An engine rebuild should be an integral part of any car restoration. Six cylinder, small block, or big block, the Camaro's engine is the life-blood of the machine, so it deserves first-class attention during your full-scale restoration.

Front end components take a terrible beating. Consi­dering highway conditions - pot holes, rough rail­road crossings, speed bumps, driveway dips, high­way imperfections - it's miraculous that so many older cars are still roaming the roads on their original front end parts. Ball joints and bushings in particular absorb tremen­dous punishment because they connect the spindles to the con­trol arms and the control arms to the chassis, respectively, ac­tually supporting much of the Camaro's weight as the wheels and tires bounce over highway hazards. But although Camaro front ends have survived the mileage and the years, the damage of time and use eventually takes its toll, usually surfacing as tell-tale pops and squeaks before advancing to the dangerous level. 

After dismantling the Camaro, the restoration pro­ject can progress in a number of different direc­tions. If you intend to rebuild the engine yourself (more on engine rebuilding in a later chapter), dis­assemble the engine and send the block, crank, heads, etc. to a reputable machine shop for boring, polishing, valve work, bal­ancing, or whatever. That way, when you're ready to proceed with the engine rebuilding at a later stage of the restoration, all of the necessary components will be refinished and ready for reassembly.

In 1966, the Trans-American Championship racing series was created by the Sports Car Club of America (SCCA). During those early days, manufacturers competed head-to-head with modified versions of their production cars — these included the Ford Mustang, Mercury Cougar, Plymouth Barracuda, Dodge Challenger, Pontiac Firebird (and later the eponymous Trans Am), and of course the Chevrolet Camaro. Competition was fierce, and as is often the case in racing, teams were looking for any advantage they could get. Mark Donohue's Sunoco Camaro Z28 pushed the limits and bent some rules to achieve an incredible winning streak in the 1968 Trans-Am championship.

Some cars are built to turn heads. Others are built to make history.

For the 110th running of the Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge on May 24, Chevrolet’s new Corvette ZR1X will do a little of both as it leads the 33-car field to green at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

And honestly, could there be a more fitting choice?

Taking apart our 1969 Camaro Z/28's exterior body panels is a tad more challenging than removing her interior. Still, we were up for the challenge, as you can see from the lead photo. Our Z/28 looks like a full-size scale model, with the exterior items all laid out as if they'd just been removed from one of those plastic scale car model trees. Follow along with the step-by-step guide, so you can get your Camaro looking like a full-size scale model like ours!

This is the fun part. Taking a Camaro apart requires no special skills; almost anyone can do it, even a novice mechanic. But a little pre-restoration planning will lessen the problems and headaches that can accompany a disorganized Camaro Project.

Before you embark on a Camaro restoration, you've got to own a Camaro, right? If you've already got a 1967-69 Camaro stashed in your garage, all the bet­ter, but if you're starting from scratch, you need to know the who's, what's, and where's of buying the right Camaro for your particular wants and needs. Camaro restora­tions can be fun and profitable, but if you dive into the project with the wrong car - rusted, faked or both - the restoration could turn into a personal and financial nightmare. Always re­member this golden rule of restoration: Don't buy a Camaro for restoration if the total cost of the car plus the total cost of the restoration will exceed the total current value of the Ca­maro when it is completed. 

The third-generation Camaro is certainly one of the most emblematic vehicles of the 1980s. Many of us who grew up in that era can still picture it in its heyday — the high school quarterback rolling up to a game in his red IROC-Z with T-tops open and Van Halen blasting on the stereo. These days, the third-gen is making a comeback as a relatively affordable classic car with a wide selection of restoration parts and performance upgrade choices. On a recent episode from the AutotopiaLA YouTube channel, Jack and his son Pete Avetisyan show off the 1991 Camaro Z28 they resto-modded, including Lamborghini orange paint and a vicious 700hp LS7 under the hood.

You are about to embark on a restoration journey that will transform a well-beaten 1969 Z/28 Camaro into a pristine show car. For this book, the staff of Car Review magazine selected, purchased, disassembled, restored, and reassembled an original LeMans Blue Z/28, one of the premier small-block musclecars of the sixties and a true collector vehicle of the eighties. Starting out with a much-abused example that was previously used as a lawn ser­vice tow vehicle, project engineer Bill Breidenbach brought the car back to life for a series of Car Review restoration articles.