Quite the bug collector.

It would be a bad day to be impaled on that at any speed.

Thanks to ghostbusters I can recognize this as a cadillac grille if just blinked in front of it.

Thanks to you, I know what movie I'll be throwing in the video player tonight!

I know someone who restored one of these in the same colour -- Dusk Rose. She told me that just replating all of the chrome cost well over $20,000.

I can believe it. It’s a hugely expensive process these days. I have to wonder how it compares to the cost the auto makers incurred back in the heyday of chrome parts.

That's an interesting question, but there's no real comparison. Please forgive me my usual car nerd musings, but, it would have cost much less for an industrial plating company to provide GM (the world's biggest corporation when this car was built) with all the shiny bits for the 100,000-plus Cadillacs that GM built in 1959 than it costs for a specialized company to entirely replate just one of them now.

Still, that's an interesting thought. Hope you don't mind my usual car nerd postings! ;)

There wasnt just chrome, but stainless steel trim, as well.

That's very true, especially if the car's an Eldorado or a Sixty Special. I once helped another friend dismantle a 1958 60 Special, and I was amazed by the complexity that went into all of the chrome and stainless brightwork. Even the rear bumper was made from multiple pieces.

The front bumper on the 57 and 58 Eldorado Brougham was polished cast aluminum because it was so massive. Steel would have bee too heavy. My 62 Sixty Special had a fair amount of stainless, as well, but some pot metal that was chromed. Still, things like the upper and lower fin moldings were stainless, as were the tail light trim

A Followup Car Nerd post, if I may...

*sorry, Good Bear, but you've inspired me with this one, which I'm sure doesn't surprise you*

Like I mentioned to sunkawaken further along in this thread, I once helped a friend dismantle a 1958 Fleetwood that he restored over four years and at a cost of well over $70,000, and that was about 20 years ago. It would cost at least twice that to restore it today.

American luxury cars from the late 1950s are among the most difficult, time consuming and expensive cars to authentically restore. Only something like a Duesenberg SJ or a classic Ferrari are in the same league, and they're worth a lot more money when they're done!

As we've observed, these cars are covered in chrome and stainless steel. This was the apex of the Chrome Epoch! That alone is pricy.

These are also BIG cars with tailfins and lots of sculpting in the design. A quality paint job on a car like this requires a lot of prep time (and paint) to do it right.

And, here's the hidden factor...
The late 50s also saw a proliferation of fancy power accessories; windows, locks, seats, antenna, trunklid; along with things like cruise control, memory seats, headlight dimmers, and so on. That stuff takes FOREVER to fix, and replacement parts are hard (and expensive) to find.
Someone who's restoring, say, an early Mustang, a British sports car, a '55 Chevy or a Model A Ford doesn't have to deal with all the weird science that these cars have.

Which brings me to my final point; compared to the aforementioned classic cars, 1950s American luxury cars are rare. That means that companies who make reproduction parts for classic cars haven't bothered making repro parts for them; you'll have to scrounge through the existing cars to get what you need for yours.
Do the math: does it make dollars and sense to go to the trouble and cost of tooling up parts for a car when only a few thousand of them were made?

Moral Of The Story: Restore that late 1950s land yacht because you love the car. Trust me: it's a big job, and you'll sink a lot more $$ into the car than you'll ever sell it for.

Didja hear about the ice cube tray that married the cheese grater? Their kids went to work for GM...

It's True! It was at GM where they met the offspring of the fishbowl and the rocket ship. Together, they created cars like this.

I'm joking: I believe that Bill Mitchell, Harley Earl's successor as head of GM's styling department, was the main culprit behind the '59 Cadillac.

Two doors or 4? Caddy was insane... those grilles come apart completely. I had to straighten my 1962 60 Special grille. You have no idea how many rivets and pieces there are....