Love can cause a person to do strange things and this Chevrolet Chevelle Laguna S3 is that concept realized in sheet metal. In the eyes of many, the Laguna is just a part of the lineage of cars that descended from cars like the Camaro but suffered under Malaise Era power restrictions. Built from 1973 through 1976, it was a car born into the oil crisis.
A quick peek at its original specs shows how underpowered it was when compared to the greats that came before it. Despite leveraging a 400 cubic inch V8, it made just 175 horsepower when new. Sprinting from 0-60 wasn’t really possible. Instead, it sort of jogged there in over 11 seconds.
Today, the Chevelle Laguna isn’t exactly a high-end collector’s item. As of this writing, only one has ever crossed the block at Bring A Trailer and it went for just $18,000 in 2021 during the midst of the wild pricing of that year. Despite that, someone reportedly spent over $150,000 making this Laguna S3 what it is; a tribute to what love can drive a person to do.
Up for sale over at Volo Cars, this 1976 Laguna S3 is mostly original with a few desirable upgrades. Let’s start with the stock stuff which includes the body itself save for the rear quarter panels. The seller says that “All the panels have been painstakingly aligned with consistent gaps that are well above average. The long heavy doors close easily with minimal effort. All the glass was replaced except for the rear quarters. They all have new rubber seals and fuzzy strips too.”
That’s the kind of attention to detail that Chevrolet might not have provided to this car in 1976 when it was on the production line. This car has its original urethane nose, egg-crate grille inserts, c-pillar window louvers, and even its “Strato-bucket” swiveling front seats. These are all products of a frame-off restoration that happened within the last few years.
What’s perhaps more impressive is just how far beyond a typical restoration this car is. If you’re curious, here’s what a stock one looks like:
Sticking to just the exterior, the rear bumper is now tucked into the body for a more uniform look. It also has cutouts for the exhaust tips. In addition, the builder grafted in functional front fender vents from a 1976 Pontiac Firebird. The wheels set the whole car off as they’re a set of staggered 18-inch akin to these ones from Ridler.
Under those wheels, keen-eyed viewers will note the huge slotted disc brakes and the Wilwood calipers. They’re an excellent indication of just how extreme this build is. Under the hood is a decked, bored, and honed 454 cubic inch V8. On top of that, it features Speedpro piston rings, rods, and main bearings.
The engine breathes through a Weiand Street Warrior intake and coated Hedman headers. In addition, it uses Holly Sniper fuel injection. New electric fans and an aluminum radiator help to keep things cool. According to Volo Cars, it’s dyno-tuned and makes 367 horsepower and 482 lb-ft of torque.
That’s more than twice what it came with stock. In an alternative universe where the Oil Embargo never happened and OPEC kept pumping out that sweet, sweet crude perhaps this is the power the Laguna would have ended up with.
Interestingly, it went to auction back in 2022. At that time, Mecum Auctions claims, the clutch and brake pedals were welded together to function as one giant pedal, but the twist is that the gearbox was a Turbo 350 automatic, so the clutch pedal didn’t function, anyway. Today, the car sports a Tremec five-speed manual, and the pedals are back to doing their own thing. Power routes to the rear wheels via a rebuilt 10-bolt positraction rear differential.
The steering linkage, gearbox, and sway bars (yes, it has both front and rear sway bars) are all new as well. The builder even went to the trouble of replacing the gas tank and all of the associated lines.
Whoever ends up slipping into those swivel seats looks like they’ll enjoy the cabin, too. It has air conditioning, a new carpet, a new headliner, a new Hurst shifter, a new rearview mirror, and new speakers. In fact, they connect via Bluetooth and an integrated microphone enables hands-free phone calls.
Dual controls allow for wing-mirror manipulation and additional gauges enable the driver to monitor vitals. The floors are rust-free and the trunk is just as nicely appointed as everything else on this car. The next buyer even gets a full-sized spare, a jack assembly, a lug wrench, and a fire extinguisher.
