Did some background digging on the car this past week and got in touch with a couple previous owners. I talked with a previous titled owner (William F.) of Brainerd Minnesota where I knew the car had made a brief stop in the late 80's. Turned out he owned it for a few years and then sold it to a friend (Larry C.), who moved it to another friend (Jay D.), who later sold it into PA where it landed with another Camaro guy. He then sold it to Fred L. (previous owner to me) who had owned it for the past 25 years before selling it this summer.
As best as William could recall, the car has been off the road since the early 1980's from what he knew. He's the same age as me (54) and said when he owned it from about 86-89 that he wanted to restore it as he knew what he had, but said he was young and that funds were a bit tight as he already owned other car including a Chevelle which he has kept all these years. He also told me who he bought the yellow Z from, and who had owned it prior to that. Both guys were local and he said both of them were total car guys. He then went on to say the first of the two guys had a few hot cars back in the 70's and 80's and he was known for hell raising around Brainerd MN with his cars. In fact, he told me that this particular owner used to roast the tires right in front of the local police station in Brainerd. I laughed because you know the cops are going to have your number when you're driving a yellow on yellow car. From what was discussed with William, it sounds like these guys drove their cars hard, and apparently had some fun with their street machines around the little drag race town.
In the past few weeks, I've gone through the car thoroughly and had discovered a few early patch panels welded into the car from one of the previous owners, one of which had me scratching my head a bit? It included some graft work with a section of another car welded in as a repair to the front tunnel area and lower cowl section. I discussed this with Fred L. who arrived with the determination that it must have been a repair from a clutch explosion. It was like a light bulb switched on when he said that. Sure enough, I quickly learned from William that he had grafted in a tunnel section from another car as he got the yellow Z with some previous floor damage due to the clutch having exploded prior. He went on to tell me he stick welded it out in his driveway and froze has butt off in doing so. I can only imagine it was the off season and I know it gets cold in northern Minnesota.
I have since reached out to the earliest owner known to the car and he was kind enough to call me back earlier this morning. We only chatted for a few minutes as he's busy working on a project today, but shared a few laughs and talked about the tunnel quickly. Turns out he bought the car with some floor damage up in the tunnel and said that the original 302 motor was killed when the clutch exploded. The subsequent damage took out the crank, the block and the M21 that was in it. He said we'd talk more tonight but was excited to learn of the cars existence and said, hang tight and I'll text you a couple pictures to keep you revving until we talk again. Yeah I got two texts a few minutes later...and you can only image how wide my eyes opened when he texted me with the following pics.
He sent me the yellow picture shown below, followed by the second picture. All I can say is Bingo! More in the coming days as I chase down the rest of the history and talk with as many people as possible. I'm over the top here just a bit today.
Pictured here when owned by Robin Conklin - Circa 1980's
A little surprise texted to me from Robin earlier this morning. I'm on it now!