Chevrolet Chevelle 1967 Convertible

At $3,033, the SS 396 convertible was the only 1967 Chevelle priced above three thousand dollars, and at close to 3,600 pounds it was also the heaviest car in the lineup. Chevrolet then made things stranger by pulling its own 375-horsepower 396 off the order sheet partway through the year, letting only 612 sell once it returned. The light-blue example featured here answers the power question its own way, with a supercharged LS3. Read on for the full story.

Every model lineup has a most expensive car, and usually the reason is obvious: more chrome, more leather, a bigger engine, a longer options list. The 1967 Chevelle’s answer was less obvious than that. The priciest car Chevrolet built on that platform was a convertible, which surprises nobody, but the reason it cost what it did had less to do with the folding roof than with everything Chevrolet had to add underneath to make a roofless intermediate hold itself together. Then, partway through the model year, Chevrolet made the situation genuinely odd by removing its own most powerful engine from the order sheet entirely, leaving buyers who wanted it with nothing to check on the form. It came back before production ended. Almost nobody got one.

The Chevelle Nobody Could Order Cheap

The SS 396 convertible listed at $3,033, making it the only Chevelle that year to cross the three-thousand-dollar line. Weight explains part of it. A convertible cannot rely on a fixed roof for structural rigidity, so Chevrolet reinforced the frame and body substantially, pushing curb weight close to 3,600 pounds and making the drop-top the heaviest Chevelle available. That extra mass is real, and it changes how the car drives compared to a hardtop with the same drivetrain. It also explains why surviving SS 396 convertibles tend to be structurally sounder than you might expect from a fifty-plus-year-old open car.

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When SS 396 Was a Series, Not an Option

It helps to remember what SS 396 actually meant in 1967, because it did not mean the same thing for long. Chevrolet had elevated the SS 396 to its own distinct series in 1966, and it stayed a series through 1968 before being demoted to an option package on other Chevelles for 1969. During those three years, an SS 396 was a specific model with its own identity rather than a box you ticked on a Malibu. That distinction matters enormously for authentication, since a 1967 SS 396 carries identifying characteristics in its VIN and body data that later option-package cars simply do not.

What Came Standard on an SS 396

Standard equipment reflected that status. Every SS 396 got twin simulated hood air intakes, ribbed and color-accented body sill moldings, SS 396 emblems on the grille and rear panel, and Super Sport script on the fenders. Inside, buyers found the trim and instrumentation appropriate to Chevrolet’s performance intermediate. It was a coherent package rather than a collection of add-ons, and the visual cues were distinct enough that an SS 396 reads correctly from across a show field even to people who could not tell you a single specification about it.

Three Engines, One Disappearing Act

Under the hood, Chevrolet listed three versions of the 396-cubic-inch big-block. A standard 325-horsepower unit did most of the work, an optional 360-horsepower version stepped things up for buyers willing to pay, and a top 375-horsepower option sat above both. That top engine is the one that vanished. Chevrolet pulled it from the order sheet for a stretch of the model year and only reinstated it late in the run, by which point the window to order one had narrowed dramatically. Whatever the internal reason, the effect on the market decades later has been permanent.

612 Cars and Why That Number Matters

Only 612 of the 375-horsepower cars sold once the engine returned. Put that against total Chevelle production for the year and it becomes clear how thin the slice is, and that figure covers all body styles, not just convertibles. A genuine, numbers-matching 375-horsepower SS 396 convertible is therefore one of the rarer factory combinations in the entire Chevelle story, rare enough that any car claiming to be one deserves careful documentation rather than a friendly assumption. Fakes and tributes outnumber real ones by a considerable margin.

Seven Transmissions and a Set of Front Discs

The drivetrain flexibility of the era is easy to forget. Buyers could specify from seven different transmissions across the SS 396 range, including the Turbo-Hydramatic 400 automatic that could actually handle big-block torque, and front disc brakes were available for anyone planning to use the performance rather than just own it. That last option is worth seeking out on a driver-quality car, because a 3,600-pound convertible with four-wheel drums and modern traffic around it is an experience that gets old quickly.

Why So Many Now Run LS Power

Which brings the story to the light-blue car featured here, and to a trend it represents. This one runs a supercharged LS3, and the reason so many Chevelle owners take that route is straightforward economics: original 396 and 427 blocks have become scarce and expensive, while a modern LS makes more power, runs on pump gas, starts reliably, and costs less to build and maintain. Purists have opinions about this. Owners who actually drive their cars have different ones. What is not in dispute is that the 1967 body remains one of the best-proportioned shapes Chevrolet ever produced, and whether it is powered by a period-correct big-block or a blown LS, the car still stops conversations in a parking lot.

Original or Modified, the Body Still Wins

The Same Big-Block, Wearing Different Badges

Chevrolet did not build the 396-cubic-inch big-block exclusively for the Chevelle. The same basic engine family, in various states of tune, also powered the Camaro SS and the full-size Impala SS during the same years, which meant a buyer cross-shopping Chevrolet’s performance lineup in 1967 was often choosing between body styles more than between fundamentally different engines. The Chevelle’s version tended to be tuned similarly to the Camaro’s, since both cars shared a broadly comparable weight class, while the heavier Impala SS 396 leaned toward torque over outright quarter-mile numbers. That shared engine strategy was deliberate on Chevrolet’s part: developing one big-block family and calibrating it across several nameplates was far cheaper than engineering separate engines for each model, and it is part of why parts interchange between a Chevelle, Camaro, and full-size Chevy of the same vintage remains relatively straightforward today. It also means an SS 396 badge alone does not tell you which car it came from without checking the specific body style.

That shape is doing more work than people credit. The 1967 Chevelle sits at the end of the second-generation A-body’s styling run, with a squarer roofline, flatter flanks, and a stance that reads as purposeful rather than decorative, and it is the last year before the dramatically rounded 1968 redesign changed the car’s proportions entirely. Convertibles benefit from that restraint more than hardtops do, because with the top down there is nothing left but the beltline and the fender shapes to carry the design. It is why an SS 396 drop-top still photographs well from angles that flatter almost nothing else from the period, and why a car like this one gets attention long before anyone hears what is under the hood. The light blue is a genuinely risky accent choice on a car this size, the kind of color that goes badly wrong on the wrong proportions, and the fact that it works here says as much about the 1967 body as any specification sheet does. Chevrolet got the hard part right the first time, which is why owners keep spending money on these fifty-plus years later rather than starting from something newer. Share your thoughts in the comments below.

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