TAC Tech => Number Crunching => Topic started by: roadking77 on January 06, 2023, 07:33:46 AM
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I am engaged in a friendly conversation with a fellow about a 77 trans am. Unfortunately he has since sold the car so many of the details will remain unknown. It was a black 77 trans am with s.e. striping. His story is that he bought it from the original owner in Canada that he has known for many years. The car was supposedly VERY low mile original condition. It was improperly stored in a barn, tires flat, brakes froze, things rusted etc. Which 1. had me question why someone would stow away a car with 3 miles! and not do it properly. The car had standard black grilles, and the window trim was polished aluminum not black. It also looked like the t top surround trim was aluminum coloured and not black. I could not verify other details, cowel tag etc.
His argument is that it indeed was a special edition car and that some if not all Canadian cars did not have gold grilles. He had no answer for the window trim.
Does anyone know if this could be?
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He's 100% wrong. Made it all up.
It's certainly possible that a real SE could come down the assembly line and somebody put the wrong grille on by mistake, and somebody else put the wrong windshield trim on by mistake, and then it's possible to got hauled to Hurst at Brighton and they put the wrong t-tops in it by mistake. If those things all occurred, then it would just all need to be corrected, because it's ugly. You wouldn't pay all that extra dough for a less attractive car. In Pete McCarthy's book on racing (oddly enough) he wrote "there's correct and there's original. There are no allowances for original" and that's right.
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Everyone with a black car wanted the gold trim, pin striping was all the rage so added it.
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Thank you for the validation. Its a moot point now as he insists that it was an S.E., for whatever reason I do not know as all he did was flip the car. At this point I think I could say the sky is blue and get an argument, LOL. His reasoning is that Canadian Pontiacs were different from their American counterpart. This much I agree with, however correct me if Im wrong but I thought that ALL Trans Ams in 1977 were built in Norwood Ohio. Unlike other Canadian Pontiacs that were built in that country.
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All 1977 Firebirds were built in Norwood Ohio.
There weren't any "Canadian Firebirds" in the old days, which was a bit of problem for Trans Am Racing (you couldn't run the excellent Chevy 302). They did have certain export-related things they did for a Canadian car.
Really, it's just an example of the stuff people make up. And they believe it, too. No self-awareness about the fact that he just made it up.
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Bingo! And he started off by saying he knew nothing about Trans Ams, I thought I was trying to be informative.
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Just shake your head and smile...
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It's not an SE. As others have said, they were all built in the same factory. I have a French-Canadian delivered Y84, the only variations between a standard T/A and a Z49 car are the metric gauges and in my case, French literature. The Y82's are the same even if delivered to Canada. If no PHS or buildsheet, it's a standard Trans Am unless proven otherwise.
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Along with French unleaded fuel decal on bumper and half eaten croissant and beret tucked under where buildsheet often is. Just kidding, croissant be long gone.
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Along with French unleaded fuel decal on bumper and half eaten croissant and beret tucked under where buildsheet often is. Just kidding, croissant be long gone.
I knew that was a thing! I saw another one online once and thought maybe it was correct. I should've taken a photo of that French fuel decal, I need to get one of those. Beret I have in ziplock back, croissant is kept in plastic container and signed by original owner. DNA test confirmed it was one owner.
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Bonjour!
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52729734844_a45ede16b8_c.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2okxF6o)Y88 unleaded fuel decal French Canadian (https://flic.kr/p/2okxF6o) by Ben (https://www.flickr.com/photos/196419001@N03/), on Flickr
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Bonjour!
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52729734844_a45ede16b8_c.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2okxF6o)Y88 unleaded fuel decal French Canadian (https://flic.kr/p/2okxF6o) by Ben (https://www.flickr.com/photos/196419001@N03/), on Flickr
Interesting.... I don't think it looked like that, it was a single line and just in French, i'll have to try find another example. Maybe they were a different format for 1979 (Z49 Y88 :shock:)