Canadian Deuces

[Mr70]

Is it true that two 1970 LT-1 COPO Novas slated to be Yenko Deuces were shipped to Central Chev/Olds in Ontario instead,and never received the Yenko Graphics/treatment?
I understand One was silver,(COPO PETES),and the other was code #48 Forest Green,is this true,and if so has it been located today?
Why,out of 175,did only these two go to Canada?

[YENKO DEUCE REGISTRY]

Pete can elaborate, but I believe that Central ordered 10 cars on their own. Why they only received 2 of them is unknown. The F.Green one is gone, per Pete's research.

IMO; I do not believe that these two cars were initially intended to go to Yenko. After checking the body number of Pete's silver car, and the vin's of both cars, their vin's are within the build weeks, but not within the color breaks. So, that tells me that they were produced in the same general time frame as the Yenko's. However, Pete's body number is between Yenko's batches, which is one reason that we feel it's possible that other dealers may have gotten some of these cars (like the rumour in the Chicago area), although none have surfaced. If Pete's body number was in the middle of, or at the end of, one of Yenko's batches I would suspect that the Canadian cars were 'add-on's to Yenko's order. I don't think that's the case. I think there was another order placed for the 10 or so cars, and either GM only built 2, or the other 8 were shipped to other dealers.

[COPO PETE]

Central in London had some great connections as they were ordering lots of COPO cars in 1969. In 1970, Dave Mathers heard about the COPO LT-1 Nova's and ordered 10. For some unknown reason, GM would only allow 2 to cross the border. After I bought my car in 1986, I learned where Dave was working at that time. I had never met him. When I finally got in his office, I introduced myself and said I owned a LT-1 Nova that he had supposedly sold in 1970. His first words were... "Which one you got??? The silver or green one". He had ordered both of them, and were built for Central, and had nothing to do with Yenko. They were the only ones sold in Canada. My car is often referred to as "the one that Yenko did not get", but it was never slated for him to have.
The green one was driven till the 1/4 panels fell off and crushed. I met the last owner and he is sick over it, but it was his only form of transportation and drove it every winter. At the time ,he really did'nt know what he had exactly! The motor was finally yanked and put in a Corvette before the car was destroyed!
Peter

[Mr70]

Thank You to both of you.
That answers all my questions about them.
Rick

[whitez]

Cool story, hard to remember all of the details from so long ago, however, I do remember that the Green Nova was destroyed then crushed after hitting a tree or a pole. Another interesting fact, June built and October sales, if I remember the stories from Dave Mather! Pete can confirm.