(first posted 12/11/2015) I’m throwing a lot at you today, but CC Commenter SomeOneInTheWildWest posted a link to this M/T review of the new 1965.5 Caprice and its equally-new 396 engine. I just couldn’t resist sharing it.
What’s a surprise to me is reading that the 325 hp L35 396 came with either Rochester Quadrajet or a Holley 4150 carburetors. I’ve always assumed only the Quadrajet was used on them.
Average fuel economy over the 820 mile test: 12.6 mpg. And the brakes are considered deficient. The soft springs and shocks were just accepted as part of this type of luxury car.
In case you can’t read the specs, here they are in larger format.
And as a frame of comparison, here’s the stats from a Popular Science comparison of the very similar 1966 cars, including a 396 Impala, 390 Galaxie 500, and a 383 Fury III. Interestingly enough, the 396 Caprice and Impala both nailed the 0-60 in the exact same 8.9 seconds. And there was only a 0.3 second variation on their 1/4 mile ETs (16.7/17.0). The 1966 Impala 396 really showed its light to the Plymouth and Galaxie, outrunning them in the 0-80 sprint by two and 3 seconds, despite having a higher (lower numerically) 2.73:1 rear axle to the Plymouth’s 3.23:1 and the Ford’s 3.00:1. The 396 obviously had better breathing (and power) at higher speeds, despite its comparable rated hp numbers.
Hmm… That first line is telling.
….the obvious.
The alternate “theory” is absurd, to anyone who was actually alive back then. Folks tend to let their imaginations run away from them…
The Baruth article you linked in an earlier post regarding the “alternative theory” was word soup spilled on the floor. The words were in no particular order of chronology or common sense.
Pure drivel, and I can see that with 1/10th of your knowledge.
+1
‘When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.’
A pithy line from The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. A great movie, but I prefer the truth inasfar as it can be uncovered. CC rules.
I’ve said it elsewhere, Chevy would not have been allowed to innovate in this space by the Fourteenth Floor guarding B-O-P’s market space but their “USA-1” sales bragging rights were important enough to Corporate that they could match Ford Division model-for-model.
It just happened that this one could be developed quickly.
Yes the car dealers were all in competition with each other. Chevy dealers were trying to steal customers from Oldsmobile and Buick.
I think the so called panty cloth (nylon?) was standard with leather in 1955 Star Chief’s. By 1958 it was replaced by plastic and some sort of textured stuff. Then by 1964 the Bonneville offers nylon again or leather.
Here LINK is a Car Life road test of the Plymouth VIP.
What I find interesting is that both Caprice 396 and the VIP 383 are rated to have 325 HP @4800 RPMs, both cars automatically upshift well before the peak horsepower. The Chevy at 4500, the Plymouth at 4200. (????)!!!
It’s been a long time, but I seem to recall that cars with AC had the trans governor set up to shift earlier. I harvested a few TH400s from full size Chevy’s for use in Chevelles or Novas and in addition to changing to a shorter tailshaft I recall using a shift kit to adjust shift points partly for this reason. Don’t know about the Torqueflight though. I used to love 325 horse 396s, all they needed was a cam, headers and ignition curve work to really wake up, even with a stock intake and Q-jet.
You’re forgetting the key issue: Gross hp numbers are generated without all accessories, an open exhaust, and optimum ignition advance, whereas net hp is as installed in the car, and is almost always generated at lower rpm. I’d bet that net hp for both of these engines is right about at those shift points, which explains why the shift points are where they are!!!! 🙂
A valid point. Looking at the net hp curve for the 396 @GM_Heritage the peak net is at about 4400. I don’t know have any info on the 383.
The net rating on the 396 appears to be about 245 hp. The 327 rated at 250 hp nets 200 @4400.
Then there was the fact that the so called horsepower rating really didn’t mean anything. There was no standard, it was all about advertising. I suppose that had to have some effect in standardising horsepower numbers, but installed numbers were much less. A 325 hp 396 is really only putting 250 hp, at the very most, to the transmission. Not that it really mattered, the Big Block was all about torque anyway.
Ah, but you forget they actually advertised LESS than true hp in order to cheat the insurance man. Roger Huntingdon (of various hot rod publications fame) had a book about the American muscle car where he proved that. So, paradoxically 325 hp is that car’s real hp (if I remember his figures).
