(first posted 2/29/2012) Hybrids are very big in Eugene, but some are just plain huge. The Prius has become the official car of Eugene, having dethroned Subaru. But here’s a hybrid of a different color: instead of a marriage of two drive systems, it’s a cross between two brands, the engine of one transplanted into another. Back in the day, when these were popular, the goal was speed, not better mileage (well, usually). And the resulting names of these cross-species hybrids were more colorful than Prius or Insight: Fordillac, Studillac, Fordick, Fordolet. Well, here’s a new one: a Chevmobile.
Lift up this Impala’s half-acre slab of hood, and where you might expect to encounter the ubiquitous small block, or perhaps a rat motor, sits an Olds 455. There’s nothing to give that surprise away, from the outside, so fortunately its owner came out to show off his beastly mongrel.
Looking at these pictures now, I see that the badge next to the front side-marker light that normally announces the engine size to the inquiring world is missing. Did he take it off purposely, to arouse suspicion, or to not mislead the unwary; or did this car start life as a fairly rare six-cylinder Impala hardtop coupe, one of a few thousand built that year?
Lost in surprise and admiration of that clean Olds V8, I forgot to ask him what exactly inspired this cross-divisional heart transplant. It’s not like big-block Chevys are hard to come by. Whatever; I love it. And it’s so utterly antithetical; Chevy engines have been the overwhelming choice of engine transplants into other makes since the first small block coughed to life in 1955. But then the big Olds has many compelling features, not the least of which is its relatively light weight and high quality.
This car brings back a flood of memories wasting hours at the drug store poring over various hot rod magazines in the sixties. Engine transplants are as old as the Model T, and kids are still dropping Integra VVT engines into Civics; but I’d say the golden age was the fifties and sixties. By that, I mean the randomness of the transplants. By the seventies, the Chevy V8 was such a dominant and universal transplantee, it got rather predictable and boring. But previously, anything went anywhere, as long as the new engine made more power, and a stout oak tree, a chain, and a come-along were handy.
There are two main eras to indulge our engine-swapping nostalgia with: pre and post OHV V8. Just to clarify, we’re talking about cross-brand swapping; dropping Ford’s flathead V8 into old Ford rails is a different category; let’s call that “updating”: expedient and cheap, but not as original or creative. In the pre-OHV V8 era, I’m thinking particularly of the Chevy and GMC sixes, and the Buick straight eight (above).
The Ford V8 is a legend, and we’ll find one to honor here, but the flathead design had serious intrinsic faults. That drove quite a few to plumb the performance possibilities of the OHV GM units. Contrary to the myth of the Ford being the ubiquitous hot rod engine in the forties and fifties, there was a strong Chevy stove-bolt and Jimmy contingent. A full range of after-market speed parts were available, and with their intrinsically superior breathing and thermodynamics, they put in a strong showing at the drags and Bonneville.
The big Jimmy sixes, with 270 and 302 cubic inches, were brutes, and with modified cylinder heads and five carbs like this example, they flew, as in right past a flathead Ford.
And the big, long Buick straight eight had a powerful presence too, both visual and aural. Check out this one with four SU carbs! That’s from the days when not every rail had a blown Chrysler hemi in it. The rat rod scene is doing its part to revive the use of oddball engines; old sixes and straight eights are in demand again.
When the Caddy V8 appeared in 1949, it might as well have been the second coming. Two visionaries, Bill Frick and Phil Walters, quickly made a business case out of it by dropping brand-new 331 Caddy engines into the light Ford sedans for a thousand bucks. The resulting hybrid was dubbed Fordillac, and made quite a sensation. “Uncle Tom” McCahill loved it, and it caught the eye of Briggs Cunningham.
Cunningham would have taken one to race at LeMans, but the rules wouldn’t allow it. But he did hire Frick and Walters to run his Caddy racing program, which we covered in our story of the hot-rod ’50 Caddy. And when the super-low ’53 Studebaker Starlight coupe appeared, Frick and Walters were on it in a flash, creating the legendary Studillac. Here is a review by McCahill of this 125 mph coupe that could outrun pretty much anything on both sides of the Atlantic at the time.
