Steve's 1969 Chevelle
I have gathered together all the photos and stories about my '69 Chevelle in one place to celebrate her 30th birthday.
For years I have been boring my friends, or anyone that showed any interest for that matter, with the stories about the blue rust bucket in our back yard. Someday my wife and I hope to rebuild the car... I have been collecting all the parts for her repairs for years and just have to find the right shop, enough time, and money to resurrect her. "Someday"
Back in '69 my Dad had two Studebakers, one was a 1962 white station wagon, and the other was a 1961 flamingo orange Lark convertible. They shared many of the same parts both cosmetic and mechanical, he was always working on the cars and swapping parts between them. I would spend hours watching him work on the cars, he rebuild the engine on the station wagon and I loved sitting in his lap driving the convertible around our neighborhood.
Boy did I ever get my dad in hot water with his father by breaking the turn signal on the convertible, he would let me play in the car and I used the turn signal lever as my shifter! He had also given me the jack from the station wagon to play with, I guess my parents just assumed that I would limit my imagination to my little peddle car but one afternoon they look out the front window to see the two back wheels of the convertible up off the ground...
(I never saw that jack again)
Here is a photo of me working on my peddle car with the jack from the station wagon...
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In the fall of 1969 my Dad started shopping for a new family car and I tagged along...
We had a family friend that worked at a Chevrolet dealership and after a few weeks of shopping my parents decided to get one of the new Chevelle Malibu's that were on the lot. Dad joking turned to me and said... "This could be your first car someday Steven, do you like the red one or the blue one?" I was a precocious 4 1/2 years old and snapped back... "Get the blue one daddy!" (twelve years later that would come back to haunt me!)
As it turned out the blue one was the best deal, it was built in Atlanta and did not have air conditioning, no one wanted a car without AC down south in the hot climate so it was shipped up to New Jersey where my father found it. After they made the deal I went with my Mother and Grandfather a few days later to pick up the car and bring it home...
Here are some photos that I took of the Chevelle in September of 1969 when she was brand new and the Studebaker Lark was being towed away..
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After my father brought home the Chevelle he had the two Studebakers towed away both on the same day, I can remember chasing the tow truck down the street. But I got over the bright orange Lark quickly with the NEW Chevelle in the driveway just waiting for me to play with her!
Sometime in December my dad took the Chevelle in for it's first service checkup and while it was in the shop he had the idle adjustment on the carburetor turned up a few RPM's. Without knowing about the adjustments made to the carburetor during the service visit my mother took the car out on a icy December morning and spun out in a busy intersection. She did not hit anything, and no one was hurt, but boy oh boy was she ever mad at my father.
I do not think that she ever drove the car again after that close call...
The car was put in the garage and that is where it sat for years. We only used it for the occasional family outings or vacation trips. Ten years later it had less than 30,000 miles on her odometer and still look show room new!
Here are some photos taken in September of 1979 when the car was ten years old.
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My father had a 1965 Valiant for his daily driver and we also had a 1972 pinto station wagon so the Chevelle was just collecting dust most of the time. My father would take the Chevelle out to wash and wax her every few months and I would get to drive her around sometimes. He would take me to the parking lot at his work and let me drive for hours. One day when I was about ten years old I backed the car into the house cracking the left rear tail light. I went to the dealership with my dad to purchase a new tail light and help him repair the damage.
Here is a photo taken in May of 1981 the weekend of the Indy 500.
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My dad had started using the Chevelle again when his daily driver the Valiant gave out on him but by now it was getting close to my turn at the wheel. I would be driving soon and the Chevelle had been my class room. By the time I was 16 1/2 and could get my driving permit however I was already an experienced driver. In New Jersey you could get a drivers license for a moped at 15 and it looked exactly like a car drivers license. *grin* Being a big boy no one ever look twice or even thought that I might be an "under aged" driver...
When I was still 15 years old we took the car to "Raceway Park - English Town" in Old Bridge Township, NJ. for a family day at the drag races.
My father had raced cars years before with his brothers and it was something we enjoyed doing together.
My Dad's 1937 Dodge race car....
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We had made the two hour trip to the race track many times before and I knew the layout very well. On this day I convinced my father to let me drive the Chevelle once we had reached the track and we were on private property. There is a long access road into the track and as you get close it divides into different directions, one for the spectators side and one for the pits.
I stayed to the left and drove into the pits...What my parents did not know was that I had put my motorcycle helmet in the trunk before we left the house and I had "other" plans for that day... After buying our tickets and entering the pit area I let my parents out of the car with our cooler full of sandwiches, chips, and sodas. I told them that I would go "park" the car while they got our favorite spot in the top row of the grandstands near the starting line.
