One of the coolest ways to improve the looks of your musclecar, while maintaining the OE appearance, is to replace the trim and flat hood with some cool SS emblems and a factory-style performance hood.
By simply opening the pages of most any reproduction catalog or going online, you can easily find SS 396 hoods, emblems, grilles, and trim in kit form for all Chevelles, Camaros, and Novas.
The emblems, grille, and trim basically bolt on, while the hood requires a little paint and bodywork first. For most of these items, the preparation, paint, and installation take about a weekend to complete and will leave your car looking awesome. Of course, we're not suggesting that you try to pass a non-SS car off as the real deal; however, if you're simply itching for the look, it's easy enough to obtain and, more importantly, it won't send you to the poorhouse.
Case in point: We took a clean '67 Malibu and ordered the items through Goodmark Industries and Original Parts Group and went to work. Most of the SS trim and grille parts arrived in kit form, while the new SS hood came primed with EDP (electro disposition primer). For the hood we needed to prep, prime, and color coat before installation. The trim installation required removing the old stuff and, in a few cases, filling and painting existing holes and then duplicating the original SS locations and drilling some additional holes. If you're not in a position to paint the hood yourself, most body shops will perform the task for less than $350.
The best part is that since this car is a Malibu and not an actual SS 396 Chevelle, there are no rules as to what's correct and what isn't. You can add all or just some of the parts. The only requirement is that you have fun doing it and enjoy the results.
Once we unpacked our Goodmark...
Once we unpacked our Goodmark SS hood, we wanted to check the seam fit and alignment before we started the paintwork. After we bolted the hood onto the hinges we made a few minor adjustments to make the hood fit squarely between the fenders with a 31/416-inch gap on all seams.
We also checked the levelness...
We also checked the levelness along the top of the fender lines and the cowl panel. This hood matched evenly on both planes.