1974 Nova 9C1 COPO Brass Hat Police Car

[9C1Beater]

I also wanted to post a few photos of the cylinder head I removed from the driver's side of the Nova's engine. It has the part number "330545" and is dated "A293', which I believe means it was made on Jan 29, 1973. The engine's pad bears the letters "CKD", and I couldn't get enough oil of the rest of the pad to make out the rest of the characters (my can of brake cleaner ran out...I'll get back to you with the rest of the info when I can). The build sheet says it was ordered with an L48 350 4-BBL, and is also coded "KD" in the box for engine code. The prototype '74 Nova cop car was built with a 350 4-barrel, and so was this one (they are identical cars except for the color). But somewhere along the line the car picked up some engine mods, and I believe they were installed by Rick Mahoney. He was the fleet sales manager for the LA Zone Office, and it was he who would be taking police car buying officials on high speed joy rides to persuade them to buy Nova cop cars instead of Mopars or AMCs. I am in the process of puling the engine and will photo document every item I find. I think Rick built a "ringer", just like Smokey Yunick or Mark Donohue would have (the excellent book "The Unfair Advantage" gives examples of them "bending the rules"!). Note that the head has 2.02/1.60 valves, and pushrod guides...Z28 stuff, not L48 350 stuff.

While I'm on here, I also want to recognize my good friend Bruce Hamilton from Abbottsford, BC. If it weren't for him I would probably have missed the chance to buy the Nova. Bruce steered Nancy Smith, the owner's daughter to me. Thanks Bruce!!!