Attack of the Clones

[epriv]

So I have been watching a lot of Mecum auctions lately that I had saved to the DVR. It's amazing the number of clones that come across the block. The majority seen to be stock late 60's Mustangs that have been turned into GT-350's as well as assorted Chevys, Pontiacs ,Mopars etc. that have new engines dropped in and SS or GTO badging added. (very few Buicks being sold and even less Rivieras). These cars are not misrepresented as being the real thing, just being called clones or replicas. Nothing wrong with that, it's your car and you can do with it as you like, but I pose the following hypothetical question for opinions sake:

Say for instance, I restore a stock 1968 Pontiac LeMans back to original factory correct and my friend takes a similar LeMans, does GTO upgrades by adding a 400CI and factory GTO badging and whatever else was available in a GTO package, and does not try and pass it off as the real thing.

Who's car would you rather have? Whose car in your opinion is worth more?

 

Mitch

[JZRIV]

One reason you are seeing so many clones is because there is a whole bunch of car enthusiasts out there who want to buy one. They have little interest in authenticity and just want a cool looking, good driving car they can have fun in without breaking the bank. With the real deal costing sometimes 10s of thousands more, a nicely done clone doesn't look so bad and is more practical to drive really.

As far as answering your question above. Hard to say. All things being equal an seeing what some clones sell for, maybe the clone has the edge in value. LeMans means nothing to some people. They might not even know Pontiac made it. but say GTO and everyone knows.

[Chimera]

Its a trick question, I know.

 

Not a Riviera...Not interested!

 

 

[Seafoam65]

                        I am probably this forum's clone expert as I have owned one for 45 years. When I was in college at the University

of Texas I wanted a GTO convertible to replace the  64 Ford Falcon Futura I was driving that I inherited from my Aunt when I

was in high school. Since the school colors at UT  were orange black and white, I naturally gravitated to wanting an orange

GTO Judge convertible. I searched for many months to find one to no avail. I had no idea back then how rare they were, with

only 108 Judge convertibles built, only about 20 of them painted orange and only 29 GTO Judge convertibles built with A/C in

1969, a necessity in Texas. After giving up on my search (they weren't in Hemmings back then and there was no internet) I decided

to build my own. I found a 1969 GTO convertible in crystal turquoise with lots of options like A/C, automatic transmission, hideaway

headlights, sport wood wheel etc. and bought it in the summer of 1971. It took me a while to save up for the conversion to a Judge

as my savings were depleted buying the car for 2,000.00. I did the conversion myself with all the correct Judge parts including

the ram air engine, spoiler, Judge decals and a repaint in the correct orange color. From 1974 until  1980 it was my Judge clone daily

driver, the only car I owned. In 1980 I parked the car in the garage and did  a quick restoration on it and drove it as a second car

on  weekends when it wasn't raining, having purchased a new Chevy Blazer to drive to work. Back then it was just a used car and nobody asked me if it was a real Judge and nobody cared. During the 80's, the first muscle car boom started and people were starting to show them at Autorama car shows, and in 1988 I decided to make the car a full blown show car, so I tore it completely down to the last nut and bolt and restored it using all the NOS parts I had acquired back in the 70's as spares for the car. In 1985

I had joined the Pontiac-Oakland Club after purchasing a mint condition 1979 Bandit Trans Am, so I decided to make the inaugural

showing of my restored GTO the 1990 POCI national convention in Kansas City. I was really excited about driving it up there as

the car had been off the road for several years while I was doing the restoration to show standards. When I arrived at the tech line

for the car show I explained to the head judge that my car was a clone and not a factory Judge convertible. they decided to put

me in the stock Judge class, as my car had no mods and it looked and smelled like the real thing. All week other people with real

Judge hardtops were ogling my car and I explained to them that I had added the Judge option 16 years before and they told me

that was OK, that I had done a fine job on the car.They   completely changed their tune on show day when they saw all the crowds

looking at my car and ignoring their real Judges. A bunch of them got together and protested to the head Judge of the meet, and

he pulled my windshield card while the voting was just getting started while I was gone at lunch. As a result of my car, they made  a new rule requiring documentation for any Judge at a POCI meet via Build Sheet. For the last fifteen years I rarely show the car at

