I purchased my ’53 almost 2 decades ago as a father and son project. It was someone else’s project that was in rough shape – in my opinion the worst way to start a restoration project. A few weeks into it my son lost interest. A few months later so did I. Fortunately I never sold it; just put it away in the back of the warehouse.
Then I stumbled on the ’65. It was drivable, but in rough shape. My wife agreed to the project as long as it wasn’t another complete restoration. It was ten long months off the road. And then we were driving it before the bed was done.
Once it was almost finished and the bug had taken hold I announced I was going to finish the ’53. Almost a year later and while I can see the finish line, it’s still a long ways off. Once it’s done I have the next project sitting in the driveway (a ’66) that we are driving.
There are pro’s and con’s to buy parts way in advance. The Hurst shifter is now pushed to the back of a shelf and we purchased a new Lokar instead. I have several duplicate and triplicate parts because I can never remember having purchased them before. (Sometime I think they just multiply by themselves when the lights are off.)
My advice would be to restore while you drive, unless you have multiples….
