WEST WARWICK Uncle Bob’s Self Storage is what it is — long rows of unprepossessing storage units. But when Alyssa Migneault rolls up the door to her unit, takes the cover off her 1987 Chevy Camaro IROC Z/28 and fires it up, it suddenly seems a lot more lively.

Indeed, the 3-inch exhaust provides a rumbling roar that more than does justice to the 277 horses under the fire metal red hood.

Migneault, 23, who works as a service adviser at Balise Auto in Warwick, has always loved cars — her father is a dedicated MOPAR man — so she grew up going to car shows — and she loves nothing more than getting her Camaro out for the summer.

“Nothing better than a Sunday wash and then a drive and a car show,” she said in a recent interview at the storage facility where she keeps the car all winter. “I’ve always loved this car, always, always, always.”

The Camaro IROC-Z model — from the third generation of the iconic car that debuted in 1967 — was introduced in 1985 and named after the International Race of Champions.

Migneault said she only drives it in the summer and then only in good weather. “It’s never seen rain or snow, only sunny days,” she said, adding that she never drives it to the market or to the mall, “or anything like that.”“The main point is getting from A to B,” she said. “It’s just the fun of getting there.”

Otherwise, she drives her 1998 Jeep Grand Cherokee, which she regards as her main car. Her license plate for the Camaro reads AMIG 1; for the Jeep AMIG 2.

Migneault, who was dressed in a Camaro jacket that she said was a Christmas present from her mother, bought her Camaro in 2002 for $3,000 cash when she was 17 and just out of high school.

“It was stored in the back of the garage and had 60,000 original miles on it,” she said. “[The seller] had bought it brand new but hadn’t used it much. But his son had driven it for a while and had “beaten the hell out of it.”

She said the owner “could not get it running but I changed the battery and it started up and it limped back to my house.”

She said she drove the beat-up 305 engine for 20,000 miles for three years while she was studying to be a massage therapist at the Community College of Rhode Island and also working in the reconditioning shop at Tarbox Toyota in North Kingstown. She said she had already taken vocational courses in automotive technology in high school.

But in 2005, it began to fall apart. Together with a friend she dropped the oil pan to replace the gasket and a piece of a piston dropped out; she knew it was time to get a new engine.

“That was when I knew I was literally blowing up my engine as I was driving it,” she said.

In 2006, she replaced the 305 with a GM 350 crate engine and then took it to SD Concept Engineering on Daisy Street in Warwick, which has entirely rebuilt the engine including reboring it and adding a bigger camshaft and stronger pistons.

“The engine is entirely new. It’s got about 350 miles on it,” she said, explaining that while the block is the 350 she put in, everything else is new.

She has also replaced the transmission, had the car painted, the rims sandblasted and painted the original gold and added a B&M shifter, a Grand GT steering wheel, a CD player and racing seat belts.

And if there be any doubt about the gender of the owner, she has a decal on the rear window that reads: “Not all women are passengers.”

Overall, Migneault said she has spent about $15,000 on the car over the last six years.

In addition to driving up to the New England Summer Nationals at Green Hill Park, Worcester, on the July 4th weekend, which she does every year, Migneault said she wants to take her car up to the dragway at the New Hampshire Motor Speedway in Epping, N.H.

“I have an itch to see how fast it goes,” she said.

For more information, check out www.camaroz28.com.

Auto Biography is an occasional feature that tells an interesting story about a car and its driver. If you think you have a newsworthy story to tell about your car, write to Auto Biography, Features Department, The Providence Journal, 75 Fountain St., Providence, RI 02902, or e-mail projocars@projo.com. Be sure to put “Auto Biography” in the subject field.

The car doesn’t have to be a classic or expensive, but it should be somehow unique. The driver must be willing to be interviewed by a reporter about what makes this car special and to be photographed with the car.

pelsworth@projo.com