That only applies to some of the very top output engines, like the hemi, the Ford 428 CJ, and some versions of the Chevy 427 and such.
There’s way to much information on all of the typical production engines for that not to be the case. It’s not difficult to calculate the actual output of an engine from performance stats. And then folks have been putting their cars on rear wheel dynos forever.
Ironically, often these engines actually put out less than advertised. The gross numbers are ridiculous anyway, as they are meaningless in terms of how the engine performs as installed in the car.
The one really obvious example of a “fake” hp number was the 335hp Ford 428 Cobra Jet. And the ’67-’69 Camaro Z28 302 probably put out more than 290 hp.
But for bread and butter engines like this 396, it was not an factor.
Yes, I do agree with Paul on this. Gross numbers were wildly exaggerated and unreliable wayyyyyy back then.
They weren’t really “exaggerated” as they were done to a specific SAE standard. But that standard had nothing to do with how the engine performed as installed in the car.
For the gross rating, the engine had all accessories, fan, etc unhooked. There were open exhausts. No air filter. And ignition timing was changed from factory settings to give optimum top rpm power.The carb was probably set to run richer too.
In other words, gross hp expressed the potential power output of an engine, but not what it actually generated as installed and tuned to factory specs.
The gross hp numbers should never have been used. They weren’t in Europe, and for a good reason. It’s quite misleading.
Paul is right on the money on this one. One thing that irks me is how many “car guys” and especially muscle car guys have very little understanding of the gross vs net hp figures. I always find it humorous how many books and experts claim that in 1972 the horsepower tumbled, when in many cases, especially General Motors, there were little differences between the 1971 and 1972 engines in real world performance.
This Chevy in question weights in at 4300 lbs and has a steep 2.73 end. It runs the quarter mile in 16.7 secs at 85 mph (and I have other sources that have this car running similar performance). That said, if this car was making anywhere near 325 hp, then it should be running much faster than that. For example, a Motor Trend test of a 1993 Buick Roadmaster with the L03 350 engine, rated at 180 hp and 300 ft-lbs SAE net ran the quarter mile in 16.9 secs and 81 mph. The Roadmaster is a similar weight and had a similar gear ratio, but even with it’s 180 hp it’s not that much slower. The higher trap speed suggests the 396 is making more power, but I would bet its closer to 200 net hp than it is to 250.
Car Life road tests are my favourite tests from this era. They have so much technical detail, far more than even magazines today. I do recall that when they tested cars from this era, they often commented on whether they thought the car was overrated power wise based on the actual performance of the car. As I recall, there seemed to be many more cars overrated than underrated.
This Motor Trend car has the 3.08:1 axle ratio. The other test had the 2.73, which was standard, but a 3.08 was optional. The 396 advertised to have 325 gross horsepower is rated at 245 net hp@4400 RPMs (see GM Heritage) and 360 lb-ft torque @2800. As I point out below, the shift points are not really optimum for best performance. During acceleration the engine will only produce the peak torque when it is running at 2800 RPMs, as the car continues to accelerate the torque will decrease. Horsepower increases as the engines speed increases until you reach the peak at 4400 RPMs, after which the horsepower will decrease and torque will decrease at a faster rate. Even so, staying in a lower gear for a few hundred more RPMs will allow more torque to get to the wheels before shifting up.
I did not find a road test of the Buick, but here is a link to a Chevy test from the 90’s with the 260 hp engine
LINK HERE
So what’s your point?
My apologies, I missed that the MT test has 3.08 gears. I don’t see where you got the net hp figures on the GM heritage site. I do have some Chevrolet produced dyno charts for 1965 Chevrolet engines, and several list the net figures (all the lower powered engines). The 325 hp engine does not though. That said, the “net” figures that GM tested in these years may not still meet the SAE net standards. I am sure they are more realistic though but stil not necessarily the same as we’ve measured hp since 1972 (which was again revised in 2006).
That said, again, if this car is actually making 245 net hp, it sure doesn’t seem to be performing as it should. The post of the 260 hp LT1 is a perfect example. This car has the same rear end ratio, is very close in weight, yet it has a far quicker 0-60 (6.5 secs) and 1/4 mile time 15.0 @ 92 mph. The 396 Caprice is closer to the Roadmaster’s result with it’s 180 hp 350. That MT article is in the April 1993 edition and also tests a 1993 Caprice that runs the 1/4 mile in 16.6 secs @ 83 mph with the same 180 hp engine (but it had lower gears and was lighter than the 1965 Caprice).
