Farewell Corvair - Fun at any speed.

I decided to sell my 1961 Corvair Monza 900.

I have had it about 8 years and have not gotten close to rebuilding the engine and have no idea when I will have the time, money or tools to do it. So, I am lettin git go at about a $2000 loss. :( I shook hands on a deal today to let it go for $1000.

Here's a 1961 Corvair Brochure. Sweet stuff. Did you know the Corvair came as a coupe, 4-door, convertible, pick-up truck,

8 passenger van,

station wagon

AND an RV!? Yes, a Corvair Ultra Van RV!

It was the 1960 Car of the Year. First car in the US with independent suspension and later the first mass produced turbo charged car. It's still a popular car for SCCA racing. It's a well supported car if you are thinking of getting one. You can get any part imaginable from performance to NOS easily and actually cheaply.

I'll miss it. It was nice taking a spin tonight and picking up and old country staion in Cinninati and listening to Loretta Lynn and Tennessee Ernie Ford... I wish I were a richer man to be able to have a vintage cruiser...

My father is a huge Corvair fanatic. He owns and drives several of the coupes. And has several non-running coupes, rampsides and greenbriers.

Air-cooled aluminum flat 6. In the rear, no less. Definitely the tinkerer's car. They got a bad rap from Ralph back in the day, but all the problems of "unsafe at any speed" were solved by the 2nd year of production. I myself have a '61 rampside that I'm (slowly) restoring. Good stuff!

Sorry you have to part with your baby,
-Joe

Pitty man, that looks like a sweet ride. That wagon with the wide whites is even sweeter.

Such a pity! my condolences. I've never stopped mourning the loss of my dad's red '65 MGB--he sold it in a fit of pique when he could no longer drive.

I've always wanted a vintage car too, but SOMETHING always has to take precedence. If only because I don't/can't work on cars either, and at least a vintage dress won't require that much maintenance. And the mortgage always needs a-payin'...or a cat gets sick...whatever.

One of the finest Corvairs I've ever seen was in Sacramento CA and it had a great little story behind it. The owner was an insanely vintage-pretty waitress--her name was Alice, maybe? So even her name was vintage. She looked exactly like a fresh-faced 50's movie ingenue, absolutely a perfect match for her ride. She'd inherited it from her mother, who, get this, was a NUN in the late 50's-early 60's who had a change of heart and left the order. Well, and her very first act upon shedding her habit or wimple or whatever was to go out and buy herself...

...a 1960 deliciously PINK Corvair. The peppermint ice cream car. Man, it was cute. I can't even begin to describe the sight of Alice with her bobbed blonde hair neatly tucked under a vintage polka-dot scarf, gliding down the grubby streets of Midtown Sacramento on a hot summer's day. Wow.

Yeah, I love Corvairs!! So sorry, Swanky.

I remember dad's old MG - didn't he call it "Caroline" or something like that? He and Bruce H. used to putt around town - Bruce had a bug-eye (if my ancient memory serves me) Sprite. Such great fun to ride in.

I've had three old cars that I loved - a '61 Buick Special convertibibble, a '62 Buick Special and a '66 Karmann Ghia. My stepdad bought the 2 Buicks when I was a senior in HS (lol, then they were just old cars, not "vintage"!), with the instruction to me to make one of them drivable. Both had "issues", but the best candidate for salvation was the '62. I cannibalized the '61 for as many parts as I could get out of it, then sold its corpse. I would have loved to keep it - it was sooo sweet. White exterior, red interior, nice shiny chrome, but the ragtop was in bad shape, and I couldn't find a replacement for it that I could afford.

Anyway, I rebuilt the top end on her (yah, I'm a girl who can work on a car), and drove her until a drunk driver totaled her on Christmas eve of '72.

My next car was the Ghia, only paid $100 for her - and that was probably high. That was the ugliest, smelliest car I'd ever seen, but what potential! The window seals were gone, and the car had been out in the weather...there were mushrooms growing in the back seat...eeew. The rear wheel bearing was frozen, and she needed a battery. The nose was pushed in, all the fenders were curled under, and she was primer grey. This was a reeeaaaallly ugly car! But the engine was special. Hi/lo cam, big-bore, built in Germany for domestic use. That little baby hauled a**!

I fixed her up, painted her, and drove her for 3 years - whereupon I sold her for almost $400. A week later the front end fell out - good old failure of rust lol.

