Now to the fun part, 1968 and the flip tops. IMO, there were three, the red one which I will call 1968-1, the tri-colored burgundy “door car” which I will call 1968-2 and the Jim Kirby car which was a near twin to car 1968-2.
Car 1968-1 started out as an all red car, making its debut, at least in the photos I have seen, at the Winter Nationals in Long Beach, CA in late January or early February, 1968. Looking at the first picture, it appears the car is still somewhat under construction as seen by the lack of a rear spoiler and an unconventional looking parachute bracket. Take special note of no rear spoiler and what appear to be real taillights. Being one of the first one-piece Camaro bodies to be produced, very simple in design, with a few imperfections. This car was to be painted Black over Red as part of a special promotion Fred Gibb and Dick Harrell were working on, and also to mirror the look of the car it was replacing, the ’67 steel bodied car, including black top, door handle and real taillights.
Because so few pictures of this car exist, either in era magazines or photo collections, evidently the car was not raced at many major races. Who knows why? It was reported that early on this car did not handle way, maybe that prompted Dick to have another car built.
Don Hardy, possibly the first chassis for a one-piece Camaro to come out of his shop, built the chassis for this car. And because they were built one at a time, and there were no rules governing the construction of these cars, chassis builders were able to “tweak” each new chassis they built, meaning each one could vary slightly from the last one built by the same manufacture.