Lest I get accused again of slighting the Olds Rocket V8, it too was popular from its arrival six months after the Caddy. But obviously, plucking new engines from the assembly line was not cheap. But as soon as they started showing up in junkyards, shade-tree transplantists were all over them. And until the Chevy V8 started filtering down, big Caddy, Olds, nail-head Buicks, and Chrysler hemis were the implants of choice.
All this distraction about hybrids, and I haven’t even started on the ’68 Impala itself. The ’68 marked the end of the fastback, and the beginning of the post-283 era. The standard V8 was now the 307, for one year only. Of course, during this golden era, just about every engine in Chevy’s vast arsenal was optional, right up to the 425hp 427 (7 liter) big block. The sleeper of the bunch was a 3500lb Biscayne two-door, with the hot 425/427.
But then this Chevmobile’s motor looks pretty warm too: Edelbrock intake supporting a big four-barrel, tube headers, probably a hot cam. And it makes nice music, when I hear it from time to time on the streets near the campus, mixing it up with all the other silent hybrids.
I always considered the 67-68 Impala to be an attractive car, and particularly liked these fastback hardtops. The Olds V8 always had such a unique sound-what cognitive dissonance with that sound coming out of the rear end of a Chevy.
The underhood shot is interesting. The double external oil filters, the lack of heater hoses, and everything looking so fresh and clean. I am guessing that the engine is mated to a THM instead of a Powerglide.
I always wonder how an idea like this got started. Was it taking advantage of a parts opportunity and making it work? Or did the guy sit there pining over the sound of an Olds V8 and wondering how he could make his Chevy sound like that? Either way, the result is unique. And fun.
Ahh, the Sound.
I always roll my windows down to catch the sound of either a Harley big twin or a Rocket V8. Always.
I pulled up alongside an early 70s Cutlass convertible recently. The whole car was shaking at idle, but man, that sound. Immediately, I went home and started searching eBay Motors for one. Gotta have it.
How did they get their engines to sound so different? Its almost like a metallic rasp.
My father’s ’69 Olds 442 w/ 400 had that unique potato-potato sound at idle, especially since the duals weren’t connected by a crossover pipe, so down low by the bumper it was like hearing 2 four cylinders synchronized with their lumpy rhythmic cadence.
Now those are my kinda hybrid, A GMC powered Chev coupe was where Fangio started his road racing career. back when I was young there were no regs for modification as long as you could sneak thru a W.O.F. test you were good to go and if you couldnt the fine was small Flat head V8s were crammed into all sorts of unlikely vehicles but a lot of old fords were repowered with Humber Super Snipe engines especially pickups Chev6s were fed GMC truck engines and the belly button Holdenor Zephyr 6 was stuffed into endless 4cylinder English cars When the Zephyr V6 arrived it turned out to be a lemon and were quickly replaced with US V8s but those compact little V6s fit into nearly any 4 banger engine bay and easy to get of course now hotrodding has gone stupidly upmarket and roadworthy regulations have strangled the shadetree industry with huge inspection costs just in time for really good powertrain swaps appearing cheap from Japan. Glad I was young when I was.
I’m glad I’m not the first on this thread. This has Educator_Dan’s name all over it, being the Olds fan he is!
I prefer the 1965-66 models over these, but having said that, the most impressive car in town back when I was still in school was a red 1967 Impala 4 door sports sedan with a black vinyl top, Cragars and raked in back. A stunning-looking car some kid drove! I salivated every time my buddy and I saw it cruise through Steak’n’Shake as we sat in my rusted-out 1961 Bel-Air! Man, were we jealous!
