1969 Chevy Camaro ZL1

From its '70s-style graphics, Cragar racing wheels, and Stahl tachometer on the dash, this Hugger Orange '69 Camaro ZL-1 is all original-including the owner.

Ken Barnhart bought the super-rare super car in April 1969 and has been behind the wheel ever since. Number 16 of just 69 Camaros built with an all-aluminum version of Chevy's 427ci big-block, Barnhart's ZL-1 is one of the original 50 ordered and sold through Fred Gibb's Illinois Chevy dealership. (A handful of other dealers heard about the special package and ordered a few, too, pushing the final production to 69 units.)

"I heard about the ZL-1, but couldn't find one," says Barnhart. "The local dealers didn't know anything about them and I was about to buy a 396 car and build my own ZL-1, but then I saw Fred Gibb's ad in a racing magazine and called the dealership. They still had several to choose from, so I was able to pick the color I wanted."

Barnhart selected a Hugger Orange Camaro with a black interior and Muncie 4-speed transmission. He trailered the car back to his Elgin, Illinois, home with a single intent: Super Stock competition.

No stranger to the quarter-mile, Barnhart had been racing since the '50s. He almost won the 1959 Nationals at Detroit Dragway, but his none-too-featherweight '39 Cadillac was edged by a fleeter Studebaker. He took the G/Stock trophy at Indy in 1961, however, in a quick '55 Chevy. The ZL-1 brought him back from a short retirement.

Curiously, as soon as the Camaro was in Barnhart's garage, the original aluminum 427 was removed. It was replaced with the duplicate, over-the-counter ZL-1 engine that is still found under the hood today. Except for an old-school Edelbrock Torker intake manifold and replacement 850-cfm carb, the engine is faithful to the original ZL-1.

But, why did Barnhart yank the original big-block?

"I don't really know," he says. "It certainly wasn't because we thought it would be valuable someday."

Being the car's one and only owner, Barnhart still has the original zero-mile ZL-1 aluminum engine.

"Well, there are a couple of miles on it," he chuckles. "I think the odometer read 1.7 miles when we pulled the engine."

As for the overall mileage accumulation of this quarter-mile-at-a-time Camaro, it's unknown.

"We never hooked up the speedometer after putting in the replacement engine," says Barnhart. "It's been like that for 33 years."

More than 3 decades' worth of hard launches have affected the odometer, however. It has been shaken and jolted enough to currently read 9.3 miles.

The non-functional odometer seems appropriate for a car that, from outward appearances, seems frozen in time. The graphics and lettering that adorn the Camaro's bodywork were done in 1969 and haven't been touched since. The only paintwork that's been applied to the car's flanks occurred when the rear fender openings were slightly stretched to accommodate larger rubber.