Bring us your tired, your poor, your un-pimped Chevrolet looking like a mildewed banana with shag carpeting on the back window ledge. Park it in front of Kroger in a swanky shopping center to devalue all the Subarus nearby. I lift my camera beside your creaking doors.
I’ve always loved original, un-“pimped” cars. I don’t mind modifications to a car if it’s done to improve its reliability or to improving its handling and roadholding. But most of the modifications I’ve seen are in poor taste. It’s one thing to lower the suspension, but I’ve never understood why anyone would want their car to bounce up in down like a basketball. That’s not what a car is built for.
Neither is a car built to be a phone booth, office, nursery, or restaurant. Or anything but driving.
What the hell is that supposed to mean “neither is a car built to be a phone booth”?
Get off the phone and DRIVE! It’s an automobile, not a telephone booth.
Simply wonderful to see. This is perhaps the first yellow ’73 Chevrolet I’ve seen – the vast majority have been green.
Yeah, I know what you mean about the green. A popular color that year! And not only is this car not green, it’s a four-door hardtop to boot. I miss 4-door hardtops, even though they were usually a bit rattle-prone.
Say are they parked in a tow away zone? I can smell the funky interior and unburned Hydrocarbons from here and I can hear the struggle to fire up too. I imagine that paint is chalky and rubs off on your hands. Where in Virginia was this photo taken because I am wondering if that is normal patina for the area.
The sound of this gen Chevrolet’s starter is fantastic. So commanding in announcing it’s presence!
some people love to hear the sound my 77 Chevelle’s 305 as it cranks to life, and some are slightly disappointed to hear that its as quiet as a churchmouse on the exhaust side.
Get that 305 warmed up and hot restarts are faster than a new car, sometimes you can just bump the key and it fires up before the starter can do 5 revolutions, other times you’ll grind on that thing before it’ll reluctantly fire. strangely enough its quite eager to start in 15 degree F weather.
And you have quite nailed the overall appeal of this Impala. 🙂
the whole quarter is gone…
It’s odd how many old cars get painted school bus yellow eventually. This one may have come that way, but even so, it’s a magnetic color to the 7th owner.
An hour away from where I live is a body shop that is making it their mission in life to turn as many of these cars as possible into what I consider to be “circus wagons”. Their shop is surrounded by 6 or 7 old RWD sedans that have been painted garish/candy colors and with 20+ inch wheels at each corner. I want to cry and I want to b….h slap the “artists” performing these transformations.
This car? I love yellow cars and this has what looks like a tan vinyl roof….great.
I had a 70 Impala as a loaner car about 1976 or 77, I have to confess that it is the only NON downsized Impala I want to own….though I might be talked into a 71 or 72. I just think the bumpers on 73-76s make these cars look “gawky”.
In the 80’s or 90s, that car might have devalued anything around it, but nowadays it is so old that it adds eclectic appeal to any parking lot or driveway. A good buffing might do it wonders, even with the rust. That car is a time trip, that is what crappy old cars looked like in the mid-late 80’s.
Also available in yellow
I prefer the early to mid 60’s Impalas myself with the ’65 my favorite as I grew up in one that my Dad owned…..but of the ’71-’76 generation, I like the 71 the most….The grille and taillights on the 71 look the best of that ’71-’76 generation to me….
The ’72 front end with the shorter grill and more sheetmetal on the nose looks less appealing to me.. while the ’73 and ’74 front ends look too blocky and square….and the 72 and 73 tailights look too blocky and pronounced in the rear bumper as well.
Besides the rotted out lower portion, the lumps in the vinyl roof indicates the roof is just as far gone. The body and bumpers appear dent free which is not normally what you would see in a rust bucket like this. It must have been taken care of for a long time before the elements finally got to it.
Any pics from the front? My father had a 1973 2 door coupe (green of course), had it until 1987, kept it looking brand new (he was a gm mechanics). This bring me back to my childhood! Someday i may purchase one of the convertible of those years….so “american classic”….
No front pics but here is another.
Wow, that is a LOT of rust on the rear quarters. Looks like it is below the trunk floor. Maybe could just be cut off and replaced with a sheet metal panel. These being body on frame cars, the frame is the important part. as long as it is solid, you can drive it till the doors fall off.