It’s worth noting that this car has a bunch of Cale Yarborough graphics on it. Those aren’t stock but instead come from the 1969 Mercury Cyclone Spoiler II. In this case, they’re still appropriate considering that Yarborough dominated NASCAR in a Laguna during the 1976 season. Chevrolet actually won the Manufacturer’s Cup eight times in nine years between 1972 and 1980. The Laguna S3 picked up two of those victories in 1976 and 1977.
Clearly, somebody with a lot of love was willing to do whatever it took to make this the ultimate Laguna S3. According to Volo Cars, they have receipts for over $24,000 worth of paint and bodywork on the car. In addition, they claim another $18,000 in upgrades during 2024. It’s asking $75,998 which is undoubtedly a lot of cheese, but this might be the greatest Chevelle Laguna on earth.
Someone had a vision and took it to the extreme.
All Photos: Volo Cars
An amazing build for sure, but why ?
Do you build / commission a car like this and end up afraid of the finished product ?
You end up with something too nice to actually enjoy. Living in constant fear of a bug splatter or rock chip, or wrapped around a pole because it has more power than you can handle ?
Building such a car with a limited appeal seems risky if the intent was to build and flip ?
I’m sure we have all seen the John Cena MG that traded hands for pennies on the dollar shortly after it was complete, again I ask why ?
Anyway, the smudge on the door @ 5:16 is a deal breaker for me anyways !
The article answers your question: It’s a labor of love.
I wonder if it’s this person’s high school car, or first car out of high school. Just like when Jay Leno retromodded the heck out of the ’55 Buick Roadmaster that he drove while courting his wife.
I hope this person enjoyed that car, because they will certainly lose money on their investment.
Another example for the generation of car – My brother has a 77 Malibu. He has owned it since high school(late 90’s). He took 4 years to restore, redo, modify it from the frame up. It was the second car he had owned. It’s a fun and neat car to drive around. He actually gets as many looks as the camaros and firebirds and corvettes at car shows. Does he drive it as much I would??—probably not. Will he ever sell it–NO—well maybe if there is a 75k offer. This car, in the article, might have some sentimental value to owner. Or, the owner may have just started down the rabbit hole of modification and didn’t stop.
If it was “a labor of love” wouldn’t he keep it ?
Not if the estate is selling it, or if they incurred medical bills and need the money. Both are very realistic.
Or maybe bringing a vehicle to its pinnacle is the joy, and how they want to work on another one.
Friend had a new one of these after HS. His was a 75 with the 245 hp 454. Not a bad car back in the day. Could never see paying 75k for one, no matter how restomodded it was.
This is peak boomer imho.
I always thought this car would look better with pop-up headlights like a Pulsar NX.
For the life of me, I cannot see dropping $76k on this when (waves hands randomly) so many other cars exist. It’s a neat car, to be sure, but it wasn’t a desirable car even back when it was new, so that was a lot of money spent to make a fancy version of a car that few people would ever want. The potential buyer for this car needs not only deep pockets but also to have the attitude that anyone can overpay for a ’69 Chevelle, but not just anyone would willingly overpay to an extreme degree for the nicest version of the worst Chevelle ever made. It’s neat someone made it, but I am simply not equipped to do the mental gymnastics required to justify why.
Ok, so I’m gonna ask the same question I asked downthread:
What car would have been better?
Something of this era, non-exotic, and not another Camaro, Mustang, Corvette, or other one-of-ten-thousand-identical-restomod musclecars. Something else equally obscure and unloved, but not as mentally gymnastic?
Since you put so many requirements on it, which the builder of this car was certainly not constrained with, my answer is no car – I wouldn’t spend the money at all on something like this, since it is a bad investment as evidenced by the selling price. There are “ten thousand identical restomods” because those 60s and early-70s muscle cars were and are desirable. If the cars that followed were as desirable, the car in this article would also be one of ten thousand, and the investment would be worth it. But it isn’t, and this car will never be worth the money they put into it. As much as the person selling the car wants unloved=valuable, that simply isn’t how things work.
Most things we throw money are not worth it. My brothers 77 Malibu might not be worth everything he has thrown at it. The fun he had rebuilding and the looks he gets going down the road and at cars shows has made it all worth while. It’s different than all of the cars from that era. Heck, so is my 68 Caprice. They both get plenty of thumbs up. Sometimes it isn’t about “worth”.
