If you were a fan of German-built Opel automobiles in the 1960s and 1970s, you had to look no further than you local Buick dealer to buy one. That’s because GM owned Opel in those days and Buick needed some small cars to sell. One of them was the Opel GT, a little sports job that resembled the Chevy Corvette of the day. The seller has a pair of 1969 GTs that could be merged into one running car if you wanted to. Located in Bohemia, New York, this project duo is available here on craigslist for the package deal price of $3,000. Kudos to Mitchell G. for this twofer tip!
The original GT was in production from 1968 to 1973 with more than 103,000 copies leaving the assembly line. Many of them made it to the U.S. although those figures aren’t known. Mechanically, the GT drew from Opel’s existing parts bin which was largely fueled by sales of the Kadett B model. So, rear-wheel-drive was deployed and the water-cooled 4-cylinder engine rode up front. The standard motor displaced 1.1-liters, good for 67 hp, while a 102 hp 1.9-liter 4-banger was optional. We assume both of the seller’s cars have/had the latter as it was much more popular.
All GTs used manually operated hidden headlights and some of the hardware is missing from one of the seller’s cars, both being 1969 models. The tan example is the better vehicle and is the most complete of the two Opels here, retaining its powerplant and 4-speed manual transmission. But the interior is nicer than the red car which is a roller.
Logic says that you would borrow from the red car to make the tan one into a daily driver. The seller then suggests you take what’s left of the red car at that point and make a race car out of it (or you could simply junk what you don’t need). If $3,000 is too steep for you, the seller will entertain trades, but we don’t know what else is to his/her liking.
I don’t know anything about these, other than when seeing one back in the day I though they looked kind of cool, from a “cute” perspective. And small. AI says they are 13 1/2 feet long, roughly the length of my SuperCrew pickup from the front bumper to the back of the cab.
Tidbit: one of the pics shows the vehicles at an engine shop, with a sign “old cars wanted.”
Being an Opel liker, I read, it was the Opel GT that was first, shown at the Frankfort Auto Show in 1965, predating the C3 by almost 3 years. The GT was the inspiration for the Mako Shark, that I believe became the C3. Ironically, they both came out about the same time, so people automatically gave credit to the Corvette. Honest Inju,,oops, I mean, I didn’t know that. The biggest problem with these, was the cost. These cost almost $3400 new, the cost of a 2 year old Corvette then, and had several shortcomings. No trunk, no 5 speed, poor handling/stopping, the headlights were a constant problem in the cold, many “wired open”, a used Corvette was a much better deal. In its 5 year run( 68-73) only about 70,000 GTs were sold here, and not many bought another.
As weird as this world is, me included, somebody has got to collect these, and a smokin’ deal for them, but not much else.
I’ve owned three Opel GT’s. I found them to be good handling and quick enough. Always generated lots of interest and questions from bystanders. Although I’m 6’2″ I fit just fine in them. And the well-designed doors gave lots of egress and ingress room. The headlights had protruding pins on them that triggered receivers when being flipped over and back. A constant problem as they were prone to breaking due to the force needed to manually flip them over. I just wired them on and put an inline on/off switch in the cabin. Problem solved. Wouldn’t mind owning another one but nice examples are expensive and darn it, I need an AC in my car these days living in West Texas. Was 101 today..
Lovely looking car. I had a neighbour when I was a boy who owned one. I didn’t consider it a “Baby Corvette” at the time. I don’t know what I called it.
Nice project for someone with space, time and money. I remember the day and I remember it well the first time I saw an Opel GT for sell, ( I use the word in the wrong context on purpose).
Nevertheless it was a bright yellow version of 1971 vintage. A family man by then (1974) a 2 seater just was of no use to me. Yet I was strongly drawn toward the little car so I spoke to my then wife, this would make me a good commuter for work and we still have the old 1965 Lincoln Continental for family use. Of course she vetoed the idea ( if money wasn’t used for her and the kids it wasn’t used at all) so I with my head hanging low walked away. Ladies take this statement to heart: A man needs somethings that are just his. Otherwise the marriage is doomed to failure. Fortunately for me I found a great wife later on who was very generous in allowing me freedom to make good or poor choices. Such was the case when I bought my 1964 Buick Riviera which I still have, but she has passed away.
God Bless America
Oh please! These are about the furthest things from any Corvette. Slow and ugly. My older brother had one new, and it was hugely unimpressive.
I have a 72 model and for it’s day 103 hp scooted it right along. Other compact sports cars were only 65 to 85 hp and of course nobody expected to get corvette performance from one, that is until the US destroyed hp ratings with low compression engines. By then your muscle cars had dropped to 150 hp and were still pushing 3500 pound cars around.
Oh wow, I really want these. I have dreamed of building a hotrod out of one for so long! Talk about bad timing and wrong place, wrong time. Too far, probably a good thing at this time.