B-Motion Prod. #'s Bogus?

[COPO]

This is quite an interesting post. After all these years, no one (except perhaps Joel) really has an idea of how many were BM cars were built. Whitetop makes some excellent points and I would tend to believe a much lower production number than 500. Not sure what Joel would gain by inflating the #'s. Perhaps he is counting the cars modified by his shop that were not purchased as new cars thorugh the BM dealership. Very interested to see where this post goes and if a close number is determined. I was one of the bidders for the EBAY BM Chevelle. It appears the market does not value the car as high as the owner as the reserve was not met after exceeding $41,000. After a $30,000 resto would the car be worth over $70K???? Perhaps.

[Fhakya]

Anyone consider getting ahold of Bill Mitchell? He's pictured in many of the old B/M write ups in HP-Cars Mag etc. as doing the modifying, tuning & testing so he would know, correct? Is he the same as "Bill Mitchell's Hardcore Racing Products"?

Just a thought.

[MrMotion]

This is a very interesting topic and most liking only to those of us who followed these cars in their time. Iam in the process of doing some historical research on a 1968 Camaro that we found thruogh parts ads. This car was a rolling chassis car we purchased it a got a GM Canada Documentation certificate that stated the car was equipped with the L78 SHP 396-375 HP engine, 4sd m22 ordered with a 4:88 gear, BLK EXT BLK DELUX INT ,full tint am-fm mutiplex white hockey stick stripe. After one year and countless phone calls, government dot listings only go back to 1977, through word of mouth one name came out which e traced. This gentleman was a GM research and development engineer who waspart of the team that developed the MarkIV engines. He ordered this car has the original numbered motor and parts,which we are ging to pickup.Original factory invoice. He trailered the car to BaldwinMotion shortly after and had the conversion done and has original bills from B/Mfor this work, and he says it took three days to do! Through our conversations he apparently was an very good aquaintance with the likes of Bill Jenkins,Smokey Yunick, Jack Roush. there are also picturse to document this car and we have already received pictures from other owners showing the condition of this car at different years. This car also held the a stock record at Detroit Dragway in 68.I believe this is not a true Baldwin Motion car but a Motion Performance coversion that is probably included in the total number of Motion Cars that Mr. Rosen can also document. He has verified to us that he can document this work with our documentation. We will keep you posted on the progress.

[JoeC]

I don't have the 1967 rule books but it was something like NHRA had SS/A through SS/J that allowed only factory built 50 or more cars. AHRA had their own classes like A/HR and B/HR that allowed 50 or more from other manufactures such as Yenko, Dana, Nickey, Motion. The article with the 1967 427 Camaro with Yenko/Harrell sponsorship ran in A/HR and was considered stock with a 427 with two Carter AFB 4B Carbs. Later I believe Harrell ran AHRA GT1 and GT2 classes. Getting back to the Motion cars, one of the best articles I have read was a Martyn Schorr article in MuscleCar Magazine 1986. Martyn refers to Joel as guy from Brooklyn with an attitude and refers to himself as a guy from the Bronx with an attitude. The article has the Motion story from 1959 thru 1980s and lists the many projects Motion was involved in. There is a picture of the Motion King Cobra on the Clayton chassis dyno with a wall of trophies in the background. There are pictures and info on; the 427 Camaro drag cars, the L88 Corvette drag car, Joel talking with Zora at the 1967 NY Hot Rod Show, Bill Mitchell's record holding Thunder Bug VW sponsored by Motion MiniCar, the Phase III GT Corvettes, the wild looking Motion/Silva Maco Sharks, the Manta Rays, and IMSA Spyder Corvettes, and the Dennis Ferrara record holding second gen. 454 Camaro drag cars, a street 1973 454 Camaro with a huge tunnel ram hood, the Z30 small block Camaros, and the V8 Vegas. As if Motion wasn't busy enough, he also had a mail order parts business, was selling tech books under the name Phase III publications, had Motion Marine, built some show cars, and did come Motion Camaros and Monte Carlos in the mid 80's.
Martyn does not mention any production numbers but states that the second gen Motion Camaros were the most successful since there was not as much competition in the big block Supercar market place after 1970. Maybe Motion did sell 500 cars if you total them all. Does anyone know if Martyn Schorr is still on Mother Earth?

[whitetop]

Hello Joe C.

Martyn Schorr is still alive & kicking I was just told, not sure what he is up to. Musclecar Review had a feature on a 70-72 Phase III Camaro 2-3 years ago, red with black stripes. Didn't the owner say their was a total of 74-76 second generation Motion Camaros made? Or I may have heard this from Brad Fanshaw who owns the red/white MSVega who grew up in Omaha and was familiar with that car.

There were two NY based publication from the mid '70's that always had a lot of Motion Street machines in them. Street Power and Street Racer were their names. Really really cheap pulp magazines. But cool as heck. They are really hard to find. I pulled out one last night and it had a 70 1/2 Phase III Camaro in it. Randy Columbo was the owner from Blue Pointe N.Y. Car had the words "The Godfather" on it's rear quarter's above the Motion stripes. Car in the feature was modified above and beyond how it came from Motion. Tunnel ram etc. I happened to run across Randy by chance at the NMCA car show at Maple Grove in PA in '93. I asked him about the Motion car and he said it was long gone and he tried many times over the years to find it. (just like what you said Rbernat). Randy did mention the hood was still hanging up in his garage.
Another car in the same mag was the original '67 BM Camaro race car that was Butternut yellow. This WAS the same one you saw in all the original BM ads. Robert E. "Reb" Brown from Hornell NY bought it from Joel. That car still had all the Motion goodies on it, NMW tow tabs, Mr. Gasket AC, Sun gauges, Motion traction bars etc. The only thing that was done to it was a repaint of the original Butternut yellow paint. This magazine was from August '76. Wonder where these two cars are today?
Whitetop

[restorer]

I was wondering about the prices of these cars (B/M, Nickey,Dana)I don't know a lot about the Chevelle and if it is a COPO or not, but if it is a conversion car what is driving the price. I am originally from a small town in Md. and the local Chevy dealer sold a few hi-perf Corvettes and Camaros but never any transplants that I know of, my question is if they did would it be worth huge dollars too? I dont think so, I understand COPOs bringing the dollars but not one that was transplanted. I could do that too

[69motion]

maybe you all are right maybe joel didnt 500 cars as he stated

[Edited by 69motion (07-31-2000 at 07:18 PM).]