I’ve always wanted an early 1970s Monte Carlo. I’ve never particularly wanted a 4X4. But here’s the chance to have both in one tidy package in the form of a home-engineered 1972 Monte Carlo 4X4. You can view the car/truck hybrid here on ebay and then hop on your nearest Greyhound bus to Howell, Michigan to give it a personal look-over. If you like what you see, there’s a price tag of $10,000 attached. Could you build a similar one for that kind of money? It’s worth doing the math if the car tickles your fancy.
How’s it put together? From the drivetrain of a 1973 Chevy Suburban, running what is labelled as a “355 SBC” V8 engine backed up by an automatic transmission. That mill has been bored .30” over, work that was done several decades ago so that the Monte could serve as a tow vehicle. The seller further says that he has driven it places, even as far as out of state, reliably. What he doesn’t say is what kind of gas consumption you’d be facing if you took this car very far or how noisy and rough-riding it might be. That aside, if you do want, or need, a 4X4, this is probably a pretty good one to choose. You’ve got all the pizazz of a sharp-looking body styling effort on the part of General Motors and all the mechanical know-how of the clever garage engineer who put this together. As far as fitness for use, everything’s fine, apparently, with the straight, rust-free body originally coming out of Tennessee.
That leaves just some commonsense questions, starting with why build this? Aside from actually having a reason, in this case, to serve as a tow vehicle, the answers are, because you can. Because nobody else did. Because you have engineering talent to spare. Why buy it? Because somebody else did the hard work, as with any restoration, and you get to just jump in and drive. At some point, though, you might want to renew the paint, which looks good in the ad but gets an honest assessment of “needs work in spots” by the seller.
But that cleverness is exactly also what makes a piece like this hard to sell. It’s like they say about custom body work (I once saw an early Mustang with three sets of taillights on each side, just to give you a visual)—everyone wants to buy it when they see it at a show, but the alligator arms come out when it’s actually time to reach for the wallet. Of course, price is everything in this kind of transaction, and the question thus shifts from “What would it cost me to build this?” to “How cheap can I get this toy?” What’s your top number, and how far off the seller’s bottom number is it?
I gained a mullet and a leisure suit just reading this
…as did I and my ballcap suddenly spun around.
Mud bog Monte 🍺 🤠 👢
Needs a 572 BBC with a 700 shot of spray!
👍👍👍👍👍😁
It’s going to need a LOT more than that! What a God-awful mess!
NO! NO! NO! Desecration in the Extreme!
Looks realy nice,, frame is tucked up nice to the body. I got a 4 door car i was going to install on a van 4×4 frame. With no drivetrane in the 38 Pontiac , it would be a low budget build i could pile all my friends in and go have a ball. Now I would need to.get more friends but we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it .
Well, if you gotta drive a 4×4, you might as well drive something over the top.
It’s fantastic looking but…. engine should be a big block 602 with a 4 speed automatic. It would move it along without sucking too much gas. The torque of the engine will do all the work. Sorry but the 350/350 don’t cut it. And i would put Montana Truck mud guards on this. The body is too nice to ruin driving off road. Good luck to the next owner. 🐻🇺🇸
Reminds me of a pal in my teen years plopped a Blazer 4×4 frame and suspension under a 69′ Camaro he had laying around that had rusted out subs..SO..being the early 80’s…ya dont restore..you improvise.It was fun till he took a corner at 60kph and it flipped over :D So whilst i would never 4×4 a classic Monte Carlo…it brings back fun memories.
destroyed a good classic what a waste!!!!
No no no no! Why, why, why! WTF! What a travesty of justice. However, its not my vehicle so they can do what they want with it. Its just head scratching.
Fasten your seat belts! It’s going to be a BUMPY ride! What a Pity! Definitely a NO VOYAGER! You can BETTE on it? 👀 It’s just TOO much !
Git ‘er Done ! ….🍺🍺🍺
You’d be the only one at “Rednecks with Paychecks”.
Threw the 50 years or driving I’ve seen a lot of these conversions,but the only one that looks good is the camino as long as it isn’t too high because it resembles a truck!
How sad. If they’d taken a car that was unrestorable and done this, fine. But this is a waste of a good classic.
2nd time, after 50 years of driving I’ve seen a lot of these conversions alot were stupid as hell,but the one that looked the best was the camino,as long as it wasn’t stupid high because it looked like a truck which are fairly high
Fasten your seat belts! It’s going to be a Bumpy ride! AND You can BETTE on it! What a dump on a Classic!
What a screwed-up mess. I own two Monte’s and would never do anything like this to them.
It’s $10,000.00 with the reserve not met. The seller wants much more. I say beauty is in the eye of the beholder and he/she can keep it!!
What hillbilly would do this?
Someone with too much money and time on their hands. I saw an early 80s Cadillac Eldorado built like this.
I can think of at least one, who’s a 2! 🤔 And not Jed Clampett!
A other ‘Bama Cruiser! I agree with the losing a nice MonteCarlo comments. But, to each his own. Actually thinking of doing this to a/couple of vehicles I have laying around. A nice winter cruiser with some ground clearance to do adventures out in the desert with some A/C cranking. It looks better than most.
It does look cool I wonder how it drive, It would be nice to take for a ride before bidding
Waste of a good Monte Carlo.
OMG… what an absolutely dumb idea!
Another example of…Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.
I kinda like it!
Hold up a minute fellers. Not too far from me. I could use the 4×4 frame and chassis under my 1958 Willys jeep pick up to make it highway speed drivable. Then restore Monte to near stock or resto-mod statis. Can you say twofer.