He was a gearhead\/car guy from birth and had become obsessed with Trans Am’s thanks to Smokey and the Bandit (1977) and his dad buying a gorgeous 1978 Gold Edition Trans Am in 1980. He was just 10 yrs old, and that T\/A made a huge impression on him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, they weren’t rich, nor poor, but the old man made it clear that insurance was going to be expensive even w\/ his job as a stock boy for the local Rose’s Dept store.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
One day his dad called him at work on the company phone to tell him he found a car he wanted him to look at.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It was this 1971 Chevelle convertible. Even though he wanted a Trans Am this yellow beauty was love at first sight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The man was asking $4500, in 1985, but they worked him down to $3400 cash money on the condition that he would keep his Alpine tape deck, amplifier, and (2) 8-inch Alpine subwoofers. The money saved went to drivetrain rebuild.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, 36yrs later, he still has his best girl and is currently in the middle of her 2nd resto since he got her. His son is in the Engineering & Auto Shop program at his high school and will get the Chevelle upon his passing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The original drivetrain in the 1971 Chevelle was the 350 V8, 2bbl 245hp option w\/ the venerable Turbo 350 automatic transmission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In 1987, he had the best machinist\/drag racer in town Dan build him a strong 1970 350 – 4bolt main block w\/ a Crane Fireball II hyd cam – .500 lift, bored .040, forged steel crankshaft, TRW flat-top pistons, Comp. Cams roller rockers, Weiand X-Celerator Hi-Rise intake, Headman Ceramic-Coated headers, Flowmaster 2″ exhaust, and a Holley 750cfm dual-line 4bbl carb.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He rebuilt the Turbo 350 with Dayton 1800 rpm stall Conv and shift kit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Left the original 10-bolt rear end with 2.73 gearings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The 1971 Chevelle is a convertible, of which roughly 5,500+ were built for the 1971 model year. Other than that she doesn’t have any super-rare options, maybe the Sunflower Yellow color.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He hopes to complete the 2nd restoration he’s given this 1971 Chevelle since he bought her in 1985 within the next year, give or take a few months. He had the 1971 Chevelle cleaned up under the hood, rebuilt the Turbo 350, brakes, gas tank, new Cragar SS wheels, and brakes this past summer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
New bucket seats, conversion to floor-shifter, and a new top will be done by Spring 2022. New paint and bodywork are yet to be decided. He will be sticking with w\/the original Sunflower Yellow color.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This 1971 Chevelle Malibu 350 convertible was Philo’s first car. In 1985 he was 15yrs old and looking to buy a 2nd gen Firebird Formula or Trans Am for his first car. He was a gearhead\/car guy from birth and had become obsessed with Trans Am’s thanks to Smokey and the Bandit (1977) and his […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":54855,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[195,194],"tags":[180],"class_list":["post-54852","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-chevelle","category-customer-cars","tag-1971-chevelle"],"acf":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/Philo-Betto-1971-Chevelle3.jpg",1024,483,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/Philo-Betto-1971-Chevelle3-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/Philo-Betto-1971-Chevelle3-300x142.jpg",300,142,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/Philo-Betto-1971-Chevelle3-768x362.jpg",768,362,true],"large":["https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/Philo-Betto-1971-Chevelle3.jpg",800,377,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/Philo-Betto-1971-Chevelle3.jpg",1024,483,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/Philo-Betto-1971-Chevelle3.jpg",1024,483,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"Ground Up Content Team","author_link":"https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/author\/klaclair\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"This 1971 Chevelle Malibu 350 convertible was Philo’s first car. In 1985 he was 15yrs old and looking to buy a 2nd gen Firebird Formula or Trans Am for his first car. He was a gearhead\/car guy from birth and had become obsessed with Trans Am’s thanks to Smokey and the Bandit (1977) and his…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54852"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54852"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54852\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":67867,"href":"https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54852\/revisions\/67867"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/54855"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54852"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54852"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ss396.com\/cars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54852"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}