to nearly original racing specs, choosing the #002 version, owned by racer George Wintersteen in the mid-1960s, as the most historically significant. Moreover, a duplicate body was built for racing to preserve the integrity of the original fiberglass. (For the sake of history, one other change was made. Wintersteen and his crew had swapped out the original aluminum small block motor, with its symmetrical rows of Weber carbs, and installed a 427ci rat racing motor with a single Hollywood carb. Racing Icons built a new motor to 1964 pre-Wintersteen specs.) The result is spectacular. We spent hours pouring over every detail of the job, which was clearly the work of masters of the art. [Thanks a million to Peter K. for the tip!]
The Restoration of Corvette Grand Sport #002 [Racing Icons]
Related:
1963 Corvette Grand Sport Replica for Sale on eBay [internal]