I am not sure if you understand torque vs horsepower or at least what you posted confused me. Horsepower is what makes the car run down a track quickly, not torque. Torque is simply the amount of turning force. And horsepower is just a function of torque (a dyno measures torque then calculates the horsepower with the RPM and torque). Even if the upshifts aren’t optimal, we don’t know if the testers shifted manually or not. Regardless, it wouldn’t have made a massive difference in my opinion.
My point was that I think the 396 would have done better in the 0-60 or quarter mile had the transmission shift points been higher, at least 4800 or 5000 RPMs.
For Bill Mitchell: the shift point are given as 4500. Horsepower is a function of torque and engine speed. Torque is really what makes the wheels go round and round.
here is a link to a 63 Impala road test that does the quarter mile in 15.2 seconds with a power slide transmission:
http://www.348-409.com/images/633406.jpg
I could reference a 1961 test of a 348 turbo glide where excessive wheel spin is noted as a problem.
Oh, net horsepower is given in the 1966 model year stuff at GM heritage center for the 396 325hp engine.
tire technology has improved a lot since the 60s. As I noted elsewhere, if you put modern rubber on that Chev you’d be faster.
Edited to add this continues below…
This one is a few years newer, but still has a big block. Not the most favorable review: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ljch2kCg4rM
“Highly unusual is the fact that we didn’t have to add any oil during the entire test.”
Stuff’s changed in 50 years…
Wonder how much wheelspin is slowing the acceleration times. Tires were worse then and controlling wheel spin could not have been a high priority on the kind of tires on a Caprice.
Wonder also why a 200 pound heavier Caprice pulled off the same 0-60 time as the Impala. C/D used to up shift autos manually but I think they were the only one.
Put modern rubber on that car and see 1/4 mile times tumble.
I doubt there was much wheelspin,on a dry track with some 250 (net) hp, 4200 lbs, and an automatic. Maybe a little bit,but not much.
Have you ever driven cars of this power class? They’re really not all that powerful or fast. A four cylinder Camry will blow them away.
Again, gotta agree with Paul. These mid sixties Big Block full sized “Yank Tanks” were not terribly fast from zero to sixty.
Their forte was mid range power. These cars were awesome powerhouses for mid range 2 lane passing and freeway entrance ramp acceleration/merging.
A two lane passing exercise that was no big deal for Big Block Mopar or Chebby would make my Camry downshift 2 or 3 gears, scream a lot and make the driver potentially dampen his diapers.
64 Lincoln on cross plies. You could make it spin quite easily. It’s also a question of weight distribution – it is for a reason they had outlandish gassers, Super Stockers with “cowboy rake” and AF/X cars in the early 60s, they were trying to shift the weight back to gain traction on cars which were basically front heavy.
This is how they set up the cars. I know, a 250 hp net Caprice was not as powerful as a 409 or a 427…
…and unless I missed it, it did not have a limited slip diff, which must detract something from the equation too. It all adds up. But to avoid confusion, even assuming I was not wrong, I’m not talking about more than a couple of seconds at the most, I certainly did not have some 13 sec fantasy in mind…
If the car had a bad launch on the track with wheel spin, this would play a big effect on reducing the quarter mile ET, however, the trap speed would not nearly be effected. The fact that these cars are only getting 85 mph though the 1/4 mile suggests to me that they are not overly powerful. The 16.7 seconds combined with the 85 mph suggests to me that the car probably had little wheel spin.
In 1965 a 396 fullsize Chevy was a fast car, but it’s all relative. During this time my Dad was driving a ’65 Impala with a six and a PG and he thought that a 283 had good power (he always wished his Impala would have had a 283). Today a 283 ’65 Impala is dog slow, and like Paul said, a 4 cyl Camry could blow the doors of a 396 Caprice. Plus, the fact that these old engines made lots of strong low end power compared to todays engines that have higher power bands make the old engines feel more powerful than they actually are.
I did drive a 65 Delta 88 that the body movement gave a great sense of acceleration, but I wasn’t timing it.