Pontiac meets because of the controversy that swirls around it, so I take it to all make car shows where I don't have to put it in modified classes even though it is a stock resto. I really enjoy showing the car at these kinds of shows and it does very very well, with lots of Best of Show awards over the years. I don't advertise the fact that it is a Judge clone but am truthful about the car's

pedigree for anybody who asks if it is real, which almost always happens at least once or twice. The funny thing is you get asked

the same question if you own a real one, so  most people who own real Judges put a copy of their build sheet on the windshield

to deflect people from annoying them with questioning of authenticity. I love my car and have no regrets about building my own Judge convertible, but if you want to own a nice clone you need to understand that a tiny segment of people you meet will look

down on your car and you just have to ignore them and tell them to have a nice day. It is not necessary to advertise the fact that

you own a clone, but it is very important to be honest about the car's origins if someone asks you about it's authenticity. As far as Judge convertibles are concerned, real ones are too valuable to drive now and they all belong to millionaires who never drive them anywhere and who trade them back and forth like rare baseball cards.The funny thing is they rant about how  desirable their car is but they only keep it a short time then flip it. I like to drive all my old cars, so I couldn't own a real one as I would be afraid to drive

a 300,000 dollar car even around the block, and I couldn't afford to insure it anyway, so I like my clone. As far as values are concerned, a very nice clone that is correctly done is worth more than the base model it was built from but considerably less than the real thing. I have turned down 80 thousand for my car recently, while real ones as nice as mine are three hundred thousand.

My car is currently worth  a little less than a same condition real Judge hardtop. As far as someone building a Riviera GS clone, I think that would be foolish as good restorable ones are relatively inexpensive and not hard to find.  

Edited December 7, 2016 by Seafoam65 (see edit history)

[RivNut]

Does this bring up the same question as what would you consider a '65 Riviera Gran Sport IF you bought it and it had all the correct "Gran Sport goodies" but somewhere along the line before you bought it, a previous owner blew up the original engine and replaced it with a LT coded motor (65 401) but did reinstall all of the original "Gran Sport goodies."  Unless you can read the LX stamped into the block you'd never know (sometimes a thick coat of paint would keep you from reading the code anyway.)  The car was originally sold as a GS back in '65, so is it still one?  Or because you no longer have the LX motor in the car do you need to remove the carbs, intake, larger exhaust, etc. so that the rest of the car conforms to the engine that's now under the hood?  What exactly is it that separates one from another and gives it value - the real McCoy which has been bastardized or a clone?  Does a '65 Riviera Gran Sport that someone has repainted with a two-tone paint scheme and running 17" aftermarket wheels qualify as a Gran Sport or did it give up that status and become a custom?

Edited December 7, 2016 by RivNut (see edit history)

[RivNut]

32 minutes ago, Seafoam65 said:

                        I am probably this forum's clone expert as I have owned one for 45 years. When I was in college at the University

of Texas I wanted a GTO convertible to replace the  64 Ford Falcon Futura I was driving that I inherited from my Aunt when I

was in high school. Since the school colors at UT  were orange black and white, I naturally gravitated to wanting an orange

GTO Judge convertible. I searched for many months to find one to no avail. I had no idea back then how rare they were, with

only 108 Judge convertibles built, only about 20 of them painted orange and only 29 GTO Judge convertibles built with A/C in

1969, a necessity in Texas. After giving up on my search (they weren't in Hemmings back then and there was no internet) I decided

to build my own. I found a 1969 GTO convertible in crystal turquoise with lots of options like A/C, automatic transmission, hideaway

headlights, sport wood wheel etc. and bought it in the summer of 1971. It took me a while to save up for the conversion to a Judge

as my savings were depleted buying the car for 2,000.00. I did the conversion myself with all the correct Judge parts including

the ram air engine, spoiler, Judge decals and a repaint in the correct orange color. From 1974 until  1980 it was my Judge clone daily

driver, the only car I owned. In 1980 I parked the car in the garage and did  a quick restoration on it and drove it as a second car

on  weekends when it wasn't raining, having purchased a new Chevy Blazer to drive to work. Back then it was just a used car and nobody asked me if it was a real Judge and nobody cared. During the 80's, the first muscle car boom started and people were starting to show them at Autorama car shows, and in 1988 I decided to make the car a full blown show car, so I tore it completely down to the last nut and bolt and restored it using all the NOS parts I had acquired back in the 70's as spares for the car. In 1985

I had joined the Pontiac-Oakland Club after purchasing a mint condition 1979 Bandit Trans Am, so I decided to make the inaugural

showing of my restored GTO the 1990 POCI national convention in Kansas City. I was really excited about driving it up there as

the car had been off the road for several years while I was doing the restoration to show standards. When I arrived at the tech line

for the car show I explained to the head judge that my car was a clone and not a factory Judge convertible. they decided to put

me in the stock Judge class, as my car had no mods and it looked and smelled like the real thing. All week other people with real

