Tag: C1 Corvette

Tom & Deb DeBold’s PERFECT 1960 Fuelie Corvette

Published on by Scott

St. Louis never built Corvettes like this!

Dateline: 6.16.21 – This story was first published in the August 2018 issue of Vette Vues – Story by Scott Teeters, Photos from Tom & Deb DeBold:

Imagine spending twelve years restoring a Corvette, winning all kinds of NCRS awards and such, only to at one point being told that your Corvette is “too perfect”! That was Tom and Deb DeBold’s experience at the 2017 NCRS National in San Antonio, Texas event. How could that be? We’ll explain later.

Corvettes have never been “cheap”. Even in the early days, a new Corvette cost about the same as a mid-level Cadillac. In 1975 I bought a 10-year-old 1965 327/300 Sting Ray Coupe with side-exhausts for $2,800, which is in 2018 dollars around $13,500. That’s around the same price some 2001-to-2004 C4 Corvettes are going for today. The point is that, back in the day, if a young man wanted to be driving a used Corvette, was willing to work hard, and work some overtime (remember that?), he could get a Vette.

But as the 1960s wore on, car insurance companies went to war on young male Corvette owners. A lot of that had to do with the way young guys drove back then. They did tend to get into more accidents, and Corvettes had a much higher theft rate. (I know, mine was stolen!) So, it was not uncommon for young guys, even with an older Corvette, to be “insuranced” out of being able to own their Corvette.

That was Tom DeBold’s experience. In 1966 as a young single guy, Tom purchased a 1959 Corvette. This was his daily driver for only 8 months before his insurance company raised his rates into the Unaffordable Zone. They didn’t like the idea of an 18-year-old guy in a fast sports car. In 1970 Tom and his sweetheart Debbie were married. But Tom promised his new bride that “someday” he’d get another 1959 or 1960 Corvette.

The DeBolds raised a family in Ohio and Tom had a long career in sales, eventually becoming a sales manager for a national pesticide manufacturer in Kansas City, Kansas. Deb had a long career as the Human Resources Director of Benefits for Dick’s Sporting Goods in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. While on a business trip to Orlando, Florida in 2001, Tom found a barely running 1960 Corvette Fuelie basket case. He knew it was time to take action, so he called Deb and told her, “Deb, I’m buying another Corvette!” According to NCRS Master Judge Steve Neal, there are currently only 15-to-17 original 1960 Fuelies in existence!

By this time, Tom and Deb had a second home in Las Vegas, Nevada. Tom had his new, 41-year-old, barely running, 1960 Fuelie Corvette transported to Las Vegas. Once Tom got the car home he was unsuccessful in finding a restorer that he felt comfortable working with. Tom didn’t want to just fix up the car to get it running again. Tom decided that his goal was to have an NCRS-level restored car. A year later, after some searching, Tom found Cub Gustafson, in Chandler, Arizona.

Cub’s background was mostly with rare European cars, such as Mercedes, Bugatti, Alfa, Ferrari, and others. Cub had never restored a Corvette but was up for the challenge. Tom and Cub found a local 1960 Corvette (not a Fuelie) in need of restoration and decided to do both cars. A long-term friendship formed from working on the two cars. Once completed, both 1960 Corvettes went through the complete NCRS judging process together and both received the coveted DUNTOV Award at the 2017 National NCRS Convention in San Antonio, TX. The second Corvette was restored for a friend and was a non-Fuelie car.

Working out of a two-bay garage, Tom and Cub took the 1960 Corvettes completely apart. All of the parts were cataloged, examined, refurbished, and repaired if possible. And thus began a 12-year restoration project. You are now probably wondering why it took 12 years to complete the restoration? First of all, it was just Cub and Tom working on the disassembly and reassembly. And secondly, Tom decided that he wanted every single part on the car to be a vintage 1960 Corvette part; everything. No reproduction parts were used during the restoration.

When Tom got his car, it was barely running and needed a lot of help, plus over the years, there had been numerous repairs done with newer parts, so everything had to be examined to make sure it was a 1960 vintage part. If a part was deemed to not be from 1960, Tom and Cub had to source the part. It turned out that sourcing parts took a lot more time than they thought it would. Plus, in the early 2000s, car parts were not as cataloged on the Internet as they are today.

So, Tom and Cub had to do a “parts juggling act” getting the car together. While waiting on parts for one component, they’d work on another component until it was completed, or stopped because a year-correct part had to be sourced. As you can imagine, the process got complicated. The guys started with the frames and step-by-step worked through everything on the cars. This is why the project took 12 years because the end goal was that everything had to be to NCRS standards.