Two things I read lead to my question. The 157 hp 302 in the 82 Capri tested out at 7.4 0-60 in Popular Mechanics and they commented that it would have been in the 6s with less wheelspin, it was on TRXs I think. Also when C/D tested a Roadmaster with the new LT1. They even put it on the cover doing a giant burnout with a man dressed as a little old lady in the driver seat. When you read the road test, the Roadmaster was 7.7 0-60 vs. 6-5 for the Impala SS with bigger Eagle GTs. My current Verano, with a 8.2 0-60, will barely chirp the tires but as large, too large in my opinion, 245/45 18 on it.
I recall Lindamood (now I think Jennings) having an article on the Roadmaster (1994) in Automobile. There was a picture of her in the Roadmaster burning rubber with one hand out of the drivers side holding a purse.
My CTS with the 320 HP 3.6 won’t spin the tires either, but it is AWD with 255/35-19 tires. On snow it will spin the tires.
Re: the Capri: that’s a drastically lighter car with a smaller percentage of its weight on the rear wheels. And it was probably a four speed manual. Different cars launch differently, especially if you’re doing full-throttle drag strip starts.
If you go back and look at videos of big American automatic sedans doing full throttle starts, there’s usually just a bit of wheelspin on one of the wheels, but it’s usually gone within a car length or two. Insignificant.
We’re not talking about launching hi-power pony cars here.
Regarding the Roadmaster: you do realize that there is a technique for creating excessive burnouts? 🙂 Don’t take literally what you see on the cover of magazines.
7000 rpm neutral drops?
I think you apply the brakes and floor the engine. Then take your foot off the brake (the torque converter is at full stall ratio).
I would trust a “Car Life”, “Road & Track” or “Car & Driver” road test article more than the pap generated by “Motor Trend”. “MT” editorials & road tests often reflected their esteem for which car maker spent the most advertising dollars with them.
All these fancy schmantzy 60’s cars with bad brakes bad suspension bad tires when
they were NEW what about when Dad hooked up the camp trailer and loaded 8 kids
and 1000 more pounds into the Jet Smooth Impala wagon with 40 thousand miles
on it and took it on some winding roads . I wonder if anybody got killed
Quite true!
My Father sourly pronounced my Mother’s beloved ’66 Ford Country Sedan a “squealing pig on roller skates”.
He was finally satisfied with it after adding stiffer shock absorbers, rear coil spring inserted “air bags” for the added load of 6 people and all the luggage my Mother needed on road trips, a rear sway bar, grayrock sintered metallic brake linings and prolly the first set of Michelin X radial tires sold by Sears, Roebuck & Company in the New Orleans area.
Drivers used to slow down if the car began to feel squirrelly. They also drove much slower on curvy roads. The limits on these cars handling and brakes were much lower than modern cars, and they were well known. Drivers did not expect to make time in the twistys. People that were seriously into campers and towing would specify the tow package options and upgrade many components themselves.
People did, to an extent.
Better design and safety features came fast in the late ’60 and early ’70s, improving safety.
But, a lot of the drama in these tests was generated by driving these cars in a manner that was not consistent with the reality of driving in a safe and sane way on public roads. Driven within their intended design, these cars delivered good service and a lot of pleasure to a lot of people, including me, who are still here to tell you that.
The test comments on the AM / FM Stereo radio are interesting.
My ’67 Ford Galaxie, that I had in the mid 1980s, had two sound systems. The original one speaker AM radio, and a four speaker after market stereo system.
At the time, some of the popular pop and rock FM stations had broadcasts on AM. So, I could listen to modern music the way I remembered it as a small child – a bit tinny, but with a certain nostalgia.
Our radio market had very little FM radio offerings into the early ’70s. You had Public Radio and an easy listening station. “Easy, KEZO,” as the announcer would say.
Buyers didn’t care much about FM in the mid ’60s as most markets had little to offer. It makes me wonder what the testers were listening to in order to make their comments.
My grandfather had a ’67 Caprice with the AM radio and the Stereo Multi-Plex 8 track tape player. Do to limited FM offerings, the tape players were for a time frequently paired with AM only radios.
My Avatar is the owner’s manual cover from that car.
