My experience too Mike, although I had a GM 63 6-CYL Chev II that was one tough car that was quite economical on fuel. I sold it at 95k miles still with the original brakes, clutch and as delivered engine. It did need a new clutch and brakes badly when I traded it in. The dealer noticed that and complained, I responded "what did you expect at 95k miles on the original parts". I towed a 1,500 lb trailer for about 15k of those miles, including across Canada and in the western mountains.
However it was a crude car in comparison to the cars since the mid 80s. Brakes that pulled severely to the side when water splashed on a front wheel, a 3-spd stick shift with no syncro on 1-st gear, no front sway bar to stop front leaning on corners, too small terribly weak Firestone tires that were failing at 10k miles, rubber front suspension bushings that created a spongy steering feel and one even had to be replaced as it was poorly installed and pulled the car to one side after a turn and even a trunk body seam leak. It also had poorly manufactured overhead valve rockers; three times I had to have a few replaced when they started squeaking, finally GM produced a newer design and all were replaced finally fixing the problem for good. GM's warranty costs on my Chev II must have assured them a loss on my car.
I immediately added a sway bar from the sporty model, soon replaced the tires with a better tire of more reasonable size, and replaced the front steering bushings with much more acceptable ones from Sears. The handling went from poor to quite acceptable, but after 8 years I replaced it with a much better built smaller car Datsun (Nissan), which even it had a few initial problems including a rear engine bearing seal failure at 2k miles that the dealer tried to pass off until oil on the clutch caused it to slip. GM in their wisdom of the time had made the Chev II of later years larger, instead of better, else I would have continued with GM. Chrysler left me in the cold by replacing my '95 Concord with the much heavier 300. I'm relieved that the move to smaller cars is now forcing them to rethink what they manufacture.