Gabriel Cestaro Jr’s ’62 Impala SS perfects the “led sled” motif for a whole new generation of hot rodders

The story behind Gabriel Cestaro Jr’s ’62 Impala SS build is one that involves a series of incidences, some for better and some for worse. In the end, the trials and tribulations that haunted this restoration project turned out to be, as Cestaro himself would find out, worth the very birth pains that they inflicted.

What turned out to be the most interesting aspect of Cestaro’s story, for the staff of Super Chevy, was that Cestaro himself was a second-generation, 1962 Impala SS enthusiast and owner. His very first experience with a ’62 SS was his father’s, a car that Cestaro remembers clearly. Cestaro himself had owned a ’62 previously, but had ended up making an on-the-spot transaction with a spectator at a car show, selling the car to that person. Ironically enough, Cestaro, having sold his car in New York, found one exactly like it when he had returned to his hometown in Atlanta, where a local rod shop owner owned one and invited Cestaro to come down for a look.

Cestaro didn’t have to give his decision much thought before buying the ’62 Impala from the local hot rod shop. As Super Chevy points out, Cestaro is fascinated with the overall look and bodylines of Chevy’s 1962 full-size line, as is evident in the fact that he maintained those bodylines while tastefully modernizing the Impala SS’ interior.

While engine performance wasn’t Gabriel’s top priority in building this car, he did have the 327 small block overhauled in a way that’s true to the hot rodding craft of the late ‘50s into the early ‘60s. Cestaro accomplished this by keeping the Impala’s factory-matching block and sending it out to a machine shop to be bored .030 over. The small block V8 was also hopped-up with a Comp cam, Edelbrock intake and a Demon series, 650 CFM 4-barrel. The relatively mild engine build made for an honest 350 horses, though Cestaro’s primary concern in building the ’62 SS was to build an early-model, full-sized Chevy that had as much of a low-stance profile as geometrically possible.

In the multi-faceted world of hot rodding, there are those who build hot rods as a possibility of what could be done with the eye candy of early styling and the technological advancements of modern drivetrains. In this case, the formula is in-reverse: the emphasis of this ’62 SS is maintaining a traditional drivetrain and body, while sporting a modern interior with an aftermarket instrument panel. If this paradox was truly the intended result, then Gabriel Cestaro Jr., a second-gen, ’62 Impala owner and enthusiast, can be rightfully heralded as a successful custom builder.

- Sal Alaimo Jr., (3/9/11)   S. J. A.