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TC member #807
I first became acquainted with this car in the fall of 1983. In the summer of 1983, my wife Marilee and I were in the market for a convertible, to be “Marilee’s collector car”. I told many friends and acquaintances to be on the lookout for a late 1960’s vintage convertible. In August of 1983, we located and purchased a 1969 Impala convertible. Some time in the fall of 1983, a friend, believing we were still in the market for a convertible, let me know that his sister and brother-in-law had a black 1969 Chevelle SS396 convertible that they were thinking about selling. (This was the same car that is the subject of this document.) I told him that we had purchased the Impala, but the Chevelle sounded interesting, so I would go and look at it anyway. He and I went to his sister and brother-in-law’s home to look at the car. I looked it over, and we went for a short drive in the car. For various reasons, I decided not to make a purchase offer.The thought of this car did not occur to me again until April of 2002. By that time, I had been searching for a 1969 Chevelle SS396 convertible for 3 ½ years. In fact, I had purchased another one in June of 2000, but it was just not the ‘right’ car, so I kept looking. I had been following a story on Team Chevelle about one of the Team members (Shannon Vanover) who had located a very nicely preserved example of a 1969 Chevelle SS396 coupe, with 19,000 original miles. For some strange reason, all of a sudden the black convertible that I had looked at some 18 years earlier just popped into my mind. I had never seen or heard of the car since, and I had not spoken to the friend who initially told me about it for several years. I decided to call my friend to see what ever became of the car. To my complete surprise, he told me that his brother-in-law still owned it. He said that he believed the car had somewhere right around 20,000 original miles on it, and that he knew the car had only been taken out of storage 2 or 3 times a year for short drives ever since he owned it.
During our phone conversation, he related an interesting anecdote regarding the Chevelle. Shortly after his sister and brother-in-law purchased the car, they were going to go for a ride in it. The car sat on an old piece of carpeting out in the garage. The owner went out and started the car up. It was on fast idle, and he put it in reverse, and the rear wheels kind of ‘threw’ the piece of carpet just as his wife stepped onto it. She lost her balance and fell down, with her leg just behind the rear tire of the car. He backed up and ran over his wife’s leg, breaking it. By this time she was yelling loudly. He thought that she was at the very back of the car, near the rear bumper, and he had knocked her down, so he put the car in drive and pulled forward – running over her leg a second time. From that point on, she would not set foot in the car, and essentially wanted nothing to do with it. That could help to explain the very low mileage on the car.
On April 27, 2002, I went to the owner’s home. I told him that I understood he still had the black Chevelle convertible, and he indicated that he did. I asked if he would consider selling it. He said “Yes, but you won’t give me what I want for it”. We discussed his asking price, and although it was more than I had expected, it was not out of the realm of possibility. I asked to take a look at the car, and he opened the garage. It was cool and raining outside, so I did not ask him to back the car out for a better look. It was very dusty, but appeared to be a very solid and relatively unmolested car. There were just over 19,900 miles on the odometer. He told me that the car had around 18,000 miles on it when he purchased it. I looked it over as best as I could in the garage, and told him I would have to think about it for a while.
I gave it a lot of thought over the next couple of months. Finally on July 5th, I went back to his house and made a purchase offer for it. He made a counter-offer. I told him since I had last looked at it, I made a list of things I wanted to inspect on the car. Since it was a nice day, he backed it out of the garage and I looked it over very thoroughly. I took it for a short drive down the street and back. During the time I was looking at it, he said on several occasions that he wasn’t sure if he wanted to sell the car. He kept asking me to make him another offer. I finally agreed to his counter-offer price, but he again countered with a higher price. I said no, I would go home and think about it some more. On July 13th, I came back with checks made payable to him, in the amount of his original counter-offer price. He accepted and I took the car home.
A cursory inspection revealed the only non-original appearing items on the car to be dual stripe whitewall tires, Holley aluminum valve covers, a blue distributor cap, orange silicone spark plug wires, and chrome plug wire loom brackets. Radiator hoses, heater hoses, and clamps had also been replaced with aftermarket items. The original valve covers were in the trunk, inside the box that the Holley pieces came in. The owner had pointed out to me before I purchased the car that the original radio speaker had become inoperative, so a replacement had been installed. Again, the original speaker was retained in the car’s trunk.
