Chuck (ACES1):
What can you tell me about Alan Colvin, Terry Boyce, Robert Genat, R. M. Clarke, Paul Herd or anyone else who have wrote books about Chevelles and or Chevrolets? Who in your opinion has been the most accurate in their writings? The most inaccurate? What was the biggest surprise you ever had dealing with factory production options?
Larry (Z)
Without pointing fingers, Larry, I'd say that I'm pretty comfortable using Colvin's "Chevrolet By The Numbers" books as resource material. I've known Alan for 25 years, helped supply and/or verify some of the information contained in his books, and I believe he's a diligent and accurate researcher. His methodology is what I consider to be the best of the published authors you've listed, although Boyce's book (s) seem to be fairly accurate. Of course, they lack the in-depth "numbers" info that Colvin's do. The others, in my opinion, merely regurgitate information that they've "read" somewhere else, and often perpetuate misinformation because they are either too lazy or incapable of doing the proper research to verify information. That being said, even Colvin's books are occasionally incorrect, but the revisions are updated and included in subsequent press runs.
Surprises with factory options? I don't know that I understand your question full, Larry, but the biggest surprise is that I'm not surprised when certain options aren't executed at the factory the way they are supposed to be. Example: I owned a '70 L78 (375hp) SS convertible. the tack should ahve had a 6500 redline, and came from the factory with a 5500 redline. Also, the door panels had the '69-style "SS396" emblems on the door panels rather than the "SS" emblems endemic t the '70 Super Sport cars. The water pump pulley, too, was incorrect... it was a deep groove-type (which the SHP motors all have), but it was a larger diameter and had the incorrect P/N and letter suffix stamped on it. BTW, I bought the car from the original owner, who verified that none of those items had ever been replaced. I've had lots of other surprises, too, in the 30-plus years I've been foolin' with Chevelles. I doubt that there is enough time, space and inclination to list them all here, however.
Chuck
