1968 Chevy II Nova: The Compact Gets Room for a Big-Block

Chevrolet's compact Super Sport was fading when the 1968 Nova arrived. NovaResource's production tables count 20,986 Chevy II Super Sports for 1966 and 10,069 for 1967, half as many in a year. Chevrolet's answer was not a new stripe package but a new car. The 1968 Chevy II Nova rode a longer 111-inch wheelbase, and Over-Drive Magazine's fact sheet records that its front subframe was re-engineered to take the 396 V-8. The compact's order form now listed the L34 396 at 350 hp and the L78 at 375, the same rating the L78 carried in the Chevelle.^1,2,3

The body was the other half of the change. Over-Drive describes a Chevelle-inspired semi-fastback roofline with wide, flaring sail panels on a wheelbase just an inch shorter than the Chevelle's, and an all-new dashboard. Wikipedia's account notes that the separate front subframe carrying the powertrain and front suspension was new to the Nova but had appeared on the Camaro a year earlier. The station wagon and four-door hardtop were dropped, leaving a two-door coupe and a four-door sedan. The badge still read Chevy II Nova; Wikipedia records that Chevrolet dropped the Chevy II part of the name for 1969.^2,4

The engine list ran from thrift to thunder. NovaResource's table gives a 90 hp 153 four, a 140 hp 230 six, a 155 hp 250 six, the new 200 hp 307 V-8, 327s at 275 and 325 hp, and the Super Sport engines: the L48 350 at 295 hp and the two 396s, the L34 at 350 hp and the L78 at 375, all SAE gross. Over-Drive adds limits that mattered on the order form. The hot 327, the 350 and the 396s came only in coupes, the L78 was manual-transmission only with mechanical lifters, and a 325 hp L35 396 appears in its table as withdrawn in April.^1,2

The Super Sport was now a performance package rather than a trim level. Wikipedia prices it at $312 and describes a 295 hp 350 with heavy-duty suspension; Over-Drive lists a special steering wheel, black-accented grille and rear panel, hood insulation, SS emblems, and red-stripe tires on six-inch rims. The transmission list was blunt about who the options were for. A close-ratio four-speed cost $184.35 behind the 325 to 350 hp V-8s and $237 behind the 375 hp engine. Powerglide was $164 with a six and $174 with a V-8. Over-Drive notes that GM's Turbo Hydra-Matic 400 reached the compact for the first time, but lists it only with the 350 hp 396.^4,2

Most buyers wanted a sensible compact. NovaResource counts 183,552 cars for 1968, while Wikipedia's table gives 201,005 without a visible citation, and neither states its accounting basis. NovaResource puts 105,680 in two-door bodies and 77,872 in four-doors; Over-Drive prints 105,690 two-doors, ten more. Six-cylinder cars were 133,658, about 73 percent, and Powerglide was fitted to 132,045, about 72 percent. V-8s of every size came to 48,624. NovaResource flags that its 1968 engine and transmission rows include the Canadian-market Acadian, so those shares describe a slightly wider population than the Chevrolet-badged cars alone.^1,4,2

The Super Sport was the rare car. NovaResource counts 5,571 of them, about 3 percent of its 1968 total. Its engine table offers a neat check: 4,670 350s and 901 396s add up to exactly 5,571, which fits Over-Drive's statement that those engines came only in the SS. By that arithmetic about 16 percent of 1968 Super Sports had a 396, which is fewer than one Nova in 200. Chevrolet's Chevelle, by comparison, took 4,751 L78s alone that year. The heavy-duty M22 four-speed went into 167 Novas, and the Turbo Hydra-Matic 400 into 98. Because the source does not split the 396 count by L34 and L78, that split is unknown.^1,2,3

Some of the most famous 1968 Novas never went through the normal order form. Enthusiast registry and magazine accounts say Fred Gibb Chevrolet of La Harpe, Illinois, working with drag racer Dick Harrell, ordered 50 Novas through Chevrolet's Central Office Production Order system as COPO 9738. Street Muscle reports that Vince Piggins, Chevrolet's product promotion manager, approved it once Gibb agreed to take at least 50, and Yenko.net says the purpose was NHRA Super Stock eligibility. The cars are described as L78 396s with the Turbo Hydra-Matic 400 and 4.10 gears, in four colors. Neither account reproduces Chevrolet's order paperwork, so the details rest on their reporting.^5,6

That account conflicts with Over-Drive's statement that the Turbo Hydra-Matic 400 came only with the 350 hp 396. Over-Drive describes regular production and the COPO account a special order, and no Chevrolet document has been found that reconciles them. The story then leaves the factory. Yenko.net reports that some of the cars went to Harrell's shop in Kansas City for modifications including 427 conversions, about a dozen by one former employee's recollection. Those are dealer and racer conversions, a different kind of car from anything Chevrolet built. Street Muscle also reports an August 1968 road test of an L78 Nova SS with the M22 and 4.10 Positraction: 0-60 mph in 5.9 seconds and the quarter mile in 14.5 seconds at 101.1 mph.^2,5,6

Chrysler's compacts were fighting the same fight. Dodge's new Dart GTS offered a 340 or a 383, and one compilation counts 5,828 GTS 340s, close to the Nova's entire Super Sport run. On February 20, 1968, Dodge released 80 Hurst-completed LO23 Hemi Darts built only for Super Stock drag racing. Plymouth issued its own competition-only Hemi Barracuda. Compact bodies with big engines had become drag-strip tools. Chevrolet's showroom entry was the Nova SS 396, and the COPO cars were its special order. Inside Chevrolet, the new car was still a sideshow to the intermediate: ChevelleStuff counts 62,785 SS 396s for 1968 across the Chevelle coupe, convertible and El Camino, more than eleven times the Nova's Super Sport total.^7,8,9,3

The payoff came a year later. For 1969 the Chevy II name was dropped, and NovaResource counts 17,564 Super Sports and 7,209 396 engines, more than three times the 1968 SS total and eight times its 396 count. The 1968 car had supplied the pieces: the longer body, the subframe, the big-block and the transmissions to go with it. In its first year only 5,571 buyers took the Super Sport and 901 Novas got a 396. They were the start of the compact big-block Nova, not yet its peak.^1,4