After doing some cleanup work and buffing the paint, it is obvious that there has been some substantial repainting done in the past. I believe the entire lower portion of the car (from the stripe down) has been repainted, and it is even possible that the entire car has been repainted. I cannot, however, find any evidence of paint overspray on the moldings or weatherstripping on the upper part of the car, so I am not sure about this aspect. There is some body filler in the bottom of the front fenders, but that is the only place on the car I could locate evidence of body filler.The car still has the original ‘Protecto-Plate’ warranty card, listing the original owner’s name (‘M Apps’) and address. It also shows the date of original sale as 1-17-69. I thought the name Apps sounded familiar, but I could not place it. Then one day it occurred to me that Apps is the married name of a girl that I grew up with. I called her up, and after introducing myself (she remembered me) and giving a little background info, I got to the purpose of my call. It went something like this:
"I bought an old car last weekend, and the original warranty card has the name M. Apps on it. I was wondering if you might..."
(she breaks me off in mid-sentence)
"Is it a Chevelle?"
"Yes"
"A black SS396 convertible?"
"Yes"
(she's speaking very excitedly now)
"OH MY GOD, YOU FOUND MOLLY'S CHEVELLE!!!!!"Immediately I knew whom the original owner was. The woman to whom I was speaking was married to the original owner’s brother; they were sisters-in-law. Molly and her husband Jeff live about ½ mile away from me. They helped me plan and produce our town’s annual car show for 5 years, so I know them well. To say I was flabbergasted would be an understatement!
I spoke with Molly a short time later. She kept saying, over and over, “You found my car! You found my car!” I asked her how many miles it had on it when she sold it, and she said “around 18,000”, which is exactly what the second owner told me it had when he purchased it. Molly and Jeff got married in 1973 and they didn’t need to use the car, so she just left it parked in the old garage at her parents’ house. She was fond of the car and was reluctant to sell, so it pretty much just sat there for 5 years. This is where the second owner saw it sitting and finally purchased it in December of 1978. I also asked Molly if the bottoms of the front fenders were rusted when she sold it. She couldn’t remember, but her husband indicated that they were rusted. This would explain the indications of body filler that I found in those locations when I was inspecting the car.
Repair & Restoration Work
I removed the Holley valve covers, and cleaned and reinstalled the original valve covers with new gaskets. I purchased and installed a new black distributor cap and original style, date coded reproduction spark plug wires. After filling the gas tank and driving the car a few miles, I noticed that there was a gas leak somewhere just in front of the gas tank. Gas would drip onto the right rear tail pipe; not a good thing. I suspected that the short pieces of rubber fuel line hose connecting the sending unit to the metal lines were probably still the originals, and might be dry rotted, so I decided to replace them. As I raised the rear end of the car up high in the air, I noticed a large quantity of gas leaking up near the engine. I discovered that the diaphragm in the fuel pump had burst. So now it seemed like a good time to replace the short sections of rubber fuel line in the engine compartment along with the fuel pump. While I was at it, I ordered and installed all new original style replacement radiator and heater hoses, clamps, and battery cables. I also ordered original style reproduction Firestone F70-14 Wide Oval tires, since the Disco-era dual stripe whitewalls were both unattractive and somewhat dry rotted. The original wheels were rusty, so I dismounted the old tires from the rims, had the rims sandblasted and painted as original, and installed the new Firestones. The car now runs and drives well, with no more leaks.
Future plans for the car include switching the interior from black to Parchment. We have a real fondness for white interiors, especially so in a convertible. Since the original black interior is in excellent condition, I plan to just remove and store the original seats, door panels, and rear interior trim panels. That way the car could be returned to original condition in the future. I have already obtained another rear seat and rear interior trim panels to be recovered with the Parchment vinyl trim, so all I need to get is another set of front bucket seats. I plan to remove the original AM radio and install a factory AM-FM radio. I also want to clean and detail the engine and engine compartment, but I’m not sure to what extent just yet. In the meantime, we’re enjoying driving the car on nice days!
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