By next Sunday morning, you can be the owner of a massive rust-pile that, in its DNA, is a 1969 RS/SS Chevrolet Camaro Indy Pace Car. You’ll have to send a truck to Cromwell, Connecticut to collect your prize should you be the high bidder here on eBay. The car is over $12,000 with many days to go in the auction. Thanks to frequent tipster TJ for this find. Note that the same car is listed also, separately, here on craigslist in Hartford, CT, for $13,400. This tip came from Mike L.
The Camaro has paced Indianapolis more than a handful of times, starting in 1967 and including for the 100th running of the Indy 500 in 2017. This nicely coincided with the Camaro’s 50th anniversary. In 1969, the second time the Camaro kept the IndyCar field in check, General Motors made 133 Pace Cars—two mechanically equipped as pace cars themselves, one to present to the eventual winner (Mario Andretti), and 130 “Festival” cars used for parade duty and other ceremonial purpose surrounding the event. Then, there were 3675 replicas (RPO Z11) that went to dealers for retail sale. What’s happened to this one in the many days since a lucky owner first took it home is anyone’s guess. Driving in salty conditions is the least of it. (The car was delivered in Wisconsin, and it shows.)
No doubt about it, this is going to be beautiful when it’s finished. If restored to stock, it will be in Dover White with Hugger Orange accent color. The interior will be orange and black with houndstooth upholstery. The car is equipped with the factory 350-CID engine and automatic transmission. The question is, what will it take to get this car restored? This heap (OK, project) is so bad it’s got almost nothing left of the vinyl top except the bows. The seats look like a full buffet was had by the nearest rodent family. Then there’s the body. Missing the front end, the body is eaten up in its lower extremities. The brake and disk assembly look like they’ve been under water. All of this damage has to be reversed.
What you’re really buying here is potential, and you’re going to be in this one for a large restoration bill. Interestingly, a similar car, in roughly similar shape, was featured on Barn Finds a few months ago. It had a buy-it-now price, but the seller ended up taking an offer, a number slightly under $15K. This one is getting dangerously close to that territory with days of auction left to go.
Rough looking car,but if you do most of the work yourself,
it might be worth it.
I knew a guy who bought one of these brand new,& kept it
garaged.It was in perfect shape,& when I last talked to the owner,
he still had it.
When finished,this could be a great looking car,
if the buyer restores it to stock condition.
You are kidding right?? People bidding that much for what?? A lot for a VIN tag.
by the time you get all the rotten and missing replaced will there be anything left of the original car
25 years ago. I saw one of these at a swap meet. Just as bad of shape, pulled out of a swamp, etc. They wanted $4500 for it. We thought, what kind of fool would pay $4500 for a VIN tag? LOL.
Good Lord.
People shouldn’t be rewarded for putting their garbage up for sale for $15000 but what do I know. I’ve always sold my junkers for $150. The 🌎 has gone mad.
I, and many like me, saw the rise and eventual fall, and then magically rise again of these cars. Oh, they are revered as almost royalty today, all hail the RS Camaro,,when in fact, and I say this time and time again, this was just someones beater. Gotten for peanuts when the rust set in, almost oblivious to its value someday,,didn’t care, just get to work, as the car literally deteriorated around them. When the motor finally puked, they were junked. Nothing special about them whatsoever. I suppose it’s why this crap garners so much money( to me) the molds are long gone, and this is clearly the “bottom of the barrel”, and if you are foolish enough to tackle something as poor as this, “Well” ( in my best Jack Benny voice), if Jack could finish that statement, he may say you’re a sucker.
It may be an orange and white RS, but I doubt it was a pace car. People don’t let Indy pace cars turn into this.
The Z11 code, visible on the cowl tag denotes a pace car.
Pace car hype is cool and all, but I still think the white/orange exterior and orange/black interior is just Gawd Awful.
Its not the first clapped out Indy pace car Camaro ,there was one in even worse condition posted ahere a while ago , and Ive seen others. As you said, at one time it was just another car. Before the internet ,no one would ever know if that car sitting in their driveway was a 1 of 1 car, or one of thousands. The Duster 340 I bought when I was in high school (and still own) , is painted F1 Mist Green . Back then it was just an odd color , it never occured to me that it was a rarely used color. years later, I read that only 117 Duster 340s were painted in that one year only color, so its kind of rare ,but for quite a few years it was just my daily driver, driven in all kinds of New England weather .
Imagine that, nobody has placed a bid yet! I doubt that the value of the scrap metal is worth even close to what they are asking, certainly what’s left of the car isn’t!