Driving straight down to the tech inspection I grabbed my helmet from the trunk and registered the Chevelle to race in the street eliminator bracket class. Just a few minutes later I was sitting in the stands eating a sandwich and watching the races with my parents. Slipping away later in the day to check out the top fuel cars in the pits I returned to the Chevelle and headed for the staging lanes. I only wish that I could have seen my parents faces as I pulled out onto the track and made my first pass... I can imagine how loud my mother must have been screaming watching her 15 year old son racing down the 1/4 mile in the family car.
After collecting my timing ticket at the end of the track and heading back into the pits I could see my father running full speed towards me, I assumed that I was about to spend the next few hours getting the biggest lecture of my life but I was wrong. He was jumping up and down, pulled me out of the Chevelle and started patting me on the back, then together we ripped the exhaust off the car so that I could "get a better time" on my NEXT PASS!!!
I did get a better time on my second pass, shaved several second off the ET and I think that I could actually hear my mother screaming at my father this time too! It was the third trip down the 1/4 mile that we all remember the most, with my fathers enthusiastic reaction I was getting more and more brazen with each pass down the track. This time I made sure that I really got a good burnout, and then instead of loading the torque-converter with the car in gear at the line like I had done on the first two passes, this time I would slam the transmission into gear with my foot on the floor board when I got the green light!
Yellow, yellow, yellow.. GREEN - BOOM!!!
With the loudest Ka-Boom that I have ever heard, the driveshaft, universal joint, and half of pinion gear from inside the differential came slamming into the floor of the car. Apparently the weak link in the Chevelle's drive line that day was the pinion gear, it sheared off like a piece of salt water taffy right at the end of the spines that mate with the universal joint and then tried to join me in the passenger compartment...
The NHRA safety safari did not appreciate the gear oil on the track!
As the gear oil from my differential poured out all over the track, the NHRA safety safari were frantically trying to get to get my attention to move the car off the starting line however the Chevelle would not move. The other half of the pinion gear that meshes with the ring gear had dropped down inside the differential completely locking up the read end... They had to bring out a tow truck to pick up the back of the car and drag me off the track! While this was going on all I could think about was...
How are we going to get home?
The track NHRA officials were great, they towed the Chevelle to a secure area near the end of the track and we locked up the car. Then my parents had to make some phone calls to have a friend drive the 2 hours down to the race track to pick us up to bring us back home. (Thanks Uncle Al!) The next day my father had to take the day out of work and hire a flat bed truck to drive back to the race track and pick up the car. He had made arrangements to have the car stored in a neighbors garage and I did not see it again for a long while... Sometime after this agonizing period of not know where the Chevelle was my father brought the car home. We purchased a used twelve bolt positraction rear-end, bolted it in the car, and got the Chevelle back on the road.
Happy Birthday Steve...
Remember when I said that my comment the day my father decided to get the "Blue Car" back in 1969 would come back and haunt me... Well I found out that the other 1969 Chevelle sitting on the lot that day, the red one, was just a little different than our blue Malibu Sports Coupe that I grew up with and loved. Our Chevelle had a 350 small block with an automatic transmission, and my father waited twelve years until my 17th birthday, to tell me that the "Red Car" was a 454 big block SS convertible with a four speed!
Here is a photo of my 17th birthday cake and me with the Chevelle in June of 1982.
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In the spring of 1982 the Chevelle was still in mint condition with only 39,000 miles. I had my drivers permit now and started using the Chevelle whenever my dad had the time to take me out for some "practice" lessons. Once we got pulled over for reckless driving, because I only had my drivers permit and a bad attitude, my father got the ticket! My parents purchased driving lessons for me because that would allow me to start driving six months earlier and it would reduce the cost of insurance. What they did not know was after the instructor would give me a lesson in his AMC pacer with two steering wheels we would go get the Chevelle and head down to the street races. I was winning anywhere between $350 and $500 bucks on Friday nights racing all of the local gear-heads...
Can you say CRUNCH...
After a summer of fun working in Wildwood NJ at a service station, street racing in Cape May, spending all of my free time and every paycheck on the Chevelle, it was time to go back to school for my senior year. Early one morning on my way to school I crushed the drivers side front fender in what can only be described as a "fender bender" of the worst kind. This marked the end of the Chevelle's life on the street and the beginning of it's short career as a 1/4 mile Bracket ET door slammer.
1984 after my "Fender Bender" ouch!
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We found a parts car...
My high school buddy who was also into turning wrenches found a 96 Chevelle that we could strip for parts. I put the Chevelle's original hood in storage, chopped a hole in the hood from the parts car, and together we started to repair all the damage on the front end. I had the original small block reworked with bigger pistons, my dad and I installed a race cam with solid lifters, 64cc heads with 202 intake valves, and a tunnel ram intake manifold with two 660cc center squirt Holly carburetors. We also stripped everything off the car to reduce the weight and before long we were taking her to the drag strip almost every weekend.
Here she is back together and ready to race...
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Time for a move...
