Motor Trends‘ Car of the Year! That’s right, Chevrolet’s downsized B-body, a radical departure from its previous version, won MT’s coveted award for ’77. Other GM B-bodies followed suit but Chevy got the award, I guess, because it was GM’s volume leader. And, as the ’70s wore on, non-GM manufacturers followed suit too. Today’s find, courtesy of Rocco B., is the less frequently encountered two-door sedan body style – always a nice discovery. Located in Ann Arbor, Michigan, this 1977 Chevrolet Caprice Classic Coupe (C to the fourth?) is available, here on craigslist for $22,500.
First up, this Chevy’s seller refers to his Caprice as an “Aero Coupe” – I’m not sure where that originated as this Caprice is a box on wheels and anything but an aero-inspired design. OK, now that that’s out of the way, let’s talk Caprice Coupe specifics:
1976 1977 Delta
- Length: 223″ 212″ (11″)
- Wheelbase: 121.5″ 116″ (5.5″)
- Curb Weight: 4,387 3,779 (608)
That’s a slimmin’ if ever there was one! As for sales, wow! Total ’77 Caprice sales were 341K units vs. 185K for ’76. And, the two-door version saw 72K for the slimmed-down version vs. 50K in ’76. Of note, 1977 marked a first for a true Caprice two-door sedan, one with framed door windows. The ’74-’76 “Custom Coupes” were considered a hybrid and officially labeled as a “Hardtop Coupe”.
Our subject car claims 75K miles and it is clean. Firethorn was a very popular hue in ’77 and this Chevy still wears it well. The finish isn’t exactly new but there is some depth and consistency to it with no sign of oxidization. The chrome bits check out too but I would have avoided the rally wheels. They’re wrong for this car and seemingly done to death – but whatever your preference, I guess. The rear window of these coupes is a cool styling touch, it’s designed to appear as a three-piece backlight, reminiscent of a look that first surfaced in the late ’50s, but in this case, it has been modernized. The seller states, “Limited production makes it a collector’s dream” but as referenced above, there’s nothing remotely limited about this Caprice’s production volume.
So, what’s powering it? Don’t know, the seller makes no mention and I would consider that a critical piece of information. After all, there were only two V8 engines available, a 145 net HP 305 CI V8 and a larger 350 that was good for 170 net HP so it shouldn’t be a challenge to know which one is occupying the engine room (and it’s barely photographed!). I have driven, extensively, a 305 equipped ’77 Caprice four-door sedan and it was adequate but no great shakes. The seller simply states, “smooth running engine“. Of note, ’77 was the first year for blue-painted Chevrolet engines, a mundane shade that replaced the venerable orange that dated to ’55 and the small block’s inception. One item of concern is the automatic transmission – this vintage Caprice was equipped with a Turbo-Hydramatic 200 three-speed automatic, a lightweight transmission that was never intended for V8 usage. A lot of barely out-of-warranty claims were made in ’77 and onward, claims that Chevrolet turned down. It was a bone-headed move and indicative of the direction of the corner cutting that GM was starting to take. There’s no indication of a problem here, just something to be aware of.
Well, it wouldn’t be a late ’70s GM product if it didn’t have red velour upholstery. I’m not sure who was driving that decision but it was found across all five GM divisions all the way through the ’80s. Anyway, the interior’s condition matches that of the exterior, it’s clean and comfortable looking. Nice to see is a dash pad that appears to be intact – these had a tendency to give it up, first, in the area near the radio speaker grille and then spread onward.
The seller suggests, “Excellent investment opportunity“. I’m afraid that I’m not synched up with that suggestion, especially with a starting point of $22,500. That said, this is a nice old car and it’s in fabulous shape – one that can be driven and just enjoyed. I’m confident there won’t be another like it produced again, so get them while you can, right?
This was one of the cars we had available to us for drivers ed in h.s. I already had my license and was taking the class for the insurance brake and what was then called a blue card which gave you full driving privileges. My teacher would drop me off at the deli to get his lunch and then come back for me on their way back.
Did you pass the course?
Goofed off a lot in that class. We had these horrible scar simulators. Sounded cool until you actually used one. They projected a movie on the screen and we were supposed to follow the driving in it. I would put the e-brake on and push the gas down all the way. It kept me at a steady 40mph. Then I would sleep. I would score just as well as if I was actually trying. And yes, I passed the course.
i took drivers ed for the same reasons. Our coach doubled as driver instructor. First question I asked when i got behind the wheel. Does this baby got the 350? Before he could even respond. I punched it!! It did have the 350! lol
1977 COTY just goes to show how bad things were in 1977.
I think the 78 COTY was the Plymouth Horizon/Dodge Omni, lets check Google
Porsche 928?? don’t remember that, of course if you remember the 1970’s you probably weren’t there.
