Saturday, April 25, 2009

End of an era


Another casualty of the recession.


General Motors has announced that they are going to discontinue the Pontiac brand.





My father has owned a Pontiac up until a few years ago when he let them all go and went with a Toyota Sequoia for size and comfort.








Pontiac GTO, Trans Am and Catalina's from the 60's and the 70's are the zenith of Muscle cars. Too bad another chapter in Detroit iron is going to the bone yard.





Here is the First muscle car I grew up with a 1961 Pontiac Ventura with a Tri-Power 389 Super Duty Engine.






I spent many an evening helping the old man tinker with the engine and was fascinated with the 3 two barrel carburetor setup. It was one of those motors that required the old school "premium" gas due to the compression ratio. And it could smoke the tires all the way to 4th gear.

3 comments:

beebs said...

I have a buddy who is a trans am fanatic. I guess I need to get in touch with him to find out what car he'll buy next.

Agi said...

One of our own posted a similar tribute the Pontiac at our place. Goodbye to the GTO.

reddog said...

I started junior high in the Fall of '63. We all wanted a Goat with a Hurst shifter, Holley carbs, headers by Hooker, Cragar mags and soft street slicks. We threw around terms we didn't even know what they meant, we just knew'em from Beachboys songs.

Kid across the street from me, got his first real job, doing freeway construction in '69. He gave thousands to a custom racing shop for a Plymouth 'Cuda with all the bells and whistles he had heard about from his older brother's friends, all his life. He never told the shop it wasn't just for the quarter mile but a daily driver. He had about an eighty mile commute, one way, to the job site. No biggy, the freeways were clear and gas was 23 cents a gallon for premium. He cracked the block the first day, after cruising along about a half hour at 85. He had a four speed but none had very long legs, I guess.