I am pleased to inform the guys here in the History/Originality Section that the prestigious Muscle Car and Corvette Nationals to be held next November in Chicago will be hosting a showcase of Camaro's and Firebirds owned by members of this forum.

Z28cop will be evaluating interest and will be putting together an exclusive group of about 6 candidate cars with an eye for originality, rarity, condition, and overall historical provenance.

Cars selected will join over 500 of the best Muscle cars and historic automobiles in North America. This event is known as the pebble beach of the Muscle car world for good reason because the best of the best display at this show.

If you feel your Third Gen is good enough PM Dan and let him know you are interested.

Calling: Leonard S..... Chazman.... Others??


http://www.mcacn.com/

 

Hey Phil, just PM'd Dan for info.

 

Cool deal. Cool show.

 

Too bad this is in Chicago in November. I would love to have my car at this event, but I won't be able to go.

Yes, LeonardS needs to get his car there!! He also needs his own display space, similar to what you had for the last Norwood IROC-Z.

 

If I still have it I'll bring it if you want it. Can also put you in touch with Bill Warner if you want the Sunoco car there.

 

I would absolutely love to see LenardS car there.
What about the JY 1LE that Bruce has ?
We need to get a firehawk and TTA in there as well.

May need more than 6 spots, I know there is a bit of extra room there!

 

There is a ton of main stream automotive media at this event including live streaming, print media and the independent guys who you tube in 4-K. This video will give folks a reasonable feel for the overall vibe of the show.

It is pretty much constant and the days fly by in the blink of an eye.

 

Conventional Center?

 

Yea LOL... These two came from another country to film cars at the show.

 

Car looks great for 140k miles. It's undercarriage is cleaner than my 20k mile car!!!

 

A lot of "daily drivers" riiiiight lol

 

"Did you add any clearcoat to the paint"? LOL!

 

 

That might be worth a drive over to see.

 

This is really a magnificent show. The biggest problem is that you cannot possibly give these cars the attention you'd want to. Just too many fantastic ones.

This year I ( and many others) were blown away by Charley Lillard's spectacularly restored 1966, 421 HO, 4 speed, Bonneville. His restorer was even there and we chatted with him for about 15 minutes about it. That's the kind of show it is.

Oh BTW, here's the car, these pics CANNOT do it justice. When a car stands out at MCACN, well......

http://www.yenko.net/forum/showthread.php?t=145697


Having a 3rd gen corral next year will make it even better!

 

I hope Phil does a full thread on that car, here!

 

I'll have to see if my son and my older brothers want to make a road trip of it, and check that out next year.

Hopefully that shows up on the pages of the POCI Smoke Signals magazine.

Can't argue with you there.

 

Very neat show. Participated in the show with our Heritage Edition in 2016. Just an amazing collection of cars to see under one roof.

Cool to hear that the 3rd generation of Camaro is starting to get recognized.

I’d love to learn more about the 87 Iroc that was there this year.

 

I saw Polo Z03s car in 16 and it's very worthy to be in the show again!

 

I thought so too, but he does mention it underwent a restoration, so it's not all original. Still looks great though.

 

Do they need to be all original cars? or mild mods ok?

 

Dan, would know more - but it sounds like they are looking for stock, mint, low milers. They won't even accept really nice drivers.

I'm planning on taking my black '89, but that MCACN registration is just as in depth as my last mortgage app. There are some questions I can only answer when I'm closer to the event date.

 

There are classes for judged and non judged.

The judged classes are going to be heavy on paper. If you score well however the paper has weight when you go to sell the car.

If you just have a really nice car there is the non judged class.

You guys will be representing this forum and specifically this section of the forum in the showcase.

 

Honestly Phil, besides us in this forum, I'm not sure anyone from MCACN would be knowledgeable enough on 3rd gens to judge them fairly.

 

Exactly....that's where this ends up qualified judges encourage participation

We have to start some place.

 

In 1997 at Vettefest i displayed my 70 RS Z28 that I restored. I basicly assisted the judges in scoring the car. The following year I was judging the Gold spinner Concourse and the restored Gen2 cars started pouring in the following years.

MCACN is the evolution of ChevyVettefest.

 

The guys with the premiere cars usually get recruited to judge at future shows.