Sure, but there absolutely is a point where the amount spent on a vehicle tips into the “irrational” realm, and worth has to be a consideration. I wouldn’t be making the comment if they had invested $10-15k on the malaise-era crapbox, but when we are talking more than most people make in a year, it’s disingenuous to pretend like no one should consider residual value on a car someone is actively trying to sell at an extremely inflated price in order to recoup the money invested.
Okay, so your objection is less that the car is bad than that there was no chance of ROI?
As I said, the car is neat, but dropping $150k on the least desirable version of a car that had two previous generations that everyone loved is just mind-boggling.
People can spend their money on whatever they want, and were this not for sale I’d have simply congratulated the owner on a nice looking car. However, it is for sale, and at a severely-inflated price that is evidence that the owner wants to get some of that six-figures spent back out of the car. Has the owner started with a first- or second-gen Chevelle, that might be feasible. But not a third-gen, no matter how nice – it simply isn’t a car that has ever commanded that kind of price. The owner cares about ROI on the back-end, but should have also been thinking about it on the front-end before dropping six-figures on it.
Huh.
I had assumed the owner had started from a point of ‘I like this car, I would like to see one with all the stuff done to it.’, then when all was said and done, they went ‘meh, not as cool as I thought it would be’ – and had a consigning dealer list it high because they weren’t in a hurry for the cash, but wanted to get as much back as possible for whatever next project they had in mind.
If they were doing some kind of financial calculus beforehand then yes, putting the cash into yet another boomer-bait barracuda or extraneous Elanor equivalent would make more sense. But at that point, wouldn’t they have been better off just buying an already completed one off the market?
It’s nice car but nothing special. There are no high dollar parts on it. Somebody overpaid on shop labor time for a not that desirable car.
The car looks good, they were nice riding cars. In terms of the expense have you priced what a decent paint job costs now adays. Plus if you had a shop do all the work the labor hours add up pretty quickly. Going to car shows, you’ll notice a big difference between the quality of the build especially of those unexperienced to those of shops (not all shops do nice work) and experienced home builders.
Wow that’s a lot of work put into it! That color combo and wheel choice is amazing imo
The Colonnade cars look good with right options and proportionate wheels. The front flares and oversized wheels do it no favors.
I’m also astonished by how choked those Malaise Era engines were. that 175 hp 400 small block is almost 3 times the displacement of the 180hp 2.5 liter 4 in my Mazda. Even GM learned to do better. The earl oughts 3800 made over 200hp with pushrods
If you love this car, you have plenty of time to save up. Because there is no way it’s going to fetch even half their asking price.
The what now?
Did anyone suppose this car was going to be AWD?
Was this article written by aliens? AI?
Rivers was talking about the brake and clutch pedals. The Mecum auction claims the pedals were welded together so that they both pressed at the same time. I’m not entirely sure why you would do that.
Edit: Ah, I detected the mix-up. This car started life as a manual and then was converted to automatic, but nobody deleted the clutch pedal. So, the non-functional clutch pedal was combined with the brake pedal to make one big pedal.
I made an edit to clarify that. 🙂
I believe this is done with auto conversions so they can have a wide brake pedal without replacing the entire pedal box.
Yep, that’s what it is! I went digging into the Mecum auction because of the mention of a clutch pedal, but an auto trans. Definitely converted to auto, but left the pedal box behind. The car had one big brake pedal!
To each his own, but whenever I see something like this, I just think “imagine if you spent that much money on a car that didn’t completely suck in the first place”. <shrug>
There is someone who thinks that about every customized car. In fact, that is what the majority of people think about almost every custom car!
Because it’s true. People spend a ton of time and money ruining cars. This may be better than what it started out as, but there was nowhere to go but up, and just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.
For real. At least start with something where POS wasn’t a delete option.
So, after reading this sentiment a couple of times in the comments, I gotta know:
What car?
Limits being: Of this era, non-exotic, and not another Camaro, Mustang, Corvette, or other one-of-ten-thousand-identical-restomod musclecars.
Datsun 510 2-door. They all got racecar’d in the 90s so you could blow 1/4 of your budget just finding an unmolested example to start with.
