The Forgotten Chevy Wagon That Shared Its Drivetrain With The Impala SS

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Sunday, 5 Jul 2026 21:00 0 3 autotech

The Forgotten Chevy Wagon That Shared Its Drivetrain With The Impala SS

Muscle cars and sports cars are great if you want to show people your hand. You can’t cruise down the road in a Corvette ZR1 or 1970 Chevrolet Chevelle SS 454 LS6 and expect to catch anyone off guard at the lights — it’s all too obvious. But there are ways to get some serious performance, if you want to remain low-key. That’s when you’ll need a sleeper car or, even better, a sleeper Wagon. These five-door wagons are the ultimate down-low flex, with only the very few knowing what hardware lies beneath that boring bodywork. And there is one giant Chevy wagon that did it better than most…but hardly anyone knows about it.

Table of Contents

Fast Wagons Are The Ultimate Sleepers

1995 Audi RS2 Avant

Bring a Trailer

The Chevy Caprice Was An Unlikely Starting Point For A Sleeper Wagon

The fourth-generation Chevrolet Caprice should probably have been better received than it was. Launched in 1991, the giant (214.1 inches long in sedan form, and 217.3 inches as a wagon) Caprice looked even bigger than it was, thanks to its ungainly styling and rear wheel arches that made it look like it was sinking under its own weight. But the car was more aerodynamic and pretty modern throughout, with the wagon being one of the very few full-size, RWD five-doors left on the market for anyone resisting buying a minivan. With contemporary features such as standard ABS, it even won Motor Trend’s Car of the Year Award. With sales slow off the ground and the reception lukewarm, this seemed like an unlikely starting point for a wagon that would borrow a Corvette engine.

The Forgotten American Sleeper That Was Basically A Four-Door Corvette

It was only sold in America for a few short years, and it’s starting to become a great used buy!

The Caprice Is A Grandma-spec Wood-Panel Wagon With Corvette DNA And Police Hardware

From 1994 to 1996, the Chevrolet Caprice Classic wagon came standard with a 260 hp, 330 lb-ft LT1 5.7-liter V8. This was the same detuned Corvette small-block used in the Impala SS muscle car and the 9C1 police package, riding on a heavy-duty B-body chassis. The “bubble” body style, which often came adorned with faux woodgrain panels, is about as unassuming as you can get, looking more like something your aunt and uncle would drive to bingo than anything else. The wagons come with plenty of modern conveniences too, including optional premium audio systems and virtually every power feature, not to mention eight-passenger seating and over 92 cubic-feet of space when the rear seats are folded flat.

The Police Package Was A Rare Upgrade For The Caprice Wagon

Not many people knew, but Chevy offered a special service/police package for Caprice wagons called the 1A2. Only 846 were made, says Curbsideclassic.com, making them one of the rarest fast wagons of the time. Barnfinds.com has a little more information on this option, saying that it was not so much a “pursuit rated” cop car, as a “county government rated” vehicle. This means that the 1A2 package was more likely designed to withstand the wear and tear that a government vehicle would endure on a daily basis at the hands of people who were more interested in getting their jobs done than in maintaining an automobile. The 1A2 package included heavy-duty items like an upgraded cooling system, alternator, more durable bucket seats, and steel wheels. It didn’t include an upgraded suspension or brakes, sadly.

This Caprice Is As Close To An Impala SS Wagon As You Can Get

What you did get under the hood was the Corvette-derived 5.7-liter V8, rather than the 200-hp 265 that lurked in some Caprice wagons. Hooked up to a 4L60-E four-speed automatic transmission, this engine was, as previously stated, the same as you would find under the hood of that left-field classic muscle car, the Impala SS. Both had 260 hp and 330 lb-ft of torque, meaning that the Impala SS was basically a performance-oriented trim package of the standard Caprice, even if it did have styling upgrades to help lift it away from its heavy-looking sibling.

The First Factory Supercharged Muscle Wagon Ever Sold

It’s an exceedingly rare option that turned a family hauler into a proper sleeper wagon.

The Caprice Wagon Was Fast For Its Time

At 4,300 pounds, the Impala SS is slightly lighter than the 4,473-pound Caprice wagon, but the acceleration figures won’t be that different. The Impala SS is usually quoted as hitting 60 mph in 7.0 seconds, although some sources claim it will hit that figure in 6.5 seconds. The quarter-mile came up in around 15.0 seconds at 92 mph, which put it in the same league as a lot of muscle cars. Expect the Caprice to not be too far behind. This was fast for the mid-’90s, a time when hot hatches would be considered extremely quick if they hit 60 mph in 7.0 seconds. The 1995 Volvo 850 T5 R wagon was dubbed a “Flying Yellow Brick” when it hit 60 mph in 6.7 seconds and covered the quarter in 15.2 seconds.

Chevrolet’s Muscle Wagon Had Almost 400 HP… In 1969

This forgotten grocery getter from 1969 packed serious muscle car punch under the woodgrain.

Getting A Police Spec Caprice Wagon Is A Job For Serious Collectors Only

There don’t seem to be any accurate official figures for how many fourth-generation Caprices sold in the ’90s, but many sources say that it was many hundreds of thousands. That means buying one today isn’t exactly expensive. Hagerty puts the price of a 1995 Chevrolet Caprice Classic station wagon, complete with 350 V8, at just $9,700 in good condition. As the video above shows, they do make cool ’90s custom rides, especially if you are matching big wheels and retaining the wood look.

For anyone looking for one of the rare 1A2 special service/police package cars, this may prove incredibly difficult. Barnfinds.com seems to be one of the few sources to ever locate one for sale, documenting a 1995 car that went up for sale in 2025 on GovMoCo.com with an asking price of $3,250. That sounds cheap, but the car in question obviously had a hard life, with reports of a lot of rust as well as general wear. Ultimately, finding a 1A2 and restoring it is one for the diehard Caprice collectors only.