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1968 Pontiac Firebird 428, 4 Speed, Factory Verdoro Green Car! on 2040-cars
Year:1968
Mileage:93000
Location:
Doylestown, Pennsylvania, United States
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I have up for sale my 1968 Pontiac Firebird coupe. This car started life as a factory Verdoro Green car with a factory white vinyl top and deluxe parchment interior. Originally this car was a 6 cyl Sprint with a 3 speed manual transmission. I purchased the car from a father and son who owned a body shop in Central New Jersey. The story I got from them is as follows: About 10 years ago, an older woman brought the car into their body shop because she had scraped up her passeneger 1/4 panel backing out of her garage. When they told her how difficult it would be to match up 30 year old paint she decided to sell the car rather than pay to have it repaired and then have it look incorrect. So the father and son team purchased the car from her and decided to restore it. The car received a brand new passenger 1/4 panel along with new floors. It was completely stripped of paint and repainted the factory color of Verdoro Green along with a new white vinyl top as original from GM. Along the way they swapped out the factory flat style hood for a "400" style hood. The only minor flaw in the entire body of the car is a slight bubble where the vinyl top meets the top of the passenger 1/4 panel. The previous owner told me that they were SO careful to not have an area where water would build up but apparently they missed this area. The bubble is smaller than a quarter and I make sure to keep the area clean and dry. It has not grown at all in the 2 years I've owned the car. The body of this car is in fantastic condition. After being painted it has ALWAYS been stored inside a garage and the paint looks great. Any and all rust was removed and replaced with fresh metal. New floors were put in along with a new passenger 1/4 panel. The frame rails were blasted clean and shot with a semi gloss black to look original. You will NOT find any rust on the undercarriage of this car. All the door gaps were lined up correctly and everything was re-installed before shooting the car with the factory color of Verdoro Green. I do still have a small 1/4 container of the mix they made. The car was painted with a base coat and then clear coat and it looks fantastic. The shine is very good and the Verdoro Green looks fantastic in a sea of red, black, and blue cars at a cruise night. The 6cyl motor was pulled and a correct for 1968 400 was installed along with a Muncie M-20 4 speed. The 400 was a stock 2 barrel 290 HP motor from a Bonneville. It was given a basic rebuild with a factory cam, and converted to 4bbl carburetor along with a factory cast iron intake. When I purchased the car a little over 2 years ago it had the stock 400, the Muncie M-20 and a 10 bolt open rear with 3:08 gears. The car ran fantastic and looked great but it wasn't anything special performance wise. Since it is strictly my weekend cruiser I wanted to bump up the performance of the 400 a little bit with a slightly hotter cam and a set of better flowing cylinder heads. So I pulled the 400 over the winter. I was going to do a cam swap along with a set of new heads but I figured it would be eaiser to pull the motor, swap out the cam and heads on my engine stand and also check out the bottom end and re-gasket the motor while I was working on it. Plus, if you've ever swapped a cam with the motor in the car you know it can be a pain. After I pulled the 400, I got wind of a local guy selling a newly rebuilt Pontiac 428. Swappng motors was NOT part of my original plan but when I got some more info on the 428 I figured why not. The story on the 428 is as follows: It's a 1969 Pontiac 428. It was built by Paul Spotts at Spotts Performance (Google them, they are an extremely well known Pontiac only machine shop here in PA). The motor was bored .030 over with new forged flat top pistons. The cylinder heads are later model 6X-4 heads which have been mildly ported to match the intake and the bowls were cleaned up as well. The heads have new stainless steel valves along with hardened valve seats. The 6X heads along with the flat top pistons yield a nice pump gas friendly 9.5:1 compression. I run 93 octane in this car and I have zero pinging. It has a set of Harland Sharpe roller rockers, double roller timing chain, hardened push rods and much more. The cam is a Comp Cams XE 284. It's an agressive cam with a nice healthy lope to it. Trust me when you pull into a cruise night or a show with this car it WILL turn heads with it's idle. I love the idle of this car. The intake is an Edelbrock Performer RPM and the car runs a Holley 750 double pumper carb with mechanical secondaries. When I dropped the new motor in I installed a set of Doug's ceramic coated headers that run back to a 2-1/2" Flowmaster exhaust system. The car sounds healthy at all ROM ranges. I was told that this motor was built to put out approximately 450 HP but I've never had it dyno'd. The car runs STRONG. What a difference from a stock 400 to a healthy 428. I've tuned the car to the best of my ability, the Holley carb hasn't been too friendly to me. It tends to run a little rich. I've played with the idle mixture screws to get max vacuum but I think it's possible that the carb may need to be re-jetted.I truly believe that an experienced engine tuner who knows Holley carbs well can really set this car up right and have it really nasty. When I installed the motor I installed all new parts at the important