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Can someone help me find out what a 74 Nova Spirit of America might be worth? Unrestored condition. Also, where there's a sight that lets you know the number made and registration sight? I appereciate the help.
Thanks, Dale danoble@verizon.net
Welcome to the site, Dale. I merged your two threads, since both had the same question and almost exactly the same answers. Most people here check the "New Posts" section, so will see the question no matter where you post it. Saves duplication for readers, searchers and post repliers.
I've paid about average $2,000 for each of the ones I bought. The one was about $1800 from Hannibal Missouri and I mostly bought it for the interior and drivetrain. It was from a person that took real good care of the interior but the exterior was rotted out real bad and I pretty much gutted it to use parts on the original one I got from Texas. The Texas one had a poor interior but the body while it has a lot of surface rust was pretty solid.
The problems you might run into is there are some specific parts for that car (hood emblem, vinyl stripes, steering wheel insert) and while the stripes are available the hood emblem and horn insert are not readily available. There were two steering wheels with the correct horn inserts recently on Ebay and from the pictures I saw of them I would say there were driver quality (thumb rub throughs on the edges). There may be others to be auctioned on Ebay but if there are you need to get some good close-ups of the center to know what you are buying.
The Spirit of America will suffer the same body issues and interior issues as all of the other ones out there from that year as well as if it has the white interior.
Body rot area's include the rear wheel opening lips, back lower edge of the front fenders, lower portion of the doors, hatchlid glass channel and the lid itself, and possibly the hatch floor and interior floor.
The white plastic interior is yet another problem. GM must have had plastic issues back then and what happens is the white panels I've seen begin to break down. They are easily scratched and when this happens the plastic come off in a powder. I've seen this also on other GM car lines from that year. The plastic also becomes more brittle compared to the black pieces I have.
While they make reupholstery kits for the bucket seats and rear fold down seat they currently only come in black and sandlewood. On mine the two rear seats I have will be put back in after a good cleaning but for the front buckets I had to have a local upholsterer redo them but he did get the two different grains dead on in a match.
While I haven't gotten real far on mine I plan on doing a test panel or two to see if I can change a black interior panel to white using SEM products but my concern is due to the paint build up and how much graining that is in the plastic might be lost. This I don't know but I will at some later point.
Check my signature and feel free to look at the photo's I have of mine. I also have other's I've seen for sale and could send them to you if needed.
Jim
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1973 Custom and Pro-Street, 1974 Spirit of America, 1977 Hatchback
Homepage: http://hometown.aol.com/krystaldesigns/page1.html New links just added January 2007 in more pictures and Steve Bailey's Benefit Car Show
I always felt, due to all SOA Nova's coming equiped with certain equiptment, a big influence on the value would be the options on the car other than the SOA options. I sold a colorado SOA Nova with a 350 motor for $3500. It needed paint, seat covers, tires and it was missing the red shoulder belts. A 6 cylinder car will not bring that kind of money. Options such as AC, power, 8 track w/radio or gauges should add to the collectibility of the car.
I had an extra set of center caps and just sold them for about $250, so anyone buying one of these cars is going to pay more for a complete car. They do not want to be buying all the SOA items one at a time.
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62 Canadian Nova 400 Conv. 350 V-8
63 Acadian Beaumont SD Hdtp 350 V-8
Thanks for all the info. You've been very helpful. Just found the car so haven't even bought yet. Restorable but has had many of the issues mentioned. Pretty complete though. Will let know what developes.
Thanks again!
Spirit of America
Soa
Linear Mode
