WORKING -- Dave Cua

Story by Alex Coolman; photo by Sean Hiller

HE IS

An artist of the automotive realm.

NOSE JOB

On a recent afternoon in a small garage off Monrovia Street in Costa

Mesa, Dave Cua was making some final adjustments to the nose of a 1973

Corvette Stingray -- a car with a cool, metallic turquoise finish that

made it look like some particularly refreshing variety of lozenge.

The car was impossibly sleek, with curves that the most liposucked of

Orange County starlets would envy. But the nose, Cua said, required

special attention.

“It’s not like the bumper is just going to jump out of the box and fit

on the car,” he said, displaying the new fiberglass model he had ready to

attach to the ‘Vette.

Cua does body work on cars. He does it by himself and he’s been doing

it for 11 years. His shop, virtually hidden from the road, is simply

called Dave’s Body & Frame.

FAMILY STYLE

Cua, 43, says he doesn’t mind if people don’t notice the place as

they’re driving by. He doesn’t need a lot of miscellaneous business

because he relies mostly on word of mouth. Plus, he doesn’t need a lot of

extra business because working on a few jobs a week is enough to keep him

busy.

On the wall of Cua’s shop is a small, black-and-white photograph of an

old couple leaning against a truck emblazoned with the logo “Warther’s

Garage” and then, in smaller letters, it says “Best is Cheapest.”

The old couple are Jake and Emma Warther, Cua’s grandparents. The

picture was taken in Ohio in the 1920s. And the business that Warther’s

Garage dealt with was more or less the same business the Cua still does

today.

“I was born into the body shop,” Cua said. “It’s kind of a family

deal.’

NO HACKS, PLEASE

The idea that “best is cheapest,” he says, is something that still

makes sense when it comes to cars. Lousy body work from an inferior shop

may cost less in the short run, but Cua argues that it’s also more likely

to fall apart.

And a hack job on a really gorgeous car can be as conspicuous as a

lousy face-lift, relying on body filler and a paint job to compensate for

a lack of artistry.

For Cua, such butchery would be sacrilege. Better to do it right the

first time, he said, and drive away with all curves intact.

“If people just look at their cars a little bit closer,” he said,

sounding slightly worried about the car-driving public, “they’d be able

to tell.”