One of our neighbors owned a 1968 Impala and I used to wash and wax it for him on occasion. I really noticed the difference between the 1967 and 1968 models. The most glaring (or non-glaring) example was the elimination of bright aluminum trim around the headliner and A and C pillars (it was pillarless) and replaced with plastic. The horror!
Still, I liked the tail lights in the bumper. That still is cool.
While on the topic of motors, I’d like to share one I saw during my weekend visit to the Tallahassee Automobile Museum (personal collection of Devoe Moore). Enjoy:
any guesses?
That’s a work of art. But I can’t ID it….
Deusy?
Nailed it.
1931 Duesy.
one more. Sorry my BB camera is not worthy of such beauty.
Speakin of a Dusey
Several years ago I saw a 32/34 Ford roadster on display at the ACD museum in Auburn Indiana. A father and son team in Chicago installed a Duesy engine. It may still be on display there?
Chicago back in 1963 for $385.00 I bought a 1956 Olds 88 2dr Sedan in very good cond. with the orig. 326 cu motor and three on the tree…was pretty quick, prob. pretty rare too. I picked up a set of original 56 olds Saturn Flipper hub caps to mount after removing the Dog Dish factory caps, it looked sharp.
One sentence describes this well: “Dare to be different.”
I’m reminded of a late 60s Mustang that was once featured in Hot Rod Magazine, the car had (of all possible engines) a Chevy 454V8! The owner told the Ford faithful to calm down. The engine originally was in a Corvette he owned when the car was wrecked and totaled out. The engine was still good and salvageable and he had a Mustang that needed an engine… Seemed like a good use of two things that were in need of each other.
Ha! That was just his excuse. Putting a Chevy engine in a Ford used to be the best way for a Ford to run better! No joke…
I remember an older friend of mine swapped a 400hp small block chev into a 68 Javelin, it used the original AMC 4 speed with a RamRod shifter and 456 rear gears and M50x15 rear tires…skinny VW tires up front…went like hell, up to 70 miles an hour at least! this was back in the late 60’s
Beautiful. I love the way the builders of these cars show off their engines. No plastic hood covers here.
Hey, does this Datsun 510 count? It’s got the record, 10.258 sec @ 123.79 mph.
White Zombie.
Use what you have! I was thinking the Olds had a weight difference compared to the Chevy BB but there’s only about 60 pounds there and in a car this big it really wouldn’t matter.
I prefer the tail of the 67 Imp but I’d take either 67 or 68 just for those lines. It’s a sexy car. Too bad they went for bulk over grace for the 8 years following this car.
Nice article, Paul! Tucked away in a box is a 1954 Motor Trend issue with Walt Woron reviewing a “Buivolet” – a ’54 Corvette with a four-bbl nailhead Buick V-8 stuffed under the hood. I, for one, have always thought Olds built the best V-8’s of ALL GM divisions; strong timing gears and chains, free breathing, no siamesed exhaust ports (unlike Pontiac) – relatively light compared to it’s corporate brothers and the competition. Good enough to remain fairly unchanged through 1990 . . .
I never liked the 68 Horseshoe taillights in a bumper look, it fared no better in the rectangle 69s, but Looking Back They are baroque in their 1 year style. I Miss that in todays cars.
These cars were EVERYWHERE in 1968 NY/NJ… Ford was nowhere near as popular.
But they were used up and gone in 8 years or under.
Reading about the Studillac again, oh man you really got me going. “Where in the world could you get as reliable a 125-mph, four-passenger coupe as the Studillac at any price?”
If only Studebaker-Packard had given up on competing with GM and Ford and said to hell with the sedans and wagons, and focused on high-performance and luxury cars. If they had put the new high-compression Packard V-8 in the Starliner in ’56, they’d have had a factory Studillac. They could have taken that racing, and dominated NASCAR and SCCA. If only they had taken Packard back upmarket above Caddy where it belonged. If only, if only…..
