looks are deceiving L-71

[HiHorse]

[ QUOTE ]
if anyone is getting sucked in by this car, I can speak from first hand knowledge that things look better in pictures. Dont waste your time JMO. you can contact me if you have any questions. I dont want anyone to make a quick decision and get burned.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Chevrolet...1QQcmdZViewItem

[/ QUOTE ] Can you share any details?

[LS6 RAT]

Bill,
A friend of mine went to view this car last week. He was interested in it, so he asked me to take a look. At first glance it appears nice, like a survivor quality car. The undercarriage is quite rough and scares a lot people off. The stamp pad has several unusual anomalies, first the engine assembly uses two different zeros, not typical for big block, the digit eight is upside down,there is bounce back on both Tonawanda stamping and St. Louis stamping, and on top of that the bounce affects digits that are flanked on both sides of a digit that does NOT have bounce back, and the last suffix letter which is an R is obliterated by that ?. The same bounce back situation also is with the VIN derivative, bounce on two digits flanked on either side by one that doesn't. Two stampings at two different plants at different times by different people have the same anomalies?
I've seen factory goofs but the chances of this many on one stamping? The other problem is their is no factory paperwork to prove this option on the car, unfortunately. Even if substantiated as all real by the factory, you would have a darn difficult time convincing most collectors of this, especially when prices go back up to what they were early last year.

[Wardy]

[ QUOTE ]
------In the $29,000 area the car is fairly priced unless the frame is rusted out. You could fluff a lot of small stuff and still be on the money. I did notice it has headers, I think, but even thats not that big a deal.
------Im curious, Chris, how did you get that shot of the pad. Its a good one!.......Bill S

[/ QUOTE ]
The seller linked to a photobucket acct in the ebay ad. I figured it was ok to post the pic if they linked to it on ebay.

[Charley Lillard]

I like the engine pad but I am not up on similar dated pads to see if they used 0 and O on similar. Someone must have some close built engines in their data base. TimG where are you ?

[Fast67VelleN2O]

The car looks pretty legit to me... Don't know why someone would restamp a car that hasn't been restored and has had headers installed at some point.

[TimG]

I don't have a problem with the "O's" or even the inverted "8", I've got plenty of examples of those in my files. The over stamp is a bit unusual and pretty messy. I'd look real hard for 435 signs on this car. No pictures of the tach, oil pressure gauge, four bolt main (big oil cooler plug), or transistor ignition stuff.
These would help verify its 435 heritage. Could it be a 390 horse motor with an over stamp from the factory? Could it have been over stamped later in life? I don't know. Too bad they had to pull the motor and rebuild it, with a strange stamp and no paperwork, you'd love to see the motor in its original, never removed condition. They should have documented the motor before removal if nothing else.

[Pat O'Connell]

Excellent points, Tim..I'd question the seller as to why the engine was pulled for a rebuild...From the description, it didn't need much once it was torn down.

[LS6 RAT]

The engine was pulled by the original owner and a small block stuck into it. This original engine was mounted on an engine stand in the garage of the owner when he died and in need of a repair from a broken piston ring. The widow sold the car to a classic car dealer and stated that this engine was the original engine from the car.
The car is and has all the original unique pieces for a L71 optioned car. The engine pad has original broach marks. I am not questioning the authenticity of the stamping, I am stating that this car with this stamping anomaly and the fact that there is no factory paperwork to verify its options, makes this car somewhat suspicious to collectors with that messed up stamping and no paperwork. This wouldn't be my first choice for an investment quality Corvette.

[bergy]

Great discussion and observations guys. I was a GMI student sponsored by Chevrolet Tonawanda back in the day. Like most co-op students, I occassionally got the crap jobs (like stamping parts that had missing/wrong digits). I'm not saying that the "T" in question is or isn't ligit, but it wouldn't surprise me. Our job was simply to obliterate the old digit and add a new one - "pretty" wasn't in our vocabulary! I usually used an "X" stamp or grinder (on "as cast" surfaces) to get rid of the incorrect digit. It was really up to the inspection department to determine the method - it just had to be correctly, permanently marked - that's all. I hate that this car has that goofed up "T", but who knew that our work as a bunch of 18 year olds would someday be placed under a microscope?

[al8apex]

I, too, went to GMI in the early 70's

I worked at Pontiac in Pontiac MI. The sh** that went on back then was truly unbelievable, at least for this 18 year olds eyes

One of my duties was to crawl around in the rafters of the engine plant and count the number of blocks that had fallen off the conveyor system ... in black sand / dust environment, probably the equivalent of being in a coal mine ... so the "myth" that block HAD to be cast within a certain time period is only that, a myth. They would send up a newbie GMI student every year to get them counted and pulled down ...

I was never involved with the stamping process, but here is a Muncie we had last year that obviously had problems with the stamp, they finally gave up and stamped it 90 degrees from the "normal" area to the top of the case ...

http://www.camaros.net/forums/showthread.php?t=136529