areas. The new motor has a brand new water pump with stainless steel divider plate, a new high flow fuel pump, new AC Delco plugs, new Accel wires, new belts and hoses, new 195 degree thermostat, brand new fuel filter, and a new cap and rotor. The rest of the drivetrain is outstanding. The transmission is a Muncie M-20 4 speed with a Hurst Competetion Plus shifter. When I installed the 428, I had the flywheel resurfaced and I installed a brand new Zoom clutch along with a roller pilot bearing. The original 10 bolt open rear end with 3:08 gears was replaced with an 8.5 rear from a 77 Trans Am. The rear had the spring mounts moved slightly inward to fit the first generation springs. The new rear has an Eaton posi unit and a set of 3:73 gears. The 428 is a great motor for a 4 speed because of it's stroke. With the 4 speed and 3:73 gears this car is an absolute blast to drive. While the car was being restored there were a lot of nice upgrades made. For starters the car received brand new rear multi leaf springs, new KYB shocks at all 4 corners and also a larger front sway bar with poly urethane bushings. The front brakes were upgraded to power disc, and when I installed the new rear I did all new shoes, spring kits, and 2 brand new wheel cylinders. This car is tight. It turns well, tracks straight and stops on a dime. I've also made several other creature comfort upgrades. When the previous owner re-did the body, he did away with the antenna in the body. He said he liked a smooth car. So I have installed an aftermarket stereo system which has an Ipod hook up that runs into the glove box. From the outside it looks like a correct for 68 stereo but it plays music from my Ipod. I've also wired in an aftermarket electrc fan in fron of the new aluminum radiator. It's covered up where you can't see it and the fan comes on at 200 degrees and goes off at 185. It's nice if you're sitting in traffic or waiting in line at a car show and the temp starts creeping up. It also has a set of period correct 15" American Racing Torque Thrust wheels along with new Cooper Cobra tires. The tires barely have 500 miles on them. Overall this is a super solid clean 68 Firebird. It gets a LOT of attention at cruise nights and car shows because it sounds great and looks fantastic. It runs strong but as I said I think a good Holley tuning guy could get more out of it than I have. It needs NOTHING. Turn the key and cruise. I'm including 2 video's I shot of the car and I also have a lot of additional pictures of the car, the undercarriage, the motor swap, ect. Also I friend of mine lives a mile from me and has a lift in his garage. I will be more than willing to show the car on a lift or put it on the lift to take additional pictures upon request. This is a nice clean turn key Musclecar. It rides great and looks fantastic. Other than some fine tuning this car needs NOTHING. I have set a fair reserve. I am not giving it way but I am also not one of those idiots who watches Barret-Jackson and thinks my car is worth a mint. Please feel free to ask any additional questions and good luck bidding. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDGrbtGeKgY&feature=youtu.be https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AH0j9-ds7Ko
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Pontiac and McLaren once hooked up, and it was rad
Fri, Jun 24 2022Most of us would bend over backwards to have a chance to own a McLaren car, but few can afford such extravagance. That said, there’s a way you can get behind the wheel of a legitimate McLaren without breaking the bank. For 1989 and 1990, the Pontiac Grand Prix was offered in a limited-edition ASC-McLaren variant that featured tuning and updates from the iconic British automaker. Examples of this rare coupe rarely surface for sale, so itÂ’s surprising to see this low-mile 1990 Pontiac Grand Prix ASC-McLaren on eBay. The car is the result of a partnership between American Specialty Cars-McLaren (ASC-McLaren) and Pontiac. WeÂ’re not talking about the McLaren Formula 1 team or even the iconic McLaren road cars here. The McLaren connection comes from an arm of the automakerÂ’s powertrain engineering department. The Grand PrixÂ’s standard 3,1-liter V6 got a massage and a turbocharger, adding 65 horsepower for a total of 205 ponies and 225 pound-feet of torque. A four-speed automatic transmission sends power to the front wheels. That output is modest by todayÂ’s standards, and it wasnÂ’t outrageous even by 1990 standards, but the car returned a decent 0-60 mph time of around 7 seconds. The $5,000 ASC-McLaren package added a load of cool 1980s tech to the Grand PrixÂ’s interior, some of which is surprisingly advanced for the time. The car got a head-up display and a digital display on the dash. The steering wheel should be delightfully familiar to anyone who remembers a top-end Pontiac of the era, with the entire center of the wheel filled with buttons instead of the airbags we see today. The car had insanely padded bucket seats front and rear(!) with a distinctive pear shape. Many sources peg production numbers between 2,500 and 3,500 units, so the car is relatively rare compared to its mass-produced Pontiac counterparts. This oneÂ’s got just 17,746 miles on the clock, too, and appears to be in excellent condition. ItÂ’s had just two owners and no reported accidents. The seller notes a little surface rust from the car being in storage so long. This era of GM cars tended to deteriorate quickly, so a bit of surface rust shouldnÂ’t be a huge issue. Related video: This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings.