Of course they did this with the ’56 Golden Hawk: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Studebaker_Golden_Hawk
“The raised hood and grille were added to allow space for a larger engine, Packard’s big 352 in³ (5.8 L) V8, which delivered 275 bhp (205 kW). This big, powerful engine in such a light car gave the Golden Hawk a phenomenal power-to-weight ratio (and thus performance) for the time; of 1956 American production cars, the Golden Hawk was second only to Chrysler’s 300 B by that measure — and the expensive Chrysler was a road-legal NASCAR racing car. The Golden Hawk can be considered, like the Chryslers, a precursor to the muscle cars of the 1960s.”
But at the same time the board decided to phase out the car business entirely, and they quit building the Packard V-8 after ’56. If only.
(Photo from oldcarsweekly.com)
It was my understanding that the Packard V8 was really heavy and screwed the weight distribution up on the Hawk something terrible. Does anybody know if the Packard V8 was substantially heavier than the Cadillac unit?
That was its reputation but apparently unfounded. The article I got the picture from says it “weighed in at about 3,690 lbs. — reportedly with 58 percent of the weight over the front wheels, a ratio that provided superior handling and road manners.”
http://www.oldcarsweekly.com/collector-cars/50s-cars/1956_studebaker_golden_hawk
The Golden Hawk Wikipedia article says “The heavy engine gave the car an unfounded reputation for being nose-heavy and poor handling (the supercharged Studebaker engine that replaced the Packard mill for ’57 was actually heavier). Road tests of the time, many of which were conducted by racing drivers, seldom mentioned any handling issues.”
The MI article says the Studillac was 3420 lb., 200 less than the ’56 Golden Hawk.
I’ve got a whole Alternate History brewing in my head over this…..fun.
Wilbur Shaw wrote an article in Popular Science about Bill Frick and his Studillac, with all the details and parts he used. What do you think of his “Curve Master” powered suspension?
http://books.google.com/books?id=Ti0DAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA76&lpg=PA76#v=onepage&q&f=false
MikePDX, you piqued my curiousity, and I enjoyed every bit of that 1953 Popular Science article. For the curious (here in 2017), here are a couple of “Curve Master” images:
I like how he’s used the heat sleeve on the rubber parts of the fuel line, where it is not needed, but leaves the metal portion which does absorb and transfer heat to the fuel uncovered. On top of that he lets the loop of heater hose lay on it. Great way to make the Edelboil live up to it’s AFB (Always Flipping Boiling) heritage.
While 454s were once built in great numbers a good rebuildable one is getting harder and harder to find and when you do people want more for a block and caps than you can get a complete running 455 for. Look for a 427 or even a 396 and the price goes up even more.
Orange cans of death.
One thing, though, 68 was not the last year for the fast back, or “sport coupe” as Chevrolet marketing called it. 1969 was. I know, cause I bought one after high school. 1st car I ever bought. Okay, it was almost 20 years old and had some tinworm issues, having been driven in Minnesota for many years, but it ran strong and would hit 20mpg on the highway if you didn’t have a lot of wind to contend with.
The term Sport Coupe originated in the ’50s as Chevy’s designation for a 2-door hardtop, as distinguished from a 2-door pillared model. When the full-size cars were restyled for 1965, the Sport Coupes took on more or less a fastback appearance. Meanwhile, when the Caprice was introduced in 1966, it offered a 2-door hardtop with a different, formal notchback roofline. This was called a Custom Coupe. The Custom Coupe was expanded to the Impala line for 1968, so the Impala now came both ways.
For 1969 there continued to be both a Sport Coupe (Impala only) and Custom Coupe (Impala and Caprice). With the 1969-70 models, there may have still been a slight difference in roofline, but the two were now much more similar than before, and the Sport Coupe was no longer really a fastback. From 1971 on, I’m pretty sure the two were identical, except that one went pillared a year earlier than the other.
I believe the “Sport Coupe” and “Custom Coupe” nomenclature continued until 1976. From 1969 onward, though, certainly from 1971 onward, they were effectively just different trim levels, not different body styles.
