Paul,the bases and tongues were not rechromed.The buckle tops were the Chevrolet sticker goes are Nos that he happened to have and I purchased from him(part of the 500 price).The original 63 webbing was cleaned.Because I wanted as close to original 1963 seat belts as possible I decided to reuse the original webbing.Keeping the original stitching was important to me and I would not let him cut the belts,he supplied and stitched on an original Chevrolet tag.The down fall to this was the s hooks on the bottom could not be removed to zinc plate,of course the nylon rivet that connects the s hooks is not reproduced and I couldn’t find anything even close to it online.He media blasted the s hooks and I touched them up with Eastwood clear zinc.The eyelets where originally cadmium plated so we decided just to clean them and save the original nylon rivets connecting the s hooks.These belts,with the exception of the clear zinc on the s hooks,are original to the car and as close to how they came from American chute co.
I remember my son and I walking down the row of judges and ram air Gto’s at the Pontiac National convention.He said to me that all the really nice cars had reproduction parts and the all original part cars looked beat.He was right,to see nice looking with original gm parts is incredibly rare.Most people don’t know,but if you do the differences between original and reproduction are glaring.
The reason I started this thread was to try and figure out 1 if my original seatbelts could be restored,2 how much all this was going to cost,and 3 how long was it going to take.
I think snake oyl turns out a really nice belt and are the go to guys when it comes to seat belts.But I am just saying you have other options.Hopefully this thread makes it easier for the next guy that wants his seatbelts restored,so they can avoid going down the google rabbit hole searching for information.I have spent a crazy amount of time researching what was correct and since day one was always the goal with the restoration of my convertible.
Paul I know you said in your first post you had sent your belts in,did you get your quote?Not that it matters at this point but I am a little curious as to what they are charging now for a resto.