Ah, the 1976 Chevrolet Chevette, it’s “unsafe for highway use,” and utilizes a non-serviceable air cleaner. It’s the perfect candidate for the Regular Car Reviews YouTube vlog we’ve grown so fond of.
As Mr. Regular will tell you, the Chevette was a response to the oil crisis back in the early 1970s. As such, it was engineered to keep things simple so that maintenance was cheaper, it was more fuel-efficient and made traveling cheaper, and it was cheaply built.
It’s easy to see the correlation between the identity of the Chevette and the definition of “cheap.” This is certainly not what Chevrolet had in mind when they named the car, though, as they had hoped that the name Chevette would remind people of the actual Corvette and lead to higher sales. While this probably wasn’t the case, Chevrolet did end up selling 2.8 million units during the 12 year life-cycle of the Chevette, so it was by no means a complete sales failure.
For fun, the little Chevette also made a pull on a dyno. We won’t spoil the output, but we promise it’s the highlight of the video.
Comments
I drove a couple of these crackers back in the day as a company car for the Chevrolet zone , Cleveland, Ohio.
I remember the one time, I picked up the car around Cleveland and drove it to Toledo where I lived.
It was red and silver/ OHIO STATE colors. It had a auto trans. and a/c.
With a 25/35 mph headwind on the Ohio turnpike, all I could do is maintain 50 mph, without it going into passing gear.
No power , no fun
Have a great day ,
JOHN BENKO
I bought a 1977 Chevette brand new for $3,400. I ordered it with the larger 4 cylinder and a 4-speed manual. I used it as my commuter car and it was bulletproof. In the winter I put on oversized wheels with snow tires and it was like a jeep in the snow. I drove it for 4 years with absolutely zero problems and sold it to a co-worker for $2,700. He drove it for many more years. no complaints about that honest little car.