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Restorer32: Quick response to your statement. Yes it does not sound like much (5 Points) but when you are judged and have to be within 5 points of the top car at a Grand National and 10 Points at other meets it makes a world of difference. Been there; done that. That's been my biggest complaint on AACA judging: eg: It not the points they take from my car it's the points they don't take off the top car when there is obvious things that are not original. Larry

Jim: Thanks for the response. Just curious has anybody tried to get that info from the AACA?? I go to a lot of swap meets and have seen many AACA Badges and Trophies for sale; in fact they are a dime a dozen if you want them. Larry

Just to play "Devil's Advocate"; how do we know that badge did not come from another car?? This has been my problem with the awards given by AACA. NO Vin reference is given to the badges and trophies. If a certificate with the date of award and vin was given (like all major clubs) there would be no question on the authenticity of the award.JMHO--Larry

Steve: Thanks Much for your comments; always like to hear your side; now some counterpoints: When I said "Dime a Dozen" I did not mean that to be the "price" of the trophy. I have gotten some from AACA and they are very nice and well made. What I ment was that "Trophys in my mind "come and go" with time. A bonefide certificate with a clubs seal and vin will be with the car for life. No one 20 years from now will even know what that trophy was given for and for what car. A certificate will. Again; all major judging clubs do that; so it can't be all wrong. The smiling faces, cheers and picture taking at national meets certainly do not indicate that trophies are not wanted by our members. Counterpoint: Lots of smiling faces,cheers and picture taken at the meets of the orig. I indicated for "Blue Ribbons and Certificates. So AACA is not unique with the "smiles". You, me and just about everyone else has an idea that WE would like the club to approve. The fact is that we have 60,000 members to serve and at times ideas do not go forward since there is just not enough interest in doing so. Other decisions end up immediately being adopted by the club. Last week we had an idea come to us and it is already approved. What was it may I ask? I did not see a "two way street" at the "Roundtables and Judges Schools" I attended. Sorry, but it was what I saw/heard. Larry

Terry: Nice idea; good idea but it will get nowhere with this club. I brought this up at the discussion/judging school at last years G/N meet in Moline. It got absolutely nowhere. I personally would rather have a bonefide AACA Certificate (with Vin on it) than any trophy. Trophys are a "dime a dozen" and mean nothing to me. Your top organizations for judging (Bloomington Gold-NCRS-Mopar Groups) all give out certificates; not trophys. Of course this is JMHO-Larry Additional Info: One question that may come up is how would that effect the Awards Banquets? With the other Org. at their Banquets a Ribbon (Blue for 1st-Green for 2nd-Red for 3rd)(No Vin's on them-just generic)are handed out just like the trophys are handed out at AACA. The Official Certificate (with seal) are mailed to the car owners. Works well-Larry

All the more reason to split the 36B class up. 1963 Chevrolet Impala's have nothing in common with 1969 Camaro's. It seems common sense to me. 90% of the other classes at a Grand National meet have no competition in their classes. All this can change if they elimimate that silly 5% rule. Of course this is JMHO. Thanks; Larry

Alan Colvin would be the place to go. Has many books on the subject. See: http://alancolvin.com/. His books can be bought on Amazon and many other places. He has done a lot of reseach on the subject. Hope this helps. Larry

J/B: AFAIK the dates on the spark plug wires went well up into the 70's for GM. My 68 Corvette and 70Z28 have them. All the professional judging for the Chevrolet's require them. My guess is that the Buick Org. would also. Also your hose clamps should be the "tower clamps" that GM used back then. Larry

Kalcorp: You are skipping the first and important step. Going to look at cars that catch your eye is "Step Two". The first step is one you got to decide before leaving to look at them. The first question is what I want to do with the car I buy; you have 3 possible answers which are: 1) Do I want a car for investment only which means you will have to get a trailer somewhere down the line. 2) Do I want a pure driver and really don't care if the car increases in value. 3) Or possibly a blend on the above two points which can be done but very tricky. One car that comes to mind would be a L79 C2 Corvette. It can be driven on occasion but only on certain days (Weather Wise) The above three points can only be determined by the buyer of the car. Larry

