This is How the NCRS Judges Corvettes

If you've never attended an NCRS judging event, and you own or plan to purchase a classic Corvette, you must! The cars being judged are some of the best in the USA, and you usually get a chance to talk to the owners and (sometimes) the judges themselves.

In this video, I share some of the cars there undergoing judging for the many classes offered by the NCRS, with an obvious bias toward C3 Corvettes, of course.

I hope you enjoy the video.

For the complete NCRS Playlist, click here.

The Cleanest C3 Corvette on Earth?

I wrote the title of this article as a question because I cannot make a definite statement proclaiming to own The Cleanest C3 Corvette on Earth.

Why you may ask, and the answer is simple: I drive my Corvette whenever possible. And while I may not be adding a lot of miles, the car gets exercise on a regular and consistent basis.

Therefore, it is not a trailer queen even though it looks quite good for its age and years of loyal service.

Timmy Briseno's 1976 Corvette Stingray

Story and photos by Timmy Briseno @1976CorvetteStingray

At fifteen years old, I purchased my 1976 Corvette in March of 2010 as my first car. 

I bought it from my neighbor who had purchased it from the original owner in 2002-2003. He only drove it maybe eight hundred miles in twelve years and agreed to sell it to me if I took care of it and fixed it up. 

I agreed and paid him half and worked the other half off at my first job the following summer.

I drove the car for two and a half years with a new crate 350 I installed, replaced the shin-searing side pipes with full Flowmaster 40s, and got the bumpers installed and painted to match (the car came with them unpainted and uninstalled).

Coolant Expansion Tank Aftermarket Caps

I think I've replaced the coolant expansion tank cap three or four times in the last six years.

Reproduction caps are not expensive at around $7 plus shipping charges each. However, when you multiply that amount by three or four, the real cost becomes clear.

I am not questioning the design per se, since they look almost identical to the originals, but I do question the quality of the materials used.

For the record, I also have an aftermarket coolant expansion tank which has performed great since I replaced it several years ago. However, the caps always fail in the same general area. I've tried repairing them with mixed results.

The 1973 Corvette Collector

The moment I spoke with John on the phone, I knew he was a brother from another mother. We had so many things in common when it came to Corvettes that it was sort of surreal talking with him. We both grew up in the 1970s and the moment we saw a C3 it became a mission of sorts to own at least one. He beat me by a handful of years getting the first one. He owned his first C3 at thirteen. I bought mine at nineteen. He's a perfectionist and so am I. I've owned six C3s over the years, he's owned probably sixty. Okay, I have a ways to go but you get the idea. And he only buys Corvettes with manual transmissions! I contacted John since he had a Craigslist listing for his 1976 Corvette Stingray, and after a few text messages and a phone call, I made an appointment to drive down to Orlando to have a look. The '76 is a low-mile beauty that drives like a new C3 Corvette. I made a video about it, of course. But the '73s made such an impression I asked him to share the story with my subscribers, and he does so in this video.