Tom’s 283 Fuelie engine received a total rebuild and was balanced and blueprinted by DeWayne Samuels of SST Performance Engines, in Scottsdale, Arizona. Fuelie engines are notoriously challenging to get running right. Jerry Bramlett in Mobile, Alabama rebuilt the Rochester Fuelie unit, “dialed it in” to the engine, and then dynoed the engine to produce 325HP.

While Tom and Cub were working on the chassis of Tom’s Corvette, the body was sent to Steve Loy in Scottsdale, Arizona for the full body treatment. Steve put hundreds of hours perfecting the entire body. The guys knew they would take a few points hit by over-restoring the body, but it was just too gorgeous to not make perfect. Therefore, everything else about the car had to be perfect

Loy painted the car with Roman Red Urethane paint and wet-sanded with 5000-grit sand paper between eight coats of clear. Tom and Cub could have stopped there, but chose to take the body to Distinct Detailing, in Scottsdale, Arizona where Scott Nicholes took the already amazing paint two stages farther by wet-sanding beyond 5000-grit, then polish, polish, polish, and polish again. The end result is Roman Red that looks VERY deep.

The Tom and Deb’s 1960 Fuelie was completed in 2014 and immediately hit the NCRS circuit and has racked up an impressive resume of awards, including:

2014 NCRS Chapter Top Flight
2015 NCRS Regional Top Flight
2015 NCRS Performance Verification
2016 NCRS Regional Top Flight
2016 Bloomington Gold
2016 Triple Diamond
2016 Chicago Concours Gold
2017 Arizona Concours Best in Class
2017 NCRS Regional Top Flight
2017 NCRS National DUNTOV
2018 Boca Raton Concours Best in Class
2018 Boca Raton Concours Sponsors Choice (out of 247 cars)
2018 Tri-Power
2018 Keels & Wheels Concours Best in Class

Along the way, Tom did an interesting thing. He used the judging as an indicator of what needed to be corrected. So whatever a judge picked up that wasn’t quite right, Tom would go back and correct. Do this, and eventually, you’ll get to “perfect”. Even the tires on the car are really from 1960!

The NCRS “Performance Verification Test” is especially challenging. Most cars attempt this six or seven times before achieving their Performance Verification. The test is a 12.4-mile drive with over 350 points that have to be passed. And when the drive is completed, it has to be EXACTLY 12.4-miles. Not 12.3, or 12.5; 12.4 on the dot! A car has to score 100-percent. If you score 99.9-percent, you fail! That’s why most owners attempt this test six or more times. (sounds worse than the Bar Examination, doesn’t it?) The DeBold’s 1960 Corvette Fuelie passed the Performance Verification Test the first time!

So where and when were Tom and Deb DeBolt told their car was “too perfect” and points were deducted? At the NCRA Regional Top Flights in 2014 and the Duntov in 2017. The judges told Tom and Deb that the car is absolutely perfect, but he would have to take off one point. And what was that? The paint. The judge determined that the paint was simply “too perfect”, as no production Corvette’s paint would ever have been that good. The judge also pointed out that no Corvette would ever stand a chance at a Concours D’Elegance show with a factory paint job. Of course, this was part of Tom’s plan, to begin with.

While the DeBold’s 1960 Fuelie Corvette has won every award there is in the arena of the Corvette hobby, there’s always more. Tom explained that what’s ahead for their Corvette is the Concours D’Elegance circuit and plans to do two or three shows per year. They have already won Concours D’Elegance Best In Class at the 2017 Arizona Concours, the Boca Raton Concours in 2018, and the Keels & Wheels Concours in Sea Brook Texas in 2018. They also won the “Sponsor’s Choice” award at the 2018 Boca Raton Concours D’Elegance event. Tom and Deb are looking forward to attending Concours D’Elegance events in Atlanta, Amelia Island, Boca Raton, Hilton Head, and the ultimate, Pebble Beach. So, the DeBolds are well on their way.

We’re sure that Tom and Deb DeBold will do quite well. The ultimate achievement will be Pebble Beach, as there has never been a Corvette at this most prestigious event. When Tom and Deb’s 1960 Fuel Injected Corvette makes its showing there, we’ll let you know. – Scott

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NEW!!! “America’s “Old Glory” Sports Car” Corvette Prints Series

Published on by Scott

Scott Teeters’ New Corvette Art Prints Series for 2017!

