yenko camaro ??

[tom406]

Thanks for the discussion, I think the debate is healthy for all of us, if for no other reason than to define what's important to us and our hobby.

For the record, super honest unrestored cars are my favorite, and I am among those who would pay more for a killer unrestored car than a fully restored one. I'm probably playing devil's advocate on this issue, since in all honesty, I probably feel only 1 guy in 50 could actually carry out what I consider to be a successful "rebody". It would require complete knowledge and exceptional restoration skill, and most of us usually just have one or the other. And the scenario would have to be like the one I told, where you had a pretty complete car to redo, not just bits and pieces. I'm NOT a supporter of building a car from tags and a title, there is absolutely no "soul" left there to debate, as its only the smallest step from finding dead VINs and building replicas. It's just if I found a neat, significant car that was just a bit too rusted or twisted, but I thought it should be brought back via restoration, I'd be comfortable (in theory anyway) using a date coded donor rather than trying to patch and realign everything. Not many cars are neat or valuable enough to justify the time and expense, though.

Finally, I don't possess the skill or ambition to attempt even a half-assed rebody (another reason to stay with gennie originals), so please don't think I'm one of the producers of these controversial cars.....

Happy New Year all.......

[Stefano]

tom406,
The rebodying of a 1969 Camaro would be an easy task to say the least. Changing The vin
(illegal BTW) and trim tag as well as the secondary Vins could be accomplished in just about any home garage.
This is one reason that original and unrestored cars are extemely desireable ,in todays market place. A car may be restored many times over, but it is original only once.
Any one can be taken by fraud. This is why it is a crime in our society.
When is the last time you saw a Super Car or high end Muscle Car advertised as number matching, date coded ,restamp ?

[JoeC]

In reference to the example given, it is a difficult job to restore a rust bucket 69 Chevelle to a #1 condition show car. The correct paint lines, number stampings, inspections markings, paper tags, chalk marks, etc., may be all gone. Same may be true for a car with an older amateur restoration. The clean donor car will have to be near the same build date and also same assembly plant as the restoration project. Also there are many small details different between a 69 Malibu and 69 SS and a COPO/Yenko Chevelle was not a Malibu and was not an SS. The 69 Corvette only had one assembly plant, 69 Camaro 2 plants but Chevelles were built in 5 assembly plants. Each plant built, stamped, and marked the car differently and made vendor changes during the year to keep up with the high volume. (total 69 Chevelle production was over 500,000 units) More info is available to restore Corvettes and Camaros but the info to restore 69 Chevelles is confused because of so many different assemble plants. I have not seen many true #1 condition correctly restored 69 Chevelles and have seen many original cars that lost their proper markings because of amateur restoration jobs. You would need a lot of experience restoring Baltimore 69 Chevelles to restore a rust bucket Yenko Chevelle to a true #1 condition show car. Just my opinions.