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"Road & Track" Remembers the Turbo Corvette Trials
Back in the oil crisis days, GM/Chevrolet/Corvette engineers were taking leftover parts from all the company's other cars and experimenting with different engine setups, like turbocharging.
There's a local gent that has an all gray 80 with this same factory installed turbo unit, includes original factory manual and confirmatory p-work. Car was delivered this way. Never saw one before, beautiful car overall that he picked up well below market
The factory never installed a turbo on a c3, Martin was some aftermarket cat almost no one has heard of, of course had Motion or yenko built a turbo vette add a 1 at the start of the asking price...
It appears to me martin copied the gm test car...
May we please see copies of the paperwork saying the turbo was adding at the gm factory....
As far as I know, no factory c3 were ever sold with a turbo installed at the factory, dealer installed is a big bucket of worms look what Motion did through Baldwin but that doesn't count to me as factory built,
Back in the 70's dealers wanted to sell cars some would do whatever to make that sale.
Ecklers had a blue and silver turbo on the showroom floor for a spell and the paint was very copied in the day, and they did a Daytona like it but I believe the Daytona had a blower.
That single small turbo on a sb v8 was a kit sold in the day mostly installed on stock cars the owner thought they had super cars,
This is the Duntov turbo that he did with AVI, at first you could only have it as a white, red convertible and it didn't do at all well, ACI tried to sell the parts and they were never too popular, someone said to hell with it and made coupes and painted other colors didn't help, I guess timing was wrong for a high priced low powered aftermarket turn key custom,
I saw one in person and while I do not really dig white I loved it and got an extra chuckle the owner was trying to convince the crowd it was a super rare factory built "by" duntov race car.
I believe timing and trends are coming around and some nice ACI Duntov turbos might fetch some taller dollars.
I was equally incredulous...I'll do my best...stay tuned
According to what I can find on the net FWIW gm had 3 test mules and only one all nice and decked out, so IF and that is a huge categorical "IF" they sold that car from the factory to the public it's even more rare than a C3 ZL-1
Since the net also has one ( of several ) that went through BJ for just under 18K I still believe that it's just a rare unknown aftermarket hopped up car like motion or yenko would build but not factory built....
At Saginaw Division we were supposed to sell or send to auction all passed model cars and trucks. Unless the car was so highly modified for display or testing, it was either returned to absolute stock or crushed.
Any modifications to a stock vehicle had to have a work order covering the change. At the end of the model year, the garage foreman would review all the work orders and insure that all changes were documented as having been returned to OEM condition.
They were very strict as to getting passed model vehicles out of service and sold. Otherwise, accounting had to start depreciating them.
I assume that Divisions like Chevrolet had similar procedures and requirements (but on a much larger scale.)
I guess you can never say cars were never sold with modifications that somehow slipped through the cracks. But there would have been warranty and safety implications as to GM selling a car that was not validated.
At Saginaw Division we were supposed to sell or send to auction all passed model cars and trucks. Unless the car was so highly modified for display or testing, it was either returned to absolute stock or crushed.
Any modifications to a stock vehicle had to have a work order covering the change. At the end of the model year, the garage foreman would review all the work orders and insure that all changes were documented as having been returned to OEM condition.
They were very strict as to getting passed model vehicles out of service and sold. Otherwise, accounting had to start depreciating them.
I assume that Divisions like Chevrolet had similar procedures and requirements (but on a much larger scale.)
I guess you can never say cars were never sold with modifications that somehow slipped through the cracks. But there would have been warranty and safety implications as to GM selling a car that was not validated.
Jim
thanks
the thing is while I do not believe that the turbo test mule is the same turbo car bouncing around for sale, one thing for sure "IF" I am wrong and this isn't a case of an aftermarket clone it would be an even rarer c3 than the ZL-1, the value?!?!?!?
well, if that was it that got under 18K at bj it was a steal.
But things like this are nothing without the provenance, documentation proof of the claim, I have upset people saying this about things, "show me the proof " people who want to be taken at their word and of course have zero to prove what they are saying.
I am in no way trying to upset people, call them out or anything like that however, I do like to keep history real.
According to what I can find on the net FWIW gm had 3 test mules and only one all nice and decked out, so IF and that is a huge categorical "IF" they sold that car from the factory to the public it's even more rare than a C3 ZL-1
Since the net also has one ( of several ) that went through BJ for just under 18K I still believe that it's just a rare unknown aftermarket hopped up car like motion or yenko would build but not factory built....
