Being a car guy I of course like automobile restoration programs, some I like more than others, by far my favorite is Bitchin Rides with Dave Kindig . I like this show for several reasons 1. cool designs usually not to far over the top I like his approach to just improving on the factory look, you know bringing in the bumpers, tweeking the grills but staying true to the original concepts, and in general cleaning things up and not straying to far from the factory look. 2. most of the time the show does not deal with a deadline if they do the don't make the show about meeting a deadline. 3. a team of true craftsman and fabricators that seam to be able to fabricate or reproduce anything .
What I don't like about the show is the fact that in a million years I could never afford one of his restorations !! this brings me to my second point I would be afraid to drive one of his vehicles after complete !! a stone chip, a hard water spot, any blemish to the perfection he created would drive me to the rubber room !!! This is why I chose a nice driver quality Olds. mechanically sound astatically pleasing but not a trailer queen I drive her and I believe she enjoys it !!
Now all this being said I do believe I sold the Olds today (deal still pending ) so I will no longer be able to play Jay Leno !! boy I wish I could keep the 56 and the 34
Whats your favorite TV restoration show ? hope everyone is exercising their Oldsmobile's
P/S if anybody wants to contribute to the let Dave Kindig restore Solly's car fund you can P.M. me ( just kidding of course )

 

I like most of Kindig's and Martin Brothers builds. They each have a few i don't care for. Strope is my favorite, by far.
The salt has started flying, so the Olds is put away until the April rains come wash it away.
I did a little road trip in October- Route 66, Sick 66, Vegas, Bonneville, and Coast to Coast, 7500mi in 22 days.

 

Yes, Bitchin Rides is a refreshing change from the days of American Hotrod or American Chopper, where each show featured a strung out crew and screaming matches between everyone. If you have not seen Kendig's recent ridler-winning corvette-ish build you need to check it out. One of my favorite quotes from that show came from an episode where they were not able to make a deadline for one of the builds. Dave's response was something like: "Well you can't get too worked up, becuase you have to remember that in the end we're building stuff that is extremely expensive that no one really needs."

 

Don't really like the restomod shows or the cars they feature. I'd rather watch Roadkill.

 

I'll watch the restoration shows if they're on, but I enjoy Roadkill more.

 

To be honest, I have not watched a restoration or car based show in years. If I want to see car stuff, I just go out in the garage and piddle, there is always a small project that can be done on the car.

 

Steve Strope and Dave Kindig are a class above the rest right there with Leno. NO BS DRAMA!
Guilds Garage is decent. So is Fantom Works though Dan Short can have a bit of drama, mostly for fun.
Freiburger Finnegan are fun to watch as they just don't give two ***** as long as it runs.
Derek Bieri and Vice Grip garage is fun to watch.

 

I like to watch road worthy rescues, the guy has a funny way of words.

 

Whatever happened to Garage Squad, did they run out of material? They should come back with Danica Patrick as the customary cute girl, then she can stop doing those Endurance commercials.

 

I don’t watch much TV (and I have a TV in the shop). But I have watched Kindig’s show before, and have been impressed. Enough so that I’ve been to his shop on numerous occasions when traveling to Salt Lake City for my work. There is always something cool in the showroom and shop tours are available. He seemed like a very approachable/pleasant guy, although I didn’t harass him. Last time I went in late October, the Twelve Corvette was under a cover in the showroom getting ready for SEMA. You can see up close details of his bumper/trim shaving and tucking in some of these photos.

 

Fantom Works was my favorite. A little drama, but not bad. Somewhat irascible guy with strong character and a loyal dog. Liked the way they laid out the issues, showed discussions and most of all? Discussed money involved. I used to yell at the tv with other shows that routinely pass by a front to back ‘upgrade,” say EFI, intake, tank, lines wiring, labor, etc, install & programming that could be $10k, on top of everything else being done, without the blink of an eye or a discussion of a single dollar.

I thoroughly enjoy Frieburger, Finnegan and gang for learning & entertainment. They always showed the good, bad & ugly, talked money and had fun. Mostly. I really like their dyno testing show.

I liked the slightly weird guy in Canada with the Windmill on the shop, too.

In a remotely related genre, the info provided by Project Farm is YouTube gold.

Lastly, there is the fairly young guy in Texas doing over the top pickup builds that always impress me with the scope of fabrication. Not exactly in my lane, but I was always impressed & interested.

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I'll watch The Guild because he's local to me here and I see some of his stuff at local shows. The Happy Hippie lives south of me about eight miles and I've been there for a car show and Dave Granger spends a lot of time at this location for his show. It's funny when you run into one of Dave's employees at a car show and because they have been on a TV show they walk around as if they are famous and try and show off. I smile and walk away to another car.
I did watch Fantom Works for a while and did enjoy how he had everything you could possibly need to do a car or even a horse drawn wagon. To bad the network didn't see the end game with his show rather then trying to get him to become a drama queen about people, cars and life.
Dave Kindig seems to keep his show in prospective and when I talked with him at a show he understands that the customer is the end product and you have to keep them happy.
Eventually these shows become about TV air time and loose prospective and start the drama crap or start flipping cars out the door.
Steve

 

I’ll take Roadkill or the variations over just about anything else on the tube. I can’t stand all the artificial drama (we’re gonna lose the shop!!!) and it seems all the build consists of basically throwing the contents of the Holley catalog at it, and the belly button LS swap.

 

^^^ I'm with Matt.

I'll just add that Fantomworks was fascinating simply for the overwhelming amount of stuff Dan got wrong. At times, he appeared to know nothing about the cars he was working on.

 

I've always been a "Wheelers Dealers" fan. This is not a resto-mod show. It's a guy that buys cars, takes them back to his garage for his mechanic to work on and then sells them. Each show is a different car. None of this dragging one build out over 3-4 episodes.

 

Like to se Dave Kindig and their builds , Wheeler dealers , no no . It was nice to se Ed China but not Mike Brewer.
Biker build of was very intresting but not American chopper who was just ridiculously with all shouting.

 

I watch junkyard digs on youtube.