Nice cars can look terrible and some awful cars can look quite lovely. I understand why folks would dissuade someone form investing in a CSL roller. The market won't tolerate a half-baked restoration. With that said, even if poorly executed, a CSL will still be worth more than one most people can pay for a weekend toy.
Pics simply won't cut it with these cars, which is why BaT auctions tend to frustrate me. Like many cars you see, my swiss-cheese CSI looked quite decent on the outside, better than my CS. The CS looked awful, but it was mostly debris in the engine bay. It cleaned up well, but not surprisingly it still needs tones of metal attention. I paid 3x the forum recommended purchase price, based on comparing 2015 market values to forum sentiment.
Hopefully all of this banter is meaningful to lurkers and better yet, someone with a driveable reference coupe. Think about it for a moment. Welding a skinny-pillar e9 roof on is a lot of prep work with practically no welding. 60% intimidation, 30% measuring and cutting, 10% welding.
Paging
@Tony.dreamer