keiser31 Posted March 25, 2021 Share Posted March 25, 2021 Pretty clean for it's age....never liked those style aftermarket wheels.... 8 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JACK M Posted March 25, 2021 Share Posted March 25, 2021 Agree on the wheels. Wheels have always been a sore spot for me. Expensive if you go with the wrong ones. 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JamesR Posted March 25, 2021 Share Posted March 25, 2021 59 minutes ago, JACK M said: Agree on the wheels. Wheels have always been a sore spot for me. Me too. I'm tolerant of other perspectives, but I've never liked the "every old car is a hot rod or custom" mentality that aftermarket wheels seem to promote. Looks pretty out of place for this vehicle, but it it's still a very cool car that doesn't appear to have been jacked with in other ways. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt Harwood Posted March 25, 2021 Share Posted March 25, 2021 Those are the wheels you buy when the used rusty wheels at the junkyard are just too darned expensive. 4 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
padgett Posted March 25, 2021 Share Posted March 25, 2021 Think the '70 Cat uses 5on5 with zero offset. At least it has a good engine, 70 455 had near as many recalls as the diesel. Weak bottom end. Fixed in 71 but no-one trusted it. 455 HO in 71-72 Trans Am was a good engine but overshadowed by the 73 455SD. Always thought they stole the horns from the 3.4 Jag. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rocketraider Posted March 25, 2021 Share Posted March 25, 2021 Those years look especially good with the Pontiac Rally II. Black or red PMD center, with or without trim rings. Was always a little more partial the 69 big Pontiac, but still a nice car to own. 69-70 always looked like they were ready to pounce. I know BOP all had to have 455s after Oldsmobile broke that gate down in 68, but I always thought the 425, 428 and 430 were better engines than the 455s that replaced them. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
padgett Posted March 25, 2021 Share Posted March 25, 2021 Particularly for Pontiac who never could afford a big block so had to get to 455 the hard way. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CHuDWah Posted March 25, 2021 Share Posted March 25, 2021 Yep, OEM covers look best: 60s - 70s land yachts should look conservative, not hot-roddy. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bryankazmer Posted March 25, 2021 Share Posted March 25, 2021 those wheel look great - on a boat trailer 4 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big Beat Posted March 27, 2021 Share Posted March 27, 2021 My first attempt at a restoration project back in the early 1990s. As a teenager, my dream car was a GTO but they were getting too expensive even then. This was the closest I could afford to a proper wide-track Pontiac. 4-door hardtop, bought for $100 from the little old lady original owner. The car ran well and had fairly low miles and a dead mint interior. The back seat had never been sat on. I thought it was a perfect drive-as-you-restore project. Unfortunately, a few months later, as I was just starting to get a few things sorted out on it, the frame rusted through under the engine. I had no clue it was that bad as I had never lifted the car to check. I was living in an apartment in New York at the time - no garage, no driveway, no way to keep a non-operable car even long enough to sell it. I jacked up the engine, put a 2x4 under it and drove the car to the junkyard under its own power. 😪 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TAKerry Posted March 27, 2021 Share Posted March 27, 2021 Theres a guy I see at the local shows, he is the original owner of a 68 Bonneville. Car is absolutely stunning and 100% original other than wear items, belts, plugs, air in the tires. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
padgett Posted March 27, 2021 Share Posted March 27, 2021 Paid $75 once for a Renault Caravelle. Turned out to have a cracked block. Lost it somewhere in the Carolinas but didn't look very hard. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marty Roth Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 I've always felt that those aftermarket wheels should only be on a Utility Trailer - never on a collectible, or even a daily-use car 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
junkyardjeff Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 Found one in the local old junkyard in that looked to be that color originally. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Stoneberg Posted March 29, 2021 Share Posted March 29, 2021 It was Christmas Eve and I was home from school and driving my Dad’s Catalina to see my girlfriend. I wasn’t paying attention and slammed that pointy nose right into the back end of some other car. That was not a fun conversation when I got home. Ruined Christmas vacation that is for sure. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TAKerry Posted March 29, 2021 Share Posted March 29, 2021 11 hours ago, Bill Stoneberg said: It was Christmas Eve and I was home from school and driving my Dad’s Catalina to see my girlfriend. I wasn’t paying attention and slammed that pointy nose right into the back end of some other car. That was not a fun conversation when I got home. Ruined Christmas vacation that is for sure. Dad had new Grandville. I was just wee bit too short to drive our lawn tractor (cub cadet) but tried to anyway. My foot slipped off the clutch/brake and the mower slammed head first into the big Pontiac. Smashed both up pretty good. Car is gone, I still have the mower. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marty Roth Posted March 29, 2021 Share Posted March 29, 2021 Dad had a sweet '67 Catalina 4-door hardtop which drive like a dream - quick, luxurious, great looking - when looking to replace my '60 Valiant V-200 with something my bride-to-be would also like, and capable of towing her father's off-shore Gulf of Mexico capable cruiser, I went with the '69 Pontiac Custom"S", choosing the {Pontiac 350 ci, bigger Hydro-Matic, F40/F41 Suspension packages, etc), all in all a great decision at the time, and soon joined by an almost new Citroen DS-21 as my daily driver which later saved my life in a head-on crash with a new full-sized Mercury when the other driver turned left into me at highwat speeds. Had I been in the Pontiac, I fear neither of us would have fared as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
padgett Posted March 29, 2021 Share Posted March 29, 2021 ps "Custom S" was an A-body, Cat was a B-body. Father had an ID-19 that would sing to you in top gear. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marty Roth Posted March 29, 2021 Share Posted March 29, 2021 5 minutes ago, padgett said: ps "Custom S" was an A-body, Cat was a B-body. Father had an ID-19 that would sing to you in top gear. Yes, Dad's B-body was great, but the A-body was the right choice for my bride-to-be at the time, and we still had use of her Dad's almost new Olds "88" Holiday Sedan. My Custom"S" was actually better at trailering the boat with comparable power, better suspension set-up, disk brakes, etc. Friends sometimes called my 4-door Mayfair Maize Poncho a "GTO in Drag". Although similar in outward appearance, our DS-21 was fantastic, a significant senior to the ID-19 (Luxury, Speed, Citro-matic 4-speed). Both were amazing - a close friend also had an ID, but he preferred mine. Many don't realize that the Citro-Matic was actually a 4-speed stick, but that the hydraulics reacted to the stick lever by declutching, moving the shifting forks, and re-engaging the clutch, and that the relative speed of each of the functions was fully adjustable with a coulple of screws - amazing to drive, autocross, etc! Thanks for your note. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
padgett Posted March 29, 2021 Share Posted March 29, 2021 Yes those "auto clutch" devices were common in Europe then: Sax-O-Mat, TipTronic. If you put too big a shift knob on a VW it would never engage. ID had a four on the column with OD top. GM A-bodies were the same from 68-72. I had an A-body wagon with a nose job that was a great tow car particularly with a rear sway bar and posi (Saf-T-Track). Had a 3.08 "economy" axle and a steel gear 400 4bbl. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Buffalowed Bill Posted March 30, 2021 Share Posted March 30, 2021 Thanks John. When was the last time you saw one? I asked myself that question, and really couldn't remember. I am drawn to survivor cars which I haven't seen in a decade or two. I suspect that this body style didn't ware well with the public, making it a pretty rare sight today. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John348 Posted March 30, 2021 Share Posted March 30, 2021 On 3/25/2021 at 1:12 PM, JACK M said: Agree on the wheels. Wheels have always been a sore spot for me. Expensive if you go with the wrong ones. I agree on the wheels also, and I would be more then happy to help him out if he needs some wheel cover's, just pay the shipping Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pfeil Posted March 31, 2021 Share Posted March 31, 2021 (edited) These are the wheels that look the best, and you can still buy them. FYI a tall deck Olds, early 400, 425, and 455 is still considered a medium block like Pontiac. Edited March 31, 2021 by Pfeil (see edit history) 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pfeil Posted March 31, 2021 Share Posted March 31, 2021 (edited) On 3/25/2021 at 12:20 PM, padgett said: Particularly for Pontiac who never could afford a big block so had to get to 455 the hard way. Not any harder than Olds, Olds is even more undersquare Olds 455= A 454; Displacement: 7446 cm3 / 454.4 cui Bore: 104.78 mm / 4.125 in Stroke: 107.95 mm / 4.25 in Pontiac 455;= A 456 Displacement: 7469 cm3 / 455.8 cui Bore: 105.44 mm / 4.151 in Stroke: 106.93 mm / 4.21 in The Pontiac 350 isn't even close, it's a 354 Displacement: 5798 cm3 / 353.8 cui Bore: 98.43 mm / 3.875 in Stroke: 95.25 mm / 3.75 in Edited March 31, 2021 by Pfeil (see edit history) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Billy Kingsley Posted March 31, 2021 Share Posted March 31, 2021 Love the Pontiacs from that era. Wait, any era. Rare to see now. I'm generally not too worried about the wheels. Simple bolt on/of parts like that, that don't actually alter the car are fine in my book. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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