You’re almost looking at a time machine — a 1976 Chevrolet Vega 52,200 mile survivor with one of the most outlandish factory interiors I’ve ever seen. It’s waiting for you in Morgantown, West Virginia and you can find the auction here on eBay. The starting price was $0.99 and 36 bids as I write have only taken bidding up to $2,149 — and there’s no reserve!
When we feature Vegas on Barn Finds it’s very similar to when we feature Pintos and Gremlins with good reason. While some readers are sentimental or recognize the good points of these early Detroit “subcompacts”, others see only the engineering flaws and other issues. This late hatchback features some unusual options and the improvements present in the 1976 models to address some previous shortcomings.
The seller tells us that the car’s paint is largely original with two small blended areas. I can’t make them out in the pictures but it’s nice that they are disclosed. The video walk around shows a few places where paint is flaking and some relatively minor rust areas. There’s one spot inside the passenger door that scares me a little but overall there’s a lot less rust than you would expect.
Whoa! What designer let this fabric into the real world! Actually, if you look at a closeup of the fabric here on the heritage Monza page you’ll see that this “Heritage” interior features little eagles and stars! There were only 2,620 Vegas equipped with the RPO Code of 07H to get this interior.
Under the hood looks terrific as well. Does anyone know if this is the right color for a 1976 Vega engine? Regardless, it’s obviously been loved a lot. Are any of you interested in becoming the next chapter in the heritage of this Vega?
Doesn’t induce an immediate headache like Porsche’s “Pasha” interior does.
Love the Pasha, this looks like wallpaper.
….Indeed. In a French cathouse!
When I first saw 1979 Vega I knew something was wrong, but it was corrected upon reading. Still, I find it amazing to see one in this condition for they were not known for longevity.
Neither was the 2.7 Liter Porsche but they’re desirable and so is this Vega
Had me a Vega for a second car once upon a time. Mama always told me if ya can’t say any good don’t say nothing. So here is what I got to say about my Vega. ” “.
There are plenty of the 2 million Vega owners that had good luck with their cars. Too bad you didn’t.
Robert, Not the early ones.
I purchased a ’75 Vega GT 4 spd in Rhode Island (1976) to take with us when I was transferred to Germany. One of the best cars I ever bought; took us all over Germany, The Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg and Austria. Wish I had it back!
By 1976 most of the bugs had been worked out of these cars and they really weren’t so bad at that point. Too little, too late unfortunately.
My 76 Vega Gt made it to 37000 mile and left a rod in the side of its crappy block. I can’t think of any vehicle that is as bad as these were.
Every single Buick engine up until they changed oil pumps in the 80’s is a far worse design than the Vega. At least the Vega had an oil pump.
1974 VW Dasher is at least as bad for multiple reasons. Perhaps a 1990 Plymouth Grand Voyager transmission eater. I had both
By this point this was a pretty aged design, by 1976 the Vega was “tapering off” and by that I think it was selling at less than 200,000 cars a year, so still a good number of Vegas rolling off the line, some fall off probably had to do with the bad rep, but a lot also had to do with the fact that the Vega was old by 1976 and the Vega also now shared showroom space with the newer (but still kinda old fashioned)Chevette.
It’s always going to be hard for me to believe anyone ever looked at that “engine”, and went on to buy one of these cars.
I had 26 Vega’s, Monza’s and other cars rebadged for this body in the late 80’s. I quite enjoyed working on them as they were simple and if you took care of them, reliable too.
This is a 76 for sure, part of the whole bicentennial package, but it is missing the re white and blue pin striping on the sides of the car. Most of these had a pure red interior, but some did get the cloth inserts on the seats you see here.
Engines were bare metal / silver, not red. The sheet metal behind the camshaft pulley on the top right should be silver, not red. A few got Chevy orange as rebuild motors, but never this bright red. This one still has the plastic timing cover, which is rather rare as they were finicky to put back in place and often left off after the belt was changed.
A surprising number of these got AC in the late production runs.
So the sellers story is nice but this engine color really throws a wrench into the story, right? Is it AT all possible this could be a factory color on the engine used later in production? The car said to be “that original” does not line up. I did not look that closely but the engine color seems to be, if not original, well done meaning out of the car, painted in pieces, thus a rebuild at some level. I wish the seller could give more info from the long time original owner.
Vega engines were painted red in 76 and blue in 77
1976 engines were painted red. 1977 engines were painted blue
It’s not missing anything. This is not a Spirit of America limited edition whuch was a 1974 white hatchback with a white vinyl roof. This is a 76 Vega with a 1776 Heritage interior option of which only 2,600 were made.
this is not a 1974 Spirit of America whivh had stripes. This is a 1976 Vega hatchback with the 1776 heritage interior option which only came as shown. 2600 built. The interior was also available on 1976 Chevy Monzas and 1976 Chevy Chevettes.
This car is the 1776 heritage interior option of which 2600 were ,ade. It did not have exterior stripping. The 1974 Spirit of America Vega hatchback was a white exterior and interior, white vinyl roof and exterior red and blue stripping. 1971-1975 vega engines had unpainted (aluminum) engine blocks and light gray painted cylinder heads. 1976 engines were painted red. 1977 engines were painted blue.
Vegaman, did you have 26 cars by choice because you liked them, or did you go from one to the other as they broke down?
Anyone but me feel the urge to put an “n” after “Vega” on the dashboard?
I may be alone on this, but I have no problem with this interior! I’ve never had any interest in Vegas, but now I like pretty much anything that has held up this long.
Nothing good to say about this Vega, so I’ll just wish everyone a Happy Halloween from me and the gang.
