It never ceases to amaze me when great cars miraculously appear in the want ads decades after they were produced. Most cars are used up by their tenth birthday, and are in the scrapyards soon after. Location also plays a big part in this scenario. Cars condemned to travel on salty winter roads age in dog years and are often rust buckets by the time the last payment is made. Despite all odds, super reader Rocco B. has found us a very nice Camaro near Spokane, Washington. This 1979 Camaro, found on craigslist, has just 113,000 original miles, and was garage kept for the last sixteen years. Best of all, the asking price for this sleek survivor is just $4,950. You can even drive it home!
There are only two problems with this car. The first is a small rust hole in the passenger door. It is small enough to be easily repaired though. Second is the color. Looking at the old paint charts, it appears this car was painted a color called Camel Metallic. Not exactly the most sporty choice. I knew a car dealer once that wouldn’t let his partner go to the auctions alone. The dealer complained that the guy would always come back with brown cars. Very nice cars with low mileage. But brown. Once the cars arrived on the lot, they would never sell. Nobody seemed to want to make payments on a brown car. Even in an era when avocado green was a hot hue.
My distaste for brown cars is palpable, but this car could overcome that prejudice. Looking at the Standard Catalog of Camaro, it is difficult to determine exactly what model Camaro this is. In 1979, you could choose from models ranging from the base Sport Coupe, to the Rally Sport, Berlinetta, or the Z28 for those with a heavy right foot. Most of the clues lead me to believe that this Camaro started life as a Sport Coupe. The seller tells us that the Z28 wheels were added later. I am guessing the black spoiler was also an add on.
Inside, the Camel colored interior looks to be in very good shape. The seller tells us that the factory seats are near perfect. They have benefitted from the previous owner’s installation of the seat covers we see in the picture above. The missing horn button and the squishy steering wheel cover detract from the otherwise nice interior, but they can be dealt with cheaply. There is also an AM-FM radio with a cassette player in the car. Unfortunately, we cannot see if it is a factory radio or an aftermarket one. Surely it will play all of our Van Halen cassettes in high style.
The trunk still holds what looks to be the original spare tire and jack plate. The trunk has also been protected by what looks to be a rubberized coating . It is amazing how little luggage space these cars had. Looking above, it is good to see that the panel below the back glass is free from rust, as is the hinge area. This is a problem area for Camaros, but it looks like the next owner won’t have to break out the welder on this one.
Under the hood rests a standard 305 cubic inch small block Chevrolet engine with a two barrel Rochester carburetor. The output was only 135 horsepower and 245 lbs.-ft. of torque. This was the late seventies after all. If you want more horsepower, there are a lot of options available to you depending on the size of your wallet and your mechanical ability. The seller tells us that the brakes have been gone through and are serviceable. A number of other parts have been rebuilt or replaced as well, such as the shocks, master cylinder, ignition module, tires, and the engine has been given a tune up. The claim made in the ad that you could fly out and drive it home is probably true.
So, is it a car that would be worth flying to Spokane for? While the brown interior and exterior don’t make one’s heart skip a beat, this is a very solid car. 233,802 Camaros were built in 1979, but not very many in this condition remain. A good detailer could have this car looking very good in just a day. From there, you could add options such as air conditioning and some performance parts. A car like this is good enough to take on a cruise or to a show, but you wouldn’t be worried about leaving it in the hotel parking lot at night. Your only worry would be pals in your car club slapping magnetic UPS door signs on it when you aren’t looking.
Could you live with a brown car?
First of all it doesn’t have to stay brown. You got a rust hole to repair and the paint looks tired anyway. So fix the rust prep the body and shoot on a better colour. My choice would be black hood and roof and the rest in red with the gm stripe kit between the colours. The interior colour would look great next to the red & black. I’d pull the engine have it bored 0.030 over. I’d put in a slightly hotter cam and top it off with a 4 bbl manifold and Qjet carb. Than maybe a 700r transmission and 3.75 gear in the back. It would be a whole differant car.
My girlfriend bought this car. I trailered it back from Spokane.
I have no issues with brown. It’s period correct and a nice change from sea of gray, silver, white and black cars that are everywhere today.
The color isn’t brown it’s ‘slightly faded and flat BRONZE’, well it is on my screen and I’m stickin’ with that. The worst color on a car is green, only grass comes in green, nothing else, not curtains, not furniture, not clothes, nothing, only grass, and leaves, oh I forgot, MG’s and E types, and who wants a grass or leaf colored car? Never had a green car and I wouldn’t be seen dead in one!
Then please send them to me, at least British cars, jeeps, trucks….darker is better tho.
Highland Green, Fathom Green, Spruce Mica…
And the all-time best shade?
Chryslers GG1 Dark Racing Green Metallic.
Must be a generational or perhaps regional thing against brown. When I was in high school (71-75), the local el cheapo paint shops shot a lot of what we called “Root Beer Brown” onto kid rods. Assuming the interior was was some shade of tan or black, it was considered quite fashionable.
The late 70’s Pontiac ruled over Chevy with it’s Trans Am over the Camaro, sometimes I think GM killed Pontiac for fear they might just do it again.
Yeah, the G3 could have really hurt sales of the equally awful Chevy Aveo.
That’s one persons opinion.
Except it isn’t tho, the trans am domin ate the z/28 it’s stock you could get a 79 tran’s am with 220 hp that’s on par with a top of the line vette, for a fraction of the cost. Not to mention it would take a lot less to hop up a 400 pontiac than it would a 350 or 305
Great entry level hobby car at this price. Upgrading the 14 inch wheels and tires to 15 inch was a good choice. First thing that I do when buying a second generation Camaro.
