Most project cars are a continuing work in progress. Even if it is a “completed” car, there will always be updates and changes that you inevitably decide to make. Such was the case for Craig Moore and his ’72 El Camino.

“In June of 2008, I was sitting in the garage enjoying a beer and cigar, and just looking at the car,” Craig told us. “I thought to myself, it wouldn’t take much to do a complete body-off rebuild. I had always wanted a Chip Foose or Boyd Coddington-type ride, and it just snowballed from that point. Ten years later, I completed my goal.”

Back in the year 2000, before the transformation you see here occurred, Scott found the Elko sitting in the garage of the second owner. The gentleman told Craig the car had spent most of its life in a garage. The car was built in Van Nuys, California, and Craig acquired the original purchase order and paperwork the gentleman could put together.

The Liquid Gold shiny stuff is a custom color, and is a perfect match for this car/hauler.

The El Camino’s original color was Code 53 (Placer Gold), and the body was in great shape Craig affirmed. “I drove it for a few years and then gave it to my son to drive in high school,” he said. After the younger Moore graduated, the car then came back to Craig. “I got the car back in 2004, and it just sat in the garage, until 2008. That’s when I started to restore it back to stock,” Craig said.

“I had it stripped down so just the frame, main body, and engine, were sitting on floor jacks,” he quipped. During the rebuild, Craig relied on his abilities as much as possible. “I custom fabricated quite a few items on the car,” he assured. “The dash is fabricated from sheetmetal and is designed to resemble the stock dash. The grill is custom fabricated as well. and was designed to match a ‘70 Chevelle grille. I also fabricated the bed tonneau cover, fabricated the radiator mount and cover, smoothed the firewall, trimmed the drip rails, and flushed out the door to match the roof.”

The paint is a custom-mixed gold, created by Jeff Matauch using PPG Industries products. Craig says it has a lot of pearl and candy in it, so it changes colors with the light. The rims are from Fesler Built in Scottsdale, Arizona. The interior is all custom with Carrillo seats.

The engine is a rebuilt 350 small-block with a Corvette Tuned-Port Injection, Street & Performance headers, DUI distributor, Griffin radiator with two 16-inch fans. Behind that is a rebuilt 700R4 transmission, and a 10-bolt rearend with Moser axles, 3.73 gears, and positraction.

Do you want to read about more Home-Built Heroes? All you need to do is click here. If you own a Home-Built Hero, we want to hear about it. Since we’ve started the series, we have received more than a few candidates, but we still want to see more – we can never get enough. If you want to see more cars built by you the readers, send us a few pictures of your car showing the engine, interior, and exterior, along with all of the pertinent information, and we’ll make you Internet famous. You can send your submissions to [email protected].