69 camaro gills... add them or not?

[67 ls1 vert]

Hey guys, I am painting a Camaro for a member on here. He has new quarters on both sides. He gave me a set of the over lays that go over the gills on the rear quarter panels. There is no holes yet and he told me to drill them out and add the grills after I paint the car.

The door handles are shaved, custom grill, shaved marker lights, no bolt holes on the bumpers either.

I was talking to him tonight about it and how you don't seem to see them on cars anymore. It seems to be a look that has been going on for the past 2 years.

What do you guys think of this? Leave them off or add them?

This will be up to him of course, just wanted to get a few opinions.

The car is going to be painted red with blk stripes.

Very pro touring look. mini tubs, big wheels, big engine, suspention, etc...

[robertjra]

off keep it clean

[67 ls1 vert]

anyone else?

[formula]

i assume that we're looking at shaved drip rails, etc as well? i.e. pretty much a no-chrome car?

if so, i think it would be much nicer touch to do a small amount of a dark accent color at the bottom of the molded-in gills instead of adding one strip of chrome to the car randomly.

[gtotto]

Couldn't you just cut the mounting pegs off the griils and add double sided adhesive to them??? If you then don't like the look, carefully remove the grills and clean up any residual gunk with WD-40.

[ErikLS2]

I have a 69 and planned on putting the gills on (with some kind of brushed look finish) so the car is painted and has the holes there. Going to have brushed look bumpers and front and rear window trim and door handles and mirros and hoping for the right amount of brushed against my blue paint. If I had to do it over again, I would have filled the holes and if I wanted the gills on there just put them on with 3M sticky tape like mentioned above.

[67 ls1 vert]

The car is a convertible so the drip rails are missing already. lol

Not really liking the double sticky idea... I think he will want them drilled if he decides to keep them on.
Thanks for the tips tho.

anyone else...

[77thor]

I like them, so I would put them on.

[esenior]

I'm beginning to agree with 671 ls1 vert on leaving the gills off. The car has body color side mirrors, no door handles, no wheel moldings, and no rocker spears. Starting to think that the gills are going to stick out too much. The only chrome visible from the side of the car will be the windshield molding, well molding, and bumpers.

Doesn't anyone make a more modern looking piece to replace the old style gills?

[ErikLS2]

I saw a 61 Bel-Air one time that had the body side mouldings airbrushed on. From a distance it looked like the nicest finish body moulding I'd ever seen. It wasn't until I got up close that I realized they were airbrushed on.

Fesler has commented that he has some billet ones coming but I haven't seen any yet