Chevy Malibu '81 info?

[Feicht]

i'm looking into possibly getting one of these for cheap, but before i decide, are there any usual problems or quirks these cars have?

the one i'm looking at is in pretty much near mint condition... it was basically an old lady's "back and forth to church" car for a few decades, hehe, so it hasn't even been driven all that much. as i understand, its been sitting a few years though, so i'd obviously need to replace all the seals and lines and everything just to be safe.

but is this a worthy lead to follow, or should i just look at something else?

[quaddriver]

well check the engine, they came with a number of them, from a little 200 inch 3.2L chevy, a 229 inch 3.8L chevy and 2 v8s, a 267? and a 305. Cop models got a 350.

the chevy v6's are junk (to be fair, the buick 231 v6 of the same year is not the best) and that 267 is a waste of 8 cylinders. the 305 would be best. however, they used a thm200 or 250C tranny in MOST applications - both of these trannies will explode on a regular basis. the 350C would be a better find.

the good news is, once you get the body, you can transplant any chevy parts into it. Im kinda partial to 350/350's

[Feicht]

hmm... well the problem is, i'm kinda sketchy on the details since the car is actually the neighbor of my parents', who live 700 miles away from me.. so i don't really know much more about it than i stated in the first post. i THINK it might be a v6, but like i said i'm not sure. i'm fairly certain the car was never beat on though since it was just an old lady's. also, i don't really care about "performance" or any of that stuff, i just want a car that runs and isn't gonna blow up in 1000 miles i could care less if i can smoke a rice racer at a red light and all that stuff


oh another thing, does anyone know of a site or anything where i can find out the actual estimated value? i tried kelly blue book but it looks like they only go back to like 1982