When I saw the AAA Northeast oval decal on the back bumper, memories of this car came back to me.
An identical car [likely this very car] was brought down from the New York City area to my restoration shop in 1998, after talking with the owner by phone. The owner had either not known how bad the rust was underneath, or had just not wanted to tell me, but on seeing the car, and what he wanted done to it, I gave him a realistic [but high $] estimate that was open-ended.
The car I saw was terribly rusted underneath, and because the owner wanted to add factory A/C to the car, I suggested a rust-free A/C body be sourced from the southern or western states, and the body shell switched. He said he didn’t have the kind of money I was quoting, so he took it back up north.
Never saw it again [until possibly now].
Maybe he didn’t come back because you were suggesting he be party to a felony by switching VIN tags.
RL, I wasn’t going to say anything, but one of the reasons he might not have wanted me do the work was because I would not transfer VIN or body tag, That would be left up to him AFTER he had paid the bill in full and picked up the car. That part of the conversation DID come up, but he didn’t try to talk me into changing the numbers.
Fair enough and I understand, glad you did say something it clears it up yor post for me.
RL,
About the same time we had another car under restoration, a 1969 GTX with a severe case of tinworm rot. The car’s owner found a rust-free body from Desert Specialties out in Arizona and had it sent to our shop. It was originally a Satellite hardtop, and I said he would have to switch the VIN and body tag himself, we would not do it.
He got very upset and was insisting I install the original VIN and body tag on the AZ body, but I explained that before I could do that, I would have the State Police inspect the car and make the decision. He ended up switching it himself after the car was out of my shop. I also made sure to photograph the car showing the missing VIN and body tag, so I could prove they were not on the car at time of delivery.
I may be crazy, but I’m not stoopid! [And I’m a former member of Federal Law Enforcement as well, not going to risk that reputation!]
It’s an ambitious project, luckily everything needed to make it nice is available in the aftermarket
Its not the first clapped out Indy pace car Camaro ,there was one in even worse condition posted ahere a while ago , and Ive seen others. As you said, at one time it was just another car. Before the internet ,no one would ever know if that car sitting in their driveway was a 1 of 1 car, or one of thousands. The Duster 340 I bought when I was in high school (and still own) , is painted F1 Mist Green . Back then it was just an odd color , it never occured to me that it was a rarely used color. years later, I read that only 117 Duster 340s were painted in that one year only color, so its kind of rare ,but for quite a few years it was just my daily driver, driven in all kinds of New England weather .
While its a hobby for some, at the end of the day i too like to eat food and pay bills.
I would do exactly what this Guy is, and that is.
Getting the most Ben Franklins i can for my Cadaver.
Someone may need the VIN to transfer this cowl section on a rust free original GM body. And then redoing the rest of the car
Previously i sold a pretty rare care for more than i paid but less than it was worth.
I kept the motor tranny wheel hood and a couple other things, someday i will buy it back.
But my car sold on EBay twice, the first guy doubled his money, the second guy made 3 grand.
Niether one of these gentlemen bought me a cup of coffee. No sandwich.
So at the end of the day if your gonna sell, get all the money or someone else will.
I too still cringe at nut and bolt 2wd restoration going for 70k, porche 356s, Some of the Down unda muscle cars. Pre 79 Broncos, and the list goes on.
I am blessed enough to actually own a concourse model with a big block 4 speed! The price of a cowl tag is pretty steep, the rest of the value if any is the weight and market price of the scrap metal.
ring…ring… “Hello…Dynacorn?”
just checked – a complete body with doors and deck lid is $14,000 plus shipping. With Hagerty pace car numbers up at $125,000 for concours condition, I would think you could do this for less than $75k. Thats pretty tempting numbers territory
This is not my world, but I am suspicious of Indy Mark valuation claims. I concede the market for bad Art in Manhattan and globally has pulled up the prices for many unusual assets but …..
In my opinion, this is wreck, or nearly so, and is worth very little.
Heck to the nooooooo. Pass on that seeming pile of excrement.
Are you out of your mind for this pile of scrap iron. Crush it and call it a day.
Buy what?
Per PT Barnum–There’s a sucker born every minute and an ass for every seat!!!
Now we know who votes—very sad
I always wonder who lets cars like this deteriorate so badly.
Good for you Bill McCoskey. We need more honest people like you. The world, as screwed up as it is, would be much better off. I know a then respected Corvette restorer, who took a beautiful red on white leather 1965 Corvette originally a 396 car with factory N14, and made it into a fuel injection model. Only a very well versed NCRS judge would know it was fake. He sold as an FI car. Back in 65, there was no indication in the VIN on a Corvette which engine it came with from GM. That began in 1972. Meanwhile, people have too much Barrett Jackson disease or look at BAT too much to see the stupid prices being paid for stuff. Even doing the work yourself, you will be under water like the Titanic on this Camaro. They are not that rare and it has a 350, and not a 396. While, I would like to see this rust bucket saved, it won’t be me.
