19lover55

I have the opportunity to purchase a 1965 Corvette L79. The owner wants me to make an offer. I am asking for help in making a fair offer to purchase.
The Corvette is driver quality and I think you could clean it up and drive as is or it would be a great car to restore. The car is a Numbers Matching and I have attached pictures. The interior looks original and is in pretty good condition with the exception of a patched drivers door panel.
The car s sitting on a lift and I was able to look under it and it looks to be original and what you would expect of a 50 year old car. The frame looked fine.
The paint is not very good quality. The body has a few hair line cracks and a bruise on the back the size of a fifty cent peice. There is a crack/seam on the left fender about 2 inches long.
I am sure there is plenty I forgot. Sorry the pictures are not very good taken with my cell.

Opinions Appreciated

Vet65te

Most of the pics are a bit fuzzy but it looks to have a 365 horse decal on the valve cover and both the 365 and 350 Horse L79 engines came with aluminum intake manifolds and that one pic of the engine shows a cast iron manifold (or maybe just a painted aluminum intake) so probably need to look a bit closer to determine what it is. Do you have any pics of the instrument cluster? If that is an 'HH' block stamp, it should be a 365 horse block.
Mike T - Prescott AZ

BANG11

HH is an L76 365 horse motor. I agree that it looks like a cast iron intake.

ghostrider20

Hard to tell from the pics if that’s a painted aluminum intake or cast iron. The bypass hose from the intake to water pump is missing. Either the intake is plugged, or no provisions.

As mentioned the “HH” is a 365 motor, and the stamping font looks correct. What carb is installed? Is there an idle pulley on the left side of the block?

I asked for for a valuation of my 65 365 coupe a year or so ago. Original, but very nice paint, and born with drivetrain, needs nothing ready to go car and 45-50K was the consensus.

If it’s lacquer paint, it can be made to shine. The cracks and dings are an issue. The 50 year old chassis wil need to be detailed or at least qualified for service. Brakes, hoses, bushings, shocks, u-joints, belts, carb overhaul, radiator, maybe a clutch, gaskets, etc can add up to 10K pretty quick.

Does the car run now? Is it road worthy (ie. drive it coast to coast without concern)? Maybe that is not a concern or you don’t care if it’s road worthy. For me, I want a car to be road worthy and there’s a cost to achieve that.

65GGvert

Just curious, what makes you think it's an L79?

19lover55

I guess I assumed it was L79 and just goggled L76 and agree. Thanks

19lover55

I agree the pictures suck. I took them with my phone and transferred them to my IPad so I could down load them. As far as the intake I do not know will have to look at it. This is all the pictures I have. I will try to go back and take more. Issue is he went to Florida and I do not know when he will return.

Thanks

Bowtyeguy

I would think 40/42 tops, you have seen the obvious body and paint mistakes and to restore it you are going to drop 20k plus and many hours and years into this. Once you get started on the restore it will steamroll.

19lover55

I don’t know the carburetor but will check out. He offered to start the car and pull it outside but I declined as the weather that day was nasty. I think you could drive the car, but does need some love.

Thanks

19lover55

Rookie in learning.
just goggled FF paint code and figured out this is supposed to be a Blue Car! Is this correct?

Thanks

Bowtyeguy

Yes Nassau Blue

65GGvert

Googled man, Googled. By the way, it also came with black vinyl interior.

19lover55

LOL didn’t even notice Fat Fingers small IPad!

thanks

3JsVette

It also depends a lot on where you want to be when you feel you're done. Do you just want to be able to drive it and have it look presentable? If you want it to be for the most part correct looking there could be a money pit staring you in the face and on top of that years before you can drive it. Just something to think about before making an emotional decision.

tuxnharley

Given the condition issues- if it is L76, 40 to 45 k; if it is L79 then 35 to 40k.

Nowhere Man

if you like the car as is and there is no maniacal issues or under lying body work issues under that paint then mid 50's. if you want to correct the paint and make the engine bay more correct then you better get it for mid 30's

GUSTO14

ghostrider caught most everything I noticed about the engine. Both L76 & L79 came with the same aluminum intake and both came with the R2818A Holley 4-barrel.

It looks otherwise like a very nice car...

Good luck... GUSTO

Nowhere Man

the L79 and L76 is basically the same engine beside cam shaft and lifters

65 fi

From a position of experience with the cost of restoration, you are going to drop a lot more money into to restoration than the value of the completed car. Unless there is a reason to buy this particular car, that justifies a money pit, you may want to look for a car which has already gone through the process of restoration. If you choose to buy this car, I would have a hard time going beyond 30K.

GUSTO14

...and the idler assembly. But a good reason to listen to the engine for the tapping sound of a solid lifter cam of the L76...

GUSTO