Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire 1960 Impala project

You have a 2 piece driveshaft in that car. Do yourself a favor and lubricate every zerk under that car especially the center driveshaft bearing. It is constantly forgotten because no GM car has come with one since the end of 1970 model year production. Do trust jiffy lube to take care of this for you they don't know it's there. If you notice an overall vibration in the whole car it's a bad center driveshaft bearing. It was eliminated on 65 and up B Bodies but big car C and D bodies had it until 1970.
Check to make sure rodents haven't moved into the exhaust system. That could be a cause of rough running and no power. A friend found a rat had a litter in the resonator of a 64 Cadillac and had these same problems.
Check your engine code to make sure it's the original 283. Many later gaskets and such won't work on that engine 65 and newer engines have many differences. You need to know this before ordering parts.
Good luck with it. I know it's a cool ride because it's as old as me!

Heard the turbo glides referred to as.. terrible glides.

Nice ride!

The OP's pics

Turboglides were behind the 348. Poerglides were behind the 283. Never saw one different unless it was a motor swap. My first car was a 60 lmpala 4 door. Six cylinder with 3 on the tree. Blew it up and put in a 283. Edk

In 1968 I did my driving test in our family’s 1960 Impala SS, 6 cylinder automatic. Even though it had a SS emblem on it, it was weak as crap.

1960 Impala SS ?... That is really, really, Really rare! lol... Although they did make a few 61 SS's i have Never heard of a 60 SS... Kidding aside. If your family had an Impala SS it was likely a 1962 or newer... And yes i think? you could get the SS option on a 6 cyl car... But Why?... lol

I miss seeing those old cars on the road.

They don’t have to be fancy.

Is that an original Virginia Car? I loved the 60 model.

Alrighty fellers, got some more information today while poking around. The car was made in Baltimore MD, shipped to a dealer north of Greenbriar in WVA, and bought brand new by a man who would pass the car down to his son. Son gave it to a mechanic who let it sit, and now it's in my driveway. The car is 100% original after doing some vin decoding and checking numbers.

It is a 283 with a powerglide behind it. Takes a fuzz to get it running but it's not a hard start by any means. Definitely needs some brake work, and I can't quite pin down an occasional squeal I hear, though the belts do need to be replaced. That's all for now. I suck at posting pics but I'll keep trying. The car is too neat for me not to show it's progress.

Thank you for all of the input and advice thus far, it is certainly appreciated. This is the oldest vehicle I have worked on thus far.

"Out past the cornfields where the woods got heavy"... "Out in the backseat of my 60 Chevy"...

A friend has a 1965 SS impala with a six cylinder. There’s lots of room under that hood. I had a 1956 impala SS 396. It was an auto tranny, I believe two speeds.

A 1956 Impala SS 396 with a powerglide? That's a REALLY scarce duck. LOL

The body on this thing is timeless. This one deserves a second life for sure.

I very strongly recommend you upgrade to a dual master cylinder even if you leave it as a drum brake car for safeties sake especially if you'll have your family in there with you. I had the single master cylinder fail on my 64 Impala SS and it was scary as chit. The parking brake doesn't do a whole hellava lot at 55 mph and a downshift on a power powerglide doesn't take affect until 30 or under. While you're at it upgrade to power brakes as well both legs will thank you. There are complete kits available a quick internet search will have a bunch. You can go from simple to a full 4 wheel disc conversion.

Yeah, probably a typo ('65) considering the first year for an Impala was 1958.

Back in those days, you could get all sorts of odd ball combinations...

" and but why?".... Factory would make all sorts of combinations, and they would just get shipped to a dealer.

Back around 1990 up in Washington State, ran into a lady with a 64 GTO at a gas station. Her husband had bought the car new, in 1965 in Bellingham WA. The car was a left over 64 model, that they dealer ended up getting in, but no one would buy it... so her husband got it at Dealer Cost. IT was the REAL Base Model GTO in 64. Had all the GTO Body parts, and the car came thru with a Bench seat in front, and a 389 under the hood, BUT with a 2 barrel on top instead of a 4 barrel or the 6 pack ( triple deuces).

It was a base GTO, with NO options from the Factory...No one would buy it due to it being base model with no options.

I worked in a GM factory in Massachusetts while going thru college for 2 yrs, until the 1974 fuel shortage scam. Factory made mid size GM Pontiac, Buick and Olds models. Saw some real odd ball combos come thru the assembly line, but they were on the option listing, combos that few people ordered. The folks at the factory would put together odd ball combos on the assembly line, and wasn't caught until it went out the door over in Final Inspection Dept. Several times I saw a Buick go out with the motor marked Olds on the Valve covers, or a Pontiac, and odd balls things like that.

People on the assembly line would sabotage all sorts of ways, just to decrease the boredom.

