...someone in your family used to race in the 70s, 80s, and up? I just got sick, as well as my dad who used to race, when he showed me pictures of perfectly good chevelles and camaros he and my older brother cut up for race cars.

I remember one in particular, a complete, numbers matching 66 Chevelle SS396, that my dad got in '74 for $50 because it was considered totalled, and all that was wrong was that it had right front damage and the right front corner of the frame was bent (how many of those have been fixed today). He proceeded to tell me how he cut the wheel openings bigger, burned all the interior, junked the dash and console, sold the motor and transmission (muncie 4-speed), because he said the 396s had no bottom-end support and always broke cranks and spun rods and high rpms.....NOOOO!

I was just wondering if any of you guys had friends or family that raced that cut up chevelles that you wish you could back in time and save before meeting this fate...because alot of carsmy dad told me weren't rustbuckets, there were quite a few good rust-free bodies, SS or Malibu, being tore up for race cars.

Its just a rant, because no one knew at that time, but I just think of all those 57 chevys and chevelles my dad could have had now...

Heck I remember my neighborhood being full of cut up 30s era Fords on race day.

I know at least one '65 Z16 that met its fate that way :sad:

I know at least one '65 Z16 that met its fate that way :sad:
Its sad to say but thats what the Z16 was pretty much built for. As for the racing part, I cannot stand to see a perfectly good car original car being totally cut up to the point of no return. On my Nova however, It is going to be a pure race car but it can easily be restored back to stock apperance. Im not swiss cheesing it or tubbing...

-wes

When I was 15 my Dad bought me a 67 Camaro, 327 with a powerglide. I drove the car till I was 22 as a daily driver. I am now fixing it up for my 15 year old son to drive. At about 17 I wanted to put a Turbo 400 in it and went a junk yard in the small town of my grandparents. A car crusher was parked in the front yard. The overseear said the own had died and the kids were closing the yard and all was to be crushed. He led me to a complete , mint condition 1967 SS Impala with a burned up motor wiring harness that I could have bought for 300 bucks. I said I just want the turbo for a hundred, I got driveshaft, starter, console and shifter , tranny, flywheel,and torque converter. He saved the car till I came and got the parts. On the day I was removing this stuff , I watch 67,68,69 Camaros, Chevelles, SS's and two Z-28's get crushed. I saw complete Road Runners, Cudas and Chargers, most all the Mopars still had the motors and tranny still in them. As sad as it made my feel that day, it was nothing compared to the 25 years that I have carried those memories..........still makes me sad...........

My dad just wrecked them, rather then cut them up for racing...

The '67 we had was built from an almost new car. Car was a '67 SS396/325HP car factory SS. Had aprox 2500 miles when it was stipped out and made into a race car.

When I was 15 my Dad bought me a 67 Camaro, 327 with a powerglide. I drove the car till I was 22 as a daily driver. I am now fixing it up for my 15 year old son to drive. At about 17 I wanted to put a Turbo 400 in it and went a junk yard in the small town of my grandparents. A car crusher was parked in the front yard. The overseear said the own had died and the kids were closing the yard and all was to be crushed. He led me to a complete , mint condition 1967 SS Impala with a burned up motor wiring harness that I could have bought for 300 bucks. I said I just want the turbo for a hundred, I got driveshaft, starter, console and shifter , tranny, flywheel,and torque converter. He saved the car till I came and got the parts. On the day I was removing this stuff , I watch 67,68,69 Camaros, Chevelles, SS's and two Z-28's get crushed. I saw complete Road Runners, Cudas and Chargers, most all the Mopars still had the motors and tranny still in them. As sad as it made my feel that day, it was nothing compared to the 25 years that I have carried those memories..........still makes me sad...........

That is a horrible story. I get upset seeing an old car outside for years that are just rusting away.

Growing up, my older brother raced hobby stock. I can't tell you the number of mid 60's Chevelle's he cut up to race or use for parts. He finally in the late seventies or early eighties started making forms for fiberglass panels from a daily driver to use.

A guy around here cut up a 69 Yenko Chevelle for a stock car in the early 70's. Interior and all parts not needed went down an old mine shaft.
When the motor blew it went to scrap. The supposed remains of the car are still around but it doesn't have the original body and the frame is questionable. It is well known as dead and gone on the Yenko site.

A guy around here cut up a 69 Yenko Chevelle for a stock car in the early 70's. Interior and all parts not needed went down an old mine shaft.
When the motor blew it went to scrap. The supposed remains of the car are still around but it doesn't have the original body and the frame is questionable. It is well known as dead and gone on the Yenko site.

I grew up watching my dad's family race stock cars (among other things), and have seen many a nice car get used up. I also have seen them take sheetmetal off one wrecked car a graft it onto another to save some cash. The could do wonders as long as it didn't have to look good closer than 20' ;)

My dad used to drag race, had 7 '57 Chevy race cars, although he was the type that wouldn't cut a car up too much, and everything was reversable. We have a lot of '57 parts stashed away from his race cars...and no, he's not interested in selling anything, we are looking for a nice '57 project car.

About 15 years ago we almost bought a '32 Ford that had been made into a stock car. There wasn't too much left, though, it was either race equipment that would have to be removed, or it was pretty badly smashed.

