Four Carbs, Four Doors, Four on the Floor … Corvair Monza 140 is GO!

corvair monza 140 sedan quad carbs
Sedans are funny creatures. Some sedans make this hoon swoon … a mid-sixties Continental with the right paintwork would make me hop in the back with Morpheus any day. Domestic sedans got tricky once the fuselage styling thing got going (1974 Dodge Monaco, anyone?), but apparently GM’s abacus-wielding stylists didn’t muck up the second generation sedan all that much.


This lovely example of the breed is for sale out of Northern California, and wears nice original paint (albeit with a couple of bruises here and there), was rebuilt and tuned up by Mel’s Vair Mart of San Jose (can you get any better than that name?), and has attractively low mileage (probably from being parked after the first time the bloody carbs went out of sync). Plus it seems to be an honest 140 HP floor-shift manual Corvair sedan … with quad single-throat carbs, no less! Methinks at less than $6000, it’d be a lot of fun for you and three of your closest friends.
Lots more photos HERE.
Ad HERE.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

The maximum upload file size: 64 MB. You can upload: image, audio, video. Links to YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and other services inserted in the comment text will be automatically embedded. Drop files here

  1. longrooffan Avatar

    Yeah….as this olelongrooffan says, "Stock Rocks" but drop a V-6 in it and, well,
    http://oleragtop.blogspot.com/2008/10/what-i-saw-
    and to quote the http://www.autoextremist.com/,
    that's all I got.

  2. From_a_Buick_6 Avatar

    To begin with, I love the second-generation Corvair. All Corvairs have that weird air-cooled, rear-engined Unsafe at Any Speed vibe that makes them both a great conversation piece and a hoot to tool around in. But the '65-'69 is a gorgeous car on top of all that. It's too bad that Nader and (mostly) the Ford Mustang killed this car, because it's probably the most unique, special car to ever come out of the Big Three.
    While the coupes and convertibles are where the action is, the '65-'67 hardtop sedan is an even bigger oddity. It's certainly a better look than the pillared '60-'64, which was badly dated by the wraparound rear glass and cantaleaver roofline almost instantly. Nobody else attempted a compact four door hardtop, probably because any "sport sedan" smaller than an Impala proved to be a flop. Chevy was obviously refocusing the 'Vair as a Euro/Mustang fighter at this point, leaving standard economy car duties to the Chevy II. And that's what makes this car such a strange offering: sedans were for you dad, and he'd probably just assume get the Chevy II. That said, I'd totally rock this thing.

    1. AteUpWithMotor Avatar

      The Mustang killed the Corvair, not Nader. Chevy initially thought the Mustang was going to be a niche item, and expected the new Corvair Monza and Corsa would give it fierce competition. By the end of the 1964 calendar year, they realized the reverse was true, and decided to kill it. If anything, the safety outcry probably kept it around a little longer, because GM wanted to let it die a 'natural' death so that it wouldn't look like they were killing it for being unsafe. (Production continued until mid-1969.)
      Even Nader freely acknowledged that the second-generation Corvair was a much better car. A friend of mine has a black '66 Monza with a copy of Unsafe at Any Speed autographed by Nader.
      Chevy really refocused the Corvair as a sporty car in 1961, after the debut of the Monza. The Monza was going to be a one-off semi-custom for the auto show circuit, but people liked it so much they put it into production. By mid-1961, it accounted for more than half of all Corvair sales, so that became the focus. It had nothing to do with the Mustang, which wasn't even a cohesive idea yet — if anything, the Corvair Monza inspired the Mustang, not the reverse — but with the fact that the economy had improved a lot since the Corvair was conceived in the fifties. The market for pure economy cars had softened, so buyers were more interested in the plusher models.
      In any case, the second-generation Corvair is a really lovely car, one of GM's best efforts of that period, It's one of those rare cars that looks good from almost any angle.

  3. Joe Dunlap Avatar
    Joe Dunlap

    You're gonna have to arm wrestle me for it first!

  4. Tomsk Avatar

    WantwantwantwantwantwantwantwantwantwantwantwantwantWANT!

  5. Straight6er Avatar

    I always thought they were worth more than that. Maybe I should get one… As long as I can somehow convert it to fuel injection, carb syncing is not something I want any part of.

    1. rocketrodeo Avatar

      Owning a big multicylinder motorcycle will cure you of the fear. No big deal. With the simplest procedure, you only do one at a time, using one carb as the index. It's actually kind of fun.

  6. Miste X Avatar
    Miste X

    Straight6er, Sync'ing multiple carbs isn't that big of a deal once one gets the hang of it. The main issue with the Corvair carbs was the sloppy linkage, which needed to have ALL the slop removed from it BEFORE syncing the carbs, then it's no biggie.

  7. rocketrodeo Avatar

    Such an insanely cool car, and uniquely American. These were not exactly uncommon when I was a kid, but their popularity was surely abbreviated. So fun to drive, too. Imagine what the 70s could have been like if this car had continued to point the way to US auto innovation.
    For sure, few people had had such a cross-generational effect on the American destiny as Ralph Nader.

  8. thomasmac Avatar

    There is a 66 2 door coupe Corvair up here for around $3500 IIRC that looks pretty mint, I have never worked on one, have no place to put it and have no need for it but I want it so bad

  9. Torque Multiplier Avatar

    Great article. I’ve favorited this page so I can follow your updates. Thanks for taking the time to share this.

  10. Randell Gemes Avatar

    Just read your post. I kind of support your views though there are two to three points which I don’t think I would agree with what you have said. The best part of it is the way you have written the stuffs. The language was easy to follow and your style was appealing. English is my second language and you have done a good job avoiding jargons and difficult phrases. Keep on writing more posts. PS: I have already subscribed to your blog’s RSS feed.

  11. Shelley Capito Avatar

    I definitely appreciate all of the hard work you’ve put into keeping this blog around for your followers. I honestly hope this remains for a nice long time.

  12. Jon Irias Avatar

    I’d like to make up a playlist from yet another website then, placed it on my myspace page. Would I get my account deleted?

  13. impreza forums Avatar

    The Geely Emgrand GT is another example of the automaker’s apparent seriousness about being considered a top-flight player in the industry. This coupe features classic sports car proportions and aside from the overdone grille, it looks quite attractive. The GT comes from Geely’s new top-level Emgrand sub-brand and boasts some impressive specs. It’s reportedly a plug-in hybrid with a 2.4-liter inline-four that churns out 160 horsepower and 165 pound-feet on its own. That output is supplemented by a pair of 27.5-kilowatt hub motors that give the GT all-wheel-drive capability. Those motors each add 132 foot-pounds of torque as well. It’s not clear, however, which axle is being driven by the combustion engine and which gets the motors. The Emgrand GT is targeted for a 2014 introduction.