I think a few comments can be made about optimum shift points. Since we have the net ratings for the 396 from the gm heritage center we know that the peak net torque is 360 lb-ft @3000 or so, and the net torque at the peak net horsepower is 292 lb-ft.
With the car in first gear (2.48:1) the torque going to the wheels is 724 lb-ft. If you shift to second gear (1.48:1) the engine will drop back to about the peak torque 360 times 1.48 = 532 lb-ft. If you stay in first to say 4800 RPMs, the torque will probably drop off to 245 lb-ft (225 hp) but the torque to the wheels is still 600 lb-ft. Shifting at the peak horsepower is not best.
Gents, there was an art to ordering a US-made vehicle back then. You really had to scout the option charts to find the right bits but if you knew what you were doing that car could be ordered so that it would not embarrass itself facing a Mercedes-Benz or a Jaguar on a European road (police suspension, disc brakes, 4 sp. box etc.). The only thing Chevy would not have had was supportive seats for when you wanted to go around corners quickly but Reuter and others did them even then. Oh, and of course you would not remain with standard rubber – Firestone, Dunlop, Michelin all offered tires capable of delivering even then.
Good luck ordering disc brakes on this car. You could order the sintered metallic drum brakes, but those were developed for competition Corvettes, and were not ideal until they were properly warmed up.
When did discs become available on these then? I admit I cannot remember the exact MY but I thought during the late 60s for sure?
I think 1967 as an option for Chevrolet.
Sintered linings were fitted to the S4 EH Holdens for Bathurst racing even on a light 1100kg car those brakes became useless after 2-3 laps the slower MK1 Ford Cortina GT won that year it had discs up front so had some braking ability at the end of conrod straight.
This model Chev sold well in the rural area where I grew up we couldnt get the Caprice unless it was privately imported and then RHD converted but local assembly V8 Impalas sold well and mostly to farmers and they held up well on the unpaved roads of the region, the last model available was in 66 then local assembly ended, new Chevs were still available but it was a mission to get them the local dealership got a Holden agency and sold those instead.
I spotted another vintage Caprice review, this one is a 1967 RHD Caprice tested by Car magazine of South Africa.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/45904802@N08/4641711411/sizes/l/in/photostream/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/45904802@N08/4641725881/sizes/l/in/photostream/
Note then they kept the 1965-66 dash.
The factory RHD cars all used that dash.It lasted from ’65 to ’68 here in Australia.
And the post about carefully selecting options is spot on. I enjoy going over old car brochures and optioning up ‘my’ car the way I’d have liked it.
My Dad owned a 65 Impala 4 door hardtop with the 283 and 3 speed manual…..While it was no rocket, it seemed to have sufficient pep…..The powerglide is what probably sapped power from those engines…..My Dad got 18-20 mpg highway with the 283 and manual trans. I read somewhere that the powerglide trans lowered fuel economy by 1 to 2 mpg on average compared to a manual trans.
I suspect our standards of “quickness” have changed over time?
A zero to 60 time of 12 to 14 seconds was considered quite peppy in 1965; the same time is considered not acceptable today.
Are some of the earlier comments gone?
Oops, my apology.
I was confusing this ’65 Chevy article with the OTHER ’65 Chevy article.
Great read. The cover photo reminds me why I prefer the ’66 over the ’65. The ’65’s front end is a little too pretty and Corvairish for such a large car. The ’66, while blunter, has a more aggressive look to it. Shame it lost the three round taillights though.
Am I the only one who longs for an automaker to reinvent the 4 door hardtop? Not necessary I know, but with today’s steel it should be possible. C’mon Audi Mercedes or even Cadillac!
“Am I the only one who longs for an automaker to reinvent the 4 door hardtop? Not necessary I know, but with today’s steel it should be possible. C’mon Audi Mercedes or even Cadillac!”
+1. Completely with you.
I became a driver after the hardtop era. I did eventually buy and own a four door hardtop, and had it for several years. It was on my automotive bucket list. I absolutely loved the experience. Decent looking 4dr hdtps were becoming a bit scarce on the road when I was driving mine. People had tons of compliments for the car, and everybody that got a ride in it with all windows down enjoyed the experience.
My one car loving kid is totally into hardtops.
While I like the style of hardtops, I do not miss the wind noise that always seems to be a problem to some extent.