Ahh, Dodge Omni was 1978 “Motor Trend Car of the Year”
Not the Trans-Am?? 280Z?? Z-28?? VW Scirocco??
928 and 280Z weren’t eligible for COTY, at the time Motor Trend had a separate Import Car of the Year award. Most years it went to the only really newly-engineered offering from Detroit.
Was pretty dang groundbreaking in 1977 actually and probably turned the tides for the others yet to downsize. Build quality was about to make a positive turn, and that car was leaps ahead of the 76 fullsize Chevy,which i also loved. The window in door frame made all the difference with sound and lack of rattles, too. This was definitely NOT a bad COTY choice
Much worse in ’71 – the VEGA won!
& in ’76 the Volare/Aspen won!
& in ’80 the Citation won!
lol
BTW, the Caprices in ’77-79 were also avail with the 250 staight 6 – not sure about the wagons, tho. Last full size Chevy prior that the 6 was avail was in the gigantic ’73! Ridiculous.
You’re joking right??? One of the best cars of that decade. Best selling car of 1977. What American car would you chose in 1977?
It’s funny how cars shrink and grow through the decades. I understand a lot of it has to do with fuel economy, yet we’ve got some pretty big barges for trucks and SUV’s these days, so a lot of it must be consumer preference also.
Does the seller think he has a Monte Carlo?
wow, i gotta say JO’D, your write up this time was poor.
the limited claim by the seller is accurate/fair.
what im suprised your not aware nor made the connection is:
the car is fair to call collector simply for its condition, then especially for its 2 door, rear wheel, 8cyl.. then the colors, then the power windows…
but mostly
Jim, the ‘aero’ is the back glass !, the fast back glass the few of these had because 5his is the car used for Nascar and other circuts.
Like the Talladega, the Charger 500,, the Laguna S3 before it and ths Monty SS after it.
If i had 20k to buy a car like this, it wouldnt be a 77 Caprice, id buy a Laguna, or an Olds or a wide body Impala or a..
but if this were less money and i had more, id buy it, its a beautiful, well equipped, a end of an era American muscle car; and I love red interior :)
Also Jim, the rim selection is perfect for this car, what would you put on it ??
$ where mouth is:
Well, the next time there’s a curtain call for BF writers how about you apply and we’ll see what you can do.
The seller calls this car an “Aero Coupe” not an aeroback and your aero comment is uninformed, the Caprice was never used in NASCAR, and the Impala was discontinued from Winston Cup competition after the ’65 season (other than the four-door W-body SS version used after the Monte Carlo’s demise). This version of the B body was never used in NASCAR competition. Chevrolet’s entries, from ’66 forward, were then the Chevelle and later the Laguna and Monte Carlo. The Monte Carlo, and Pontiac Grand Prix utilized an “aeroback” glass arrangement in the mid-’80s and it was a considerably slipperier design than the partially slanted, sideways folded backlight used on this version of the Caprice/Impala.
Oh, and my opinions are my subjective opinions, nothing more; if you don’t like them, then don’t read them. I call them as I see them, it’s not my job to favor or criticize any subject, I write what I see and it’s that simple. Speaking of simple, one would have to be to think that a car that was copied 72K times is somehow limited.
Wheel selection? How about the original Chevrolet wheel covers? That’s keeping it real and original.
JO
Keep writing the articles J.O, we appreciate them.
I top dislike the rally wheels on this car. They are fine on the intermediate size cars but this cat should have full wheel covers. Rally wheels are way way overused. You see them everywhere at car shows. JO, ignore people that always have to nitpick
dear JO’D ,
pardon me if i came across too hard or scornfull or negative..
i did say ‘i gotta’ and ‘this time’ :/
Id say your probably my favorite writer for BarnFinds and if there was a spot for a writer, id be honered; i love Barn Finds .
As for you efforts to ascert yourself as accurate and me as some soet of idiot :
the car, the glass was in fact for racing..
if you insist otherwise, perhaps the R. Petty 42 and Gatorade 88 cars were just a some minor league cars i got mixed up about ;)
https://bench-racing.blogspot.com/2015/01/the-petty-caprice.html?m=1
hey J. i still respecr and appreciate you 🙏
My buddy in highschool (the 80’s) had one these with shackles, air shocks and Cragars. Very cool look for these. I’m unsure of engine mods, but this would be easy to add performance to.
Still an attractive design forty-six years after its debut. My paternal aunt had one, ice blue, white landau roof and that big aquarium-style rear window which was an arresting feature. To me it seemed to have the poise of a thoroughbred at the starting-line.
