You like ’67 Chevys? Here’s a feast for you then. And the one that caught my eye is the Biscayne with the police package leading the way. That’s somewhat appropriate, as it’s wearing Rally wheels, due to it having the optional disc brakes, which came with the bigger 15″ vented wheels. Strictly speaking, these weren’t exactly Rally wheels, as the police units came with tiny little round hub caps and body-colored or black wheels.
They’re very familiar to me, as Baltimore County bought a big load of them, and the police headquarters were just a few blocks away from our house. I was quite taken with them; big 15″ vented wheels with disc brakes! What’s GM coming to?
I couldn’t find a ’67, but here’s a ’68 with the same vented wheels and the little cop car hub caps. Not quite Rally wheels.
I assume the Rally wheels were really just a stylistic offshoot of the vented wheels that were packaged with the optional disc brakes. They were still quite uncommon in 1967, except for the Corvette, which had them standard, and also the ’67 Camaro Z-28, thanks to its big 15″ wheels and disc brakes.
Otherwise, ’67 Chevys, even the big Impala SS 427, came still with 14″ wheels and full wheel covers. It was very rare to see Rally wheels on any ’67 Chevy other than the cop cars, Vette and Z-28. That’s because disc brakes still weren’t standard, not until 1970 at least on big Chevys. The Rally wheels proudly let folks know one had sprung for better brakes. Not surprisingly, police were the earliest adopters.
Australian assembled ’67 Impalas had 15″ rally wheels. Still a great looking wheel, along with the Pontiac Rally II and the Magnum 500.http://oldcarbrochures.com/static/Australia%20and%20New%20Zealand/Chevrolet/1967%20Chevrolet%20Impala%20Brochure/image2.html
With an enlarged two page spread photo, I’m a bit surprised they let a car with such inconsistent panel gaps go to final. Usually, makers were pretty careful with details like this. Or they’d touch up the pic.
Nobody gave a damn about panel gaps until the Europeans and Japanese came along and folks started noticing the difference. They were atrocious back then, and the trim pieces didn’t align, and…
I know. I’m referring to letting the photo go to final. They cared in their marketing. As brochure and marketing pics were generally decent, and not this sloppy. If reality was another story.
Actually, these are completely normal door gaps for the times. Go look at the ’67 Chevy brochure. They’re all about like that, especially when shot from the rear. Nobody could get much tighter door shut lines in the US back then.
http://www.lov2xlr8.no/brochures/chevy/67cf/67cf.html
Your inclusion of the brochure reminded me of the sad airbrushing job on the Bel Air, where the rear door was erased to turn it into a 2-door sedan. Notice the short front door and improper location of the B-pillar.
Our family car back in the day was a 2-door Bel Air in turquoise, minus the whitewalls depicted (and no V8).
And there’s this badly botched 1971 Bel Air from the brochure.
Suddenly it’s 1955 with that vertical A-pillar (at least on the passenger side)!
And these Chevys looked great compared with anything coming out of a Chrysler plant. 🙂
Those aren’t actually Rally wheels. No vents. But they do have the Rally wheel center caps and trim rings. I’m assuming these were assembled in Australia at Holden? Local wheels?
Yes GM Holden (Australia) assembled 1967 Impala. This is from the sales brochure from Australia. They had some major differences. There was the body colored wheels with ralley centers, vinyl roof molding on all models similar to Oshawa, Canada built cars, red-orange-red tail lights with the reverse in the bumper corner…..and the RHD ’65 like reverse dash. All came with 327s. Interior had local upholstery and radios. All dash pads and steering wheels where black. The front and rear bench seats both had the fold down arm rest. Door panels were US versions with the carpeting extended upward a little. The buttons on the door panels and seats were white on all models. ….Arden Marquardt, 2311 West Street, Sioux City, Iowa, USA 51103
Also, all 1967 RHD full-size Chevrolet kept the 1965-66 dash like this Aussie one
https://www.chevytalk.org/fusionbb/showtopic.php?tid/247007/ along with South African version like the one shown in this vintage review of Car Magazine.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/45904802@N08/4641725881/sizes/l/in/photostream/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/45904802@N08/4641711411/sizes/l/in/photostream/
Here’s a good pic of the wheel on an Indiana State Police car – unusually an Impala Sport Coupe.
That is one of the coolest cop cars I’ve ever seen. And a coupe, no less.
+1
I agree, the Biscayne and Bel Air 2-door sedans was usually serve a cop cars. It’s cool to see a Impala hardtop doing the job.
….. and a 396 to boot! That car would be a nice find today.
Plus it has those optional lamps outboard of the headlights. They were purely decorative (not cornering lamps as would become more common in later decades), illuminating with the headlights. The amber lamps in the bumper served as parking lamps and turn signals.
Very observant. Can’t believe an Impala hardtop coupe was a real cop car, but this one seems to be legit, with all the cop goodies. Wonder if Hoosier JPC can give us some background?
Rally Wheels: The beginning of the end of wheel covers.
Although the fake wires put up quite a fight. 🙂
with curbs everywhere…
I was quite young when Baltimore City Police Cars we’re painted in that livery, and barely recall them using the ‘68 Chevy. I only recall that just barely since we had a ‘68 Impala Custom as our family car…
As to Baltimore County, I don’t recall them ever using Chevys in the sixties, but when the downsized Malibu hit the scene in the late seventies/early eighties, Baltimore County had lots of those, switching to the Dodge Diplomat/Plymouth Fury by the end of that decade. It was the full size Fords that I recall early on for the Baltimore County Police Department.
By the mid to late seventies, Baltimore City was on an AMC kick for a while. What I recall vividly, was the switch to BLUE lights for the City Police cars. But for some reason, I thought that happened when those ‘68 Chevys were in use. The pictured patrol car obviously has a cherry on top.
I have always found the differing approaches to the introduction of disc brakes between the various companies interesting. Bot Chrysler and Chevy introduced discs with special wheels/wheel coverings, and both companies seemed slow in getting discs to take off on dealer order sheets. Ford stuck the discs behind standard wheels and tires but put a special brake pedal inside as the callout. From what I noticed back then Ford got a much higher proportion of cars with discs out the door than the others did between maybe 66-68 or 9.
Agreed. In the ’67 brochure, there’s one or two distinct references to the optional disc brakes. By the ’69 big Chevy brochure, it’s a single line buried in with a long list of the more obscure options.
Part of the issue was that I’m quite sure Ford was using 15″ wheels from 1965 on, so there was no need for a bigger wheel or wheel cover. Chevy used 14″ wheels through 1969, even on the SS427. So they needed a bigger wheel, and the 14″ wheel covers wouldn’t have fit. If they had gone with 15″ wheels back in 1965, it might have been somewhat different.
I suspect some buyers were put off by the Rally wheels back then, on a Caprice or Impala, hard as that is to believe now! 🙂
That is an excellent point on the 15 inch wheels – one that had not occurred to me in the context of disc brakes. Ford had those brakes on Thunderbirds and Lincolns in 1965, as I understand it, so it would not be surprising that they designed the new 65 Ford with the bigger wheels in preparation for offering discs in 66.
Ford used different wheels for disc brakes in 66-67. They used a 4 piston Kelsey-Hayes caliper . The normal wheels would’nt clear them. That changed in 68. They went to a cheaper sliding (floating ) caliper that was Ford
Designed.. it was at this point that discs were standardized with power brakes. Even as a kid, I Kew how to tell which of the 3 brake systems a big Ford had. Plain pedal high-manual drums. Plain pedal low,- power drums.
Round disc, low,- power disc. Interestingly,
Police brochures mentioned a manual disc option in 1966-67. Never saw one, I guess it would have been round disc high.
I.n 1969, beancounters even got to the brake pedals. Galaxie 500 and lower models deleted the stainless pedal trim, so a power braked version was ID’d by a plain circle embossed in the pad.
,
GM introduced front disc brakes on pickups in ’71. The 10 series had 15 inch rims, but switched from six lug to five larger ones. Also the vacuum power booster was optional the first year. It would stop, but pedal pressure was high.
In high school, a friend’s dad had a ‘69(?) Chevy two door, pretty unassuming spec, perhaps not even an Impala, but it had Rally wheels and “low profile” (60 aspect ratio) tires and it looked good. Rally wheels may be a cliché now, but 50 years ago they were fresh and handsome. And I still like them.
It wouldn’t have come from the factory with 60 series tires. He must have switched to them later. Maybe the Rally wheels too? It was an extremely common thing to do starting in the early-mid ’70s.
’67 Chevys were EVERYWHERE back then. My Dad had a new ’67 Belaire 4 door company car. Maroon with a black interior. We went to Target for camping supplies and when we back to the car we hopped in (nobody locked cars back then). He struggled to get the key to work in the ignition switch. As he was struggling I looked at the car and immediately told my Dad “we’re in the wrong car!”
Agreed, they were everywhere and we used to look for duplicates of ours. Usually the closest we could come was to a Bel Air 4-door in the same color because of the relative rarity of the 2-door sedan.
Our next door neighbor had a ’67 Bel Air wagon, dark turquoise with a contrasting interior and optional auxiliary lamps outboard of the headlights. I don’t recall that being a common option.
If they had been Fords his key might have worked. We had lots of Fords during the era. My Fairlane’s ignition key would start my mother’s Falcon.
Some stories are just too funny
And this is one of them.
I would have just said ‘+1’,
But I can’t since I am him…*
THE POEST!
-The Poest
*Because obviously that wouldn’t be considered a poem in anyone’s book.