Big difference with the Impala Sport and Custom coupes was the back window glass shape. Concave for Custom, convex for Sport. No Sport coupe for ’76, though.
IMHO, the Sport coupes after ’68 aren’t really true fastbacks, just common slanted rear treatment.
The white roadster with the blue center stripe #25c is the 1953 Tatum Special powered by a 302 cu in GMC with a Wayne head.
For more photos see-
http://www.fantasyjunction.com/cars/1150-tatum-special-302%20c.i.%20gmc%20engine
There were TWO ’68 six cylinder Impalas in my little hometown of Hamlet, NC. Both of these were sold new by Bennett Motor Company. One was a blue four door sedan and the other one was a yellow two door hardtop like the subject car here. As a young child, I always looked for the fender call out or in this case, lack of. The yellow two door wore small hubcaps and of course, one could not miss the distinctive six cylinder sound.
I don’t recall any other years in which there were six cylinder Impalas around my town. I do recall a 70 Biscayne and a 71 Biscayne. Both of these had standard transmissions.
Mr. Bill
Hamlet, NC
Swaps like this were fairly common in the 70s and ’80s with bucks-down young guys. There were lots of big Chevy’s running around with 2 barrel small V-8s and Powerglides, and even then a big block Chevy was the most sought after and expensive used V-8 out there. A Chevy bolt pattern TH 400 was pricy as well. The BOP stuff was cheap, plentiful and gave comparable performance. There was a ’65 Chevelle 2 door sedan with a warmed up 455 Olds out of an old Delta 88 running the streets of our little town, and it was very competitive. I’ll bet the wheels and tires cost as much as it cost him to build the car.
By the way, have look at the engine in the rod with the checkered firewall. That sure looks like a small block Chevy painted green to me. Maybe the guy used late style heads with the newer style valve cover hold down and painted “Oldmobile Rocket” on them?
Right you are. Why would someone go to all that trouble to fake an Olds v8?
I’ve taken it out.
I had a navy 68 Impala SS. It was huge. Fun fact. The drivers side engine badge said 307. The passenger side said 327. I am 99% sure it was a 307 as it was a 2 barrel and had the 2 speed power slide. I can assure you all I never suffered whip lash in that beast!
My Dad’s ’66 Impala Fastback had the 283 with the two-speed power-slide, but his ’68 Impala Custom Coupe had the 3-speed THM. I had to look, but according to this… https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevrolet_Impala_(fourth_generation)#1968 you could still get the PG with the the smaller V8(s).
It’s weird yours had some badge confusion going on between 307 & 327. It was probably a screw up at the factory. If you are saying it was never all that quick, it was likely the 307. I loved Dad’s ’68, but it wasn’t exactly fast.
1968 327 2 bbl Chevs could be had with PowerGlide as well.
Another very good article which indirectly champions GM’s glory years. Simply put, prior to the hardcore consolidation beginning in the seventies, each GM division had very solid engineering departments and gave hotrodders a veritable bonanza of hot V8s to transplant into whatever they might have had.
If Bunkie Knudson, Pete Estes, and John Delorean hadn’t seized the initiative to capitalize on the burgeoning musclecar fad, it’s quite possible Oldsmobile might have been GM’s performance division, and not Pontiac. There was, of course, the 1949 Rocket 88, a car many consider the true originator of the musclecar. All the divisions had solid V8 engines back then, but Oldsmobile’s were some of the best (as well as Buick). Ironically, Pontiac would be dragging up the rear, but their absolutely superior marketing would carry the day in what counted: sales.
But even more notable is how Oldsmobile also gave some serious effort into improving a car’s handling. It was none other than Oldsmobile that was the first domestic automaker to offer a rear sway bar (at least after the Corvair). The general industry wisdom was that a rear sway bar would make a car’s handling too ‘twitchy’ but Olds went ahead and offered it from the factory, anyway. It was almost as forward thinking and European as front disc brakes.
