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Short Work: 1966 Chevrolet Gasser Wagon

Even without photos of the side of this car and just one overall exterior photo, it’s still easy to see that this 1966 Chevrolet Chevy II wagon is a shorty and a gasser, and possibly a drag car and who knows what else. It’s located somewhere in southwest Minnesota and it can be found on Craigslist for $12,000 or offer. It would sure make short work of your next grocery run. Thanks to Nicholas T. for submitting this tough little gasser!

This is the only other exterior photo, which is strange because Craigslist doesn’t charge to upload a gaggle of photos of the vehicle that you’re trying to sell. I may as well wonder why cats throw up on the carpet or why people barrel out of the side aisle with their shopping carts in stores like they’re the only one there, to even begin to wonder why anyone would list a car for sale with only two exterior photos when they could load a dozen photos. Why, Barn Finds readers, why?! In any case, it is what it is, as they say, so let’s move on with this custom hot rod. And custom it is, very custom right down to the shortened chassis

It looks and sounds like the builder spent a lot of time and probably a lot of money building this custom drag car. The interior looks great and there is still more than enough room to haul groceries in the back in-between the custom roll cage. The seller says that it’s a former drag car but is now a street car. Could you imagine driving this crazy car on the street? Model year 1966 would have been a second-generation Chevy II and I have never seen a shorty made from a Chevy II wagon before. I wish that there were more photos of the body so we could get an idea of the scale and quality.

You can tell by looking at the underside of the hood that this wasn’t done as a concours build, it was most likely done for fun and I bet that it’s reeeeeeeal fun! This is “a 355 with Dart 202 heads, roller rockers lumpy cam . hooker headers, tunnel ram with dual Holley carbs. built TH 400 trans. built posi rear with gears. chrome wheelie bars, drive shaft loops.” This YouTube video isn’t of this car, but I bet that the 355 V8 with dart heads sounds fairly similar to this yellow Chevy II shorty wagon. That ain’t no battery-powered car sound there! Thoughts on this sweet shorty? Have any of you built a shorty, or a drag car? Or, both?

Comments

  1. Avatar Madmatt

    I love gasser inspired vehicles from the 60’s
    and this looks cool!Must have been a lot of time spent
    to get it to this point,looks good,Iam sure that engine
    cost the owner quite a bit,but I’ll bet that it runs well!

    Like 0
  2. Avatar JW

    12K or offer for this seems reasonable for the work performed and it looks like it was done fairly well, more photos before I would even make an offer and then a personal inspection before handing him the cash. I like it and I’m a Ford truck / GTO guy.

    Like 0
  3. Avatar Steve R

    I doubt it was ever raced seriously, if ever, at least in its current form. It’s to short to be stable. Besides NHRA rules dictate a minimum wheelbase, which is in the neighborhood of 100+ inches, it’s not likely this thing would pass tech. That was used by the local track to get rid of a friends car, a low-10 second Triumph TR7, it was unstable and he refused to slow it down.

    Steve R

    Like 1
  4. Avatar Dolphin Member

    Steve R beat me to it: it’s too short to be stable.

    Actually, compared to dragsters, which are always very long both in relation to axle width and also compared to regular vehicles, this is waaay too short.

    A bit of instability or different amounts of traction of the rear wheels and it would probably be off the strip in a flash.

    Like 0
  5. Avatar Rhett

    I’m with Steve R – that thing looks squirrely standing still, much less at 120 mph.

    Like 0
  6. Avatar 68custom

    early Nova wagons are so uncommon so I am not a fan of the shorty, man I bet it gets wild when you stand on the gas!

    Like 0
  7. Avatar 64 Bonneville

    that’s how you fix rusted out floor boards in Minnesota. I like though.

    Like 0
  8. Avatar Rick Reynolds

    This car was probably altered when Nova wagons were 500 dollar cars.
    Now, it would be worth more the way it came.

    Like 0
  9. Avatar Troy s

    The value of this street freak Nova isn’t in the form of dollars but in the bug eyed ear to ear full tooth grinned feeling you get when you romp on this thing. That 355 just looks nasty with that tunnel ram and fender well headers. Hard core Nova to the bone!

    Like 0
  10. Avatar chad

    a bud drags a Starlet (500 – 700 HP) somewhere down in Jersey.
    Both R pretty short. So it IS done…

    Like 0

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