My name is Maurice Boetto, but I am known to all as “Moe”. Here is a short history of my 1962 Corvette, which I have owned for close to 50 years. As a kid I used to watch the TV show Route 66, and fell in love with their Vette. I promised myself I would one day have my very own, even though I was raised in a Ford family. While in the Navy in Charleston, South Carolina, I found what would become my ‘62 Vette on a used car lot. Not having much money as a sailor, all I had to bargain with was my cool 1964 Ford Falcon Sprint. It was built up, and had everything you could do to one at that time. We worked out a deal and traded. I was beyond thrilled with now owning my dream.
I then joined the Corvette Club there and immediately got into autocrossing, which turned into being able to race on tracks like Charlotte, Darlington, Road Atlanta, Daytona, Sebring, plus many smaller tracks around the south. All of this aggressive racing did eventually start breaking parts, rear ends, axles, transmissions and motors. Everything was fine and dandy until it was wrecked at a race in 1989, by a friend I had let drive it on the track. Yes, back then I let other people enjoy racing it too. It’s what we did back then. The wreck took out the front end up to the windshield.
Well, after that it sat in my garage for 16 year until I found a body shop that would work with me. They had if for 4 years, and when it was done it was awesome. The work was done at Blue Moon by Bob Brown and Anthony Muniz. I got a shell of a car back, but it was more than I expected. It took me 2 years to put it all back together. While doing so I had Allen Rice of Santo’s Automotive add front and rear suspension from Jim Myer Racing, plus a complete Wilwood disc brake system. It was just as good as putting a full custom frame set up under the car, and a third of the price.
After all these years of having the fun of autocrossing and driving all over the country I am now on motor number eight. It is a 383 cubic inch stroker built by my friend Jay Hedgecock. The guts consists of a 010 high nickel block, 4-bolt main, square decked, bored .030 over, line honed, hot tanked and baked. It has an Eagle 383 balanced rotating assembly rated to 700hp, nodular iron crank, forged I-Beam rods, Hypereutectic pistons, NKB aluminum heads, 2.02 / 1.60 stainless steel valves, screw in studs, and stainless steel roller rockers with poly locks and guide plates. It also has ARP bolts for the heads, intake, mains, Comp Cams kit 512/512, Comp hydraulic lifters, Comp pushrods, Comp dual roller timing chain, 8-inch harmonic SFI balancer, SFI rated fly wheel, and much more. Recently I have installed an 8-stack fuel injected intake built by Speedmaster, with the FAST Sportsman setup. All of this was done by my neighbor and friend Gene Brownlie, who also did some wild fabrication in the engine compartment, that he came up with.
In the last four years before Covid, in addition to hitting up lots of local car shows and cruise-ins I would take it out west for car shows as well. That usually included five weeks in Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada, and of course Texas. I did however also take it to Los Angeles for a TV show called Sticker Shock.
“The Deuce”, as the car is called, is pretty well known thanks to Russ Muller and all of the pictures he has taken and posted on Facebook. But to me it’s not just about the car, it’s about the car people that come with it. Like DJ Don Musica, Tara Bush parking cars at the shows, friends like Curt and Trish Wieland, Alan Hughes, photographer Charles Rushforth, Brenda Denny, and Jim Mummah who is no longer with us. Car people are a family that it is nice to be a part of. Plus a big shout-out to Mike Kelly’s Cruise News for letting me share a little of my story with all of their readers. I have enjoyed driving “The Deuce” for almost 50 years, and am looking forward to many more fun years still to come! CN |
