1986 Chevy Camaro ’86

1986 Chevrolet Camaro History

1986 Camaro Sport Coupe restyled and upgraded. New lower body striping, black headlamp pockets, black mirrors, and F41 suspension calibration standard. New silver 15×7 (up from the 14×7 rally wheel) steel 5 spoke rally wheels became standard equipment on the 1986 Chevy Camaro Sport Coupe. 1986 Chevrolet Camaro Sport Coupe also got the previous year's 1985 Chevy Camaro Z28 taillights with the horizontal black separator bar. The Berlinetta model was discontinued early in the year.Late in the 1986 model year, the 85mph speedometer in the Z28 and IROC-Z were replaced with a new 145 mph unit. All 1986 Chevrolet Camaros had the newly required CHMSL (center high mounted stop light) mounted externally on the leading edge of the hatchback glass. This was the only year Z28's and IROC-Z's had the CHMSL mounted here. Fog lamps were now available on the Sport Coupe and Berlinetta, and the fog lamp/`CAMARO' front grille assembly of the '86 Camaro IROC was now available on the regular '86 Camaro Z28. New clear coat/base coat paint was adopted this year.The original 215hp 305 TPI motor came out in 1985 available both in the Z28 and IROC-Z. The motor was detuned for 1986 losing 25hp due to a cam change. Torque was increased though, from 275 to 285. Automatic transmissions were required on all 1985/1986 TPI powered cars.

All 305 TPI (LB9) motors (1985-1992) came with one of two basic cam grinds. An easy way to identify the type of cam on an LB9 car is to look at the tach: the lesser cams have a yellow line at 4500 and red line at 5000; the hotter cams have a yellow line at 5000 and red line at 5500. See chart at end of chronology for more cam info.LG4 305 V-8 cars got electric cooling fan.G92 performance axle ratio available only on Z28 and IROC-Z.Records show that 74 L69 (5.0 liter H.O.) Camaros were built. The L69 is shown as being available in the 1986 Camaro brochure, but it was put on strict restriction. It's rumored that records also show that 50 1986 350 (5.7) IROC's were built. These cars were built primarily for testing and were the ones we saw tested by the automotive press late in 1986. These 350 IROC's (being 1986's) had the externally mounted third brake light on the hatch glass and the pre-1987 head/edge mounted valve cover design. The 350 in the IROC-Z differed from the Corvette 350 TPI in that the IROC-Z 350 TPI had the regular Camaro valve covers, iron heads, (instead of aluminum) and iron exhaust manifolds. At the last minute it was decided that the 1986 350 IROC would not be available. Originally it had been planned to release them without T-Tops and air conditioning. Fortunately, they decided to wait for the 1987 model year to start production of the 350 IROC with both being optional.

Paint RPO's change for a new base-coat, clear-coat process. The 305 H.O L69 was discontinued because of fuel boiling problems.

1986 Chevrolet Camaro Drivetrain List

*only 74 produced   +rumored only 50 produced as test cars  *Borg-Warner rear axle

1986 Chevrolet Camaro Production Numbers