Dateline: 9.1.17 – In November 2015 I helped out with Jan Hyde’s John Greenwood Tribute Event at Daytona International Speedway. Jan is the owner of Registry of Corvette Race Cars. My part of the effort was the creation of a promotional flyer, a two-sided poster featuring Greenwood’s Stars and Stripes BF Goodrich Corvette and his Spirit of Daytona ’76 Corvette on the high banks of Daytona, and a hand-out sticker featuring a profile view of Greenwood’s Sebring ’75 Corvette in front of an American flag. (see the end of this post)

The graphic layout for the sticker stuck with me and I kept looking at it thinking there might be something there as a new prints series that would appeal to Corvette owners and fans of all generation Corvettes.
 
After numerous prototype layouts I settled in on “America’s “Old Glory” Sports Car”. The first one was kind of easy, but once layout completed, I knew I had a ton of work ahead of me. What started out as a fairly simple idea turned into my Project for 2017! And now, it is ready to present. Continue reading “

NEW!!! “America’s “Old Glory” Sports Car” Corvette Prints Series” →

Corvette Timeline Tales: July 8, 1955 – One of Five 1954 Corvette Nomad Show Cars BURNED!

Published on by Scott

One of the five 1954 Corvette Nomad show cars that would today be worth over 1,000,000 was ordered destroyed by a bureaucrat!

Dateline: 7-8-17 – Norm Brown got a new job at Chevrolet, but little did he know that he’d be helping to send one of the five Corvette Nomad show cars built for the 1954 Motorama to the crusher. According to Mario van Ginnekin’s  ***  “Remarkable Corvettes” webpage, three of the five Nomads are known to still exist. “Why” one of the Nomads was sent to the crusher is not known. However, even though the ’56 Corvette with its updated body was about to go into production, the Corvette was not generally liked inside GM.

Photo: GM Archives

Also, by the end of the 1955 production cycle, Chevrolet had only sold 4,640 units from ’53 through ’55, which was NOTHING for a GM car. Continue reading “

Corvette Timeline Tales: July 8, 1955 – One of Five 1954 Corvette Nomad Show Cars BURNED!” →

Corvette Timeline Tales: June 26, 1958 – A 1958 Corvette becomes the 39,000,000th Chevrolet built!

Published on by Scott

A little known Chevrolet/Corvette milestone, a 1958 Corvette marks the 39 Millionth Chevrolet!

Dateline: 6.26.17 – In the early days of the Corvette’s existence, GM had an odd relationship with the car. Power-players such as Harley Earl, Ed Cole, and Bill Mitchell went to bat for the struggling sports car many times. And then there was the wild Russian engineer with the funny name, Zora Arkus-Duntov that pushed to make the car a successful racecar. But GM is all about sales and Chevy wasn’t selling many Corvettes. By the end of 1957 Chevy sold 14,446 Corvettes in total from 1953. In 1957 alone, Chevrolet sold 254,331 4-door Bel Air Sedans!
No, Corvette sales weren’t even a blip on the GM profit margin. So it is peculiar that GM would have chosen a 1958 Corvette to officially be the “39th Million Chevrolet. But bean-counting aside, the Corvette indeed had a special place in GM. No other car was using what was then, a new high-tech composite material Continue reading “

Corvette Timeline Tales: June 26, 1958 – A 1958 Corvette becomes the 39,000,000th Chevrolet built!” →

1953 Corvette – The Story of the First C1 Corvettes

Published on by Scott

Dateline: 5.15.12

A look back 60 years ago to how the first Corvette came to be.

I call the Corvette the “The American Automotive Horatio Alger Story.” It’s the ultimate automotive rags-to-riches story. You could also call it an automotive Cinderella story. While the C6 has taken more flack than it deserves, it’s good to look back to the very beginning to get a really clear picture of how far the Corvette has come in 60 years.

Since we’re rolling into the C6’s final year and looking forward to the new 7th generation Vette, the next several installments of my VETTE Magazine monthly column looks back at the “first” of each generation Corvette. So, let’s go back to the beginning. – Scott

In September 1951, GM’s chief of design, Harley Earl took his Le Sabre dream car to Watkins Glen for a little GM-style show’n tell.  Earl was impressed with the “sports cars” he saw there and went back to work with a new car concept for General Motors – an American sports car.