Interesting Olds-Chevrolet “hybrid”. Well, as long as it’s in the same GM family.
I recall reading in one of my Dad’s 1950s-vintage Car Craft magazine of someone in Pomona, CA stuffing a souped up Cadillac V-8 into a Henry J. Lots of underhood, firewall and frame modifications had to be done to fit the V-8, but the car was kept stock looking on purpose. The only thing tipping off something was lurking under the hood were twin tailpipes and 15″ rear tire slicks. That “innocent stock” Henry J had a notorious reputation for surprising the Chevrolet and Ford hot rodders.
Well, this car is almost supernatural … but only almost …
Did the owner buy the car from someone in Jersey?
While GM/Ford/Mopar swaps seemed to be common, up in them thar hills of western Massachusetts there were other things afoot as well; Two I remember as a kid were…one, in 1961 or ’62 a neighbor bought a wrecked Studie Lark (maybe it was a Daytona, who knows? – I was six years old LOL but I remember that weird-looking car) with the R2 supercharged powerplant and Gene and his brothers shoehorned that drivetrain into a 1961 Ambassador. That car I know, because it had those weird one-year-only front fenders that only Inspector Clouseau could love. It ran so well it was still on the road ten years later when I became a motorhead. Fastest Rambler I ever saw until the AMX came out in 1968.
The other one I remember was when I was in college, when a classmate from Huntington with a decrepit old IH Travelall plunked a Buick 401 nailhead V8 engine and the Dynaflow or whatever it was into his old wreck, just to keep it going until he graduated. No Idea where the donor car came from, but the way kids drove back then I wouldn’t doubt a fellow student sold or gave Sandstrom the car just to get it it out of his old man’s back yard. That’s how dads were, back then. 😀 (My dad had a few hairs across his butt, just because I had four Corvair parts cars in OUR back yard when I owned my ’65 Monza 2DR hardtop. Go figure. To be fair, they were WAY out in the back yard by the brook, in the puckerbrush. Didn’t matter to him. Picky, picky…)
These days, no one needs to be creative. Just add a fart can exhaust (45HP) and a loud stereo (103HP) and your car is faster than anything on the road. 😀
The “mods” seem to have “preserved” the car. Aside from that, the color, the wheels, the steering wheel, the oddly tufted front seat; just not at home here.
Although GM was an enormously profitable company in the 60s, I wonder how much more they could have made if they’d gone to corporate engine sharing in the 60s, instead of the 70s. (Yes, I’m aware there was some sharing in the 60s, but not very much.)
Around 1970, you could get a 454 Chevy, three different 455s from Pontiac, Buick, and Oldsmobile, and a 472 from Cadillac. In hindsight, it seems kinda pointless and expensive.
A decade later when GM started putting the sbc in the other brands it seemed pointless and cheap.
It was also a disappointment for some of the buyers of the time. The 450 cu in plus offerings really did have their own characteristics.
I may be highly prejudiced, having founded an Olds Club Chapter in 1984 and owning about 15 vintage Oldsmobiles, right up to today, but imho Olds big blocks (actually even the 307, 330 ,350, 400, and 403’s were sort of big blocks in a way as they were all based on the original 303 so Olds never actually made a true small block ala Chevy) was the best of GM’s big block engines in many ways: rock solid and highly adaptable, a real beast of a motor. I’ll take mine in a Toronado W-34 GT. A good and refreshing choice for this Chevy.
“Olds big-block”?
455 was the same basic block design for Olds/Buick/Pontiac as the smaller cc. Some younger car fans think ‘block size’ is the cubic inch displacement.
Had a minor tiff online with a Gen X age Olds fan who called the 455 a “big block” since it “has higher deck height” then the 260-403. But they all use same motor mounts, so?
Mea culpa. I wrote this originally back in 2009 at the other site, and I obviously made a major faux pas. Thanks for the long-overdue correction; it’s fixed now.