A TENACIOUS mechanic has converted a $400 rust bucket into America's best custom car. JF Launier, 39, spent 22,000 hours and $300,000 pimping out a 1964 Buick Riveria - even remortgaging his parents' house as well as his own to finance the project. But the risk paid off when the finished article - named Rivision - won the Ridler award for America’s most creative and innovative custom car at the 2014 Detroit Autorama. Its value has also jumped with Mr Launier estimating it to be worth at least $1.65m in man-hours alone. Mr Launier runs JF Kustoms in Osoyoos, British Columbia, Canada.
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MotorTranscript
00:00The car was built over a course of six years, it took 22,000 man hours to build it, just
00:06a lot of blood, sweat and tears.
00:11This fully customised Buick Riviera has been a labour of love for Canadian J.F. Nornier.
00:17He's been renovating vehicles since the age of 13, but in 2014 this Buick finally earned
00:23him the coveted Riddler Award for America's most creative and innovative custom car at
00:28the Detroit Autorama.
00:32The project began with a 1964 Riviera, bought from a junkyard for just $400.
00:39People always ask me why a 64 Riviera, well the long and the short of it is, when I was
00:4321 years old I had a 64 Riviera, I sold it to start my first business and I thought to
00:48myself, I'm going to have another one of those cars one day, I didn't really know I was going
00:52to take it this far.
00:54What followed were countless modifications to the original Buick body.
01:00The 1971 Riviera roof, with its unique shape and sloped rear window, was fitted to the
01:071964 chassis.
01:09The car was shortened by removing sheet metal from behind the doors and rear wheel openings.
01:14The front wheel openings were moved forward to make space for a 6.2 litre Chevrolet V8
01:20engine, which provides 784 horsepower.
01:24JF estimates that he spent $300,000 on the project in total.
01:29The car was built over a course of six years, it took 22,000 man hours to build it.
01:35It was everything I could afford, it was my parents' house got remortgaged, my house got
01:39remortgaged.
01:40The math's pretty simple, it's 22,000 hours, $75 an hour shop rate, you're looking at a
01:47million and a half just in hours.
01:50JF named the finished car Revision, and in 2014 he proved that one man's trash is another
01:56man's treasure by winning the Riddler Award.
02:00But despite his success, JF warns that budding car customisers shouldn't take such projects
02:06lightly.
02:07It was ups and downs, it was always a battle to try to get enough money to buy parts, to
02:11find enough time in the week to balance family, business and a project of this magnitude.
02:18I always felt like giving up, there wasn't a day where I didn't feel like it was too
02:21much, we had taken on too much and we had just gone too far with it.
02:25Be very prepared, don't just build your first car and think it's going to win, this is our
02:30fourth attempt at it.
02:32You got to be prepared, you got to be prepared to give up everything for a long, long time.
02:37There's no doubt though, that he's proud of turning a rust bucket into his most prized
02:41possession.
02:43There are people that love it, there are people that hate it, there's kind of nobody in the
02:46middle.
02:48This car is what I wanted in a race car, this car is what I wanted in a show car and it's
02:53beyond that on all aspects.
02:55I have drag raced the car, I have road raced the car, I have won the biggest award in the
02:59world, those three have never been put together and I drive my kids to school in it and take
03:04the kids for ice cream.