Post WW II saw the birth of plastics and glass-reinforced plastic, or “fiberglass” and Earl saw a new way to build prototypes and production cars. In February ‘52, Life Magazine presented the new space age material in a story titled “Plastic Bodies For Autos.” By March, GM was reviewing the Alembic I, a fiberglass bodied Jeep. Impressed with the new material, Earl decided to start moving on his sports car idea. Engineer Robert McLean designed a chassis layout and by April a full-size plaster model was shown to GM’s management. The following month, Ed Cole was promoted to Chief of Engineering for Chevrolet and was onboard with Earl’s project. Earl pitched his concept to GM’s president, Charles Wilson and Chevrolet general manager, Thomas Keating in June and got the approval to build a functional prototype for the GM Motorama in January 1953. The car’s working name was… “the Opel Sports Car.” Continue reading “1953 Corvette – The Story of the First C1 Corvettes” →

1954 GM Motorama Concept Cars – Corvette Wannabees

Published on by Scott

Dateline: 4.24.12

Corvette’s Motorama Kiss’n Cousins

In 2009 when GM was getting negative publicity because of its financial troubles, I received a few emails with images of the 1954 GM Motorama Concept Pontiac Bonneville Special, Buick Wildcat II, and Oldsmobile F-88. For 1954, these are very cool-looking cars and you can’t miss the Corvette connection. The basic message in the email was, “Look at what the Corvette could have been if GM hadn’t let Chevy have the design. These cars had bigger engines and were nicer cars. GM got it wrong.” To which I say, “Ah, no.”

To begin with, the Corvette came first. Harley Earl started his small sports car design in 1951. By the end of ‘52 the hand made XP-112 Corvette was ready for its debut at the ‘53 Motorama Show on January 17, 1953. The concept was a completely unproven and much to Earl’s delight, was very enthusiastically received. So the car was rushed into production with almost zero development. By June ‘53 the first of only 300 Corvettes was released. Compared to the 332,497 Chevy 210 Deluxe 4-door sedans sold in ‘53, 300 Corvettes almost doesn’t qualify as “production.”

But before the numbers came in, Pontiac, Buick, and Olds wanted to take their shots at the 2-seater sports car concept. But unlike the spartan Corvette, the other divisions went in the direction of the ‘50s – big and bold. All three cars were typical concept cars – over festooned, and not produceable at a reasonable cost. The Corvette, also a concept car, was much more realistic for production. Continue reading “1954 GM Motorama Concept Cars – Corvette Wannabees” →

The Briggs “Swift” Cunningham 1960 Fuel Injected Corvette is Now a Movie Star! “The Quest” DVD – Available Now

Published on by Scott

Dateline: 9.7.11
After years in the making, “The Quest” DVD can be yours for just $20 Bucks!
The 1960 Fuel Injected Corvette famously known as the “Cunningham Le Mans Assault” car is now a movie star! It seems that for most of us, there’s a Time/Date stamp on our affection for Corvettes that coincides with that first moment we laid eyes upon the machine. For me, it was ‘66 to ‘69 big block Corvettes. For Chip Miller, it may well have been this car, the 1960 Briggs “Swift” Cunningham 1960 Fuel Injected Corvette. it’s not hard to “get” the passion. When you look at the machine, it screams “RACE CAR!” And while that is definitely correct, a closer examination of the car reveals how astonishingly close the car is to a stock ‘60 Fuelie Corvette.

For an excellent look under the pretty fiberglass, check out THIS PAGE from the Corvette restoration masters at Corvette Repair. Kevin MacKay and his team are arguably the masters at vintage Corvette racer resto work. Thanks to Corvette Repair’s work, this car has won the NCRS American Heritage Award.

Here was the deal for this Le Mans-winning Corvette. The car started life as a new Fuel Injection optioned 1960 Corvette. Cunningham’s team was well seasoned at preparing a car for endurance racing and took maximum advantage of Duntov’s “racer kit” options. RPO-579D got you the then top-of-the-line 283/290-HP Fuelie engine. RPO-685 mated the 4-speed manual transmission to the Fuelie. RPO-687 added the heavy duty brakes and special steering. And RPO 1625A added the oversized 24-gallon fuel tank. That’s essentially all that was needed from the factory to build a race car upon. This configuration was the 1960 equal to a 2012 Z06. From there, the Cunningham team removed items that race cars don’t need, such as front bumpers, and fancy interior door panels, and added safety and go-fast parts, including racing lights, louvers on the hood for additional cooling, headlight covers, side-mounted exhausts, Halibrand lightweight racing wheels, a quick-fill gas cap, and miscellaneous other touches. The car was AMAZINGLY stock. This will be obvious when you check out Corvette Repair’s Portfolio Page.

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The rest is history. With John Fitch and Bob Grossman doing the driving, the Cunningham Corvette took first place in the GT 5000 class and finished in 8th place overall. Pretty damn impressive for a machine so close to a production car from St. Louis! Continue reading “The Briggs “Swift” Cunningham 1960 Fuel Injected Corvette is Now a Movie Star! “The Quest” DVD – Available Now” →

Vette Videos: 1953 Corvette TV Commercial

Published on by Scott

Dateline: 8.12.11
It all had to begin somewhere…

Harley Earl was a leader in women's rights in the workplace.