_NOT_ much rust there JYD ~ remember you’re in Az. where rust advances slowly .
I grew up Down East where a 5 year old car was considered good if it had this little amount of rust….
-Nate
I love it, four doors and all. It’s basically a later version of my ’64 Fairlane. Only 10 years apart actually. It’s a big American car, which makes it politically incorrect, and it is unrestored, which gives it personality and character. To me such a car is beautiful, but since most consider it ugly, it can also be used as reverse snobbery. I love driving my Fairlane in traffic. People put up their windows and try to inch away from it, especially when I rev it a little, with it’s glasspacks.
Sadly, that Impala is an emissions car where I live, which would make it a nightmare to own and drive.
Of the 1971-72 full sized Chevy’s I thought the 1971 had the best looking front end and the 1972 had the best looking rear end, it is hard to say which year I liked the most between the 1971-72 full sized Chevy’s but the reason why I choose these two is because they weren’t fully smogged and the 5mph bumpers weren’t used on these cars.
Oddly enough, that car has brand-new Virginia tags, so someone either just bought it, moved to Virginia with it, or perhaps just re-registered it after a long period of dormancy. Or possibly all three of those things at once.
The only thing I’d do to fix up the car is to wash it, repaint it if it needs it. And drive it if it’s driveable. 🙂
Yes, license plates starting with “V” with the longstanding state slogan “Virginia is for lovers” are newly issued ones in VA. I’ve started to see a few even newer ones starting with “Y.”
This is not normal patina for a central VA car, although for one that’s more than 40 years old, I’m not surprised by the rear quarter panel rust.
The setting looks very familiar to me — Barracks Road Shopping Center in Charlottesville?
Good eye!
I want this car so badly. Such a better beater than the typical ’98 Lumina you’ll find on craigslist in 2015. Like a time capsule to the crappy “old” cars of the 1980s.
Just today I saw a blue-and-white ’71 Impala sedan on the road here. I see it from time to time, but never when I have a camera at hand. It looks in surprisingly good shape; no rust whatsoever (but that’s typical in Tucson), all the trim in place, and the blue paint looks merely a bit dull. It doesn’t even sag on its springs. I have no idea what the interior looks like, though.
I could do without the shag carpeting, but as long as the car runs and there’s no rust or or body damage, I’d be willing to drive it.
No rust? You must not have looked closely at the rear quarter panels!
Cool old Chevy. Probably too far gone to economically repair, but hit the rusty spots with some POR-15 to stop them from going further, and drive it until something breaks. Then sell the bumpers to someone’s restoration project.
In 1974 my father bought a 1972 Impala four door hard top. Medium blue vinyl roof, light metallic blue paint, and cloth/vinyl upholstery. My father being totally devoid of any automotive knowledge did not make the nexus that while the car was registered in Florida the seller was from Minnesota but spent winters in South Florida. Not long after purchasing the car lumps began to develop under the vinyl roof. Rust was eating away the top at an alarming rate. In September of 1975 my wife and I moved to New Orleans and my father asked that we take his Impala (because of the human cargo I had to move) and he would keep my 1971 VW Fastback. The exchange was temporary as we were coming home for Christmas. The Impala didn’t give me any problems during that time, except for the large gas bill which I was not accustomed to and could barely afford. I was a full time college student with a part time job. A few days before our scheduled departure for Christmas vacation the Impala’s transmission started slipping badly. I was frantic and asked everyone I came in contact for a recommendation for a transmission repair shop. Word came back that a certain shop would do it for $200. That day, December 21, 1975, I dropped the car at the transmission shop and was told that it would be ready the next afternoon. The next day it was early evening and they were still working on the car. At around 6 pm they finished I paid the $200 and started off for I-10. Before I was two blocks away an awful sound came from the transmission. I managed to get the car back to the shop. The tranny had to be removed and a new torque convertor installed. It was sometime after 9 pm when they finished the car and once again headed straight for I-10 heading east. My confidence level that the car was going to make it to Fort Lauderdale was LOW but it made it. I was ecstatic to get my VW back.