I keep hoping someday I'll find another old Ghia to cherish!

amiotiki

It's hard to keep an old car if you can't do the work yourself because of time or space constraints.

I was a VW man. I only drove VWs until about 3 years ago. I've owned a '68 poptop camper, a '67 split window van, an '82 rabbit, and a '68 fastback. My favorites were the '67 van, which I converted to a camper by removing the bench seats and installing the interior from my '68 pop-top. I had to sell it for peanuts when I was going to college because I couldn't afford to get her engine rebuilt. I've always regretted that mistake.

A few years ago I had to get rid of my beloved fastback - a great little car with electronic fuel injection that never had problems even after 35 years. It also had front wheel disc brakes and was surprisingly roomy for a VW. People would ask "where's the engine?" when I opened the back trunk and there was no engine showing because the pancake engine is fairly low compared to the beetle which has no trunk to speak of. I think the Type III (fastback, squareback, notchback) were the peak of VW engineering in the air-cooled era. Anyway, I had to get rid of her because I couldn't find a reliable mechanic and I had no place to work on her myself. That and she leaked like crazy so when it rained the windows fogged up real bad and she would fill up with water. I even had mushrooms growing on the carpet for a while! Getting new rubber seals was an expensive undertaking (over $1000 plus labor). I miss her.

My dream 60s car is the VW Type III Ghia, with a body designed by Ghia. Only about a thousand remain in drivable condition worldwide.

[ Edited by: thejab 2005-09-26 10:51 ]

I grew up with a 65 coupe 4-door like this one:

My grandma bought it new, and my Dad acquired it when he sold our late 60s Valiant. He has it, and it does need a little work.

Some %$#@! hit the driver's side door while it was parked out front. I've grown up loving this car, and hope to some day have it fully restored.

I'm sorry to hear that you've had to sell yours swanky, maybe some day you'll be able to purchase the car of your dreams.

[ Edited by: Tikiwahine 2005-09-26 11:33 ]

When I was in college (ca. 1989) I guy in my dorm bought three for $500 a piece. He was driving one without plates, gets pulled over, the car impounded, had to pay a fine, pays the impound lot, gets his car and drives past the same cop on the same road and gets pulled over again. OK, that wasn't really about the Corvair... But my best friend bought one of them and it's still in his old man's barn. I think it was a 62(?)

My Gran'pa was a Studebaker man, bought a new one with all the bells & whistles (and Studabaker was big on bells & whistles) every 5 years. When Studebaker stopped manufacturing in South Bend he was "forced" to buy a Corvair, a Navy Blue '65 coupe (I think it was a Corsa), and died before it could be delivered.

My Gran'ma drove it until she gave up her license, and then my parents used it as a second car until the mid-'80s. The 'vair was going to be mine when I got my own license but my parents had to move & we sold it to the brother of one of my friends, a mechanic nicknamed Kerker. Kerker did some much needed engine renovation work on the little 'vair, and then drove it through a concrete bus bench. I wish there was a happy ending to this story. :(

Ah, Amio, the '65 MGB was named Carolina. I STILL miss that car. Its original convertible top was RED--do you remember that?!? They stopped making them and we had to settle for black, bleah. I never forgave Dad for selling Carolina (to a bitchy yuppie real estate agent!hissssss!)in a fit of pique when he had to stop driving.

(And I couldn't help but think 'good luck!' when, the first time I ever had the opportunity to own property, the house was on Carolina Street....)

We also had a purple, YES, PURPLE Austin Marina in the late 70's. It was totaled by another of those damn drunk drivers. Red interior too. Very scary and totally 70's. No horsepower whatever but really, it was such a cute car. I believe it was the last gasp of British Leyland, too.

But my favorite was my grandma's early-60's Fairlane. Ah, lounging in the Fairlane across the Bay Bridge onto the old Embarcadero Freeway, on the way to watch Turk Murphy play at McGoon's...those were the days.

Jab, I'll never forget the VW wagon a bunch of us rode around in all through high school. For some reason it was called "The Toad" and the steering wheel shimmied wildly the minute our speed topped about 25 mph. And yeah, it leaked like crazy whenever it rained.

Sorry for the digression...

My parents used to drive a 1967 Chevelle Convertible... until maybe 1980 or so, when the cops pulled my dad over and told him it had so many rust holes it was unsafe to drive!

I remember my dad driving around while I lay down across the back seat, staring up at the moon...

Those were the days! No seatbelt and a bench seat! Can't do that now.