Judge hardtops were ogling my car and I explained to them that I had added the Judge option 16 years before and they told me

that was OK, that I had done a fine job on the car.They   completely changed their tune on show day when they saw all the crowds

looking at my car and ignoring their real Judges. A bunch of them got together and protested to the head Judge of the meet, and

he pulled my windshield card while the voting was just getting started while I was gone at lunch. As a result of my car, they made  a new rule requiring documentation for any Judge at a POCI meet via Build Sheet. For the last fifteen years I rarely show the car at

Pontiac meets because of the controversy that swirls around it, so I take it to all make car shows where I don't have to put it in modified classes even though it is a stock resto. I really enjoy showing the car at these kinds of shows and it does very very well, with lots of Best of Show awards over the years. I don't advertise the fact that it is a Judge clone but am truthful about the car's

pedigree for anybody who asks if it is real, which almost always happens at least once or twice. The funny thing is you get asked

the same question if you own a real one, so  most people who own real Judges put a copy of their build sheet on the windshield

to deflect people from annoying them with questioning of authenticity. I love my car and have no regrets about building my own Judge convertible, but if you want to own a nice clone you need to understand that a tiny segment of people you meet will look

down on your car and you just have to ignore them and tell them to have a nice day. It is not necessary to advertise the fact that

you own a clone, but it is very important to be honest about the car's origins if someone asks you about it's authenticity. As far as Judge convertibles are concerned, real ones are too valuable to drive now and they all belong to millionaires who never drive them anywhere and who trade them back and forth like rare baseball cards.The funny thing is they rant about how  desirable their car is but they only keep it a short time then flip it. I like to drive all my old cars, so I couldn't own a real one as I would be afraid to drive

a 300,000 dollar car even around the block, and I couldn't afford to insure it anyway, so I like my clone. As far as values are concerned, a very nice clone that is correctly done is worth more than the base model it was built from but considerably less than the real thing. I have turned down 80 thousand for my car recently, while real ones as nice as mine are three hundred thousand.

My car is currently worth  a little less than a same condition real Judge hardtop. As far as someone building a Riviera GS clone, I think that would be foolish as good restorable ones are relatively inexpensive and not hard to find.  

It's a driver and for most of us, that's what we want.  Love it!  Good fore thought in starting your collection of parts when they were still just parts for a used car.

[epriv]

Great story Seafoam. Beautiful car. It looked great before the conversion as well. Ed, the whole question comes down to how committed of a purest you are. Again, nothing wrong with clones, the ones on TV are top notch and done very well, but personally, I like them they way they came from the factory, but that's just me. I'll bet most judges at local shows wouldn't be checking numbers or build sheets if you decided to throw some GS badges and a chrome air filter cover on your '69 Riv.but didn't bother to add the other elements of a true GS.

 

[Chimera]

Or maybe I feel like putting Redline tires and a "Star Wars" air cleaner on my non-GS 67?!

[KongaMan]

Nothing to do with anything, but back when I was a kid living in Arlington, TX one of our school field trips was to the GM plant where The Judge was being made.  As you might imagine, that made quite an impression on all of us budding gearheads.

[Seafoam65]

1 minute ago, KongaMan said:

Nothing to do with anything, but back when I was a kid living in Arlington, TX one of our school field trips was to the GM plant where The Judge was being made.  As you might imagine, that made quite an impression on all of us budding gearheads.

                      My car was built in the Arlington, Tx. plant, and in 1992 I attended a reunion car show for Arlington built cars at

the Arlington plant. An old timer at the plant walked up to me and stated that he was absolutely certain that no orange automatic

trans GTO Judge convertibles with A/C were built at the plant as he was working there then and he said he would remember a special car like that. I explained to him what my car really was and he smiled to realize that his recollection was correct.

[SpecialEducation]

If you own the car to make you happy, and it has the looks & performance that makes you happy, then that's enough.

 

If you own the car to brag & win trophies, go ahead and pay the premium for the factory originals.

 

My parents had a green Le Mans when I was a kid, but to me the look of an orange Judge is about as good as it gets.  If a Le Mans fell in my lap, and I had a choice of upgrading the powerplant or the body, I'd happily drive a Judge looking Le Mans with the milktoast 350...