My uncle lives right on the shores of Lake Ontario, and the erosion was getting to be a problem (they are on top of a cliff). To combat it around 1970 they pushed 10-12 cars over the cliff :eek: and followed it up with TONS of rubble. Amongst the cars were some Impala's, my Dad's burned to the ground '57, a wrecked '64 Chevelle, and a '57 Pontiac Safari(?) Wagon - a Canadian-only wagon that is basically a Nomad.

I've blocked most of this story out, but you guys brought it all back to the surface. :sad:

When I was a kid in the late 70s, if you saw what we cut up for parts, you would seriously cry.

i cut up a perfectly almost new honda to use as my track car. 40 years from now, my great grand kids would be mad at me for doing so. hehehehe.

bit really i think most people if not all, did not even think about this cars as being clasic someday. back then they were used cars, and considered cheap and throw away.

we had, and to some extent, still have small dirt tracks peppering california, as i'm sure does the rest of the country. when saugus was still open, on a good saturday night, 40-50 cars would show, probably 90% of them were chevelles, including a car i used to pit for. sportsman class was 99.9% g.m. cars 80% chevelles, some camaros, and the occasional ford. i'm sure you can go to any local track, and cringe when you see the amount of early cars, being trashed, but hey! how was anybody to know, these rides would be better investments than the stock market. heck i talked my first 56 chevy down to $600 before i bought it, now you couldn't buy the hood for $600.

i've read in several magizines lately, the point of view is becoming, don't sell anything, you'll never be able to replace it, so don't sell anything you don't absolutely have to.

they made lots of cars back in the 60's threw 80's, but the population has almost doubled, car collections have swallowed up hundreds of these rides, tracks have destoyed many more, who knows how many were lost to crushers, or are buried in rivers ( i had a sprint that was literally found in a bakersfield river bed, and restored), how many were lost to europe ( i keep hearing of these hemi cars found overseas) and lets face it, most are not looking at these cars as "second" cars anymore, i see quite a few daily drivers, no they are not ls6 or copo cars, but you'd be surprised what i see on the raod daily, and many cars are hidden i garages either waitng restore or already in prestine condition.

i have two cars in disaray, right now, neither is a premium car, neither rare, nor historical, but i'm trying very hard to hold on to them both, because who knows when i'll be able to get another. at the prices of todays market, even if it stablizes, getting even a decent runner is getting pretty expensive, and getting close to a desirable model, is close to impossible.

i don't have the talent that lance-w has, or the $ that foose has, so i need to keep my eyes open, try to get lucky, and try not to cry over the cars i've let go over the years. race cars aside, it's probably more my fault that i don't own a high end car, because i let most of them go, not knowing that we would all be struggling against a very harsh supply and demand situation.

who knew?

.

My friends' oldest brother had a Z16, I think he bought it around 68, he ran the living hell out of it. By 1970 the orginal motor smoked so bad we used to laugh at him and tell him to "junk that wreck", of course we all had the nice new 69's and 70's Chevelles. He got so ****ed off he went to Scuncio Chev. and bought a brand new LS-6 over the counter. I think he had 4:56's in the rear and Guess What? There was'nt a street car around that could touch him. Well, we had to listen to him until the Arab Oil Embargo and that put the clamps on everyone. He ended up buying a Toyota as his new daily driver and if I remember right, the car basically sat for another 7/8 years until he plucked the motor and scrapped the body, by that time it was pretty rusted out. Who would have ever known, by todays standards, that car would be like finding gold. The crusher got another one!

It's kind of understandable, the ruining and abuse of those cars when they weren't that old. What really makes me sick is when it happens TODAY, when we should know better!!!

I stopped in at the local repair shop the other day and there was this '66 Olds Toronado- a pretty cool and unique machine, if you ask me. It had no dents, perfect glass, good chrome, etc., etc., but there was some rust around the wheel wells. Guess why it was there... go on, I dare ya... some gourd head brought it to the shop, and is paying full shop rates to get the engine fixed, so he can run it in a DEMOLITION DERBY. :sad:

Makes you wonder if a Cavalier Z24 will worth anything....hmmmm..ahh, nevermind..:D

heck think of all the hotrods that got the roofs hacked for sunroofs back in the late 70s and 80s. after a few years you couldn't give the cars away, so I imagine alot of those ended up in the crusher. Jim

I think it would make me more sick to see it done today that back then.

Looking back, yeah it's a damn shame that stuff like that happened, how some of those parts that were destroyed could be worth alot today....but then again I'm sure no one back then thought in 30 years these now old cars would ever be worth anything....

Heck I wasn't around then but I'm willing to bet no one even thought then they'd last much over 10-15 years. How many people can back me on this one?

I read somewhere about how common it was to remove and dispose smog equipment back then....now I hear the purists are paying top dollar for it.

So in retrospect you could almost say the fact alot of this stuff is now scarce due to the fact the (now) old farts disposed of it way back when, has driven the prices up....otherwise they'd probably still not be worth anything today.....

Makes you wonder if a Cavalier Z24 will worth anything....hmmmm..ahh, nevermind..:D

I hope I don't live long enough to see the day it is. :eek: