The listing for this 1964 Chevrolet Impala proclaims, “The vehicle is drivable and is mainly used for car shows“. Huh? Really? When I think of a 1960’s Chevrolet Impala and car shows, this example is not what comes to mind. But let’s not give it short shrift, yet, and look it over. This Impala is located in Albany, Georgia and is available, here on eBay for a BIN price of $8,500, OBO.

There’s nothing unusual about finding a ’64 Impala for sale today, 57 years after the fact. Chevrolet only made 442K two-door hardtops that year, just like our subject car. If you made the wild assumption that there were only 5% still in existence, that would add up to 22K cars – that’s a bunch. Whatever the case, they’re hardly rare. Some models, such as those that are SS equipped, or outfitted with a 409 CI V8 engine and a four-speed manual transmission, or a convertible, have collectability, but this example covers none of those bases. It’s just a standard old Impala two-door hardtop.

What this one does have is plenty of rust, both surface, and rot-through. It has a cracked windshield, missing trim, and what looks like an out of align passenger side rear wheel. Bent? Maybe, or maybe a whole lot worse. Missing wheel covers and a flat tire round out the exterior picture. The good? There’s really nothing to crow about.

There are no images of the supposedly operable engine but the fender V badge indicates that a 195 gross HP, 283 CI V8 engine resides under the rusty hood. It may start but I can’t imagine that there is too much actual driving that this Impala would be capable of undertaking. A two-speed Powerglide automatic transmission appears to be in place.

As for the interior, a tetanus shot may be in order before attempting entry. The front seat looks like it has been through a wood-chipper and the rest of it is a dirty, dusty, rusty mess. It could be worse I guess, the headliner could be doing a stalactite thing but it’s not, at least not yet. This thing has been to a car show lately? I’m calling horse hockey on that one!

So, $8,500 OBO for this Impala? I’m “exasperated and exubertated” at that suggested price. Is this Chevy salvageable? Absolutely unless the heavy X-frame has some perforation going on. Note the rear license plate, it’s a Minnesota tag with what looks like a ’77 registration sticker – we all know what Minnesota winters can do to old steel and sheet metal. But back to the restoration question – my question is why bother? This isn’t a special or collectible model and there are much better examples available for considerably less, wouldn’t you agree?