Out of high school and working full time turning wrenches to support my bracket habit I moved with my parents from New Jersey and my beloved "Raceway Park" to Rhode Island. It did not take me long to find a new service station to turn wrenches and a new track up in New England. My father and I started tearing up the drag strip at Connecticut International Dragway in Colchester, CT.
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This group of photos are from 1985 and 1986 before the track in Connecticut closed.
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Click on this link to hear an audio file of a burnout, you will hear me roll through the "box" and spin the tires to get them wet and then smoke them up to get them HOT!
Click on this link to hear the audio of a "quick" trip down the quarter mile!
We replaced the tired automatic transmission with a rebuilt 4 speed, (real race cars have a clutch!), a new shortened rear-end with a spool, lowered the car 4 inches in the front and 2 inches in the back, and enjoyed another season spending our weekends at the track. The next year the owner of the race track passed away and the track closed, shortly after that I met my wife and put the Chevelle back in the garage...
Wedding Bells...
In the fall of 1992 after dating for six years my wife and I got married. The Chevelle had been resting quietly in the garage for all those years when we decided to turn the garage into additional living space. For the first time in twenty three years the Chevelle would be stored outside as my father and I turned the garage into a small apartment for my new bride and me...
My fancy mouse condominium...
Since 1992 with the car relegated to the back yard it has become a breading factory for the local mice, chipmunks, and other little rodents living in out yard. From time to time I will uncover her, wash off the dirt and grime, and then put her back up on the trailer for the next generation of yard critters to enjoy.
Here is how she looked in the spring of 1994...
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We need More parts...
I have been buying lot's of parts for her eventual restoration. I have a new front fender, all of the grill pieces, new center console and interior parts, hundreds of the original mounting tabs and screws, marker lights, emblems, etc. the list just goes on and on. My brother-in-law (a professional welder) and I have been talking about cutting out the back half of the frame and installing a new racing frame with eight point roll-cage, a four-link rear with massive Mickey Thomson tires and huge wheel tubs. We are also talking about mounting a racing fuel cell and dual batteries in the trunk.
These shots were taken the summer of 1999 when the Chevelle turned 30 years old.
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Of course right after Ed McMahon stops by with my publishers house clearing check we will be dropping in a monster big block create motor with a blower under the hood! Then you just have to install a nice set of chrome wheelie bars and a parachute to round out the Pro Street image! Here are a few photos I found on the internet of a Chevelle build will all the features I am hoping to install in my car. This one was built "Right" and looks awesome, it looks like it is going 100 Mph parked in the driveway...
These photos were taken from the internet. This is how I want my Chevelle to look someday.
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Those nasty Vermin!
It has been several years since my Dad and I uncovered the Chevelle, this summer we decided it was time to clean her up the best that we can, and replace the aging car cover with a new one. Every few years we would take the car off the trailer, give her a bath and then put the car back, this year we found an awful mess. Life just keeps happening, several family illness and a hectic work schedule have left no time for the Chevelle, and we were horrified to find the entire car packed with acorn shells, dead mice, and all the NASTY droppings those miserable vermin leave behind.
All of these "poop pictures" were taken the summer of 2004 while trying to clean her up.
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It took several hours to remove all the rusted parts from the trunk and passenger compartment then Dad had to put on a mask to protect him from the disgusting smell while shoveling out the pounds of shells and POOP! We were expecting to find flat tires, in past years we always had to fill the tire up before taking the Chevelle off of the trailer, but now they are no longer capable of holding air.
The tires are only flat on the bottoms... let's try and fill them up!
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Time and neglect have really taken their toll on the Chevelle. When we took her out of the garage back in 1992 there was only two very small patches of rust behind the rear wheels, now the whole car has rust patches and it is only going to get worse. The Chevelle has developed more rust in the past 4 years then it has in the first 30 years of her life. After Dad finished all his poop scooping I spent a few hours working with the power washer trying to scrub off all the years of muck and dirt both inside and out.
I wanted to fire the beast up but was afraid to try with all the surface rust.
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I had planned on starting her up and taking the Chevelle out for a ride around the neighborhood but after seeing how bad the everything looks now I was afraid to even try and turn over the engine. The 350 small block was freshly rebuilt and in perfect condition back in the 1987 when we were still taking the Chevelle to the drag strip and she had always fired right back to life whenever I took the time to try in years past. The last time I took her out to melt some tires in 1999 the engine fired without fail but now I will have to put it out, break everything down, and rebuild it again...
The interior was a complete loss so we just ripped everything out.
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We were so upset with the condition of the interior we just ripped all of it out. I have been planning on adding a roll cage and wheel tubs so most of the interior would have been replaced anyway but it was still very disappointing to see the condition.
Here is the Chevelle all washed off and ready for her new car cover summer of 2004..
If you stand far enough away so you don't gag on the stink she still looks good.
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