Читать книгу Lost Muscle Car Dealerships - Duncan Scott Brown - Страница 31

Bill Thomas and Dick Guldstrand are suggested as some of the earliest guys to transplant a 427. There is a suggestion that Bill sparked the Dana project. The threads connecting the key figures are there, but untangling them without documentation remains elusive work for historians. What is known for certain is that Peyton Cramer was a strong believer in the 427 Camaro. Large signs at the Dana Hi-Performance Center highlighted the fact that this lot was the “Home of the Dana Camaro.”

This November 7, 1966, article about the new Dana Super Camaro 427 gets most of the facts right. However, it underrates the engine at a “mere” 385 hp when it was really a 425-hp beast. (Photo Courtesy Dave Fillion Collection)

The Dana dealership at the 8730 location was up and running in late August 1966. Development of the 427 Camaro began immediately after the debut of the Camaro platform from General Motors. Two versions of the first 427 Dana Camaro were underway, as indicated in an article dated November 7, 1966. Based on the publication date, it’s conceivable that the 427 Dana supercars were available as early as mid- to late-October 1966.

Other dealerships also recognized the marketing potential and were putting a 427 engine into a Camaro early in the production run. One way to determine how early these conversions were made is the fact that both Dana and Nickey were using a Camaro SS 350 as their donor platforms. The 396 375-hp Camaro was the ideal candidate for conversion, but at the time of these early 427 conversions, the 396 wasn’t available. The 396 325-hp platform became available in late 1966 or early 1967; the 375-hp version didn’t appear until March 1967.

Bill Thomas Race Cars was located at 502 East Juliana, Anaheim, California, in the fall of 1966, which was about 25 miles east of Berry Plasti-Glass. Bill Thomas was an unofficial factory representative for Chevrolet racing (Chevy was not racing, if anyone asked). Bill Thomas Race Cars hooked up with Nickey Chevrolet in Chicago and established a West Coast distribution deal. The relationship continued until the end of 1967. Bill was given a surreptitious request by Chevy engineering’s product performance leader Vince Piggins to get the Camaro beefed up.

The commonality between the Dana Camaros and the Nickey Chevrolet Camaros built by Dick Harrell is unmistakable. The time frames are very close as well. The article “First Test Anywhere of Nickey 427 Camaro” appeared in a magazine with an early publication date of January 1967. Cover dates are advanced later than genuine newsstand printing dates. Once you count back for the lead time to write the story, the date of actual Nickey conversion was about the same as when Dana is believed to have converted Camaros to 427 power.