Conversion from square to round headlights

[Quicksilver]

Hi all. I am looking to buy a 72 Avanti. The current owner says he has all the parts to convert the car from rectangular to round headlights. HE considers these parts to be worth $2000 CDN.  First, how much trouble is it to replace the front "grille", and second is that a reasonable price?

Is this conversion popular, rare, difficult? Thank you for your help

[mfg]

If he really has all the parts involved, I believe his $2000 valuation for them is about right.....In my humble opinion though, those parts should probably be offered to someone who owns a round light Avanti and has been in a frontal collision.

It definitely is a major job to properly make that conversion, and if the square light front of this '72 Avanti is in good shape, I'd leave it the way it is and enjoy it.

[Avanti83]

That's currently a touch over $1600 US and if he has the correct front valance the entire structure across the front of the car will need to be replaced. Difficulty is the entire front needs to be removed properly, joint strips fabricated to join the new and old panels and the entire valence assembly aligned and re-adhered into position. There's a lot of fiddly involved to get it right but far from impossible. Not cheap to farm out either.

Parts prices are in-line if they are new or in excellent condition. Some of those parts are also not so easy to find and having everything could save a lot of time and hunting. Get the parts manual if you decide to go for it and be sure everything is really there.

IMO the round eyed ones are the best looking and I considered doing the same thing to my 74 but it needed so much other work that I never got around to it.

If it's your dream, go for it.

[PackardV8]

We've seen both here, so it would be interesting to know how many round headlight cars were converted to square, "to look like the latest style" and how many square headlight cars were converted to round "to get the original, classic look." 

jack vines, who prefers the original recipe, but owns the Barris custom with quad round headlights.

[mfg]

To each his own, but the only time I'd consider this conversion would be if an Avanti took a hard hit in the 'nose', and all the frontal pieces needed replacement anyway!