 

I wonder how well my 996 point judged car would do at MCACN? In all reality though, I don't believe any car should be ranked that high. When you have a thousand points to play with, EVERYTHING can be a deduction. You can ALWAYS find something to deduct on a car that gets driven. Every stone chip, windshield chip/scratch, dust/dirt, etc is all deductible.

Being a judge in these 1000 point contests was good, except I wasn't allowed to judge the class I was most familiar with due to conflicts with my car being in that class. With so many discrepancies with the third gens, will there ever be any judges that know enough about each model and the options available for each year, colors, etc? I agree with Charlie that we are the best judges for the 3rd gen class, but we can't judge our own cars!!!

 

The judging teams are typically three person teams that take about an hour to 90 minutes to do a car. Usually one of the team members is the SME on the type of vehicle being judged. The other guys are there to pick up the grass show issues, cleanliness, defects, rust dirt paint issues, interior wear etc. The casting numbers, dates, correct replacement part determinations and originality disputes are settled by the team SME. As a judge You cannot judge your car or your class.

It is nearly impossible to show a car and judge... you are too busy to do both.

 

I know all of the guys who judge the Pontiacs at the show & know them well but I don't think any of them have the knowledge base to judge the third gens.

 

What makes the judging more difficult is remembering all of the details. On some of the old TV shows where you have your experts discussing the 60s and 70s cars, it always amazed me the knowledge these guys had and spewed on the spot. I still question if they are provided some info for the show. How can they know/remember so much?

I can provide answers to questions here, but I have a library of resources at my fingertips. I don't have that at a car show, so I can't remember all of the details. It amazes me what Drew comes up with when we scrutinize a used car from eBay or a dealership. Steve Magnante, the Barrett Jackson commentator, also amazes me as he knows details about each car as they cross the block. He's not sitting behind a computer spouting details that he can find quick answers to, He seems to really know his stuff.

 

It's commitment, I suppose. To factually recall the info is a challenge, for sure.
I've had several national judges on teams I've managed, retire, due to their confidence or enthusiasm fade. The hard part, is finding replacement judges who actually know or have experience in the marque. And my experience, it has to be knowledge of an iron-clad nature. Tough business, for sure.


Regarding the "grassy field" type of judging, from my own experiences, I have zero time for that. Too subjective, and too little knowledge when compared to more model/brand focused judging.

 

Also, sometimes the judging is fair and sometimes it's not.

Two years ago my friend was invited to bring his one owner, original paint, 16K mile, '67, 427 Impala to MCACN. A truly magnificent car. He was in a display of restored full sized cars, his was the only original. It's interesting to see a nicely detailed original paint car next to restorations with $30,000 paint jobs. Can you say over restored?

Anyhoo, the judges took points off my friend's car for "paint defects". On an ORIGINAL PAINT car. That stuck in my craw.

 

Exactly why I quit judging and investigated how cars were built in the plants. For those of you with the book have a look at the preface.

Judging can be a nasty business for sure and without exception 100% of the high end restorations today are really someone's interpretation of what original is to that person.

The rub always happens when someone else offers evidence of a process deviation and a contrast is drawn between two restored cars... That is when the fur fly's.

 

And that's why I won't choose to have my car judged at next year's display. As long as I'm happy with it and my fellow 3rd genners can appreciate it as an original time capsule, that's what matters to me.

 

You are so right, Phil. Seeing a beautifully preserved original next to a cost no object restoration is an educational experience. The story of my friend's Impala for example.

 

I stopped having my car judged years ago. It became an obsession with clean that I didn't enjoy driving the car. Every time it went out, it got dust or dirt in the wheel wells, dust on the interior, etc.

One of the points I got deducted was because my undercarriage looked dirty. It was Rusty Jones, beeswax based, undercoating. Another point deduction was for panel alignment. They deducted a point because the ttops weren't aligned equally side to side. But they didn't take off any points for stone chips in the paint, or windshield delamination at the edges, or a scratch on my headlight ****, or as okfoz noticed immediately, the wrong color sway bar end link bushings or the AC compressor being aftermarket, etc, etc. I should give my car a 1000 point judging and see what I come up with. I'm thinking probably in the low 900s, because a 30 year old car will have some imperfections! Nobody feels good about getting low 900s when others get 996 for a non trailered, non restored car.

 

I am always drawn to original cars, even if they show some wear.

