BF Auction: 1977 Chevrolet Monza Dragster
- Seller: denny k
- Location: Highland, Illinois
- Mileage: 1,101 Shown
- Chassis #: 1R07U72136691
- Title Status: Clean
The Chevrolet Monza wasn’t exactly the fastest product that Chevy ever built, but thankfully, the engine bay was large enough to fit a small block V8 under the hood. As you can see with the example offered here as a Barn Finds Auction, the current engine doesn’t entirely fit under the hood. This supercharged 434 cui V8 easily fixes the Monza’s original lack of speed and horsepower! The seller helped the previous owner, a close friend who passed away, put the car together, so when the family decided to get rid of it, they offered to buy it. It’s an incredible piece of machinery, but they’ve realized it deserves to be raced rather than parked in their garage. If you’d love to have this monster of a Monza, cast your high bids below!
To say this is a serious machine would be an understatement! It was built to lay down serious times at the drag strip. The interior has been stripped of anything unnecessary to reduce weight and make room for a roll cage. It has also been tubbed to allow for drag slicks.
A lot of money has been spent on Monza’s engine. It’s a Motown small block engine bored to 434 cui. To allow maximum boost from the BDS 871 supercharger, the engine was built with a compression ratio of 8.54 to 1 and is equipped with methanol injection. The forged crankshaft and rods were sourced from Callies. It’s also equipped with AFR heads and rockers. All that power is routed through a Powerglide transmission and a Ford 9-inch rear end.
While we don’t know what this Monza currently weighs, in stock form, it would have weighed around 2,800 pounds, which is quite light. If the roll bars and parachute are any indication, this is a quick machine and is capable of hitting 130+ mph in the quarter mile.
It’s too bad the previous owner didn’t get to enjoy their creation more. The seller believes their friend spent over $90,000 building the car, and it looks like no expense was spared! You can hit the track in this incredible Chevy for a fraction of that. Leave any questions you might have for the seller in the comments below.
Bid On This Auction
hotrod75 bid $10,000.00 2024-06-07 10:04:04
Fast1 bid $9,000.00 2024-06-06 10:07:50
Pro Design bid $1,100.00 2024-06-04 09:05:09
Comments
Wait for all of the usual V-8 Monza comments about changing out the spark plugs!
I’ll be first! I helped a friend change plugs in a V8 Monza in 1982… never again!
I love it! But would love a nice condition stock one, even with the small V8.
If only it was street legal. Then my son who will be driving in a few months would have his first ride. His mother can’t complain. It has a roll bar, great seatbelts, Monza’s were manufactured during the oil crisis so it probably gets good mileage and it can’t sustain highway speeds for a long time as it will blow up.
Perfect, if only street legal
I would strongly suggest that this car is indeed street legal. It has lights, wipers, and street legal rear tires. Tilt steering column with turn signals, probably has a horn also. Remote mirror, crank up side windows, none of these would be on a race car. I’d say this was an older 80’s-90’s Pro Street build. Pro Street is making a comeback, there are a lot of these cars hidden away.
First car for your son!!????? He would kill himself with this!!!!!
Prolly a LOT better than mine was with the 140…
Like changing plugs in a big block Duster.😉😬
I bet the a/c is ice cold with that big ol’ compressor up top.
Probably hotter than hell.
That blower on top has sbsolutely nothing to do with the AC
Woosh!
lol!!!
Parachutes are required for vehicles that reach 150 MPH in both NHRA and IHRA competition. Looking at that cage it is probably legal to 8.5 seconds. Removable side bars I think are good up to that 8.5 certification.
I am like many others. I wish I could afford to own it. I actually have a 1977 Hatchback 2 + 2 Monza I have been working on for my son. It came factory with the 305 V8 & automatic transmission. It should all be numbers matching, but I have not actually checked all of it. It is drivable & street legal, but it still needs some work. Mine is black with black interior. I love this drag car, though. Everyone that asks me about my Monza , because most do not know what it actually is. My response is usually , ” You will rarely see them on the street. Normally you only see them on a dragstrip!”
Whoa, mama, can’t keep my yap shut on this one. Before you get all goofy, like the spark plug thing, you are greatly missing the point here. When the NHRA class of Pro Stock was just beginning, these were the predecessors. It has little, if anything in common with a street Monza, so don’t bother going there. I get a vintage NHRA channel, that highlights this era. Originally, many times, it was shown on the Wide World of Sports, opposite women’s curling( or something ), and very little air time. Some of the greats were, Bob Glidden, The Professor( Warren Johnson), Bill Jenkins, Ronnie Sox, and what surprised me, do you know what the majority of drag racing cars were then? Oldsmobile/Pontiac, yep, GM threw a ton of money into the sport( and still does), they were wildly uncontrollable, and ironically, not a heck of a lot faster today, just safer.
