I found this one in southern Ontario and viewed it today, 1967 Beaumont Sport Deluxe 396 73817 V.I.N. #'s match 396/325 and a 400 turbo, was Bolero Red with black interior, has the 1970's flip flop purple and beautiful velour/diamond tufted interior ! The car had door skins, quarters and fenders installed back in the early 1980's-the owner still has the quarter panel louvers, Sport deluxe emblems, rocker moldings and front fender emblems-should I buy-should I wait-decisions/decisions
I guess it all comes down to the asking price. You're pretty damn good with the numbers Ken, so I suspect you know deep down if you should pull the trigger... Todd
Its a 73817 V.I.N. so I knew it was a 396 car, George faxed me the documents the engine number matches the block, its a bolero red with black interior 396/325, 400 turbo, buckets/console,PS,PB car-the owner has had it since 1976, its pretty tough but real, no dollar deal here but yes getting to be a rare find-I will do something shortly-I thought the interior was quite the time capsule also
George has suggested to me that the 738 V.I.N. sequence started sometime between late Dec 1966 and early jan 1967. A 736 V.I.N. Sport Deluxe could be had in the first half of production with big or small block but the only big block would be an L-34 and an option usually stamped on the cowl tag. The 738 V.I.N in the later half of the year is a big block 396/325 hp base model with the optional L34 available which would be stamped on the cowl tag.
Nothing is carved in stone !
George has told me that in the early years of documenting he used A51 as his base to call a car sport deluxe and actually admits to wrongly documenting at least one small block 736 V.I.N. as a Sport Deluxe, the Sport deluxe was a trim package option-R.P.O. # anyone ? first half of the year ??? George can't answer that.
Ken
P.S. I'll delete this also if I am rightfully corrected
It would be interesting if there was a BBC 736 sports optioned car (SD)...i've never heard of one existing but then again, also never heard of a 6cyl 1967 SD car, who knows what was out there! they are all quite rare! Dave do you have documentation supporting these engines? Also do you know if the number of SD cars in 1967 (451?) included the 736 SDs? and also how many were 736 SD cars? do you think there were more or less than the 738 cars? I think its pretty equal??
A51 was the buckets/console option right? I dont think there was a seperate RPO code for the 736 SD's...unless there were no buckets/console customs made until the 738 sequence started which would then make sense that A51 in the early days was the SD option... did i confuse anyone? i think i confused myself!hahaha!
one real way to know is that if you have 736 car with no holes for any custom chrome lurking under the paint you definitely had an SD car! both of my 736 SD cars had original paint on them when i bought them...mine is still all original sheet metal...
George has suggested to me that the 738 V.I.N. sequence started sometime between late Dec 1966 and early jan 1967. A 736 V.I.N. Sport Deluxe could be had in the first half of production with big or small block but the only big block would be an L-34 and an option usually stamped on the cowl tag. The 738 V.I.N in the later half of the year is a big block 396/325 hp base model with the optional L34 available which would be stamped on the cowl tag.
Nothing is carved in stone !
George has told me that in the early years of documenting he used A51 as his base to call a car sport deluxe and actually admits to wrongly documenting at least one small block 736 V.I.N. as a Sport Deluxe, the Sport deluxe was a trim package option-R.P.O. # anyone ? first half of the year ??? George can't answer that.
Ken
P.S. I'll delete this also if I am rightfully corrected
If I understand you right, then the scanned page in the Beaumont registry thread on this forum proves it had to happen before Dec 16th. On that scanned page, there is a pair of 738 big block cars made back to back on that day (well, back to back serial numbers anyway).
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1966 Strato Chief 2 door, 427 4 speed, 45,000 original miles
1966 Grande Parisienne, 396 1 of 23 factory air cars
Yes, Shawn Heffernan owns a GM documented 1967 SD396 Beaumont L34 optioned 73667 V.I.N. convertible-one of 602 73667 cars , the number produced is for model # being convertible-not suggesting big block or sport deluxe. A51 is the bucket seats, D55 is the console but both of these could be had with a beaumont custom. You could not order according to GM paperwork a Big Block without the sport deluxe package. 451 produced would be 73817 car being a sport deluxe hardtop.
I suspect the convertible posted in N.S. is also a 736 v.i.n. rag seeing it has no big block hood which is the way early cars would have been (66 also)-check the cowl tag on 736 vin cars for L34 bingo its a BB, M40 may be a hint also seeing few small blocks got the 400 turbo
I had an early 736 v.i.n. hardtop with buckets and console that was not a sport deluxe.
Give me a guess of the asking price before I can release it ! The car runs and drives and was plated as recent as two years ago but has obviously not been the toy or maintained since the 1980's will need complete restoration, usual trunk floor patches, body panels have been changed etc...
Interesting, i've never seen a BBC beaumont with a flat hood! and a BBC SD Convertible! very cool! again, not surprisingly that i havent seen them since they are all rare cars and i've only been into the cars in one city for maybe 20 years now...not when they were new!
I'm going to guess between $7-9k, wouldn't be surprised to hear it was as high as $13k though in this market... i may be really out to lunch on prices, and if its true that canadian cars are getting a bit more attention in the american market, then that would put the car in the top end of the scale i'm guessing... but generally the canadian cars, although rarer and documented sell for less than the same relative american car, imo...
anyone have an idea of production numbers for 736 vin SD cars??