Ok, let's not discuss weight now vs. when we were younger. Yep P-hole, Nader was (and still is) an ass-hole. The '65-'69 Corvair had the same suspension set-up as a Corvette, but Nader had already done his damage and the car died on the vine after that. The Corvair above was a '61-'64 model. I never was a fan of the boxy look, but it was pretty much the norm in those days. I thought the '65-'69 Corvair was a sharp looking car. In fact, many people eventually mistook my '65 for a Camaro at night (once I put big tires on it). I bought that car for $500 during my senior year of high school with some big modification plans. Since I'd no longer need the engine, I did everything I could do to destroy that car (mechanically), but I could NOT break it! I finally dropped the engine and sold it to a dude for his dune buggy. THEN I started working on my new vision for that car.

My dad blue printed an LT-1 crate motor (350 cid Chevy) and added a few goodies ... Crane Cam (an experimental cam Crane sent us to "test" and report back ... it was a frigging MONSTER!), Manley sodium filled valves, Crane roller rockers w/solid lifters, custom headers bolted to Corvair Turbo mufflers (yes, those were actually "performance" mufflers back in the day), Edelbrock intake, Holley 850 cfm double-pumper carb, Holley elec. fuel pump, dual-point ignition and prolly a few things I've forgotten now. It was running at 13:1 compression, but we had REAL pump gas back then. We figured it was pushing 600+ HP on the street, but never dyno'd it. Let's just say it was pretty danged hot for late 60's - 1970 technology. I worked on that car every weekend, nights after school/work ... pretty much every spare minute of my life .... when I wasn't running around trying to get stinky on my pinky.

Roll bar, reworked shifter, new Borg-Warner gages, Nardi walnut steering wheel, aircraft landing lights for high beams, custom heat treated main shaft in tranny, shot-peened differential gears, custom interior, engine compartment converted to a trunk, trunk converted to storage for radiator and battery, etc. I ripped out the back seat to drop the engine there to make it mid-engine beast! I did swap out the '65 half-shafts (2-bolt) for '66 half-shafts as they were 4-bolt from '66-'69.

I cut out the fender wells to fit the 15" Corvette wheels w/Firestone G60's and F60's mounted, re-worked GMC dump truck radiator w/Corvette burp tank, Fiat (?) master cylinder and sintered iron brake shoes (kind'a-sorta donated by Roger Penske through Mark Donohue - long story ), super beefy sway bars (front and rear) and it was finished off with a bitchin' paint job designed by yours truly ("donated" Cadillac paint from the Memphis dealership). I'm sure I've forgotten some of the goodies put into that car as it's been a few years. I know I've posted these before, but I never get tired of seeing my old high school/college hotrod and the memories of sucking the doors off every challenger I ever met on the street.

One regret I've always had is that I was never a "picture taker". I wish I'd taken that car out for some pics with a nice background, but I snapped these with my old Kodak Instamatic and a 12-pic roll of film behind the shop while I was at work.

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