The GM Fisher Body Ternstedt plant where I worked roll-formed the decorative moldings for this car. The body-side moldings were extrusions made in our Dept. 4. I personally roll-formed a large number of lower rocker panel moldings for these and the Impalas too. They’d go next to the transfer die where Dottie fed the moldings in one at a time and out came a trimmed molding with both ends finished. We were using a brush-on surface protection fluid called Mar Proof. The solution laid-on a thin red coating of a plastic to protect the molding from scratches. Then the finished moldings could go directly to Anodize, then to Paint to get the black accent stripe painted-on just below the bright bead which ran along the top.
Cool. Thanks for the insight Nostromo!
You’re welcome, Bub. I was very young when I started with GM. Just under 20 years-old. It was an eye-opening experience. A Personnel representative said to a co-worker during orientation, ‘Factory work isn’t for everyone.’ I overheard this. They know about these things. One-quarter or more of those hired in January ’76 didn’t last out their 90 probationary period. Eye-opening.
I got a taste of the summertime heat in the building sometime in early-May. Good grief. It got very hot but I had to stick with it. The pay and benefits were top shelf and I figured to get married one day. I had my favorite jobs there over the years and got to be a process troubleshooter which was satisfying. Best wishes, Bub.
I “got in” when I was 22. Glad I’d had time to go around the block first.
Yes, I remember new hires leaving at lunch and not coming back on their first day. It could be a very hot, heavy, dangerous job. We had about 9000 people equally split between the old, late 19th century chain and wagon facility that the town grew up around, and the newer foundry and engine plant on the outskirts, built to launch the small block in ’53 and ’54 for the ’55 model year.
The ’90s and the 2000s saw international trade agreements kill us off. Down to maybe 1400 consolidated to Powertrain. Me and my cohorts had 25 years and absolutely nobody beneath us, so no seniority. Great work by a strong Union and a “good” local management team saw all of us hit our 30 years and pensioned out. Hope you were as lucky, Nostromo 👍
I’m glad you made it, Bub. I went into warehousing for (let me count now) a little over seven years after my home plant let me exercise an option based on seniority. I had just over 21 years in my home plant. I worked in two GMSPOs for over seven years.
After my wife passed away in 2002 I felt like a tumbleweed and I transferred to Doraville Assembly then Wilmington Assembly. Retired in 2009. The end of a long, winding and interesting road. With my transfer to Wilmington Assembly I landed very close to my home area and I was very fortunate to finish there as opposed to, say, the northwest corner of Ohio. That was a real possibility but my seniority allowed me greater flexibility in choosing one location from my top three choices; thank God.
Really Interesting! I worked for a Chevrolet dealership from late ’72 through mid’74, mostly doing warranty repairs. I never gave a moment’s thought about the trim and from where it came. Thanks for your post, very informative!
JO
You are welcome, Jim. I was up to my armpits in fabricating functional and decorative moldings for all of GM’s vehicles for a good bit of my 21 years at the GM hardware plant; ’76 to ’97. I was also involved in making components for electric and manual seat adjusters. My time was probably split 50-50 between the two pursuits. I see things in these Barn Find stories and often enough a memory will surface. Best wishes.
The seller is calling it an “Aerocoupe” because of the 3-dimensional back glass. And Rallys with white letter tires are cool on any rear-wheel drive Chevy, this is America after all :)
Cool find! The ask is roughly 3x the original sticker. Our family had a new 1977 Delta 88 4dr…350 V8, crank windows, air, rear window defog and a stereo. That’s it…out the door for $7,000 from Dill Oldsmobile in Chesterton, Indiana. It’s still a decent sized car but the late 80s and early 90s cars look downright small and short compared to new stuff.
There’s a front wheel drive Olds 98 Regency I see regularly where a live…it looks very diminutive parked next to an Accord or Camry
I had one of these 20 years ago. Brown with brown velour interior. 350 with a 4 barrell. Loved that car. Rode smooth as glass and drove very nice on the freeway. Got stolen and when it was found the drivetrain was missing. With liability ins., got nothing out of it. THAT was a bummer.
My 1977 Chevette had the same transmission. Okay for a small car with a 4 but a boneheaded move for a heavier car. I know my Dad’s ’78 Grand Prix had the lightweight automatic with the 301 V8. He had planned on towing a horse trailer but that was a no go. Got rid of it in short order. He was not happy.
Hi April. Too bad for Dad. He deserved better.
What kind of service did the Chevett provide?
All small-car automatics in that era have a dismal reputation for their driving experience – as Regular Car Reviews said about the one in a K-car “the torque converter eats so much power, it comes back for seconds” – but I’ve never heard of a Chevette laid up by a bad one.
I doubt that 301 would have towed anything too far, no matter the transmission.