Don't do car restorations for all organizations! If your into judging for your cars; "gear" your restoration for the club you will get it judged. eg.: If your redoing a Corvette for Bloomington Gold or NCRS you will have to have a totally original car. If your doing it for AACA you do not have to be as no where as original as they permit all kind of "Dealer Installed" items and the judges are not in the same league as the other organizations. This will save you a lot for the cost of the restoration but of course the value of your car will reflect it. Larry

billybird: I also agree with you to have things fair and perfect. What happened to me at last years Grand National at Moline IL is related to what you said. It was raining on/off all day and the judges where really pushed for time. I was parked in the middle of the largest class last year. (Class 36b) Anyway after they judged my car the deluge came and never let up. I was unfornunate to be the last car that got the chassis judged. All the cars on my right got a "free ride" on the chassis. Not complaining as the judges did the best they could do. I was just unlucky. Larry P.S. Don't know the policy but I would like if this happens and not everybody is judged completely that the section not judge for all (chassis) should be eliminated in the tabulation for all. It was not because I saw some points docked off when I got my scoring sheet back in the mail.FYI

FWIW: Al Holbert won the IMSA GT Championship in 1976 with SBC Monza. Picture below. Larry

Magoo and Pontiac1953: You are not doing your homework very well. A 350 was indeed a option in 1975 in Calif. due to the emissions of the smaller V8. I should know; my brother bought a brand new one. Here is the proof from WIKI: Chevrolet's new 4.3 liter (262 cid) V-8 engine was optional. The smallest V8 ever offered by Chevrolet, it featured a Rochester 2-barrel carburetor and generated 110 horsepower (82 kW) at 3600 rpm. For 1975 only, Monzas sold in California and high altitude areas met the stricter emissions requirement by substituting a version of the 5.7 liter (350 cid) V8 engine with a 2-barrel carburetor tuned to just 125 hp (93 kW). Larry

Instead of a single car lets add a whole silly division they came up with--->Saturn. Stupid from the start and the taxpayers had to pay for it at the end. Larry

Tommy: Looks like it a difference of language. Here is my e=mails from Coker. Larry, Hello: Thinking of having my 1966 Corvette judged with the NCRS. As you know they look at everything closely. Does your reproduction tires for the above have any markings on them eg. DOT Labels and etc. that where not on the original tires back in 1966?? Let me know when you can. Larry Thank you for checking with us at Coker Tire. Our tires are made in original molds but will have DOT dates as it is required for street legal tires made or manufactured after a certain date to have them. I suggest checking with judges to see what is accepted and allowed as many collectors and show participants use our tires on Concours judged shows. Thank you Richard Stephens The only thing I can think of is they might have some tires W/O the markings for "Display" purposes only; not to be driven on the street. I have seen a lots of reproductions tires that have been docked points from the premier judging org. Larry

By law all tire makers are required to put the proper codes and tire makeup on their product. This applies to big or small tire makers. The Mid-Year Corvettes original tires had no D.O.T. markings on them. The Coker reproductions tires are required to have the D.O.T. labels on them. Of course the NCRS and Bloomington Gold org. dock points for having that label. The way is should be because they are not original. Larry

Got this from by other club (NCRS). This is Big news for the Chevrolet owners. Larry;) National Corvette Restorers Society is pleased to announce that we can now provide certain information for model years 1965 through 1972 for Camaro, Chevelle and Nova through the efforts of the NCRS and permission granted by General Motors. We believe our fellow hobbyists and car clubs have desired this information since it became available for Corvettes several years ago. The information consists of the dealer code, dealer name, dealer location and the production date the car was produced. The good news is this may allow you to find the original dealer where your Chevrolet Camaro, Chevelle or Nova was shipped and possibly open the door to finding more information about your Chevrolet. A Camaro, Chevelle or Nova Shipping Data Report can be ordered only online. Membership in NCRS is not required. The fee will be $50 payable by credit card or PayPal. You will receive via USPS a letter with the information which includes the NCRS official seal. In limited cases the dealer code is not available or readable and in this case a full refund will be made. This service will begin during the second quarter of 2014, at: www.chevymuscledocs.com

