Ghost Post wrote:

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Good one Ray!.

At least the hose moved over to the same side as the Pontiac has but the filler/cap is still in a different position?.

So is the first pic w/ the Chrome V-Cvrs. the '65 L78 396/425 and the Pass. side upper hose an easy way to tell?.

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I can't remember where I got that first one but I am pretty sureit is an L78 4 speed car.

I had an great uncle, Uncle Clayton, who worked at the radiator plant in Oshawa, so Canadian cars got rads made in town, that might explain the filler neck location. Uncle Clayton drove a maroon 66 Laurentian and he was always proud to say he made the radiator for it.


-- Edited by 73SC at 14:17, 2009-01-20

I didn't notice it the first time I looked at the blue 65 Parisienne with the 396, but the air cleaner looks the same as the ones on my 68 396/325 Caprice and my 69 396/265 Caprice.

Hi guys;
Last summer I was out in my 65 and got talking to a local guy i Know. He told me he brought a new 65 custom Sport 2 dr hardtop with a 396 in it when he was young. Next time i see hom i will ask some more questions.

The one thing I'm also seeing (I think) is besides the rad hose configuration, the CP 396/427's from 65?-to 68 (drivers side alternator) have a unique alternator bracket from the US BB's of that vintage.
That and the heat stove appears to be on the passenger side.

68'

 I think it's a 68' Ray.

 The light from the hood vents on the breather and the drivers side alt tell me it is.

 A 69' would have a passenger side alt.

 65-67 would have no hood vents.

Id like to relate a few things in this topic.

Back around 2001 or 2002 at the GM show in Oshawa I chatted with a guy that brought 2 big mid-60s Chevies to the show, both painted white. The first was a 66 Impala Sport Sedan built in Canada with 283 power (I dont remember for certain). The other car he brought was a U.S-built 65 Impala SS convertible with a 396/325 & a factory 4-speed. He seemed pretty knowledgeable. He told me that after the 409 was eventually dropped from the 65s, the 396 did not rush in to replace it. He said "no 396s in Canadian Chevies in 1965". He also has a friend who owns 1 of 12 Canadian-built 1968 Impala SS427 convertibles (I have seen this car numerous times since 1991). I do have a 1965 Canadian Pontiac brochure with the 409 listed (publish date 9/64). It also lists 3-speed manuals as being offered with the 409s. Those must have been the HD Warner 3-speeds, and from what I have gathered they didn't offer them at the start of production (brochures can carry mistakes).

The 396 / 325 would not have come with chrome dress-up on full-sized Chevies or Canadian Pontiacs, in fact not even the L78s in 1965 had chrome under the hood. It can be easily added, but it was not stock in 65. All passenger car 409s between 1963 - 1965 did come stock with chrome, no matter what horsepower rating.

An L78 would come with an unpainted aluminum intake manifold and a painted dual snorkel air cleaner. The L35 would have a painted cast iron intake and a painted single snorkel air cleaner.

The underhood shot of the blue car with the 396 looks like a 68 engine. Certainly the air cleaner with the Thermac flapper valve on the snorkel was not used before 68. Also pre-68 engines still used an open PCV system with an open breather cap on the valve cover. For 1968 the switched to a closed PCV system with rubber hoses to the air cleaner.

Concerning the differences in the radiators for Canadian cars, I found the original radiator different than what the purists call for on a 6-cylinder Chevelle (mine is a 6). For one thing mine is a center fill like a small-block V8, not the offset fill like the U.S sixes.

-- Edited by CdnGMfan at 22:58, 2009-02-21

Hi guys, thanks for the additional info.  I think the consensus here is that no 396's in 65 for Chev or Pontiac.  That being settled (unless somebody shows us a 65 with a correct and dated 396) my brother and I would really like to find out eventually if there are any other later 409 Pontiacs at all.  Judging from the production number for the 340 horse in the sporty Pontiacs of that year (like 74) there must have been even fewer 400 horse 409's and likely not very many at all in the regular Parisienne line except maybe for a few wagons.

So please keep you eyes open and let me know if you ever run across any. Lets face it, it would make for major bragging rights if we really had the last one so I am kind of hoping....

ken  

You know I never asked that exact question, just if they had put any 396's in.

It might certainly be worth another 57 bucks and end a lot of guessing!

Thanks for the push.

I'll keep you posted! I hope he's still working.


 

-- Edited by 66 Grande guy at 23:53, 2009-02-23

I find it interesting that Ken's '65 Parisienne Custom Sport 409 4-speed didn't come with Positraction. It's funny but that gold with black vinyl roof '69 2+2 427 4-speed in Selkirk that was for sale in the fall of 2007 also came without Positraction.

As for gearing, my '65 brochure lists 3.31:1 (12-bolt) as the only ratio offered from the 250-horse 327 up (except the 327 / Powerglide 250-horse version has a 3.07 12-bolt). Another curiosity is that Positraction is only listed as being offered on t he 12-bolt rears on optional engines (i.e. NOT the six or 283). It is an early printing so who knows if the unacknowledgment of Posi on the 10-bolt is a printing mistake.

Astro Jet wrote:

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My understanding is positraction, safe-t-track, or any anti-slip axle was always an option on every GM vehicle in the 60's and 70's, even the Corvette.  It was like any other option or feature, available, but at extra cost.  I think part of the philosophy back then was to make the starting price as low as possible for marketing reasons, and then leave it up to the sales personnel to get people to "trade up" to a more loaded vehicle.  Profit margins were always higher on individual options than they were on the vehicle itself.

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Hillar, I agree with everything you said above. I believed that during the golden years, GM offered limited slip on all RWD axles.
Dad used to buy Biscaynes with almost no options. He'd spend $5 for HD suspension and maybe a few more for a HD battery. No wonder he got diddly for trade in. Jeez, $90 spent on p/s would net you $100 more on trade-in. I can recall dad buying a Mazda B2000 long bed pickup in '86. He insisted on manual steering but the dealer only had p/s  on the lot. The dealer ate the labor  to convert it to manual steering.

Oh, to be able to special order a vehicle to your specs. I would drive something interesting for certain.

 

Not on topic but speaks to Hillar's post.......The last car I was able to order by checking the boxes was a 1992 Bonneville. The order was made in the fall of 1991. It was a company car and we got them from Addisons on Bay but we had a budget limit. I took the book home for a few days and studied the heck out of it. When we sat down to do the order a few things amazed the salesman as follows: I ordered a SE with the SSE's 3:08 axle ratio, dual exhausts outlets like the SSE (only ever saw two like that), ABS (optional) a driver enthusiast package with rear spolier delete that was a $219 credit, some other goodies he never knew about like a leather wrapped steering wheel, cargo package with net and tie downs, same gauges wheels and tires as SSE and a BLUE interior with grey exterior. I did not order a console. I think it is obvious what I was doing, trying to get the best performance for my budget.