The brown color goes well against the black Z-28 rims, not bad looking at all. Same with the interior, matches well, and kind of a relief from the usual colors we see. Got a feeling the very sight of an automatic transmission will cause outrage with many readers.
No, the 305 was never meant to be a powerhouse mill and it lived up to those expectations well, but speed costs money. How fast do you want to go?
Nice car for a fair price.
Great write up on a fairly boring car. Well done Jeff Bennett.
Hardly a boring car.
Installing the spoiler probably required holes, so I would paint it body color. Z-28 wheels would be replaced by color-keyed Rally wheels on Radial T/A’s. Clean the engine, fix the door, remove the seat covers and find a horn button. Add Van Halen tapes and voilà, done!
My next door neighbor bought one of these when he got hired into GM. We thought we were pretty cool cruising in a Camaro after driving rust buckets in what seemed forever. It was new and smelled great, we were young and stupid. He was a bit (quite a bit) dumber than myself. He got his first girlfriend pregnant, married before he was 20, and divorced before he was 25. But for a short time life was grand.
Here’s a little help in identifying Camaros of this period. This is a Base Sport Coupe with added wheels and spoiler. The Berlinetta looks like this with lots of pinstriping on it. It is a little fancier too. The Rally Sport had a contrasting colored hood to include the top of the rubber baby buggy bumper. It had a contrasting stripe. And, of course, everyone knows what a Z28 looks like. They all had 14 inch wheels standard, except the Z28
That’s good if this was 1983, but after 39 years, a lot could be changed.
Multiple times.
Wait, where’s that great car mentioned in the write up?
Getting restored.
Didn’t all Camaros these years come with the space saver tire in the trunk?
Not really comparing apples to apples, when you compare this base Camaro to a Trans Am. This is the perfect color if you like to drive fast. It is so boring even the Police don’t notice it. Whenever I see fire engine red cars or Hemi orange cars, I know that they rarely exceed the limit.
Hey now, I bought a 78 Camaro in the same Brown new off the car lot. But it did have T\tops Black interior and a manual on the floor. Gold wheels. Loved it. It was fast and fun. But again I was young too.
Paint please and pump up the engine with cylinders bored out plus forged pistons with a mild cam tied to headers and a new trannie that’s improved gears For some road cruising.’
If it’s brown flush it done ✅
A reasonable price ✅✅✅✅✅
Well Tony C. You forgot one thing. MONEY is also green, and I love that kind of green. Otherwise couldn’t agree more😀😀
Sorry Murray, I forgot about money in the US, our money is all different colors and plastic too with a clear see through panel in the note as well.
It’s just a ‘thing’ I’ve always had, I just can’t abide a green car for some reason.
I love seeing these plain jane Camaros popping up.
Reminds me of my first brand new car – 81 Camaro, black, rally wheels, spoiler, V6 auto. All show, no go.
I have had 2 of these,, A 1977 LT and a 79 base model,, still got the 79 and used it as a donor car for a rat rod prewar coupe.
(Tie the subframes together, add some bracing and add the 39 Body shell on and you have A v8 HOT ROD with decent brakes, handling and useful items like wiring, fuel tank and wipers.)
These were just cheap muscle cars but huge aftermarket business’s grew up around them like Summit racing, PAW, and others supplying the parts to upgrade a basic car into performance. The bones were there for handling too,, upgrade sway bars, shocks and bushings and you had a corner carver.
Downside was these cars were heavy, doors weighed a ton, so did the hood. Many of these ended up as circle track racers and many race fields were filled with these.
No lack of cool ideas for these,,,I still got a stack of car craft, Hot rod and super chevy magazines from the 70s-early 90s, Amusing these are now collectible, used to be so common
That’s a little steep for a plain run of the mill Camaro. They are not rare, unusual, or hard to find. And yeah, that’s one of the most undesirable colors in today’s palate. I had this exact same car, sprayed in the exact same color in the early 90s. Rear leafs sat a tad lower, but it was almost in the same condition. One of many gen II F-bodies I have owned. I made a side racket out of pulling these cars out of the weeds, and out of garages in rough neighborhoods in Detroit. Made a ton of money off of parts in the earlier days of eBay. I feel bad about it now, but I sent somewhere between 75-100 Camaros, Firebirds, and Trans-Am shells to the shredder. The one I regret the most was the 455 S/D. Motor was locked from rain going into the carb for years and years, and the body was rotten beyond even the most ambitious welder.
But I sold the still functioning shaker for twice what I paid for the whole car on eBay….
I had a 78 Camaro RS that was one of the cleanest Camaros of that vintage I have ever seen, I liked it very much. On this car the 305 would have to be gone it’s just to pitiful to even keep around. You would need at the very minimum welded in sub-frame connectors, this car with a posi rear end and decent gears would be able to handle a 400 to 450 hp engine and that would be a SBC. Camaros like this can make a reasonable street car but don’t try running it in any serious manner at the track like this. If your plan is that then gut the car completely and put a good cage in it to very securely tie the sub frames together. If you want to race and not do that, buy a different car!!!!
Brown is making a comeback. Ford offers a brown color for the new F-150’s. A guy at work has one, and it is a very nice color. I’ve had 2 brown cars: a ’74 Galaxie coupe, and a ’77 Monte Carlo, with the Joe Cool swivel bucket seats. I’m a brown fan. Plus, it’s just fun to say the word “brown”.
We have had more compliments on my wife’s 70 Mach1 that is ( Y Code ) Chestnut Metallic. Which is pretty close to a Root Beer color.
I had the exact same color / year / everything.
I always wanted to change the color when I had it, but now after two decades looking back I find it fitting. Is this car still for sale?
No, it’s not.