Westbrook — Rich Willard picked up the remnants of a 1928 Packard three decades ago, but he's been so busy building his antique auto restoration business that he never quite got around to fixing up his own car.

"I bought it as a basket case," said Willard, owner of Vintage Motorcars on Boston Post Road not far from the Old Saybrook border. "It literally came in pieces."

Over the years, he put in a few days here and there to bring the Packard 526 Runabout back to life, researching the right materials to use and finding sources around the country. But other projects kept getting in the way.

"When you're in the business, you don't do your own stuff," he said.

Then he heard that the Barrett-Jackson collectible car auction house would be coming to the Mohegan Sun June 23-25. And that jump-started a more aggressive effort to finish the Packard restoration, helped along by his 83-year-old father Sam, a former auto mechanics teacher.

Finally, about two weeks ago, the 30-year project was largely done, the chrome headlights gleaming and the leather seats smelling like new. Capping it off is a replica of one of the original radiator ornaments that gave the Packards their distinctive look.

"It was a really difficult restoration," Willard said. "You had nothing to go by. You had no forensics."

Willard's father, who has done antique car restoration as a hobby for decades, did much of the research on the vehicle, which was custom made. With no definitive indication of original colors, Willard made his own choices, picking out three different reds for the body and a handsome brown look on the interior.

"The late '20s up until the '30s were just some of the best (years for cars) styling-wise," Willard said.

Willard figures he and others put about 6,000 hours into the restoration. Other projects he has been involved with have involved more hours, including work on an antique fire engine and another involving a Nash bus, but this was the longest in terms of the years between start and finish. 

"Packards are a mainstay in the antique car hobby," Willard said. "They're very well built, very well designed."

Unfortunately, the Packard's exquisite design and workmanship required many hours to manufacture, said Willard, and the $3,000 original price tag compared with the cost of a $700 Ford doomed the brand to extinction.

"They made too good of a car," he said.

The typical older man who buys a Packard will find it has no radio, no air conditioning (other than putting the top down) and gets only about 8 miles to a gallon of gas. But it does feature unique drum headlights and cool looking running boards, not to mention a handmade trunk that really is a trunk attached to the back of the car.

Willard figures the car will fetch about $400,000, and he's glad Barrett-Jackson has decided to make southeastern Connecticut home for its inaugural Northeast Auction. The auction will be broadcast live on the Velocity and Discovery television networks.

"It's going to be a proud day ... to be on national TV," Willard said.

l.howard@theday.com

Twitter: @KingstonLeeHow