Junkyard Find: 1976 Chevrolet El Camino Classic

The General dominated the American cartruck world, building Chevrolet El Caminos and their GMC-badged twins for a collective quarter-century. I used to see these vehicles regularly in car graveyards, but now they’re very rare Junkyard Finds. Here’s an example of the Early Malaise Era El Camino, found in a Colorado yard over the summer.

Ford built Rancheros for just over 20 years, while Chrysler made Rampages and Scamps for a mere three years. Of course, all three companies built utes for the Down Under market for a much longer period, but GM deserves the title of King of the American Cartruck.

I find this ’76 especially interesting because it was built at Fremont Assembly in California, future home of NUMMI and the Tesla Factory. Back in the 1980s, I had an acquaintance who had worked there around the time this Elco was built, and he told me that they wrecked “a couple hundred” vehicles per year by drunk-driving them from the assembly line to the storage lot.

This is an El Camino Classic, which came with rectangular quad headlights and chrome trim.

The MSRP with V8 engine was $4,468, or about $25,338 in 2024 dollars.

The build tag says the original engine was a 305-cubic-inch small-block with two-barrel carburetor, but a junkyard shopper has made off with whatever engine this cartruck had when it got thrown away.

The two-tone paint added 40 bucks to the cost, which seems like a pretty good deal (though that would be $227 after inflation).

There’s no air conditioning, but the automatic transmission would have cost $260 ($1,474 now) over the price of the base three-on-the-tree manual.

It’s bent and rusty, but just about any El Camino seems to be worth enough nowadays to have a good shot at avoiding this one’s fate.

Starting with the 1978 model year and continuing through the final El Caminos of 1987, these cartrucks were based on the smaller and more angular G-platform Malibu.

1976 Chevrolet El Camino in Colorado wrecking yard.

1976 Chevrolet El Camino in Colorado wrecking yard.

1976 Chevrolet El Camino in Colorado wrecking yard.

1976 Chevrolet El Camino in Colorado wrecking yard.

1976 Chevrolet El Camino in Colorado wrecking yard.

1976 Chevrolet El Camino in Colorado wrecking yard.

1976 Chevrolet El Camino in Colorado wrecking yard.

1976 Chevrolet El Camino in Colorado wrecking yard.

1976 Chevrolet El Camino in Colorado wrecking yard.

1976 Chevrolet El Camino in Colorado wrecking yard.

1976 Chevrolet El Camino in Colorado wrecking yard.

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1976 Chevrolet El Camino in Colorado wrecking yard.

1976 Chevrolet El Camino in Colorado wrecking yard.

1976 Chevrolet El Camino in Colorado wrecking yard.

1976 Chevrolet El Camino in Colorado wrecking yard.

[Images: The Author]

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Source: The Truth About Cars