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Post Info TOPIC: An interesting Hemmings article on Pontiac s


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An interesting Hemmings article on Pontiac s


Check out the following link for a story about an experimental car along with an number of Ponchos for sale 

Today we learned: The Fiero wasn't Pontiac's first mid-engine car

https://www.hemmings.com/blog/2019/11/14/today-we-learned-the-fiero-wasnt-pontiacs-first-mid-engine-car/?refer=news&utm_source=edaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2019-11-14

For your morning read.

Cliff



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Cliff

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Like the larger type for my eyes. 

 

 

MC


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Very cool, with an unusual engine choice.

Pontiac 2 stroke X4.jpeg



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We should all thank the old car Gods, that this germ was never made. 



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1957 Pontiac Pathfinder Deluxe sedan restored 261 six

1974 Chevrolet Caprice Estate wagon low mileage original 400 V-8

MC


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long stroke wrote:

We should all thank the old car Gods, that this germ was never made. 


 I can't really agree, George.  Companies learn the most when they try to innovate, and they would have learned a lot by producing this car, though it could have been a sales flop (or it might have developed a cult following like Corvair).  I imagine, with this layout, they could have engineered a small sports car that handled really well, likely better than its European contemporaries in fact.  The chassis layout combined with an air-cooled two-stroke powerplant would have made it a solid candidate for gaining engineering knowledge and might have given GM a leg up on the Japanese competition that was about to flood our shores.  Instead they came out with the Vega, which unfortunately damaged their reputation for decades (and reinforced the mindset that American companies couldn't build a good small car).

Just think of the possibilities...

 



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MC wrote:
long stroke wrote:

We should all thank the old car Gods, that this germ was never made. 


 I can't really agree, George.  Companies learn the most when they try to innovate, and they would have learned a lot by producing this car, though it could have been a sales flop (or it might have developed a cult following like Corvair).  I imagine, with this layout, they could have engineered a small sports car that handled really well, likely better than its European contemporaries in fact.  The chassis layout combined with an air-cooled two-stroke powerplant would have made it a solid candidate for gaining engineering knowledge and might have given GM a leg up on the Japanese competition that was about to flood our shores.  Instead they came out with the Vega, which unfortunately damaged their reputation for decades (and reinforced the mindset that American companies couldn't build a good small car).

Just think of the possibilities...

 


 Pontiac was too great a car company to come out with this junk. biggrin



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1957 Pontiac Pathfinder Deluxe sedan restored 261 six

1974 Chevrolet Caprice Estate wagon low mileage original 400 V-8

MC


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Perhaps they should have invented a throw-away brand to try new stuff... Saturn?



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The Vega was not a bad car for the time, it just had a very poorly engineered engine. This 2 stroke was competitive wth a Treblant, which aint saying much.

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63 Parisienne sport coupe (The Big GTO), black, maroon interior, 409 4 speed; former owner of a 59 El Camino, 63 Corvette SWC, 62 Chev Bel Air SC.
1963- Pontiac top selling car in Canada

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MC


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Thanks for setting me straight. I had no idea.

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DonSSDD wrote:

This 2 stroke was competitive with a Treblant, which ain't saying much.


 Yep, although Trebants got very trendy with the fall of the Berlin Wall and the band U2.



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MC


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OK, let's be serious here for a second.  Trebants were a product of communist East Germany, all built virtually the same from 1957 to 1990.  They were very basic cars (no tachometer, no indicator for either the headlights or turn signals, no fuel gauge, no rear seat belts, and no external fuel door, and drivers had to pour a mix of gasoline and oil directly under the bonnet/hood) and were basically communist-government controlled:

"Being that its manufacturer was a state monopoly, it took ten years to acquire a Trabant.[10] East German buyers were placed on a waiting-list of up to thirteen years.[11] The waiting time depended on their proximity to Berlin, the capital.[6] Official state price was 7,450 GDR marks and the demand to production ratio was forty three to one (1989). The free market price for a second-hand one was more than twice the price of a new one, and the average worker had to wait ten to thirteen years on a waiting list, or, if available, pay more than double for a second hand model."

"The Trabant's build quality was poor,[13] reliability was terrible,[10] closer inspection revealed "patchy assembly quality",[14] with an atrocious maintenance record.[11] According to automotive journalist Doug DeMuro, the Trabant was loud, slow, poorly designed, and badly built.[3]"

All above info from Wikipedia.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trabant

To compare a GM concept car to a product of a post WW2 communist nation just because it happened to have a 2-stroke engine is not a reasonable comparison, IMHO.  (I was going to say a strawman argument, but thought that might be too harsh).

FWIW, 2 stroke engines have their pluses and minuses, but their two of their pluses are lighter weight and more torque at higher rpm, a configuration which would be desirable in a sports car.  Alas, among their minuses would be having to mix fuel and oil and the smoke resulting from the burning oil. 

If the car had made it to production, the 2 stroke engine probably would have been dropped in favour of a 4-stroke, and who knows what else it would have been watered down to once GM management and bean counters got their hands on it.  Maybe it would have been a chance to perfect the Vega aluminum engine before the Vega (since obviously they did not test it sufficiently before putting it into production).

Regardless, that's all I'm going to post on this subject.  Thanks Cliff for bringing it to our attention.  I at least thought it was a cool part of Pontiac history...



