My 'car(s)' story...

[1Bad'66]

I was asked in another thread if I would be interested in starting a thread about my old Nova that I had before my Corvette.

Sorry in advance for the long post!

Here goes!

I found the car in Ohio. 1966 Chevy II SS. Had a BBC on spray (250 shot) in it when I got it. Ran it like that for about a year. Then decided I wanted to go a different direction with it. So: I tore it down. Really down. Engine/trans out, the whole front clip/subframe. Down to a shell. Re-did everything! Did all the work (except building the trans and engine machine work) myself. Smoothed the firewall, tubular front clip, disk brakes all the way around, and built a 408 cube F1 Procharged, blow thru carb'd monster!

The car was a blast to build. I had so much fun in every spare minute I could find working on it. The Mrs was not very thrilled, because we only have a 2 car garage and I kicked her out as my 'project' took up the complete space...for 2 years! (she was thrilled when she finally heard it fire up and go around the block on its' own power...lol)

Anywho, I cruised around and did a lot of local shows/meets/cruises with it for a few years. Had a lot of fun and met a lot of really good people.

I started to get 'bored' and wanted to do something else, maybe modern muscle, but did not know. I put the car up for sale without any luck...as we all know the market a few years ago took a crap and car prices plummeted!

One night while at a local cruise in, a gentlemen expressed interest in my Nova...he wanted it more than I did and a deal was struck. Enter my ZO6!

I researched and joined a few Corvette forums while I still had my Nova, I guess I really know what I wanted to get into (!), and had my ducks in a row.

I absolutely LOVE my ZO6. It does everything so damn well! It even has a/c and heated seats! (the mrs likes this). You can even hear the stereo while driving around! Now, don't get me wrong, I really loved the old Nova, and it was a really cool car. It got tons of looks! It was just a limited type of vehicle whereas the vette can do it all.

I miss being able to really 'work' on a car. I do perform as much work on the vette as I can: maintenance, brakes, engine work, I just can't tune it---there's no carb! lol. And I can't weld on it...which is a passion of mine. Love it!

Summing it all up: I miss and love classic hot rods/muscle cars and think they get much more (well deserved in my opinion) attention than a modern muscle car, but the modern cars do so much so very well, it's hard to beat them.


And now, the guy I sold the Nova to sold it and it has made it's way to FINLAND!! Holy smokes, my car is in Europe! I actually talk via email with the current owner and he has expressed interest in my visiting him in Finland so I can see it...and I imagine help him work on it and show him all about it since I know all of it's nuances! My wife and I are actually considering taking a trip over one summer to visit!


My story so far...now some pics of the old: 1bad'66!


Build up video:







Walk around video: