Buh-bye, Twenty-Sixteen, and don’t let the screen door hit you. Git. SHOO. Out! You were like the drunk party guest who refused to leave quietly, breaking many, many things in our house right up until the very moment your taxi arrived. Let us now attend to the infant New Year that’s crying and screaming its head off from its playpen. There, there, now. It has been almost a year since I spotted our featured vehicle in a residential neighborhood in Las Vegas which seemed to be the perfect habitat for this two-toned beauty.
This setting, for many, is the real Las Vegas – far removed from the neon, clanging bells, glitter and boozy decadence of The Strip. Walking to the High Roller Ferris wheel at The Linq from downtown to meet up with friends, I had chosen to walk through this residential area as I like to imagine what life would be like in environments different than my own. Real people live here – folks who have mortgages and carports and barbecue grills and pet dogs (thankfully, none of which started chasing me). This is the good life.
The El Camino had also represented the good life for some, ostensibly combining the utility of a pickup truck with the sporty looks and creature comforts of a popular passenger car – first the full-sized Impala for 1959 – ’60, and then the middleweight, A-Body Chevelle-turned-Malibu starting in ’64. Born in an era of United States history that seemed fascinated with the Old West, the El Camino brings (to my mind, anyway) connotations of cattle ranches, lassos, Marlboros and dust, Pardna. Even modern day Las Vegas seems to have more than just a touch of the Pioneer Days in its aura, especially having been home to two different El Ranchos, The Frontier, The Western, Bill’s Gamblin’ Hall & Casino, and other Western-themed establishments, many of which are all gone like so many tumbleweeds blowing in the hot, desert winds.
Looking at this El Camino within the setting of this residential side street, it occurred to me that even though this neighborhood is worlds different than my own on Chicago’s north side, there are similarities between the two. I hope it’s obvious that I’m not referring to the architecture, but rather to the things to which many of us universally aspire. To borrow a lyric from the live version of Janis Joplin’s “Ball And Chain”, “…everybody in the world wants the same damn thing.” This is true. Outside of the context of that song, it’s true that so many of us want a nice ride, a nice home, nice things, and to be loved – regardless of where we’re from or how we personally identify ourselves. It gets tricky when we, as individuals or collectively, start to feel that there just might not be enough of the good stuff to go around.
Speaking of getting around, our featured truck is likely powered by a 115-horse Chevy 4.4L small-block V8, though a 3.8L V6 (also Chevy-sourced) with 110 hp came as standard equipment. The base price for ’82 squeaked in right under $8,000 (about $20,000 in 2016), though this was without necessary options. Base weight with the V6 was roughly 3,300 pounds. I have no firsthand experience with any El Camino, but I can imagine that driveability with the 4.4L and its 205 pound-feet of torque was a tangible improvement over the 170 lb./ft. of the standard 3.8L V6. Australian “utes”, which were basically the same types of vehicles, have always seemed to me to have gotten a lot more use as actual cargo haulers than I ever remember seeing in the U.S. when El Caminos freely roamed American roads. Is my perception an inaccurate one? About the biggest, heaviest thing I remember seeing in the back of an El Camino was a dirt bike, but then again, I was a city kid who grew up in a Midwestern industrial factory town.
The base-model version of the very last iteration of the Elky was a good-looking truck, in my opinion. It wore its quad-headlamped “Malibu” face very well, and it looked much more natural and organic without the Monte Carlo-sourced rubber-ducky front fascia featured on the SS models. Why even try to be aerodynamic? You’re a truck. I actually have no idea if our featured vehicle is an ’82, as this frontal styling lasted all the way through swan-song ’87 with no notable changes, so please pardon my assumption. As for 2017, which marks the thirty-year anniversary of the last El Camino rolling off an assembly line, let’s try to be deliberate in making it a great year as we look at the road ahead.
Las Vegas, Nevada.
Monday, February 8, 2016.
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Nice Elco. I always regarded these as a specialty vehicle, not mainstream and not a truck, even though GM threw it in with their real trucks for marketing purposes. They were, to me, a redneck image car, a stylized characature of a working vehicle.
I think all the salt-of-the-earth farmers and hardworking people might have been embarrassed to drive something so frivolous when they had real work to do.
However, I am frivolous and not particularly hardworking so I would love to have one.
Back in the day when these were still new or at least relatively new I knew a few contractors who used them as their vehicle as the boss man. Behind the seat was perfect for tubes of blueprints. The bed was big enough for them to haul the supplies that the workers may tend to run out of so he could keep them on the job and not running out to get little things. Of course most of them hadn’t picked up a saw, hammer, paint bush ect in a long time, though many had started out doing that.
This makes a lot of sense. Back in the day, I was that supervisor, doing exactly that job, including picking up the last minute tools, supplies etc that the jobsite needed. But I drove an extended cab Chevy S10. On several occasions I had 2500 lb of cargo, an amount that might squash an Elco. Also the lockable space in the cab helped. But an Elco would have been nicer to drive.
I think your cargo figures are a wee bit optimistic. The S-10 was rated for less than half that 2,500lbs cargo. Even a 1/2 ton truck would be at its upper payload limit with that load.
Both the S-10 and El Camino are full frame vehicles, with comparable payload ratings of about 1,000lbs.
When standard trucks were real working vehicles, I knew skilled tradesmen who drove El Caminos because they were faster and more comfortable.
You make a good point Joseph. If everyone on this planet realized that we as humans have more similarities than differences, the world would be such a peaceful place!
Happy 2017 everyone!
Now that I’ve lived in Las Vegas just shy of 10 years, I’ve become jaded to vehicles like this – I see them often enough that they barely catch my eye anymore.
I forget that my friends in Rustlandia haven’t seen one of these in 20 years.
I think Joseph could probably corroborate this, although he seems to have a special knack to finding old vehicles here– even cars like the GM A-body are thin on the streets in Chicago. I saw an H-body FWD 88 a few days ago here on Division street and I did a double take.
Evan, all six of my trips to Vegas have yielded a treasure-trove of great, vintage American cars! I have to be quick on the draw with my camera, and have even had to “choose” one on a few occasions when more than one CC was a moving target.
And CJC, to your point, that cars disintegrate here in the Midwestern slush and salt are exactly why I would stop to photograph an H-body Delta 88 in good condition. Total throwback. 🙂
Nice shots of the El Camino, I usually stay in the touristy part of Vegas whenever I visit. So, it’s interesting to see your shots of the life outside the strip.
I don’t know what holds in store in 2017. 2016 actually ended up being a pretty good year for me, I was actually kind of bummed to see it go. Then on the 30th, I saw on Facebook that one of my dearest friends from high school ended up passing away unexpectedly. 21 years old too. When I shared my COAL on Facebook, he actually gave me an offer if I wanted to submit it anonymously to a website called Vice. I didn’t take him up on the offer, but that spoke a lot about his character. He was a great guy, and me and my friends are going to miss him a lot.
So, that was my 2016, great year, followed by an unexpected gut punch at the very end. So, I don’t know how 2017 will pan out, but maybe it will be better.
Oh gosh, that’s terrible, Joseph. I’m sorry for the loss of your friend – 21 is far too young. It almost started to feel like 2016 had started to take on its own tangible character (kind of like the Overlook Hotel in “The Shining”), but then I started to think that maybe news outlets did a little extra sensationalizing. Just my perception. Today’s my first day back to work, and so far, so good in 2017. Cheers, friend.
I’ve always liked El Caminos and and Rancheros.
My best friend had a ’65 with a 283 4-speed. Being a motor head, I’m sure he hauled car parts and anything else that he needed to carry around with it.
I had a chance to buy a ’60 El Camino that didn’t run and needed a front clip along with a ’60 sedan delivery at some point in the ’70’s. I REALLY wanted the sedan delivery and didn’t have the money for both, so I let the El Camino go (I didn’t know then that 5-6 years later I’d let the sedan delivery go too). I’d still like to own one or both of those vehicles to this day.
My brother had the ’79 Black Knight version. I think it was his first new car. He special-ordered it with the V-6 3-speed manual transmission, and power windows (at the time he bought it, he had a motor route for the local newspaper).
Joseph, again a great article.
My neighbor had this Malibu El with the monte aero nose painted in primer black. He was a body guy and did a lot of work on it. Sadly, he moved a couple years ago, so I don’t get to see the assortment of cars he would work on out of his garage. My favorite was a basket-handle T-Bird in that 70s yellow he restored for the original owner.
In California, a lot of these and other A-bodies had the 3.8L Buick V-6. I believe the 229 Chevy V-6 (3/4’s of a 305 small block) was not emissions certified for CA..
That’s correct. Neither the 229 cubic inch V6 (produced from 1980 to 1984, used in A-, B- and 1980-81 F-bodies) nor its predecessor the 200 cubic inch V6 (produced in 1978 and 1979, essentially 3/4 of a 267 V8, used only in A-bodies while other models still used the old straight six) were emissions certified for California. In California, cars that would have normally used these engines got the Buick 231 instead.
Neat to learn about the Buick V6 engine .
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As one who worked both on and with this series of Malibus when they were new I grew to dislike them because GM cheaped out so much on them ~ the dashboard simply _isn’t- ~ there’s a gauge binnacle then it tapers away to nothing, no room for a glovebox ~ WTH ?! .
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Nevertheless they’re still incredibly popular to – day, one of the highest theft rate cars in The Ghetto .
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Decent looking IMO .
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LAX Police had them as black & white squad cars, they were simply awful .
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-Nate
No room for a glovebox? Wait, what? The glovebox was present and accounted for in both of my Malibus.
The interior quality was, admittedly, not top notch. The plastics in my ’79, which all started out roughly the same color tan, had faded to various colors ranging from white to a peculiar pink by its 20th birthday.
Nope ~
The gauge binnacle stuck out and immediately right of that the dashboard went in as close to the firewall as they could get and still squeeze in a heater .
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Miserable cars, this from a die hard GM/Chevrolet fanboi no less .
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I remember working on them, that was awful too .
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-Nate
There must have been some glovebox delete option for the 9C1 cars in that case. Mine was a base, not a Classic, so I doubt there were any special interior options.
Could be but every one I’ve seen here in California was this way .
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Good to know not everyone suffered the wrath of GM .
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-Nate
Very nice car
these last gen el caminos are fairly common around here, I pass by 2 of them on my way to work.
The El Camino almost made a comeback in 2010 as the Pontiac G8 ST (ne: Holden Ute), essentially a GTO with a pickup bed. But Pontiac was shuttered before it could become a reality.
As it turns out, it looks like the Australian ute from both GM and Ford is going away soon and, with that, probably any chance of a return to the US market, as well.
Rudiger, I do remember reading about that from around 2010, and I wondered if it would pan out. I think I would have liked the vehicle you described better than the Chevy SS, though I did like those, too.
Aahhh, the 4.4 V8. The 267 V8, arguably the worst SBC of them all, from what I’ve been told.
I remember being told the Chevy engineers developed the 267 to have “the economy of a six and the power of a V8.
Instead, apparently, it was the polar opposite.
I’ve driven exactly one of these 267s, it was in a friend’s ’79 Malibu that I was scrapping in 1988. It had a rod knock.
I’ve wondered why they didn’t just reuse the 4.3 262 V8 that had come in the Monza 2+2s a few years before…or better yet, the 305, which was as good a small-block as any of the time.
Anyway, I thought the 4.4 was gone by the time this nose appeared, leaving us with the 3.8 or 305. While I prefer either an ’80 or ’81 with the single headlights, this nose is quintessentially Chevrolet and attractive in its own right.
I think the main focus of those lackluster, small V8s was emissions and fuel economy. Performance was further down the list. The irony was none of them were very good at anything and, accordingly, none of them lasted but a couple of years, either.
1982 was the last year for the 267. IIRC, availability of the 267 and 305 in Chevrolet RWD A-bodies in this period was as follows:
1979-80: all models have choice of 267 2bbl or 305 4bbl
1981-82: Malibu coupe/sedan and Monte Carlo available only with 267 2bbl; wagons and El Caminos continue to have choice of 267 2bbl or 305 4bbl
1983: 267 dropped; 305 4bbl available in all models
The 267 wasn’t any worse than the 262 or the 305 for reliability as it was just another small bock Chevy with smaller pistons. It made more power and torque than the 262 which only had 110 HP in 1975. The 267 started off with 125 HP in 1979 and ended up with 115 for 1982 with the leaner burning C4 emissions system.
Having driven many cars equipped with this motor I can tell you it was much nicer than the 229 V6 for smoothness, power and drive-ability which is not surprising considering it made a full 35 additional LBS FT of torque than the V6. Mileage was virtually the same as the V6 as the greater torque moved the vehicle with less strain and take note that 267 equipped cars had lower gear ratios for less engine revs on the highway.
The 267 in my best friend’s 1982 Caprice coupe was a perfect example. He bought this car from an elderly lady with only 66K miles and it ran mint. Being that this was a heavy car at over 3600 LBS, the 267 was for sure not a sprinter but was light years better than a 1983 229 V6 sedan me and dad test drove a year prior to this. He also got very good mileage with this setup usually seeing over 20 MPG as a combined average despite having a 3 speed transmission.
I also have a Consumer Guide test report with a 1982 Malibu Classic with the 267 and they averaged 20 MPG in there tests and said that despite not having much more power on paper the small V8 was a clear step up from the std 229 V6 tested a year prior. This engine mainly gets a bad rap for being one of the least powerful small block Chevy engines. But lets keep in mind that Ford had a 111-115 HP 255 V8 from 1980- 1982, Olds had a 260 V8 that made only 100-110 HP and Pontiac joined the party with a 265 V8 that made 119-120 HP from 1980-1981. These peanut sized V8’s were where the industry was headed starting in the late 1970’s as a result of the 2nd fuel crisis. Note from 1983 onward all these small V8’s were deleted and the larger 305, 302 Ford and 307 Olds motors took over as the bread and butter V8 options due to a strengthening economy and easing of fuel prices.
I’d imagine the downsized V8’s actually weighed more than the normal versions with thicker cylinder walls, or did they get shorter deck heights?
Stroke was the same as the 350, so I’m pretty sure deck height was the same also. I presume that would make it heavier, though the difference couldn’t have been more than a few pounds. The 2bbl Dual-Jet probably weighed less than the Q-Jet on the 305 so you might get a bit back there.
And having owned both a 267-equipped ’79 Malibu and a 229-equipped ’81 with pretty much identical options (A/C, auto, and almost nothing else) I can tell you unequivocally that the ’79 felt much more powerful. Yeah, only 15 HP and 30 lb-ft torque on paper, but that made the difference in real-world performance between “acceptable to good” and “wow this thing is slow”.
Considering the old 262 only made 110/160 or thereabouts, it would have given you nothing over the 229 except a bit more smoothness and two extra pistons.