The Chevrolet Vega is a much maligned little car (with good reason), but there was one bright spot: the remarkable Cosworth Vega, a limited-edition model that boasted a British-made performance engine.
I never expected to have a Vega for Pick of the Week, but the 1976 Cosworth Vega advertised in ClassicCars.com for sale in Deltona, Florida, sounds like a tasty survivor offered for the affordable price of $15,500. The car is in restored condition, the seller states, with a Creamsicle orange paint job.
The car is equipped with the desirable five-speed manual transmission and has apparently been a Florida car its entire life, sparing it the rigors of northern winters that notoriously caused Vegas to rust out.
Cosworth Engineering of England produced the hand-built 2.0-liter engines, which benefited from the company’s experience with racing engines. The twin-cam four banger produced 111 horsepower and 107 pound-feet of torque, which might not sound all that impressive these days, but with a curb weight of just 2,760 pounds, the Cosworth Vega could sprint from zero to 60 in 7.7 seconds, according to tests at the time.
The Cosworth Vega also received aggressive suspension tweaks, improved brakes and a special performance wheel-and-tire package. Contemporary road testers were impressed, several of them suggesting that this is what every Vega should have been like in the first place.
Notably, the Cosworth was the first Chevrolet passenger car with fuel injection, although the photos of this car’s engine show a pair of Weber side-draft carburetors. That aftermarket modification could help boost performance. The seller doesn’t reveal any other upgrades, but the Webers are a good sign of an engaged owner.
Cosworth Vegas are very rare. The cars were built for just two years, 1975-76, and only 3,508 of them were produced, compared with the run of ordinary Vegas during that time of more than 190,000. In 1976, just 1,447 Cosworth Vegas were made.
The sticking point was the price tag. In 1976, the list price topped $6,000, which was just several hundred dollars less than a new Corvette. With the Cosworth engine built overseas, they were expensive to produce. Only those performance enthusiasts who understood the exotic nature of these cars stepped up to buy.
1957 Belair had fuel injection as an option.
Good catch, Amy. Corvettes also had optional FI. Story should have noted that the Cosworth Vega was the first Chevrolet product with standard fuel injection, not optional.
I was employed at Chevrolet Tonawanda motor division in Tonawanda, NY from 1973 to 1982. The Cosworth twin cam engine was assembled at the Tonawanda factory- Plant 1 in an air temperature controlled dust free room. There were only a handful of men that assembled these engines. They were all in the inspection department.
The vega is the best car I ever owned . I can not find many that are not either destroyed or ready for the strip….. Love to see any article featuring a vega…. Thanks for the good work
I love the color ” Creamsicle”” everyone my age knows Orange on the outside & White on the Inside. The best Ice Cream I ever enjoyed on a stick. I never owned a Vega, but this one sure is nice. Hank McCabe
I think the 57 Bel Air was mechanical injection the Cosworth was Electronic injection. Plus another first for the little car was a stainless steel tubular header as standard
The Chevy Cosworth was the first Chevy to have ELECTRONIC fuel injection (EFI), the first General Motors car with EFI being the 1975 Cadillac Seville V8 engine. Cosworth Engineering in England developed a 2 litre racing engine using the aluminum Vega engine block. That engine won some races in Europe but was ultimately a failure. GM had a deal with Cosworth to use their design for a streetable engine which a few years later became the Cosworth Twin Cam Vega’s engine. As an original owner of a ’75-1/2 Chevy Cosworth, and a lifelong member of the marque club, my advice to collectors should be to get one now. The prices for an original, unmodified Cosworth are going up substantially due to the scarcity of good examples.
Clark is correct I owned a slightly used 75 1/2 in 1977-79 and it was a great little car. After owning a new 72 GT the Cosworth was a totally different drive with more power all the way to 7000 rpm and very nimble.I looked at a couple of very nice examples 2 years ago for less than $7000 now they are $10,000 plus so I missed out on a very nice deal.
Thanks, gents, for clearing up the fuel-injection issue.
The advertised car is one of the “Limited Production” (a limited edition is usually just a trim package!) ’76 Chevy Cosworths that were built halfway through the model year (Jan. ’76) when GM decided to offer Cosworths in eight Vega exterior colors (perhaps to boost flagging sales) in addition to black. Before that, all Cosworths were black. Interestingly, black was NOT a factory exterior paint option on Vegas until the 1976 model (only on the Cosworths). The Medium Orange exterior with white interior is striking. I know the owner of this car who is a long-tenured CVOA member who has recently retired. The photos show the car on display in Building T at the 2011 Carlisle GM Nationals. This car, along with my car and eleven others, were Invitational Cars, picked by a Carlisle panel for display that year when the Chevy Cosworth was the featured car. So, this car is one of the absolute best examples, even with the engine modifications, especially of a 1976 Cosworth. The only thing, I believe, that has kept this car from already selling, (if the seller is not including the complete EFI system with the car) is that it would be expensive to find the necessary long-discontinued and rare parts to reinstall the original EFI back on this car’s engine.
Yep the author is incorrect. The engine was assembled in the US. It was a special off the assembly line team that built it. There is video and pix out there. The engine was very advanced for it’s day with dual overhead cams and a computerized EFI. As far a power, the debate is ongoing as to whether the Webers or the EFI is quicker. I always felt that the EFI was a first in it’s day and taking it off was not the way to go. My Cosworth is long gone the rust bunnies got it as it was a Chicago car. But I plan on getting another. Also no one know exactly how many Cosworths were made, I have heard 5000 as a number, but they keep popping up as barn finds, some with very low miles. All in all a cool car which is getting the respect it deserves (finally).
The ads used to say “One Vega for the price of Two.”
There were 3508 Cosworth Vega’s made over two years, one of the lowest production models ever offered by GM. 1975 production totaled 2061 cars, 1976 saw 1447 cars built. Each car came with a sequentially numbered dash plaque, some of which were either damaged in assembly or pocketed as a souvenir. The last dash number for the ’75 model was 2069, the last ’76 was 3522. The 5000 number relates to how many engines the Tonawanda plant produced in anticipation of car sales.
As Elvis would say, if he was still around Thank ya, Thank ya very much. enough about
the Vega, lets move on to something else.
Hank you don’t have to read this string so you can move on. As for me a proud and happy Vega owner at least many very nice examples have survived unlike the Pinto or Gremlin LOL
OK Paul if it makes you feel better, I’ll move on.
Don’t go because of me LOL but I need to go and work on my V8 Vega project.
Well Paul, You have yours and I have mine. So lets get to it !
Bob Golfen said
August 8, 2014 at 2:03 PM 1957 Belair had fuel injection as an option.
Bob, The Cosworth Vega was the first GM car to have ELECTRONIC Fuel Injection.