Super Rare, Super Long Four-Door C3 Corvette Pops up for Sale

Four-door 1980 Corvette was commissioned by GM and is one of only six produced and two known to still exist.

It’s hard to fathom, but there was a time when GM was considering building a four-door Corvette. Well, at least it might have been hard to believe until recently. These days, we’re constantly hit with rumors of not just a Corvette sedan, but perhaps even a Corvette SUV. Thankfully, none of which have actually made it to production yet. Well, sorta. The incredibly elongated C3 you see here is in fact real, but GM didn’t technically build it. But they did commission a company called California Custom Coach in Pasadena, California to.

A grand total of six of these cars were produced in total as part of an exercise to test the market and gauge interest in a family-friendly Corvette. Needless to say, it didn’t exactly set the world on fire. And today, only two of the original cars are known to still exist. This is one of them, and it’s currently up for sale over at NBS Auto Showroom for the tidy sum of just over $102,562. But then again, the car is in completely original shape, right down to its numbers-matching drivetrain. And it only has 20k miles on the clock, to boot.

The story behind these interesting “family man” Corvettes is fairly well documented, too. Super Chevy did a story on the other surviving car some years back, where they detailed GM’s plans at the time. Apparently it was going to be called “Corvette America” (how appropriate), but the automaker knew it was a niche product from the get-go. In fact, they only planned on building 40 of them per year.

The one prototype and five cars produced were constructed from two Corvettes each. After slicing them in half and putting them back together, the resulting wheelbase was 30-inches longer than a regular C3. It wasn’t just low interest that killed the Corvette America, however. Or its limo-like looks and super cab full-size truck length. It was also the car’s exorbitant cost. While a regular C3 went for around $13k in 1980, the four-door was set to cost $35k.

As for this car, it’s been around the block a few times, unsurprisingly. According to Barn Finds, the four-door ‘Vette first popped up for sale back in 2017 with an insane price tag of $275k. Two years later, it resurfaced on Craigslist (of all places) for $119,650. So will it sell this time around for an even bigger discount? Despite the car’s cool story and incredible rarity, we have our doubts. After all, America didn’t want a four-door Corvette 40 years ago. And it doesn’t look like we’re ready for one now, either.

Photos: NBS Auto Showroom

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