OK, here's what I learned...not as satisfying as I'd hoped but the best I could do.
Went to the local cruise where I saw the car last and ran into the owner but he no longer has the car. It was a metallic gray 80 with~20K miles on it, single owner car that was in incredible condition. He bought it for 10K and sold it around 18 months later for 25k (he's heading south to spend the proceeds on a C2).
Anyway, he said the car was delivered from the factory to the dealer, a shop in Reading Pennsylvania, where the turbo was installed, looked just like the one in the Turbo Vette above. They supposedly did 10-ish of them. The accompanying book for the turbo he showed me last year was a GM book for sure. He claims that the turbo is listed on the buildsheet which he sold with the car, so it was factory spec'd to have one, but installed at the dealer.
Best I can do...if I ever come across the car at another event I'll be sure to snap pix and get a more solid history. In the meantime I would say confirmed, it was not factory installed, but it was not an aftermarket part.
The gray one had the turbo badging just like this...
OK, here's what I learned...not as satisfying as I'd hoped but the best I could do.
Went to the local cruise where I saw the car last and ran into the owner but he no longer has the car. It was a metallic gray 80 with~20K miles on it, single owner car that was in incredible condition. He bought it for 10K and sold it around 18 months later for 25k (he's heading south to spend the proceeds on a C2).
Anyway, he said the car was delivered from the factory to the dealer, a shop in Reading Pennsylvania, where the turbo was installed, looked just like the one in the Turbo Vette above. They supposedly did 10-ish of them. The accompanying book for the turbo he showed me last year was a GM book for sure. He claims that the turbo is listed on the buildsheet which he sold with the car, so it was factory spec'd to have one, but installed at the dealer.
Best I can do...if I ever come across the car at another event I'll be sure to snap pix and get a more solid history. In the meantime I would say confirmed, it was not factory installed, but it was not an aftermarket part.
The gray one had the turbo badging just like this...
Best, Steve
A fellow on the mako site make perfect "mako" badging, not GM but looks just like it...
Sorry as you might expect I am not only not sold it was a factory turbo corvette but for me this just leans more to being an aftermarket custom, in the same vein as say motion and Baldwin chevy,
For me a dealer installation is aftermarket in a way in fact dealers sometimes installed parts that were not GM.
Motion would take a new car rip off the emissions ( oops ) hop it up and sell it...it was new, it was in a way dealer installed but no way a factory car, it was an aftermarket custom.
I bet a lot of purists especially the NCRS would love a doc that proved a corvette was spec from the factory to have a turbo and the dealer installed it, but we do not have even a photocopy of that doc, we have a story from your friend at a cruise, and of course we all know that docs are faked to make a car worth more.
The car is the video, that really looks like some aftermarket custom and not even a very good one, chevy would not tack on a boost gauge on the column or have the engine looking like that, a GM installed turbo would look factory not aftermarket as that white car does.
When a cat tried to sell for example a ZL-1 or L-88 he has to come up with some impressive proof, all kinds of documentation and paperwork and he can share his "stories" but the cats paying top dollar will want documented facts and then some, we have none in the case of this turbo car...you have more than I do.
Please do not let anything I said offend you I simply require proof for something like this and I have yet to get any, and in this one I hope to be wrong a factory turbo vette, like I said more rare than a ZL-1 it would turn the vette world upside down.
Wasn't the Duntov a factory option? Single turbo...I've seen one before.
Maybe it was just a package developed by ACI and sold as a dealer-option?
no...the duntov wide body aci turbo was just another aftermarket conversion, sure it had his name and I believe even a "nod" from gm for him to do it but was no way a factory built and sold turbo c3.
when it comes to mods and customs I do my homework doesn't mean I do not get wrong information or that I am mistaken sometimes hence why I said above that IF there was a factory built c3 turbo sold as a production car it would turn the vette world upside down, and be more rare than a ZL1
05-31-2016, 01:17 PM
"Road & Track" Remembers the Turbo Corvette Trials
Chevy should have put it into production.
Martin was some aftermarket cat almost no one has heard of, of course had Motion or yenko built a turbo vette add a 1 at the start of the asking price...
