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Posted

I bought my first Monte Carlo about 1988 and it was a '71 with a 402 and a 4 speed. I made some improvements and sold it after 4 or 5 years for a profit to use the money for home renovation, with plans to get another one someday, knowing how rare they are. 

I bought a one owner '71 350 Monte from a neighbor about '94 and used it for a work car for 2 years. My son and I restored it for his high school car in '08, and he still has it. It was the first car I've done all of the body work and paint on. 

I bought our '70 SS454 soon after finishing my son's '71 and did a body off resto-mod on it. The build thread is still here, in the SS454 forum. 

I drove 13 hours to Denver, Colorado, 3 years ago to buy a very solid and driveable '71 402, 4 speed that came out of Tennessee. The short story is we agreed on a purchase price and the guy backed out on me. That was 26 hours wasted, not to mention the fuel. 

Right after that, I had a guy in northern Alabama sending me photos of another one that he had for sale and it was another southern car and it was also very solid. It was an Oshawa built car and he sent photos of 2 line sheets he had found. He was going to do a rest-mod and had already had the transmission rebuilt. He had the engine rebuilt at a local machine shop. The short story is the block had been decked and the machinist restamped the block without him knowing of the deck work/restamp. I noticed a mistake in the partial VIN stamp in his photos. He quit answering my phone calls and messages, even though I told him I was still interested in the car. 

That brings us to this car. I saw a reply a guy made to someone on a Facebook group post about 6 weeks ago. He said he had this car and would be selling it in a few weeks. I sent him a PM and asked him to let me know when he would be ready to sell. He replied with a lot of history of the car and some pics. 2 or 3 weeks later, I was 5 hours south of here, loading it up. 

The original owner, Gus, ordered the car at his hometown Chevrolet dealership in Thayer, Missouri, which is barely north of the Arkansas border. He wanted an SS454, but bought a 402 because of insurance. 

Gus worked as an engineer for McDonnell Douglas Aircraft in a suburb of St. Louis, and he and his brother were car guys with Corvettes. He drove the Monte a lot as his work car until the summer of '83. He kept it decent and driveable all through the years, but he put very few miles on it after '83. When Gus retired, he moved back to Thayer. He kept all receipts for any maintenance done on the car and he always kept very detailed records, which I now have.

The car came with some extra parts, including an excellent NOS grille, still in the box, that Gus bought many years ago after the car was hit lightly in a parking lot. He'd had a repaint done in the late '70s, along with a full rebuild on the numbers matching engine. 

In 1974, Gus wanted a better shifter, so he installed a Hurst. He saved everything he removed with the Muncie shifter and put it in the Hurst box. 49 years later, it's all still in that same box, and now in my garage. The shifter still has the factory black shifter knob with no shift pattern on it. 

Gus found the build sheet under the dash pad when he did some work on the car, and the protect-o-plate is also included with all of the documentation.

I'm very glad to have gotten the opportunity to restore such an amazing Monte Carlo. It has more options than any of the 3 other 4 speed Montes that I mentioned above, and it'll make a very fun car. The original color is a little different than what it is now, but not a lot different. It's supposed to be Rosewood Metallic. 

I've already removed the fog lights, and I'm going to continue keeping detailed records so a future owner will have it all. The carb is a service replacement for a '71 that was assembled in '79 and installed in '81. 

The car has AC, a working tach and gauge dash, a 3.31 posi rear, the optional NK4 Sports Steering wheel, the auxiliary lighting package, an AM/FM 8 track with 4 speakers, rear window defogger, Rally wheels, and Gus installed the F41 suspension that he got from a Chevelle at a salvage yard, along with salvage yard chrome valve covers. He also had Sears add cruise control and I found a vacuum hose for it had come off at the brake switch. I just reconnected the hose and it still works! 

The car now has a freshly rebuilt carb, new battery and tray, and new Moog rear springs. The 42 year old tires don't leak and have very, very few cracks for their age, but they won't be on the car too much longer. 

I've bought NOS quarters and some other sheetmetal already. I'm trying to locate a solid tailpanel and the last few inches of the trunk floor. The rest of the trunk floor and the floor pans are solid. 

Dan 

 

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  • Like 13
Posted

That's awesome Dan!

Thanks for sharing and keep us updated, you know we like pictures too!

  • Like 6
Posted

Great story and great car!  Keep the progress pix coming. 

  • Like 5
Posted

Amazing story Dan, thanks for sharing.   We are looking forward to the progress stories and pictures.

rob 

  • Like 5
Posted

Amazing car. Awesome find and I’m glad the story finally made it to the site. As nice as it is now, I can’t imagine how nice the finished product will be. Great story and an even better save. 

  • Like 6
Posted

What an amazing car with such a great story! Looking forward to following your progress on this one. Thanks for sharing.

  • Like 5
Posted

Great story and can't wait to see the finished car. My question is how do you find a 4 speed car. If you come up with another one let me know. Good luck with the project. 

  • Like 7
Posted

Great to know that another survivor is now in good hands!  It already looks a lot better and we know what you are capable of through your amazing SS!  At least your 402 4-speed has factory A/C and power steering - mine was built with neither.  Good luck with the resto and enjoy the unique pleasure of owning and driving a big block 4-speed Monte!

