One day I decided that I was just going to go out and get my dream Impala. I always liked the 65 Impala with the three round tail lights on each side of the deck lid. To me it was the coolest Impala ever made, and they made lots of them. A few months earlier my wife and I had bid on a 65 409 SS that had a small fire in the engine bay caused by bad wiring. I figured I could fix it pretty easily and end up with a valuable asset as well as a cool old school cruiser. Unfortunately we were outbid at the last possible moment.
After a lot of searching I thought I had found my car, but it was 18 hours away in western Arkansas. It was advertised to be a clean, mostly rust free, 65 Impala SS with a 327 4-spd drivetrain. The previous owner had a large car collection that he characterized as a car museum. I decided to go for it and pulled a trailer almost 1,000 miles to check it out and hopefully bring it home.
The Bad!
Boy was I disappointed when I first saw her. It didn't go how I had hoped it would, and it wasn't how any respectable seller should go about describing a car. The seller was nice enough to loan me his magnet to check for rust. I think he figured that by giving me a two pound magnet, that could pick up stainless steel from a foot away, would help seal the deal. However, I brought my own magnet, and it never lies. She was full of holes, and rust was lurking under gobs of body filler. The passenger side floorboards were actually just license plates slid over gaping holes. The 327 was actually a 283 that barely ran, and the 4-spd looked like a swap from a non SS car. The deck lid was an apparent chop job where a 3rd light was added to a Belair deck lid. Instead of the 12 bolt it has a 10 bolt rear with just a single upper control arm. The worst part was that the previous owner painted over the original Evening Orchid paint with grey primer and a black stripe because he didn't like driving around in a pink car. :(
The Good!
So I eventually quit looking because there just wasn't anything available. Then about six months later, and just by chance, I saw an ad for a fairly straight looking 65 Impala project for sale with lots of extra goodies. When I saw the location I was in disbelief. It was sitting in a storage lot five miles from my house, where I had stored a pair of 96 Impala SS's a few years earlier. I contacted the seller and arranged to go see it the next morning. I took my magnet, flashlight and mirror as I usually do, but I didn't need them at all. It turns out the seller owned a reputable collision repair shop and had his employees work on it over the years when they didn't have work. The body was straight as an arrow and was in guide coat. The doors and decklid were all perfect, and the fenders were replaced with good donor parts from Arizona. It came with a spare 12 bolt from a 65 passenger car, a tilt steering wheel, a 65 Impala console, 65 Impala front buckets and all of the trim. I figured I could part it out and get my money back, so we shook hands and I picked her up a few days later,
So don't give up, your car is out there, and it could be closer than you think!