Happy to see Jamie Palmer writing again!
Well, Todd, thank you very much — you made my evening! Happy to see you commenting as well!!
Those three guys around the pumpkin look like your typical Vega owners………..
I had 3 Vegas. THANK YOU! :)
I had 2 Vegas. 73 GT and a 76. The 73 head gasket went (surprise) but I had 2 cars worse than the Vega. 80 TR7 and 83 Shelby Charger. Both were money pits.
74 Spirit of America Vega hatchback had stripes. This is a 76 1774 Heritage special interior trim which had no additions to the exterior. 71-75 engines had light gray painted culinder heads (blocks were unpainted). 76 engines were painted red. 77 engines were painted blue. vegaman needs to brush up on Vega facts.
This is the 1776 Heritage interior available on the 76 Vega It did not come with exterior stripping. 2,600 were built with the interior option. It was also available on the 1976 Chevy Monza and the 1976 Chevy Chevette. 1976 Vega engines were painted red. 1977 Vega engines were painted blue.
It is very easy to see why there are so many low mileage Veggas. I was never sure mine was going to bring me back from anyplace it took me to. Mine (a 4spd Kammback) had 40k on it when an unsuspecting MG dealer took it in trade for a used Midget. It was on its third warranty-supplied motor. All of its motors were mostly silver. I don’t remember seeing a red one. Usually it’s possible to say that a car was pretty good except for its (something or other – body, motor, etc). With the Vegga, you had a poorly designed and rust prone body driven by a poorly designed and unreliable motor. Even it’s brakes were iffy. I guess it’s only saving grace was that, for its day, it was a nice looks ng little car. At least it was till the “safe” plastic bumpers came along. I’ve missed almost every car I ever owned – except the Vega. I always wondered, were automatic Vegas called Vegamatics (cue the “I Love Lucy” memories)?
This Vega would have the improved 2300
Wikipedia:
“The 1976-77 2300 engine received a new cylinder head design incorporating hydraulic lifters to replace the unusual taper-screw valve adjusters, factory iron cylinder liners, improved coolant pathways, and better valve stem seals along with a new five-year, 60,000-mile (97,000 km) engine warranty. The engine’s name was changed to Dura-Bilt in 1976 to declare that its problems had been resolved.”
Seller says it has a Turbo 350 tranny… with a 4cylinder??It’s up to $3550 now… only Vega that interests me at all is the Cosworth.
Likely a THM 250. Externally they look the same but the 250 used an Intermediate Band instead of an Intermediate Clutch as in the 350.
“Relatively minor rust areas?” Remember this is a Vega we’re talking about.
The Vega had specific rust areas that were mostly caused not by the vehicle design, but the transportation method used. In an at the time innovative approach, these cars were chosen to test the autopack, which was a very long railroad box car that had sides that folded down into ramps. The cars were driven up to the ramp, clamped in place, then a large forklift would lift the ramp door back up, resulting in the car pointing straight down at the floor of the car.
The designers of the Vega had no idea they would ever end up in this weird position, and didn’t design the car to shed water from this angle. Water would leak from the roof of the railroad car and collect on the car in unusual locations- under the trim, in the windshield cowl area, etc. There were no drain holes in these places as water would never normally get into those spots and sit for any length of time. How often is a car ever operated 90 degrees pointing front bumper to the ground?
It’s true, the cars started rusting on the dealer room floor.
The railroad car experiment was deemed too labor intensive and expensive. Once this transport method was eliminated, so too were most of the rust issues.
That explains my experience in 1973 seeing a nearly new Vega in the teachers parking lot with giant rust holes at the cowl. Something I’ve never forgotten seeing.
I saw a new early k-car on the plymouth dealer showroom floor & the paint was peeling from the glove compartment door! lol
I wonder if anyone picked up a new Vega directly from the FACTORY, skipping the “face the sky” delivery?
Cars that were sold locally to the GM plant in Lordstown Ohio where they were manufactured also did not have the rust and other issues that came from the cars being shipped nose-down. Cars sold within a couple of hundred miles of Lordstown were shipped to dealers on conventional car-carrier tractor-trailers rather than on railcars.
One would THINK chevy would IMMEDIATELY stop shipping the vega like that as soon as dealers reported rusting ones on new car lots – in late 1970 – not 1973!! or later! They should have also recalled those cars to fix them – or scrap them, instead of selling them.
Still, even if all Vegas were shipped sitting on 4 wheels, i am sure vega bodies / F-bodies of the 70’s & other 70s cars would/did rust out faster & in unexpected areas all over the body, unlike most 60’s car bodies.
I wonder how TODAY’S small cars would react to shipping like that.
i say tub the back end and race it. what a sleeper. these were great drag cars. when finished basicly an engine with a seat… the 70’s are coming back again.
While I clearly realize the sacrilege, I have always wondered why no one ever put the small Ford 289 in one of these. It seems like a perfect match for the little thinwall motor. But of course, you would still have to deal with the rust issues that seemed to plague almost all of these cars. But its still nice to think of this little lightweight body with a solid little V8 (I know that the SBC was added to many, but the 289 just seems like a better fit).
Vega unless they get better with age they couldn’t give me this thing!
Had a 73 Vega GT…bought it for $75 with 46000 miles on odometer…it burnt & leaked oil at a ridiculous rate…head gasket went…timing belt went…body rusted & fell apart…sold it for more than I paid for it to the scrapyard though lol…
I am surprised a scrapyard took it.
I remember the pick a part yards saying they would buy any car but a Vega, or a Rambler I think.