Examples, when I was on the spray line.
1. Paint a car one color, but then under the truck lid, paint the inside of that another color.
2. Drop a pop bottle down inside the door, before putting on all the hardware and cover. So you open and close your new cars door and the bottle is making the door go Klunk Klunk ever time you use it.

the silliest I've seen: We had a 130 guys on the spray paint line. Car comes in the spray line, first section is too guys who just put the paint connectors on the machine that applies the primer, and then they apply the prime to sections the machine couldn't reach, as the inside of the door jams etc.

then it passes to the next section of 4 people. I was the left side lead. On the body carrier, would be a manifest for the car, taped to it. The supervisor would write the paint color code ( a number) with a magic marker in large print. One color had 3 tones to it, depending if it went on a Buick, Olds or Pontiac. Depending on the car code, that color was # 59, 69 and 79.

To sabotage it, just due to boredom. The appropriate car color would be 59, so I'd plug in that spray hose on the overall machine and then in my hand sprayer for the hard to reach areas, I'd put that hose on... the guy who was the rear on the left side, would just look up and see the color I'd put on, never looking at the manifest. To break the boredom the guy on the other side, might plug in number 69 or 79. With all the light in the spray line we could tell a color by a glance, which is what most guys did on down the line. So in the spray line, one half would get painted a Buick version of that color ( a sort of bronze), and the other half of the car on the right half would be painted a Pontiac or Olds version of that color. Everyone chuckling. As the car went thru the rest of the plant, with the lighting there, no one could see the difference all the way thru manufacturing.

Until.... the car was outside in the sun light. Then the car looked like something out of a car wax commercial, where one half is a faded color and the other half is all waxed up, with the wax they were advertising. They'd have to take the car, dissemble a bunch of it and re run it thru the spray line.
When management would come up on the spray line, they would go to my 4 man section and try and chew out me or the other guys, depending on the side the wrong color was painted. Our response would be, that the color code scribbled on the manifest looked like a 59 to me and the other guy would claim it looked like a 69 or 79 to him. all the other guys down stream, just painted their part with what they looked up and saw coming down the line..

Funny part was that 128 guys could see what was being done, and instead of stopping the line.. they'd let it go on thru... they could see what color was being used on each side, but management knew they just looked up and painted their part, with what was coming down the line...

YET the other half of the story...

Number 11 was white on the paint code and Number 19 was black. You got in such a daze on that production line, I've seen when I would read number 11 or number 19 hand written on the manifest, the lead on the other side read the opposite number I interpreted as written. So the left half of the car is painted white and the right half is painted black. It was go past 124 more guys down line from me and the other lead, and no one would notice it. Finally someone down the assembly line would notice it, stop the line, which got the supervisors attention real quick. They would halt the entire production line for the entire factory, while that car body was taken off the line, and then management would have to go to each section thru out the factory and pull that manifest from their production line. and then re enter the car on the production line from the start.. the body we'd messed up, went to a final production section and be shipped off to somewhere else to be stripped and then sent back.

in those days in the 70s, it cost GM some unGodly amount of money, for each minute that assembly line wasn't moving. Management would want to chew out the people they thought were responsible, but being in a Union, the UAW.. If your manager tried to be a bad ass on ya, all you had to do was to tell him to file a "78". That meant, he had to do was STFU, and call down a Union Shop Steward.. Shop Steward would explain the issue to him, he'd listen and then tell the GM Manager to get Screwed. If the manager pushed it, the Shop Steward sent down would call back on the Walkie Talkie to the Union Shop, where management just hung around all day. They'd go out immediate and do a plant wide shut down, until the issue got "solved".

Heck sometimes, several times in an 8 hour shift, a shop steward would come by, and just tell me to drop was I was doing and don't lift a finger until he came by and tell me to start working again... another plant shutdown due to a managerial dispute somewhere in the plant. Sometimes the shop steward wouldn't show up to tell you to start working again for 15 to 20 minutes. Even GM told us when we orientated as a new hire, for each minute the assembly line isn't moving, it costs the company 10K.. and that is 1973 dollars.

After working in an automobile plant for 2 years in college.. I've only EVER bought one American made vehicle new. and I had that less than a year.
That was an F 150 back in 86. I've seen first hand what kind of shop the UAW runs...

My family roots are the county to the south of Greenbrier WVA, it was probably bought at the Chevy dealer there in Lewisburg.
That body is in good shape for coming out of that area. Plenty of dirt roads, few car washes ( especially from back in the 60s and 70s) and they salt the roads when they are icy in West Va,

Must be a low miler, even if it is 62 years old, for the body to be in as good of shape as the pictures show..

any body rust under it, particular under the passenger compartment?

Over all, not knowing what you paid for her... I think you did pretty darn good on your purchase.

Where do you reside over in Virginia?

Jeebus fuggin Cryst Seafire... Your long post above leaves little doubt to what destroyed the American automobile manufacturing industry as we knew it back in it's Heyday... #firingsquad