Troy, I've had a restoration shop in the Dallas area for the last 25 years and offer this advice--get references, references, references. Then when you talk to one of the referred people ask him who else was having their vehicle done at the shop at the same time his was being done. Remember the shop owner is only going to give you the happy ones and the other guy needs to be heard from also. We furnish anyone with a list of EVERY job we've done for the last 25 years. Restoration work is impossible to give a rock firm quote on but we always tell people they are 100% welcome to be in the shop whenever their ride is being worked on, and can put some sweat equity into it if desired. Examples of unknowns are foremost rust, you just don't know till it's all stripped or maybe something like king pins, some you can almost push out with your finger and others you end up having to pull the axle out, strip it, put it in the press, reassemble it, bleed the brakes, etc. One takes half an hour and the other takes half a day. We meet this situation by having each person working on a project put his name, date, hours worked, total hours, and job done on the work sheet with each vehicle. If there is a discrepency between hours charged and work done there better be a good explanation or he doesn't have to worry about the customer climbing his [censored], my footprints will already be there. Our pay policy is the customer pays zero, nil, nothing until the work is completed. We must do it right because we have a 2 1/2 year waiting list to get into the shop. Good luck and remember, if anything seems fishy about time or charges, don't give it a chance to happen a second time because it will. Evan
