Knob repro for 68 and early 69 seat belt retractors

davepl · Poncho Master!

Knob repro for 68 and early 69 seat belt retractors

68sd396rag · Poncho Master!

post a pic-as far I remember when I was buying seat belts from wrecking yards all over the place and it always seemed to me that they little plastic cinched knobs were on later years like 71/72-don't ever remember them on the 69 cars.Not saying they didn't make them-just never saw them.And I pulled hundreds of sets of seat belts.

North · Guru

Here is a pic of my 69 GP. It was a 69 only feature (until december 31st 68) of all GM A, B, G or C cars equipped with deluxe belts. 69 deluxe belts introduced self tightening lap belts for the driver and right front passenger. Twisting that little knob released the tensioner on the retractor so you could move without unbuckling the belt. On Jan 1st 69 GM announced they had discontinued the release feature (I believe the reason might have been regulatory) and the knob was removed from production.

2017-07-19 073.JPG

68sd396rag · Poncho Master!

Huh weird-I only ever found them in later cars-might be my brain fading though too LOL.Cool GP-69 with a passenger recliner-bet it had a power bucket drivers side too eh?

seventy2plus2 · Canadian Poncho Superstar!

The 69 2+2 I bought for the chassis had them, but was missing one knob. After checking numerous 69's at Flatla Auto Wrecking, I finally found a car that had them. It was a blue knob, which I painted black to match the set.

Being much more familiar with 1970 models, I'd never seen them before.

davepl · Poncho Master!

Ha! I'm going to have to buy a black repro and paint it blue to match the interior....

68sd396rag · Poncho Master!

I may have one or 2 hanging around-will look for you

seventy2plus2 · Canadian Poncho Superstar!

Lets just say the one I got was much less than $10. I might even have a second one around (still blue) as I think I grabbed both from the car.

North · Guru

68sd396rag wrote:
Huh weird-I only ever found them in later cars-might be my brain fading though too LOL.Cool GP-69 with a passenger recliner-bet it had a power bucket drivers side too eh?

That GP has 37 options (and thats counting the SJ option group as one item). Originally from Seattle, must of been some future Microsoft guy pre-spending money he hadn't made yet!

davepl · Poncho Master!

I'd always kind of assumed your two really high-option cars (the GP and the Brougham) would have been GM exec cars or factory demos or something like that. Do you know the story on either of how they came to be so loaded up?

68sd396rag · Poncho Master!

North wrote:
68sd396rag wrote:
Huh weird-I only ever found them in later cars-might be my brain fading though too LOL.Cool GP-69 with a passenger recliner-bet it had a power bucket drivers side too eh?
That GP has 37 options (and thats counting the SJ option group as one item). Originally from Seattle, must of been some future Microsoft guy pre-spending money he hadn't made yet!

LOL-Some GP's we found in wrecking yards over the years were all loaded up with options for sure.The dead give away is when you 'd find a 69/70 GP with the seat release button on the side of the seat-can you say"it's got a recliner" under your breath.9 times out of 10 if ya found a passenger recliner the driver side was a power bucket.I think Carl sold me set of buckets for my 68 SD rag that came out of a 70 GP in Fergus Falls Minnesota.Found the same car years later in the same yard and it gave up a pile of options to me that day-power locks,power windows,gauges,tilt steering,disc brakes,map light mirror,and I believe a power trunk.The buckets were black leather if I remember correctly.Sadly that wrecking yard is all crushed out.

North · Guru

Those 69-72 GPs must have made GM tons of money, they cost $700 more than a GTO base price for what was basically the same car and they probably had $1,000 more options on average than a GTO to.