It is so hard to restore a car to the way it was when it left the factory. The temptation is always to try and do a little better than the factory. Better paint with multiple layers of clearcoat, when the factory used a single stage enamel. Perfect undercarriages, eventhough the factory just assembled them with overspray and flaws. And so on and so on....

It's hard to reproduce originality. That's why so many cars are either over restored to near perfection or under restored with easy to find aftermarket parts. Getting them just right is so, so tough.

In a way, we are very lucky as 3rd gen enthusiasts. Even 30-35 years later we are blessed with many available, pristine and low mile 3rd gen Camaros and Firebirds. Most of them only require some detailing, sorting and TLC to appear factory fresh. And that's hard to duplicate even with a six figure restoration.

 

In a way, you see that with a lot of modern "collectible" cars. Especially from the mod-late 80s-forward. The reason is simple, that's when cars began to really be collectible.

Think about the magazine articles and the fact of the market crash which led many to look for ways, other than the market, to "hold" their money or make "investments". I know this is starting to stray off topic a bit, but that's why so many mid-80s cars, forward, were put away or seldom driven.

 

Probably, now's the time to start stockpiling all of these low mile, minty, '80's cars....

I wish I had a warehouse, I'd pick up a few more.

 

Yeah, I felt bad after I asked him about the sway bar end link bushings...

 

I would think the best way to handle being judged correctly is A) Remember that primarily this is supposed to be fun. And B) Document EVERYTHING yourself.

We are still a LONG ways off from having the kind of in-depth documentation necessary to really judge a proper thirdgen. We have documented more on this sub-forum than you'll see anywhere else, but we still don't always agree on what is correct. My personal feeling is that the best way forward is to photograph everything in detail before a car is messed with. Because as much as it stinks, an original car picks up tell-tale signs of being disassembled. Some things on our cars are really hard to recreate. Then you've got poor quality reproduction parts, and even GM parts that didn't match originals, and any kind of repair or upkeep even can wear away at the car's originality.

 

The trouble with books or manuals however, is they are only as "good" as the editor or organization (politics) allow. I can cite dozens of examples of errors within the 4th Gen NCRS Manuals. The guy at the top apparently cares, but politics don't seem to allow corrections. Nobody wants to rock the boat, and cars have slipped through with high awards, as a result.

 

I once considered writing a book on the topic of thirdgens, but ran out of steam. Unlike the 1st gens where you have to worry about the changes between 3 years, there are 11 years of production for the 3rd gen, and every year except for 1992 is slightly different than the previous year. Even 92 there was some extra bonding that they were experimenting on for the 4th gens, but that is mostly hidden. So every year there is something different.

John

 

Plus all those vac hose codes and routings for the early carbed cars.. yowza

 

You know the ThirdGen Expo event that Jeremy and I put together every year has been getting more popular. It's a casual event and that's cool, but I wouldn't mind seeing it develop into the Bloomingtin Gold or MCACN of 3rd gens, with judging of show quality originals and restorations.

That would take more work than I personally could devote, seeing as I messed up the trophy order last year and had to go back and take back a couple awards to give them to the right folks.

Anyhoo, ThirdGen Expo seems to be the largest 3rd gen only event in the country at the moment, so any input on that would be great from you guys.

 

Chazman, The GM Nats, or whatever it's now called at Carlisle (in June) is a big event for F bodies. I've seen a range of 3rd gens in attendance, and was a spectacular event until politics pulled the Camaro Nationals from the show.

MCACN used to be, and might still be the "third award" in the "trifecta" of Corvette awards, annually. It was Bloomington Gold, NCRS Nationals, and the Chevy/VetteFest, back when it was at McCormick. I haven't followed MCACN's judging enough lately to know if it still is relevant to the trifecta in the Corvette world.

At any rate, I still think the National Corvette Museum could and would host something, and I've been on the planning committee for events there before. The Motorsports Park would add cost of course, but what if it were a facet of another event.

Not trying to go off topic with this from MCACN, as that's really what this thread is all about, but mentioning ideas for conversation.

 

I figured I'd bring Phil's thread to the top for everyone to consider. Even though MCACN is local to me, it didn't work for me this year, maybe next year.

 

Would be nice to see a good set of 3rdgens in there next year.

 

This show needs to be on every car guys bucket list!! I went 2? years ago and I saw like 34 Hemi Cuda's and Challenger CONVERTIBLEs in 2 rows I'm not a mopar guy but the $$ on display of all brands is un fricken real !!