When buying vintage or muscle car parts, consider the following, from less to more dangerous for you:

- Some sellers may grade something as Mint, or Excellent, just because it still exists after all these years!
- Some sellers do not know what aspects of their parts to describe in detail
- Some sellers are volume sellers on eBay Motors and sell lots of used chrome parts an simply don't detail their descriptions.  They leave it to the Buyer to ask specific questions
- Some sellers place parts on eBay that might not be high demand parts in hopes someone will 'take them of their hands' and they intentionally do not want to provide details so as to not have to point out flaws
- Some sellers know the condition of the part is undesireable and intentionally do not disclose certain details and/or do not include pictures that might tip off flaws

1) eBay 101:  Use the FeedBack system. Look at the Seller's quantity of feedbacks (more the better), the percentage of satisfied transactions from other people who have bought from the Seller, and look at recent feedback from Buyers for used parts. 
- In other recent Seller's auctions, did the Seller use a comparable amount of detail and pictures compared to the auction you are interested in? 
- In other selling auctions, did the Seller include closeups?  This means they <at one time> had a digital camera capable of taking good closeups.  In the auction you are interested in, did they include comparable quantity and detailed pictures?

2) Questions?  Consider  asking these questions  early in the auction (not on the last 2 days): 
- Ask if there is any scratches; either large, or by sandpaper or steel wool
- Ask if there is any large under-chrome dimpling/pitting.  This is common on pot-metal chrome plated parts from the mid 60's through the mid-70's
- Ask if there is any pitting where the chrome has separated (like a 'zit' bursting)
- Ask if there are any small pitting
- Ask if the chrome has any signs of thinning, or 'sun-bleaching"
- Ask if there have been any repairs (visible or not)
- For common popular cars like Camaros, Mustangs, Chargers etc, be sure to ask if the part may be a reproduction and not an original.

Pictures?  Here is how you can help yourself
- If there are no pictures,  ask for some.  Experienced sellers will always include pictures.
- Remember to use what you learned above from reviewing other recent or active Seller's auctions.
- Chrome is hard to photo without the flash reflection making the part look worse than it is. If the pics are unclear, ask for more from different angles.  If a Seller is having problems etting good details, suggest that they try to take the closeup in the best possible daylight so flash impacts are eliminated or minimized.
- If the auction contains some pictures that are clear in detail and some that are blurry, be weary but also open-minded.  Ask the Seller to send more pictures of the blurry aspects.

Jusut like the school cliche':   Ask Questions!