I owned 5 hardtops and was quite satisfied with their performance. They were associated with repeat luxury buyers for about 30 years. I would imagine that with modern manufacturing and modern crash standards that they would be better then ever.
I have owned 5 cars with hardtop style windows on the doors. The first was a 69 GTO, and the engine made enough noise that I don’t recall wind noise from leaks in the windows. However, my second car, 1971 Riviera, did have noisy air leaks around the windows. I had the seals replaced on the rear windows to fix the problem, but it made it better, but not entirely quite. My 76 Riviera had B-pillars with hardtop windows on the doors. It was much better. The 1995 Riviera and 1998 Aurora had hardtop windows on the doors with B-pillars. The Riviera was fairly good, but there was an air leak on the Aurora that was annoying.
I think that a hardtop coupe would be good, especially a hardtop convertible.
Adjusted for inflation, the Caprice’s price in 2015 dollars is $36,532. For comparison, a 2016 Impala 2LTZ is $36,415, not including the $1000 on the hood. If you check all the option boxes, you can get the 2016’s MSRP well over the $40,000 mark. I’ve read some road tests of the contemporary Impala suggesting that, when fully loaded, it is a worthy alternative to a Lexus ES350 or Buick LaCrosse. The more things change, the more they stay the same…
On the other hand, the base price of $3092 in 1965 corresponds to $23,346 in 2015. Does anyone know if that’s the base Caprice or the base full-sized Chevrolet (Biscayne, I guess?) The base MSRP of a 2016 Impala LS with the four cylinder engine is $27,970 ($3704 in 1965), so you would have to drop back to a 2016 Malibu LS at $23,995 or Malibu L at $22,500 to spend the equivalent cash. I guess the concept of a loss-leader, no heater or radio, three on the tree, dog-dish hubcap stripper is long gone.
That is the base price of the Caprice. Comparing car prices from 1965 with no options with base cars of today is misleading as todays cars have much more standard equipment.
To expand on what I said: The so call full size Chevrolets from the 60’s really came to an end with the 1996 RWD Caprice/Impala. Chevrolet never really got a front wheel drive car that replaced the old full sized cars. Buick on the other hand transitioned from RWD to FWD in the 80’s, but these cars came to an end with the Lucerne. Cadillac’s from the 60’s come to an end with the DTS/deville, although the current XTS is sort of a replacement, but it really is not a 60’s style Cadillac.
I think GM entire current lineup (except for trucks) is so completely different from what you got in the 60’s that there is no real comparison.
If you were buying a car in the 60’s your budget was probably quite different from what it is now. Adjusting for inflation allows one to see what price range things were in then compared to now, but it really only puts you in an approximate range. A 65 Caprice should have been well equipped with a price tag of $4000+.
My 2014 CTS was priced in the 1965 Fleetwood range but it is nothing like the Eldorado or Sixty Special from that era.
That 396 looks like it was shoe-horned into the engine bay. I woulda thunk the Caprice would have had more room under the hood.
Not available here as a complete car but one local guy imported a 396 to install in his 283 Impala for towing and launching his boat it towed just fine but wasnt as road fast as either of his teen sons had hoped for, it was later retrofitted with disc brakes up front they should have been standard.
$107 for that FM multiplex (stereo) radio add-on is $945 in 2021 dollars. Yeeeeee!
While it’s true those old factory radios were pricey, high-profit options, it should be noted they were also pretty sturdy. I can’t ever recall anyone reporting one that malfunctioned or broke.
I doubt this. Car radio repair was a viable business; most decent-size towns had at least one such shop, and they did well enough to keep at it. Most of those that survived past the ’80s had to diversify into speedometer and instrument cluster repair or convert to sales-and-installs places.
While there certainly were/still are places that sold and installed aftermarket car radios (anyone remember those old Craig underpass units?), I don’t recall any that specifically fixed factory radios.
Careful not to fall in the I’ve-never-seen-it-so-it-doesn’t-exist trap. I’ve got plenty of ’60s and ’70s factory TSBs listing authorised repair shops by city and state/province—here’s a grab of part of one page of one such bulletin—and I even patronised one or two of them over the years.
So wait, the 425hp version of the 396 was only available in the Impala, not the Caprice? Ta seems odd, even if they were positioning the Impala as a sportier model.
It was available across the line.
