This car caused a stir at Carlise I understand, it's sporting Ontario plates. Pretty rare one, long window GTO with Ram Air and 4 speed with Formula X grille treatment. Anyone know the owner? I have it on good authority he lives somewhere between Toronto and Ottawa.
My first thought was that the ram air system was homemade - well done though. Is this a production unit?
Also, those grilles weren't an available option, were they? To me it looks like somebody decided to build what would be the ultimate '73 GTO, and did a good job of it.
-- Edited by MC on Tuesday 15th of July 2014 10:19:17 AM
There is a long story to Ram Air on these cars. The one pictured looks identical to the over the counter factory offered setup. Only 9 or 10 were ever sold. I do have it on good authority that this person fabricated this unit from factory diagrams and units. The hoods are also rare but do come up now and then on ebay and what not. The front end treatment borrows from the Formula X concept cars, photos of which have only surfaced in the past two years or so.
-- Edited by 73SC on Tuesday 15th of July 2014 02:39:32 PM
The ram air and grille are not regular production items. What makes this car interesting is the long window and 4 speed. 4 speed was only available on 400 V8 cars 455 was Bonneville engine with THM 400. It will be interesting to know if this is an Oshawa car because the numbers on the long window GTO are really low add in 4 speed and this is likely a less than 10 made car, if Canadian. Remember, 3 speed heavy duty trans was standard GTO offering.
Very interesting car. I have not seen it before. As Big Bear said, there is a good feature article on this car in the latest HPP written by Don Keefe. Pretty much a homemade Ram Air system copied from the factory documentation.
I did see a complete system on a GTO some years ago from an owner in Minnesota who worked for a GM dealer, bought a '73 new, and found all the parts through the GM parts network. I was invited to his house to see it when I met him at the GTO Nationals in Minneapolis back in 1990. I have a bunch of photos of his car somewhere in an album at home.
I did manage to buy a hood at Norwalk a few years back that had the honeycomb screens in the back of the scoops instead of the plastic honeycomb closeout plates. The seller told me some guy bought the sheetmetal pan and foam that was bolted to the bottom of the hood a few hours before I saw the hood. I almost choked when he told me that. What a score that would have been to find a complete functional '73 Ram Air hood.
So far I have counted four SD455 GTO's. Silver (formerly Imran's), the white 'Formula X' one, the black one that's been around for decades, and the one below.
I think each of these cars takes a few liberties with "correctness". For instance, Imran's car has a Super T-10, not a Muncie. The orange one has a 455SD decal on the air cleaner, which the original prototypes didn't have.
It's interesting to see the more recent enthusiasm for a car that was never in production... I would love to see someone build a factory-style 1973 SD455 Grand Prix. Now that would be REALLY different. I can't believe Pontiac planned on producing those at one point.
-- Edited by Bob F on Tuesday 7th of October 2014 01:30:30 PM
I have one that was never produced, I'd like to see more Canadian Pontiac LeMans with BBC power like mine, the way GM Canada should have built them in the first place.
I have seen an early sales brochure only once and I should have bought it with Grand Prix with NASA hood and SD option. Kicking myself !
Absolutely! By the way, I had forgotten that besides the Firebird/TA, GTO and Grand Prix, the Grand Am was also supposed to get the SD455 option for 1973.
Here's an old website page documenting a one-of-none SD455 Grand Am:
"This car was ordered from the factory with an SD-455 engine, but was delivered with a 400-4 speed. The original owner replaced the motor when the car was new with an SD-455."
That's a beauty for sure. There is also an early promo photo of what we know as a 73 Grand Am SD Ram Air car badged as GTO. I think it is well know that the GTO based on te Grand Am styling was a last minute Cancellation and relegated to option status on the LeMans. We'll have to dig that one up for posting.