I think the BFs auction site covers a lot of people, just not sure this is the crowd to appreciate what this is, 19sixty5 seemed to be the only one so far. Vintage drag racing is making a comeback, of sorts, not nearly like when this was a viable racer, but nostalgia racing shows, there still is a lot of interest. Awesome find.
Right up your alley: Powerglide
Powerglides are used extensively in drag racing…
Pro Stock made its debut in 1970, with Bill Jenkins holding the initial record of just under 10 seconds. The current record is held by Erica Enders is 6:45 Those were the golden days of drag racing. The Pro Stock cars are very consistent and all run super competitively against each other, and they are back to probably the most level playing field in the NHRA. I would say that this car was built as a Pro Street car rather than a full-on race car.
Bill “Grumpy” Jenkins Pro Stock Monza was at one time in Don Garlits Museum of Drag Racing, in Ocala, Florida. I would expect he still has it(?). There was also Don “The Snake” Prudhome’s Monza Funny Car at the Don Garlit’s museum, and would guess he would still have it, also. John Force raced a Monza Funny Cars earlier in his career also. Tom Hoover raced a “Showtime” Monza Funny Car. too. I have owned one of the two Monzas I have since about 1988 (1975 Monza Town Coupe), that came from the factory as a 262 cubic inch V8 (4.3 Liter), and a four-speed Saginaw transmission. This true Edelbrock Performer RPM intake manifold, and a very trouble-free 600 Edelbrock carb with Electric choke added to it. I have always been fairly interested in Monzas because they are not often seen on the street, and are unique in many ways to be a Chevrolet car ( H-body, cousin to Vegas & Pontiac Astre ), along with the Pontiac Sunbird, Oldsmobile Firenza, and Buick Skyhawk. They would not actually belong in the proper category of what is considered muscle cars, but can be made to run fairly well without some major changes to them. They are unibody cars which creates a limitation with how much horsepower & torque you can throw at them without reinforcing them structurally with a roll cage, tube frames, back half, four-link suspension, with a stronger differential like the drag car Monza for sale. I do not know if they will ever get as popular as they once were in the 70’s & 1980’s? Very doubtful these days. I have a1974 Z-28 from California that has the original Hi-Performance factory 350 cubic inch Chevrolet engine, & factory Muncie 4-speed transmission , 10-boly factory Posi- diff., original factory shifter ( not a Hurst ). The engine is basically the same as what was in the 1974 Corvette. With the same finned aluminum valve covers. This car is more of a muscle car than the Monza. The factory engine has the big valve heads with screw-in studs w/ guide plates, Forged steel crankshaft , forged pistons, forged “pink” rods, four barrel carburetor , and so on. Does not matter. I got a tangent after the guy had to start on the early Pro Stock years. Nobody should forget one of my favorite Monzas that “Jungle Jim” Lieberman match-raced in the 70’s that was a beautifully painted car. Most everyone remembers Jungle Pam the most, and for a number of good reasons. Mostly her physical attractiveness! Sorry, I need to stop, and let all this stuff go, and end! Gerald
Closer to pro modified than pro stock. No blowers or other power adders in pro stock.
Or, as they’d say; Injection is nice…
But I’d rather be blown!!
A hell of a Monza! I agree with Howard, BF may not be the best venue to sell but I am certainly happy the seller let us view a labor of love, drag art, and a blast from the past. Good luck!
I changed the clutch out in a monza v8, it was a horrible time to get it done. They have a counter weight bar on the transmission and the engineering of that car was a nightmare.
In the early 1980’s I managed to change all eight spark plugs in my friend’s 1978 Pontiac Sunbird, which was a twin to a Chevy Monza, without taking the motor mounts loose. It was a 305 Chevy/automatic.
It took more than a few beers and may have been faster to take the motor mount loose and jack up the driver’s side of the motor. But I did it just to prove that I could, and my friend was providing the beer anyway.
Big Fun!!
OoPs! Got carried away on my rant. The true “Street car” with the Edelbrock Performer RPM intake manifold, is how the incorrect sentence should have been started. I screwed up! Getting old and cannot type well anyway. Gerald