Susin: Thanks for the nice response/explaination. Still think when they(powers of the club) changed the general thinking of judging;W/O any mandate from the members openned up a lot of gray area's that will come back to bite them you know where. This is witnessed by a current thread of Vogue Tires. There will be a lot more(gray area's) coming down the line. Documentation can be "made up" easy when it's not from the factory and "dealer installed". When I started with this club it was a "Factory Original Car Club" period. Now its "will make them the way we want too; along with documention". I guess I'm too much of a car puirest and too accustomed to clubs like NCRS and Bloomington Gold. Yes they have some gray area's too; but nothing compared to ACCA. I also sense you think along the lines of me but just don't want to ruffle any feathers. Larry P.S. Let's hope the new V/P of Judging has his own thoughts and is independent and free to install some of his ideas. IMHO

Hope they can find someone that promotes "original factory cars" not "cars that are made up the way we want them". I like this club very much and hope they can get back on the correct track. Time will tell. Larry

Wow; what a surprise. Now who will take the "Hot Seat"??? Larry

Thanks to Steve for some nice input. Now a few comments on his comments: Larry, I respectfully have to disagree with you. I am sure our officers and club officials including myself talk to far more members each year than you realize. We listen to round table comments, here from our regions and chapters and hear from our members at national meets. We hear from those that are active in showing cars. Steve: Talking is one thing; implementing the ideas are another. I'll stand by my statement that AACA wants no input from the members/judges. As came from the factory. I worked for the factory. I was a dealer and have a better idea than most of what that could mean...literally! AACA did not cause the world of over restoration, people like me, when restoring cars went for perfection and the cars were never like that from the factory. It is now the standard in the hobby and we simply try not to let an over-restored car gain any extra points. "As from the factory"....well in my area we had a large dealer group and many times we ordered cars and had them specially modified as marketing cars. The first retail customer bought a brand new car albeit modified. They did not come from the factory that way, at least not the factory as we are referring to. The list goes on, should we make sure every car has orange peel? How about the cars I got with the mistakes or the very poor factory repairs? What about some of the convertible conversions that were "sanctioned" by the manufacturers but dealers had to pay separately for those modified cars. The list goes on... Steve: You bring up valid points but will all due respect the cars involved would represent maybe 1/2 of 1 percent of the cars judged. 99+ percent of the cars that are judges are TFP (Typical Factory Production) As it stand now we are running around in circles until we make a definate standard for the judging guide. Current members and new member do not know where is club is going as far is judging goes. In the last several years we are on a slippery slope to give trophies to everyone and to make the cars "how we want" not how "the factory made them". I'm getting awful tired of the word "documentation" for the all this "dealer installed items". If the majority of the members want this; so be it; then will know if we want to "go are seperate ways". Lets quit dancing around this issue and make a definate statement one way or the other. Larry

Would like to see a membership vote; referendum on the simple question: Do we want our judging system based on "as they came from the factory"? Yes or NO. Very simple. Ballot can be sent when we pay dues. Everyear it slips more and more into "make them how we want" system. Bring it up to a vote; what are you guys afraid of? The truth?? What we are doing now turns off a lot of people in the club. Comments please. Larry

Susan: You hit the nail of the head; nice response. There is a famous saying that applies to the AACA Judging Guide made by a lady from CA. It is: "We got to pass this to see what's in it"!! I've come to the conclusion that the "Powers of Be" with this club want absolutely no input from the members or the judges. It's their way or the highway reguardless of common sense. Larry

Well put Bob; I guess the powers to be are trying please everybody; by doing so the true factory cars get hurt by it. I mention the above situation several months ago about "changing the edic" in the judging guide will open a new set of worms. Will they are really starting to wiggle around now. Larry