Kurt's Cars - 1978 Chevy Monza

1978 Chevrolet Monza Hatchback | 2.5L 4 cyl/4-Speed
Purchased: 1978 | Scrapped: 1994

This is a car that simply drove until it could drive no more. It's also a car that spans many years in my family history. It carried the Clarks in happiness and sorrow, and was dependable darn near to the end of its life in 1994. Each Clark (with the exception of my mother, who hates stick shift) had time behind the wheel. My parents purchased the Monza used at Chuck Olson Chevrolet in 1978, and traded in a 1975 Chevy Nova; at the time the Monza had 5000 miles and a slightly scrubbed fender. The engine was the trustworthy and underpowered "Iron Duke," a 151 cubic-inch 4 cylinder developed by Pontiac. It had a 4-inch bore and a 3-inch stroke, which were the same dimensions as Chevy's infamous 1967-69 302 small block race motor. 1978 was the first year it was released, and it employed a "1978-Only" cylinder head design that had the intake manifold and exhaust manifold on the same side of the engine. It was an indestructible little motor that got 30mpg, but it had the speed of a turtle. Later years would use a cross flow head design that breathed much better than the 1978 design.

My father, being a minister, needed a car that was economical, easy to work on, and cheap to fix. Although underpowered, the Monza fit that niche well. He drove it for a couple of years, and then gave it to my sister to drive. She, in turn, got rear ended three times.

The first time my sister got rear ended, she was knocked around like a rubber ball while sitting at a traffic light. A car hit her from behind doing 20 mph. That impact smacked her into the car ahead. She then bounced off that car and back into the car behind her, which -- in turn -- was hit by another car from behind. The Monza was drivable, surprisingly, but endured a severe body tweak. Damage to the front and to the rear were fixed, and the body was realigned...only to be smacked another day.

I was in the backseat during the second accident in 1980. We got smacked by an Oldsmobile doing 20+ mph, driven by the underage friend of the owner's daughter. She had no driver's license, no insurance, and no restraint as she started bawling in the middle of Bothell Way in what is now the City of Kenmore. She had a right to cry; our insurance company hammered the car's owner pretty hard. Yet again the car was repaired, receiving a new passenger side quarter panel.

My sister drove the Monza for four or five years, and endured yet another accident during that time. Eventually she gave it back to my father; he then drove it until giving the car to me in 1987 when they moved to Chicago. By then the Monza had 105,000 miles, and I started using it as my daily commuter. I learned quickly not to drive the Monza aggressively; in a session of hard shifting, I managed to get linkage stuck and had to drive 12 miles home in second gear. That little episode taught me to be nice to what I drive, a lesson that has stayed with me since. Another night, on the way home from work, I suddenly lost power (not like it had a lot to begin with). The engine wasn't smoking or overheating; it just didn't feel like it was running on 4 cylinders. I limped home (15 miles on Interstate 5), and did a compression test; I found no compression at all on one cylinder. Again, it was not burning oil and it was not making any "death rattle" noises. So I pulled the cylinder head and discovered a bent intake valve. How I bent a valve doing 60mph, I'll never know.

Since I worked for Al's Auto Supply in Everett WA at the time, I procured the parts I needed and replaced the valve and all valve seals on a workbench in the back of the store. When I reinstalled the head, it started like it had never been apart. I succeeded in putting my poor little Monza back on the road for about $50, thanks to some friends who gave me an extra hand when needed plus plenty of moral support.

When I was accepted to Washington State University in 1988, I packed up the Monza and drove to Pullman. There it served me flawlessly as a car for cross-state trips and for jaunts up to Spokane for...well...whatever I went to Spokane for. It was during this time that I met my lovely wife. We were meant to be together for this reason: she drove a 1978 Chevy Monza, just like me.

Sherry's 1978 Monza

The main difference between mine and hers was that Sherry's had an automatic transmission, and was even slower than mine.

In 1989 I bought a `59 International pickup for $350. As I began repairing the old truck and using it more daily, I drove the Monza less and less. My father had a use for a second smaller car, now that he and my mother had moved to urban Chicago to pastor a church there. So I packed the little Monza for a trip east. One stop I made on the way there was in Sheridan WY; an old cowboy sitting near me asked, "Is that your car?"

"Yep," I answered.
"What kind of license plates are those?"
"Washington."
"Where you from?"
"Pullman."
"Where you going?"
"Chicago."
...long pause...
"Well why the hell would you wanna go there?"

The trip was 2000 miles with no more suffering than a flat tire in Gillette WY and a quart of oil. I handed my parents the keys to a car that had been in the family 12 years and had racked up around 130,000 miles.

When my father took the car in for the emissions check in Illinois it failed. Tests run by his trusty mechanic indicated the carburetor was worn out, and wasn't repairable. Not only did the car have a one-year-only cylinder head, but the darn carb was also one-year-only and it cost over $400 to make the car pass emissions. In the years following, Sherry and I visited my folks in Chicago a couple of times. The Monza was always there, looking tired and getting rusty. Yet it started every day, and carried us on day trips to Indiana, Michigan and Wisconsin. In 1994 with about 150,000 miles on the clock, the car once again failed to pass the tough Illinois emissions test. My father took it to his trusty mechanic, who informed him that the engine was too tired to pass; compression on one cylinder was at about 20% of the other three. A rebuild was required, but would cost more than the car was worth.

So, on a sad day, my father drove the car to a wrecking yard and walked away with $50. It had spanned three decades of Clark history, and carried us for thousands of miles. In short, we used it up and got our money's worth. It makes me wonder about the person who put the first 5000 miles on the car. Did they think it would last another 16 years and rack up all those miles? All that remains today are about three pictures and lots of memories.