  • Like 7
Posted

Sweet find Dan! Like others have stated, we await the progress and more pics of this great find! 

  • Like 6
Posted

Nice find Dan! What a cool story as well. Looking forward to seeing the progress! 😎

  • Like 3
  • 1 month later...
Posted

I haven't had much time to work on this car yet, but I changed the plugs and did a compression test. It runs and idles better, but now it seems the fuel pump is giving up. Suddenly, the motor is fuel starved when accelerating hard. That'll be the next change. 

The Hurst Competition Plus shifter felt pretty sloppy. The car actually came to me with the original Muncie shifter, plus a spare one that had a part number written on it as if a salvage yard would have done.  I cleaned it up in the degreaser tank yesterday and it's in great shape. Gus changed to the Hurst in '74, so my guess is that he got the spare Muncie shifter from a low miles Chevelle that had been wrecked, but decided not to use it. The mounting bracket and braces were still attached to the Muncie shifter that he took out, and that shifter was worn noticeably more than the spare one was. I was able to remove the Hurst this morning and install the Muncie. It works great, and every piece of original hardware I needed was in the Hurst box. I forgot to take a photo of the shifter after it was cleaned up, but I'll get one with it installed. The rubber shifter boot was hard and it crumbled getting the Hurst shifter out, but a new boot came with the car. I'll be installing it soon. 

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  • Like 8
  • 9 months later...
Posted

I haven't done much work towards the restoration of this car this year, but I did take the rear bumper off to get ready for tail panel and quarter panel replacement work. Sold the trailer hitch. I've bought NOS Rally wheel center caps, nice radio and headlight knobs to replace the sticky ones, a really nice exhaust manifold heat shroud, and a pair of working horns. I sold the passenger side fender and I put a rust free fender from my Arkansas parts car on it to check the fit. I have another rust free fender for the driver side that I bought separately, plus 2 rust free doors that are from the same parts car, and NOS quarters. The Muncie shifter with the original knob on it is back in place and it works great. 

    Today I checked the dates on the 7" Rally wheels on the car, plus 3 more that came with it. I found that I have the 5 wheels it came from the factory with and 3 of them were on the car. The 5 are dated January 18th, 1971. This is consistent with what I was told when I bought the car in May of 2023. The other 2 had been used for snow tires by the original owner. It had Firestones on it from 1982 that I took off today to get the 5 wheels ready for restoration. Those old tires look like they haven't lost a pound of air since I got the car. I put some 9 year old BFGs on 8" Rallys on it for now. I put it in the trailer and it's going in the barn for a few months. 

     I'm retiring from my US Army Corps of Engineers hydro-power electrician day job on January 9th. I'll still have my fabricating business where I make some Monte Carlo parts and True Slap shifter detent plates. Working one job, not 2, is a very welcome change. I'll have time to get our '57 Nomad back on the road and to do a few things to our '70 SS454 car before Spring arrives.

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  • Like 9
Posted

Congratulations on the retirement, Dan!

Welcome to the club where every day is Saturday 😁. I've been retired about 2 1/2 years already, and can honestly say that I haven't missed going to work a single moment in that time (I do miss access to the sheetmetal and machine shops though).

If you're like most people, you'll wonder where you found the time to go to work, with all the stuff you'll be doing.

  • Like 7
Posted

Dan,Great story on a BBC 4spd find!  Ditto what Joe T said on retirement also!  I haven't found where I had the time to go to work either ! Man, wish I knew you were selling that trailer hitch. I could have used it. Where did you find a good tail panel? AMD should buy those dies, and start making this part for the First Gen Monte Carlo's. I had to get one from Illinois way back in '05.

  • Like 4
Posted

Hey Dan, That 4spd looks sweet!!!  You always turn out Great cars!!!!! Cant wait to you start ripping into her....

Congrats on the retirement, and becoming one of us with less time than before!!!!  lol  Enjoy!!!

  • Like 4
Posted

Dan, that's a fantastic back story ! 

I can hardly wait for the future progress pictures and of course the final prevail !! 

Definitely sounds like a car I would be envious of.  

Oh yeah above all CONGRATULATIONS ON RETIREMENT !!  Enjoy every day as if there was no tomorrow !!! 

  • Like 5
Posted

You will wonder how did you get everything done while still working a full time job and the try to remembering what day of the week it is

  • Like 4
Posted
3 hours ago, Leghome said:

You will wonder how did you get everything done while still working a full time job and the try to remembering what day of the week it is

I have a clock that not only tells time but what day it is too 😅

  • Like 2
  • Haha 4
Posted
5 hours ago, cny first gen 71 said:

I have a clock that not only tells time but what day it is too 😅

Yea Steve i broke mine, It is stuck on Saturday!!!!    lol

  • Haha 5
  • Yay! 1
Posted

I've been busy making a parts list to try and get the majority of the needed parts ordered before the prices climb. I ordered some of them last week. Many more to come. 

Dan

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  • Like 12

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