George,
While yes, honesty is important, it’s also about self-preservation. I started my restoration shop on plenty of hard work and 80 hour weeks, and except for rare car club national meets, vacations were unknown.
But it was also the knowledge that if the Feds/DOT or State Police came looking, and found out we had changed a VIN plate and/or body tag, I could lose my shop and possibly multiple years of freedom, not to mention a fortune in legal defense costs. It’s just not worth it.
And of course I had anywhere from 6 to 10 guys who depended on me for a job. If the shop closes, they can’t simply go down the street to the next antique car restoration facility.
Now about early Corvettes: Back in 1976-78 I worked for another restoration shop in Northern Virginia. We were finishing up work on 2 early 1960s ‘Vettes when the State Police came in and seized them both. Seems they were stolen a few years earlier, and only after they had been mostly restored, did the original owner “find” them and demand his cars back. My boss lost a lot of money on those cars, and said “Never again will we work on a ‘Vette”.
No mention of the mileage on the odometer?
I’ll bet it’s under 100,000.
Camaro of Theseus?
heres a question
how would you know if this is one of the actual pace cars or one of the 3600 replicas?
The VIN information will tell you that.
Ran when parked …
Is it legal to take the cowl with the tag in place and weld the entire piece into another body?
pacekid,
Federal law requires all factory identification marks must match. This includes the VIN plate, firewall tag [or fender tag as on MoPaR vehicles] and ALL of the hidden VIN marks placed by the manufacturer [and said locations known to law enforcement].
Many manufacturers stamped the VIN on a unit-body rear frame section, and these frame members often rust away and require replacement. As not replacing the frame member is considered a safety issue, it is allowed to replace these pieces, following specific state requirements.
In my state {MD} as long as we kept records of the change, and added the EXACT VIN stamped digits, this was allowed. We always gave the old part to the car’s owner along with photos of the work involved in the part’s change out, and number stamping. Our tool collection included a full selection of number and letter die sets, from 3/8″ all the way to 3/4″. We always created a solid holder for a frame section to be stamped, and we clearly stamped the number in the part before welding it in place. This allowed us to precisely line up the numbers. It also ensured the numbers were under the various coats of paint.
Law enforcement generally understands the need to make these changes, and are only concerned when there is evidence of an attempted fraud. In most instances, If a body shell is changed out, it is possible to change over the tags provided everything has been approved by the local MVA/DMV or State Police [not local police]. It’s sometimes a long process, we’ve had to load up a partially restored car on our trailer and make multiple trips to the MVA’s State Police inspection facility so they could examine and approve what was being done.
In the 1980s we were restoring a 1959 Cadillac Eldorado Biarritz convertible, that was so rusty we felt it needed a replacement main floor, cowl & trunk floor, using a Coupe Deville donor body. The car was significant as it was Biarritz body #1, and the first owner had been the DuPont family. We had to do the work correctly and the car’s owner had the finances to do it right.
Before starting the restoration we took the original car down to the State Police inspection facility on a trailer, along with the coupe body shell on the back of my flatbed pickup. Arranged for the inspectors to check them both against the NCIC stolen car database, checked our receipt from the California junkyard we got the coupe body from, along with the shipping receipt to get it to MD. Agreeing there was no fraud involved, they gave the OK to transfer all the VIN items, plus replication of the 2 hidden body frame numbers.
They decided that because we were not changing the chassis, drive train, or all of the body shell, we were only replacing “pieces and parts”, and the parts being replaced required the R&R of the VIN info.
We offered to take detailed photos of the work and provide them to MVA, and their decision was that as long as we submitted the supporting photographic evidence we didn’t even need to bring the car back for an inspection once the car was completed.
What this shows is the importance of including the MVA/DMV in the decisions of what you want to accomplish FROM THE BEGINNING, and be very open in offering to have them inspect the vehicle. If you can satisfy their need to ensure there is no fraud involved, it’s unlikely they will deny the request.
I found that if we approached the MVA/DMV and State Police in advance, and ask them what we should do to keep it all above board and legal, even when it had never been done before, they were willing to work with us in making it happen. Note that we had already prepared a written statement of what we intended to do, so they had a record of intent.
Your state my not be as forward thinking as Maryland, so it’s important to get it in writing that what you want to do is permitted.