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Just a bit of humour about the Trabant MC, the only 2 stroke car I could think of and its a bit of a stretch to call it a car.
I love 2 strokes like the etecs by BRP, we have 2 in our marine rescue boat. Low end torque like a V8 or a turbo 4 stroke and exceptional on fuel. They are the only 2 stroke that meet current California emissions and 4 stroke outboards are like overhead cam motors, gotta rev them to 3500 to find any torque or hp.

If gm had put an etec in that thing, or the Vega, they may have sold a ton. The wife owned a Vega when I met her, she says that was why I dated her!! 45 years later, the Vega is long gone, but were still ticking.

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63 Parisienne sport coupe (The Big GTO), black, maroon interior, 409 4 speed; former owner of a 59 El Camino, 63 Corvette SWC, 62 Chev Bel Air SC.
1963- Pontiac top selling car in Canada

Mahone Bay, NS Still not old enough to need an automatic



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maxresdefault.jpg

U2_Zoo_TV_Tour_Trabant_in_Hard_Rock_Cafe_in_Dublin_(5466177224).jpg



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Prince Edward Island

'64 Parisienne CS "barn find" - last on the road in '86 ... Owner Protection Plan booklet, original paint, original near-mint aqua interior, original aqua GM floor mats, original 283, factory posi, and original rust.



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DonSSDD wrote:

Just a bit of humour about the Trabant MC, the only 2 stroke car I could think of and its a bit of a stretch to call it a car.
I love 2 strokes like the etecs by BRP, we have 2 in our marine rescue boat. Low end torque like a V8 or a turbo 4 stroke and exceptional on fuel. They are the only 2 stroke that meet current California emissions and 4 stroke outboards are like overhead cam motors, gotta rev them to 3500 to find any torque or hp. 


 When I was about 15 working at the gas pumps a guy pulled up in some foreign car I didn't recognize and shut it off before I got outside. I ran out to the pumps and he said "Wait a minute." He poured a measured amount of something from a jug into the gas tank, then said "Give me 5 gallons please." I was so curious I had to ask. Yup, it was a 2 stroke, a Saab. I couldn't help but laugh when he started up to drive away.



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MC


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DonSSDD wrote:

Just a bit of humour about the Trabant MC, the only 2 stroke car I could think of and its a bit of a stretch to call it a car.
I love 2 strokes like the etecs by BRP, we have 2 in our marine rescue boat. Low end torque like a V8 or a turbo 4 stroke and exceptional on fuel. They are the only 2 stroke that meet current California emissions and 4 stroke outboards are like overhead cam motors, gotta rev them to 3500 to find any torque or hp.

If gm had put an etec in that thing, or the Vega, they may have sold a ton. The wife owned a Vega when I met her, she says that was why I dated her!! 45 years later, the Vega is long gone, but were still ticking.


 Sorry I misinterpreted.  I thought you were way more well-informed than that.

I suspect the reason that 2-strokes never caught on much in cars is the requirement to mix oil and gas, and the resultant pollutants from burning the oil.  Mind you on some of the 2 stroke motorcycles I had experience with years ago, the oil was added to a separate reservoir and mixed automatically with the fuel.  Still, forget to fill the oil reservoir and bad things happen.  At the time that GM was playing with this concept, pollution laws were just starting to trickle down from the US government, so I'm sure the writing was on the wall.  Much easier to control emissions on a 4-stroke than a 2-stroke, though I'm sure it could be done to a high degree now - but now we're looking towards electrification, not different methods of burning petroleum products.

Still, you have to admire the imagination of the GM engineers at the time for even considering putting a radial 4 cylinder, two stroke, air cooled engine mounted amidships in a car.  Contrary to George's beliefs, this concept was brilliant.  Who knows what ideas trickled down to other cars as a result of this research - that's the way it works in the auto industry... an idea may seem crazy but the lessons learned from brainstorming, building, testing, and more brainstorming are the meat and potatoes of automotive engineering.



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Kinda like a wankel, an invention that booted around a long time until Mazda got into it seriously? I drove in a Mazda wankel wagon in 74, we hit about 130 mph. If they ever figured out premature engine wear, oil consumption, fuel consumption, and I think emissions, they had a ton of potential.
I had a 71 kawi 500 2 stroke back in 72, it was wicked fast and very smoky and had a separate oil tank. It got about 35 mpg on a good day. It would pass everything but a gas station. And I lived to tell about it.
Im only well informed mechanically on 59-64 x frames. My memory is very selective and inaccurate.

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63 Parisienne sport coupe (The Big GTO), black, maroon interior, 409 4 speed; former owner of a 59 El Camino, 63 Corvette SWC, 62 Chev Bel Air SC.
1963- Pontiac top selling car in Canada

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MC


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Ha ha... everybody's memory is selective and inaccurate.  At times, mine seems to be nonexistent!

I heard about those Mazda Wankels - the RX-3?  Never had any experience with them though.  I do recall that Chevy tossed around the idea of putting one in the Corvette in the 1970s though, and what I didn't know was that they had originally planned to put one in the Vega (to bring the conversation full circle).  It's discussed in this article:  https://www.automobilemag.com/news/1973-four-rotor-corvette-prototype-mid-engine-chevrolet-corvette-history/

I also recall seeing a Wankel-powered Suzuki motorcycle at Atlantic Motorsport Park back in the 1980s... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=natnFOAwIRk

The Kawi 500 triple 2-strokes (the H1?) had quite a reputation around here as death machines - apparently lots of power but the handling wasn't so great.  Glad you survived it!  A buddy had a later KH400 back in the day - you could hear him coming for miles...



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