1966 Corvair
The 1960-1969 Chevrolet Corvair was a rear-engine engineering marvel. Meant to compete head-on with the popular Volkswagen Beetle, the Corvair was Chevy’s first compact car. It featured independent front and rear suspension—the first GM product to have both, and clean, fluid styling applied to Fisher Body’s first unibody, as well as the air-cooled horizontally-opposed, aluminum 6-cylinder engine hooked to either a modified 2-speed Powerglide automatic, or manual 3- or 4-speed transaxle. Ford, Chrysler and American Motors all introduced their own answers to the Volkswagen, but they were conventional layouts and styling. Initially available as a coupe, convertible, 4-door sedan, station wagon, rampside pickup (Loadside) and van (Greenbriar Sportswagon), the station wagon, van, and pickup were dropped when the new styling debuted in 1965. The unique unibody was code named Z-body.
Controversy surrounded the Corvair, from its habit of tucking wheels under the car during hard cornering, resulting in severe accidents. This deficiency was broadcasted to the world as a result of the book “Unsafe at Any Speed” by crusader Ralph Nader. A simple stabilizer bar was added to the rear end to eliminate the problem, and most Corvairs were retrofitted with the component. The rear end was completely redesigned for the new 1965 models.
A sports car of sorts was created with the RPO 649 “Spyder” package to Corvair Monzas, which added a turbocharger to increase performance. Named the “Super Turbo Air”, stouter engine components, a 4-speed manual transmission, and improved suspension components were found on Spyders to help withstand the extra horsepower and torque.
The newly styled 1965 Corvairs were well received by enthusiasts, but sales never reached the levels of the first generation Corvair. Both a Monza and Corsa package were offered on the Corvair, but the Spyder performance package was not continued after 1964.
Chevy determined the Corvair was more of a “specialty” car than a compact, in spite of sales of over 200,000 units the first six years of production. They initiated a program to design a more traditional compact, which became the Nova in 1961. Sales steadily declined after the Nader book in 1966, and Chevrolet opted to cancel Corvair production after the 1969 model year.
1966 Corvair
With the Mustang and Ralph Nader’s book combined, sales of 1966 Corvairs sunk to just over 100,000 units. 1966 saw very minor tweaks from 1965, with the most apparent being the Corvair script was moved from the deck lid to the front next to the driver’s side headlight. Sometime during the 1966 model year Chevy management chose to discontinue the Corvair after tooling had been amotized.
AVAILABLE MODELS:
1966 Corvair
- Body Style
- 2 Door Coupe
- 4 Door Sedan
- Convertible
- Engine Options
- Opposed Flat 6, 164ci 2-1bbl 95hp
- Opposed Flat 6, 164ci 2-1bbl 110hp
- Opposed Flat 6, 164ci 4-1bbl 140hp
- Opposed Flat 6, 164ci Turbo 180hp
1966 Corvair VIN Decoder:
First Character: Make
Second and Third Characters: Trim
- 01 ~ 500 (standard)
- 05 ~ Monza
- 07 ~ Corsa
Fourth and Fifth Character: Body Style
- 37 ~ Coupe
- 69 ~ 4-Dr Sedan
- 67 ~ Convertible
Sixth Character: Year
Seventh Character: Manufacturing Plant
- K ~ Kansas City, Missouri
- L ~ Los Angeles, California
- O ~ Oakland, California
- W ~ Willow Run, Michigan
Last Six Digits: Production Sequence
- Starting number: 100001/up. Subtract 100,000 to obtain vehicle number
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