Not bad. It was my first car so anything with wheels would have been fine. Less than a year old so it was still pretty nice. Since I was a poor kid making payment myself something that got good gas mileage was a plus. I was also looking at a 1969 Camaro convertible with a 307 powerglide that was in decent shape. $900 but it needed a new top (I could have picked up one for $100 from J.C. Whitney).
Yeah, I was a dumb kiddo.
We all were..gives us something fun to look back on. Call it experience.
That’s true!
Oh, one more cars I looked at was a five year old ’74 Chevrolet El Camino. Sharp two-tone blue and white. Was owned by a Judge who took care of it. When I figured it would be a gas hog I passed.
Wow. That’s one discerning eye.
I’m sensing a lot of commentators are less-than-thrilled with this model. I’ve never been a big GM guy; but this model, aside from the THC200…was GM at its absolute finest. The size was right; the power was respectable for the times; the lighter weight and a suspension engineered with one eye on police departments, gave it some moves. Rare in a full-size car of that time.
I liked the look. Later, I was driving a cab in a large city, and half the fleet were Impalas. I found I liked driving them, too – since the other half were Dodge St. Regis or Diplomats.
Elsewhere on the Web, someone made comparisons…the most successful models Chevrolet made, and their dimensions. The Tri-Fives were at the top…and their size and their weight, were right in line with a second-ranking, these downsized B-bodies. There was a sweet spot there, size, weight and utility…no matter the styling or design language of the time.
I suspect it was just GM paying attention to markets and its product planners, for a periodic change.
As I recall, when these came out they weren’t called Aero Coupes. The early ’80s Monte Carlo with the similar back window treatment got that moniker.
That would be the 86-88 Monte Carlo and Grand Prix Aerocoupe.
That’s right, there was also a Grand Prix, wasn’t there?
I went to work for GM in 76 at St. Louis plant. we worked 9 hours a day building 56 of these cars an hour & they ran 2 shifts. If memory serves me right the 77,78 & 79 got car of the year awards. So to sy this is a Rare car is a bit of a stretch. I had a 78 & 79 Caprice the same color as this one. ” Firemist red metallic” They were sweet rides to be sure.
Keith:
I know the St. Louis plant was the ‘Vette’s home for years and I know that they produced other cars too. Did they use separate assembly lines or was it the same line for every model? I toured the Broening Highway plant in Baltimore in ’69 and then again in ’71 and they ran the Chevelle, Pontiac LeMans, and Monte Carlo off of one primary assembly line, one after another – they didn’t even seem to be batched, but I’ve often wondered how St. Louis did it.
Thx!
JO
Keith cool story. I believe the beveled rear window/2 dr make it pretty rare. And that piece of glass is near impossible to find today
It’s amazing how much the value of these have shot up in the past year or two. I own three Caprices of this style (1977-1990) and have owned others and there are now some 4 doors that are selling in the upper teens and even 20’s if they are low mileage originals. Literally just a few years ago, you could get them for a third of that on the high end. Not a lot of clean originals left.
3rd gen chevelle, the last. One of few chebs I like to look at (all models).The big sq grill, 2 hdlghts, the camino’s curved rear window/hdbrd…
Real nice car now lower your price by 10 grand and maybe you’d be in realistic price territory.
22500???? Are you kidding me??? For a caprice that was worth only 1500 in the mid 2000s I bought 2 one for 1500 the other for 800 drove them home and pulled the motor & transmission for something else. Gah 22500 i hope he gets it, these 2 bodies i have must be worth 5000 ea
I have owned many cars over the years. This car was the only one that reminded me of being in a meat locker or commercial freezer. God did it throw cold air.
Many of these vehicles ended up Saudi. I was there for a month of the PATRIOT Missile program. One of the soldiers told me it was a great car here because of the extreme heat in the summer months.
Beautiful car with a crappy transmission.IMO overpriced by a lot. Always wanted to take this body and make a street rod out of it. Maybe in another kifetime
Some of the comments on this are hilarious and uninformed at best .
I think the write up was fair and informative .
There is no way in hell someone is paying 20k for this Caprice no matter how nice it is .
It’s at best a 305 /350 choked out Malaise special .
I’d take a ‘77 Olds in my garage for 32 years any day over this or a Delta 88 pace car .
My Grandpa had a new for 77 Caprice , silver with black velour . Beautiful car from my youth and I never would want it due to its absolutely scary underpowered engine .
I can just imagine your reaction to this car if it had the emission strangled 250 straight 6 instead, a full load of adults & their luggage on board & the a/c on, trying to get onto the interstate via an angled upward entrance ramp!
The only thing slower might be this dinosaur if it was a ’73 with the much heavier 5 mph front bumper & if it had the powerglide (last year offered) instead of the 3 on the tree & a/c …
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6k_tY2O0wc
lol