What an OUTRAGEOUS proposal! Take a Chevy sedan chassis and drivetrain, soup up the in-line-six “Stovebolt” engine, and dress it with a sexy lightweight body made of an exotic new material – fiberglass. That’s was GM chief of design, Harley Earl’s idea of an American sports car.

The Stovebolt-Six engine was goosed by adding three Carter one-barrel carbs, a more aggressive solid-lifter cam, increased compression to 8:1, dual valve springs, stronger exhaust valves, and a high-efficiency water pump. The 115-HP Stovebolt six was reborn as the Blue Flame Six and packed a mighty 150-HP @ 4200 rpm and 224 LB/FT or torque. (calm down, calm down) The transmission was the tried-and-true Chevrolet Powerglide automatic with the shifter on the floor.

The Blue Flame Six engine had 150-horsepower, 223-lb/ft or torque, and a redline of 5,000 rpm!

While the fiberglass was exotic for 1953, there was a more practical reason for using the plastic material – COST. Even though finishing the body was more labor intensive, it was no where near the cost of making the huge metal stamps for steel body parts. Chevrolet engineers determined that if the car failed, they would have a minimal financial risk using fiberglass. Continue reading “Vette Videos: 1953 Corvette TV Commercial” →

Was 1962 the “Best” of the C1 Corvettes?

Published on by Scott

The straight-axle Fuelie was tough enough to win it’s class at Le Mans in ‘61. Was the last of the C1 the “best”? Let’s have a look-see!

Click the images to see much larger images of these classic Corvette ads.

No matter how well received a performance car is, the day will come when the decision is made, “Let’s build a new version!” For the first generation Corvette, that day arrived in late 1959. Two years before, Ed Cole was driving his Q-Chevrolet project that would have put a transaxle in every Chevrolet car, including the Corvette, by 1960. Chief of GM styling, Bill Mitchell attended the Turin Motor Show in ‘57 and especially liked the humps over the wheels and the unique tapered roof of the Pininfarina and Boano cars. So he instructed his designers to come up with something based on those ideas. Penned mostly by Bob Veryzer and Pete Brock, the new shape is unmistakably the genesis of the Sting Ray.

While the Q-project was quickly shelved, Mitchell couldn’t let go of the Q-Corvette shape. Early in ‘59, Bill made a deal to buy the mule chassis from the Corvette SS racing project for $1. Designer Larry Shinoda was charged with designing a roadster version of the Q-Corvette for the Corvette SS chassis. On his own, Mitchell successfully raced his Sting Ray for two reasons. First, he wanted to go racing, and second, to test the public’s response to the new design. It didn’t take long before it was obvious Continue reading “Was 1962 the “Best” of the C1 Corvettes?” →

Bill Pierceall’s 612,000-Mile 1960 Corvette!

Published on by Scott2 Comments

 

Hot Rod ’60 Corvette does America’s Four Corners

Pretty HOT-looking for a 50-year old babe! I’ll bet that Hemingway never drove anything like this!

Before The Corvette Report was a full-fledged blog, it was a monthly email newsletter. A regular feature of the newsletter was titled “Let’s Play Corvette Odd-Ball! Quirky Vette Factoids” In the October 2008 newsletter I posed the question, “What’s the highest mileage Corvette on record?” With a little help from former VETTE Magazine assistant editor, John Nelson, I reported on a VERY high-mileage Vette, owned by Bill Pierceall.

As of the 2008 report based on the June 2001 story in VETTE, Bill’s updated ‘60 Corvette had just over 500,000 miles on the odometer. In the ‘90s the car had been updated with a completely new ‘96 Grand Sport suspension and LT4 engine. The back end of the car had been widened 3-inches per side to cover the wide GS rear tires, dechromed of the side cove trim and the front fender top trim, and then painted pearl blue. I won’t retell the story, but you can check out the VetteWeb post with this link…

http://www.vetteweb.com/features/vet0601a2_1960_chevy_corvette_convertible/index.html <– there’s a typo on this page. The story is from 2001, not 2009.

The 2,900-pound machine is good for a 162-mph ride, limited by the C1’s aerodynamics and what Bill calls “the pucker factor.” (I think most of us can relate to that). Pierceall obviously followed Duntov’s instructions to the letter, to all Corvette owners to “Drive and ENJOY their Corvette!,” and then some! Continue reading “Bill Pierceall’s 612,000-Mile 1960 Corvette!” →