And in contrast, look at what contemporary aftermarketeers could do to pimp your Chevy coupe:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/1973-Chevrolet-Caprice-Crown-Coupe-Neo-Classic-Brochure-wi1585-BQ83HM-/370774144081?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item5653dc7451
One of the biggest issues with GM cars of that era is that all the rubber bushings rotted out prematurely. All of the bushings in the front suspension, rear suspension, and body mounts would need to be replaced. Ball joints and steering linkage usually wore pretty fast as well, though most probably did not get the maintenance they were supposed to. I found all this wrong with a ’77 Corvette when I bought it back in ’90. I also had an engine mount fail. Lucky the engine didn’t fall out of the car.
That’s exactly what I’m dealing with now on my own GM products. On my ’75 Corvette, I’ve already replaced all the rear suspension bushings. Next step is the fronts.
On my ’71 GMC Sprint, one of the front upper control arm bushings actually fell out.
I think it cost me about $1500 to have the rear suspension, including replacing the sagging spring, rebuilt on my ’77. The trailing arm bushings have to be pressed in. Replaced all 6 U joints, wheel bearings, and stainless steel brake calipers. The expensive part on the front was that power steering cylinder.
Another nice old car , unless the engine is completely shot it’s quite easy (if time consuming) to make it whistle through any smog test .
Easy starters too once you’ve blocked the EGR valve and properly tuned it up .
I well remember these new, at the time I didn’t like them but they proved to be rather good cars as the decades rolled on by .
I too like hard Tops but don’t want to own one…
-Nate
I remember these cars and they aren’t worth a moment of nostalgia, in my opinion. The 1977 replacements for them were a leap forward in every way.
Nostalgia has nothing to do with how “good” something is, if fact it is often the exact opposite. There are a number of cars from the ’60s and ’70s I would love to own and drive, because for some reason they meant something to me back then. The fact that they were not as well made or as functional as other cars doesn’t even enter into it. I do remember the ’77, I was 18 when they came out. I remember all the commercials about the “new” Chevrolet. I worked on a ton of them. They were good solid cars, and I wish they would bring them back as today’s transportation cars. They were well built, and plenty functional to serve as people carriers. They were comfortable, and they had RWD. But I don’t feel the nostalgia for them that I do for, say, a ’77 Monte Carlo. That style of Monte Carlo came out way back in ’73, and to me was a beautiful car, though I preferred the round headlights of the earlier models.
A 1973 Impala 4-door post was the first NEW car my family purchased. It had dark metallic green paint, green vinyl interior, a 350cid four barrel, factory dual exhaust, and air conditioning. It also had poverty dog-dish hubcaps which truly detracted from all its its other fine aesthetic qualities.
I basically learned how to work on cars with this Chevy. When I was 14, the carburetor needed an overhaul. By myself, I purchased a kit and dove deeply into that Rochester Q-Jet. My father, a muscian, trusted me for reasons unknown, but he had NO IDEA what I was doing. The first time I put the carb back on, fuel came gushing out the vent tube while cranking. I then noticed I left out an o-ring from the needle/seat assembly. Those are important! With that issue solved, the car ran like new again, though I failed to properly reinstall the choke linkage. The third installation was the charm! The sense of accomplishment was unparalleled. I was hooked on fixing cars!
About a month later, my next project was replacing the starter drive–success, the starter would actually engage the flex plate now! My older brother then crashed it into another car, so I went to a wrecking yard and purchased a complete front clip. That front bumper was really heavy, but I was a strong kid, so I got it mounted pretty well…after bloodying my knuckles. Removing the fenders revealed a whole different car…I was intrigued…it must be how a medical student feels when that first scalpel incision is made in a chest cavity….. Once the clip was painted to match the rest of the car, the Impala look new again. I was so proud!
The Impala faithfully served for more than 10 years…until the front clip I installed got crushed by my Dad late one night in San Francisco. By that time, the green Chevy wasn’t worth fixing…..
I took drivers’ ed in a 1973 Impala…two, actually. Some days it was a green coupe, others it was a light blue 4-door sedan. Neither would get out of its own way.
That was prolly intentional ~ retarding the ignition timing by 3° really takes the ‘ zip ‘ out of any engine and it’ll still start easily and run smoothly…
-Nate