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Chevrolet Vega
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How about this one:
I was out late one night in my 73 wagon. I was taking a shortcut back from my girlfriends house, came around a corner and floored it. Got up to about 70 (open road) and let off the gas. It stayed on the floor!!!! I reached down to pull it up, figuring the return spring broke but it was jammed. I cruised it for a few miles back to civilization and pulled into a convienience store. HARD on the brakes. I got it stopped (it had an auto). I turned the key off and it sat there and ran for another ten minutes (very roughly - sort of dieseling). When it finally conked out I got out, opened the hood and the exhause manifold was glowing bright red. The throttle linkage had fallen off of the side of the carb and wedged it wide open. Put it back together and off I went (after cooling down). I am sure that really helped that fine engine out.
I would have asked her about it if I knew before she left.
She must have had a soft spot for that car (or been real cheap!), since it wasn't a case of not being able to afford something new.
2020 Acura RDX tech SH-AWD, 2023 Maverick hybrid Lariat luxury package.
In normal service this design worked quite well. This design's major weakness was an intolerance to overheating. Over a certain temperature the silicone would migrate out of the aluminum pores leaving the cylinder bore unprotected and ravaged by ring friction.
When you saw a Vega puking large amounts of oil smoke you were witnessing the result of a reversal of the silicone impregnation process. Inspection would reveal excessive cylinder wall scoring which rendered the oil control rings useless.
The majority of the engine components and final engine assembly were done at Messina, New York.
Dusty
Just another example of a great idea from GM's product designers without the backing of upper management. When the going gets tough, GM just quits.
Little-known Vega fact: After the 1977 model year, GM had a quantity of Vega bodies still lying around, but they had officially discontinued the model. So they stuck Monza fascias on them and sold them as 1978 Chevy Sportbacks. I bet they're really rare today, probably another example of a car that has no collector value in spite of its rarity.
-Andrew L
My mom and stepdad briefly had a '78 Sunbird, bought new. It wasn't a bad car (it had a 3.8 V6, IIRC), but was lousy in snow (nose heavy RWD) and had a tiny, low back seat (not good when you have two growing boys). They traded it in on a 1980 Fiat Brava. My parents didn't have the best judgment about cars back then.
Looking back, it is apparent that the Vega was an okay idea on the drawing board, but was a car rushed into production without being developed. It was half-baked, and it's hard to re-bake something once it is out of the oven, if you know what I mean.
If someone they could have made a Vega with a decent smooth OHC engine, a workable shifter, some rust-proofing and about $100 in upgrades to seats and switches and knobs, it would have been a pretty nice car. Styling was okay, size was okay, economy was okay. It could have competed with contemporary Japanese cars.
I have an old Consumer Guide used car book that says of the Chevette something along the lines of "they squeak and rattle with age, but seem to keep on going". Basically, I'd guess they were a "nickel and dime you to death" car, versus a car that would just dump on you all at once!
The thing that annoys me is that, from what I've seen in pictures, the I-Mark was a pretty good looking car back then. They had a coupe (NOT a hatchback) model that looked kinda Vega-ish. Also a notchback sedan that just looked better-equipped and more upscale than the Chevette hatchbacks GM pushed on us.
For instance, here's the "Vega-esque" coupe I was thinking of...
And the notchback sedan looked like this...
At a quick glance, they hide their Chevette origins pretty well, but look at the windshield/cowl area, and the front doors, and they're almost pure Chevette.
I do remember in an auto mag (can't remember which one) they compared a Lamborghini to a Chevette. They did a REAL test on the Lambo, not just how awesome it was, but how poor the build quality was. They said it was so bad it rivaled the Chevette.
Anyway, Mom ended up getting a 1980 Malibu coupe, which is probably for the better, because it was still running well 7 years later, when I got my driver's license and she handed it down to me. I don't know if a Monza would've made it that far ;-)
Speaking of Monza miniatures, I do remember having an orange Hot Wheels Monza as a kid, I think they put it out when the car was introduced (late '74).
I know these things were designed to accept anything up to a Chevy 350, but how did they really handle and act with bigger engines? I have an old used car guide that covers the '77-86 era, and it says to pretty much avoid them all in general, but gives extra warnings about the V-6 and V-8 models because the extra weight would make the whole thing sag. My neighbor used to race Vegas when I was a kid, and he put 350's in them, but I'm sure he also built up the suspensions to match.
I guess the Ps didn't love it too much, they got rid of it in '80 (for a Fiat Brava sedan, of all things, very scary). Good thing we also had a '72 Ford Club Wagon (in very glamorous two-tone green) as our 'reliable' car, LOL!