Junkyard Gem: 1992 Pontiac Firebird
Mon, Dec 18 2023Last spring, this series featured a 1992 Chevrolet Camaro RS in a Northern California junkyard, an example of the final model year for the highly successful third-generation GM F-Body. On a later visit to that yard, I spotted the Pontiac sibling to that car, a Firebird that was born the same year at the same Southern California factory. When the Chevrolet Division introduced the first Camaro as a 1967 model, the Pontiac Division got its own version of the F-Body called the Firebird. While the two cars were built on the same chassis and looked very similar, the first-generation Camaros got Chevrolet engines while their Firebird colleagues got Pontiac engines (including the innovative SOHC straight-six). The 1970-1981 second-generation Firebirds still had some Pontiac-only engines, but Chevrolet and Oldsmobile power crept under some hoods during that period. The third-generation Firebirds first appeared as 1982 models, and they drew from near-identical stockpiles of GM running gear (including the distinctly agricultural Iron Duke four-banger, which could be considered a Pontiac-derived engine). When the Camaro got the axe after 2002, the Firebird's neck was put on the same chopping block. When the Camaro returned for 2010, the Pontiac brand was sputtering to an agonized halt during its final year and there was no chance of the Firebird's return. This car is a fairly ordinary coupe, though it does have the mid-grade 205-horsepower 5.0-liter Chevrolet small-block V8 instead of the base 140-horse 3.1-liter V6. A 5.7-liter small-block was available as well. A five-speed manual transmission was base equipment, but few Americans wanted a three-pedal setup by the early 1990s. This car has the optional four-speed automatic. The MSRP with 5.0 engine, automatic transmission and air conditioning (which this car has) started at $14,304. That's about $31,868 in 2023 dollars. It was built at Van Nuys Assembly in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles County. By the dawn of the 1990s, the Camaros and Firebirds made at Van Nuys Assembly had become known as the worst-built GM cars made in North America, and the plant was shut down forever soon after this car was built. Today, a shopping mall lives where the factory once stood. This car managed to drive more than 150,000 miles during its life, so it beat the odds. The thrid-gen F-Body was pretty antiquated by the early 1990s, but the fourth-gen cars handled better and looked up-to-date for the era.
GM doing fine at retaining Pontiac owners
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The numbers are a little lower than an earlier R.L. Polk & Company study, but Edmunds says General Motors is keeping more former Pontiac buyers than it has since 2007. Most are turning to vehicles from Chevrolet, especially during January and February of 2011, when GM incentivized Pontiac owners to stay under the umbrella. Those moves seem to have worked, and 28.1 percent of Pontiac owners trading up made the jump into a Bowtie.
Buyers that have gone elsewhere have largely stayed loyal to Domestic automakers, with Ford picking up the most conquests from Pontiac, with 9.4 percent switching. Toyota and Honda picked up 7.4 percent of the pool of former Pontiac drivers. The numbers are defying any predictions that Pontiac buyers would completely exit the General Motors fold, and have climbed up closer to parity with the retention figures of other GM brands from a 2009 low of only 16 percent retention.