That’s a great answer! There is a BUNCH of European and Japanese stuff that I hadn’t considered.
Put a modern MB DI v6 into a w123. That would be fun.
the Laguna was always a pretty slick looking car, just born in a dismal era for automobiles. 175 HP was actually not terrible to be honest, Cat choked single exhaust massive two barrels with retarded ignition and low compression really did a number. I don’t honestly think they really did that much for emissions since most of the cars would be backfiring and running on when shut off it seemed like,
I do like the look of these. And if you’re going to replace pretty much everything with better parts, why not start with something a little unexpected?
Sure, the resale of a 1970 Chevelle is going to be higher, but that’s not why I’ve ever chosen a car to restore. I will admit that low resale potential has prevented me from choosing some rattier examples of the projects I’ve done.
I guess the bigger question I have in this instance is why does it look like a regular S3 with a decent paint job and TA vents grafted on, it does not scream 150K to me unless the guy spending the money is just not all that builder grade. But yeah, it would always be a much better choice to start with a 1970 model, however, some people do like these later models well enough to fall into the trap of if I put this much into a car it will be worth that much or more when I am through. It is only worth what somebody else will pay.
Some of the Colonnade cars really do look good, I’m glad to see one get some attention!
Neat, but the wheels let the whole thing down. First of all, while the fronts are 18s, the rears are 20s and are totally unnecessary IMO. Second, the wheels look like winter takeoffs for someone’s Camaro.
Agreed. Seems like nearly all of these restomod cars are ruined by putting ridiculously large modern wheels on them. They just look terrible. Wheels should be just big enough to clear the brakes, and no more.
Size is one issue. Style is another. There are much better restomod rims that would work on this than these cheap-looking mesh wheels. Even some green Bassett like stock car wheels would complete the Cale Yarborough edition look.
All of the stupid wagon wheels universally look terrible, but it’s likely a chicken or egg situation.
This is probably the coolest Colonnade restomod ever.
I hope the new owner enjoys it!
“All the panels have been painstakingly aligned with consistent gaps that are well above average.”
Soooo plus/minus 1/16 of an inch rather than 1/8?
They are all in the same time zone
And actually parallel.
Cool! Now do the same with a contemporary Pontiac Can Am and I’m on board.
White with blue stripes?
Nah, I’m keeping the red/orange/yellow. Peak 70’s!
except Super Duty 455, No Chevrolet lump making only 360HP, those things started at 300 HP and could be tuned with just fuel and ignition adjustments to make more.
High on my list of “if I won the lottery” dream builds.
As long as this rebuild was done as a labor of love, then, – to paraphrase Barry Goldwater (who himself paraphrased his speechwriter Karl Hess) – I say extremism in the preservation of beloved automobiles is no vice. Good luck finding a buyer that might share that valuation, though.
well said.. Great story, well written, but I’m not buying the book..
Back when cars had colors 🙂
This was before we all became colorblind.
This is right up my alley. I’ve always been a fan of the GM Colonnade cars, and also have always been fascinated with low volume “performance” versions of average cars (even though many were just lipstick on a pig), especially those for racing homologation, so I’ve always found the Laguna S-3s interesting. Lots of money invested here, but for someone (including myself if I had that kinda of money), it’s worth it.
That is fucking sweet and exactly why I’m not allowed to have money.
Fun fact; In 1973 alone, Laguna was the top Chevelle series and offered in all body styles – coupe, sedan, and wagon (that last with or without woodgrain). Buyers weren’t ready for a mass-market Chevy sedan with an Endura front, so it was replaced by the Malibu Classic while the S-3 continued as a coupe only and was revised for 1975 with this slanted, less stylish but more aerodynamic front which completed the pivot from “plush Chevy for when the Caprice is too big and the Cutlass too ostentatious” to “NASCAR homologation special”
I would fight that notion as the slant front end looks far more stylish to me. but I like them both.
This will look..fine(?) in it’s climate controlled bubble.
I can appreciate the heck out of this, but that is a lot of cheddar!
That’s where I’m at. This is gorgeous and the work looks like it was done extremely well.
But $76k gets me into a lot of other better looking, better performance, and more desirable cars.