About

(DISCLAIMER - This is NOT a picture of the actual car, but it's damn close. I found it on the internet. Please ignore the 1962-63 style wire wheel covers... )

Here it is folks - The car that started it all for me. It happened like this: I was driving home from work one evening in my 1965 Chevy II 4-door ("Sonny"), when it came down with a terminal case of "Palsy Of The Linkages". First the column shifter locked up in second gear. Fortunately it could maintain an almost safe speed on the expressway I was accelerating onto at the time, since the next exit wasn't for another 8 miles. When I left the expressway and depressed the clutch, the pedal just dropped to the floor with the clutch still engaged. Fortunately, the light changed and I could keep rolling. I managed to plan ahead enough to not have to stop for several more miles until I came to an intersection with a lot of traffic. I lugged the engine down as far as it would go without stalling and managed to keep going... until I stepped back on the gas. That's when the throttle linkage decided to come unclipped. That was it. I'd had it. When I finally got home, I looked through the paper for a cheap car. Being a Chevy man I first looked at the Chevys. Well, everything was out of my price range... except for a couple of Corvairs a guy was selling about 15 miles away. I went to check them out the next day, a Saturday. Both were in decent shape for 15 year old used cars - it was the undeserved reputation of the Corvair that made the prices so low. I chose the '65 over the '66 he was also selling because 1) it had about 10,000 fewer miles, 2) had a 4-speed instead of the '66s 3-speed and 3) I liked the dark green of the '65 better than the light green of the '66.

Specs

164 c.i.d., horizontally-opposed air-cooled 6-cylinder engine. It was rebuilt about 5 years before I bought it with an eye toward bottom-end torque. The owner used the car to tow his twin sons quarter midget race cars.
4-speed fully synchronized transaxle
3.89:1 Limited-slip differential
Because of the low rear gear and the touquey engine, the car would jump off the line! I never had it down a dragstrip, but according to my wristwatch it would do 0-60 in about 8 seconds. The quarter mile was another story, since it was wound up tight in 4th gear by about 90 MPH!

Factory Options

Monza trim
AM radio
Front full-width floor mat
Passenger-side sun visor vanity mirror

Mods

Mechanical mods (all done by a past owner):
Stroker crankshaft
Torque cam
Original transaxle replaced with one from a '66 Corvair Corsa with 3.89:1 gears and limited slip

Comfort, convenience, and cosmetic mods:
Trailer hitch and wiring (there when I got it)
Custom striping
Rear "Cove" panel painted gold
Dual sport mirrors
AM/FM/Cassette Stereo
70-series tires (I forget the exact size) on the original steel 13" wheels
Lace-spoke full wheel covers from a Chevy Cavalier Type-10
Driving lights

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