We keep discussing the dawn of the Brougham Era, but isn’t the big news the change from The Chevrolet to Corvair/Chevy II/Chevelle/Caprice (and similar for BOP) in five years, plus Camaro/Monte Carlo/Vega by 5 or 6 years later? How complicated things must have suddenly become for every part of the industry. But none of us were adults in the 50’s, so one car per brand is a foreign country.
Lessee here: severely inadequate brakes, lousy even in new condition, operated by a single-circuit, single-piston master cylinder. Severely underspecified engine mounts and tires. What could possibly go wrong?
Through the 1950’s and into the 1960’s magazine tests did not display braking distances. Instead they would describe how much pressure was needed on successive stops, or some kind of “g” decelerating measurements. I never did understand what that meant. I’d much rather know how many feet it took to come to stop from 60 mph. Sure, most cars stopped poorly, so that a car in front of you couldn’t “brake check” you like they can Today. However if there’s a jack knifed big rig blocking the road ahead of you, you needed to stop in the shortest distance possible.
Readers might be reminded that most motorists were driving on two or more lane country highways at this time, these would twist and turn with the terrain, and there were likely to be a series of sharp turns at the end of a straight away. Freeways were not yet ubiquitous at this time, so driving at high speeds for long distances was not a good idea or even possible.
Back then, talking about car safety or accidents was “bad luck”, unfortunately. Why many resisting using seat belts.
Big 3 were selling sizzle, but had to be dragged kicking and screaming to add safety features
It seems like the hot ticket would be a Caprice with a 327 (fastest version of the lighter smallblock), standard suspension and cop brakes.
It’s surprising Chevy took so long to offer the Caprice as a post sedan, not until 1972 or so.
I don’t think the Caprice had a B pillared 4 door until 1977, when the hardtops and frameless glass were gone. There was an Impala sedan with framed glass before that.
If the Caprice was supposed to compete against Ford’s LTD and be an ersatz luxury vehicle for Chevrolet, then why was the base engine a 283 2bbl and a three on the tree. I suppose the simplest answer was profit, but somehow I would have thought the 327 would have been a better choice.
Regarding gross horsepower vs. net horsepower, back about 1969 or so Car Life came up with a formula based on a vehicle’s acceleration to determine how much horsepower it actually put on installed in a vehicle with the exhaust system, fan and all the other equipment. If I remember correctly, a Chevy 350 rated at 250 hp, was actually putting out around 180 horsepower-I was shocked.
Back in 1977 When the downsized GM cars were introduced, Car & Driver compared the performance of a ’77 Impala with the 180 net hp 350 against their test results of a 1966 Impala with the 325 gross hp 396. If I remember correctly, the ’77 beat the ’66 in all aspects.
Was the base engine in the LTD a 352? If the base in the Ford was the 289, well, that explains that.
But if it was the 352 then, yeah, it’s a big faux pas for the Chevy to come with a 283. Of course, if the MSRP of the Caprice was that much lower than the LTD, and optioning it up with a comparable engine didn’t take it that much over, well, it would have been a wash.
“Regarding gross horsepower vs. net horsepower …”
Agree 100% with “nwflvr”! So many “car fans” look at later Net HP ratings and say “malaise”, based solely on the digits. But they know nothing about difference between net vs. gross.
This was back in the day when many of us weren’t old enough to drive but we knew what was fast from what we read. Our Dad worked for a Chevy dealer and had a few Impala “Demonstrators”. My brother and I couldn’t wait for Dad to take us for a test “Ride” in the new 396 Impala SS he brought home….he was happy to oblige!! The fastest car in our suburban American neighborhood we had to compare the “396” to was a Ford Galaxy “XL” with a 390. We were amazed how much stronger the Impala felt compared to the Ford and the 50 year old test numbers here match that memory. As we got older and cars got faster I remember the first GTO Dad brought home…a ’67 400/335 Horse with a Turbo 400 Automatic…man that car was faster than anything we had been in!
Fast forward 50 years…I own a base C7 Corvette Convertible, 460 horse/465 ft TQ 6 speed Auto. I have taken it to the local Drags a few times and it runs low 12 second 1/4mile times at low 120 mph range….and gets high 20s mpg on the road!! It’s fun to look back 50 plus years to what we have today compared to what was considered fast when we were kids!!
Thanks for posting this…great memories.