1969 Silver Trans Am

Doin some research on the 1969 silver trans am that was used in the march issue of Hot Rod magazine.Does anyone know what happened to it? It was a Ram Air IV auto. that was in the Hollywood CA. area sold at Royal Pontiac to Geo Stephens in 12\69. Would like to have any info availible since I think I have the car.

 

Hot Rod mag of what year. I have most of them for the last 6 years

 

March issue of 1969 featured this car as a prepoduction release. It was tested by varrious magazines then released to Royal pontiac for sale. No records after that.

 

What makes you think you have it?

 

I'm being Mr. Obvious, but "Got PHS?"

That would confirm the VIN, T/A, RAIV, and delivery destination...

 

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It was lordstown built 11/4/68.PHS has long list of options that include folddown rear seat,auto,safe-t-track 390 gear,disc brakes.deluxe interior etc.But the interesting thing for me are..PHS show "Display" and also 35-997 that I understand are engineering dept. destiation codes.The car came with ralley gauges & hood tach option but my car has stacked gauges & tach.So someone changed that as well as added the fender extractors and the 1 inch frt. sway bar.The trim tag paint code is palladium silver.On my PHS from Jim the note that is hand writen says "special price car" sold to Geo stephens for $1093.92 and $100 for handling the suggested retail was $4223.34 and the 1969 Hot Rod article says price for the TA was $4200. but the paper work was not created till 4/18/69 and shows ship date & execution date of 3/24/69.Hot Rod did the road test for march 1969 issue so that would have gone to press around Jan 69.This car no longer has the hood or the rear spoiler or the RA IV motor but everything else is there.Don't know for sure but just tryin to connect the dots.

 

Wow, cool.....good luck running it down. Always fun to figure out the history of our cars!:TU:

 

GM didn't title their cars until it was sold to the public. Assume Pontiac was handled like Olds (where I was at the time), and many times the paperwork followed the cars out of the system, not led them or went with it. Most of ours went out the "back door"as "scrapped at supplier" :laugh: :laugh: without VIN plates. Paperwork and VIN plate followed. Most dealer sponsored race cars didn't start life as what they appeared.

Congrats, rare find. Wish we had PHS for our cars...we're finding a lot of wacko "originals" that appear to be dealer converts without the customer even knowing it..an "OHS" would avoid many arguments...and disappointments...

 

Mike Noun knows about these cars.

I, for one, don't think it was a Trans Am.

 

Whats a freeway fliero No: Sort of a Buick Roadrunner only better maybe

 

Never mind I Googled it and spent the tie to read the thread. Anyone know where that car is now? Any new info as to if its the test car?

 

Quit a jouney so far..lets see..found the original rear spoiler from the car from John Haley in Minissota,talked to Eric Dahlquist who wrote the JUNE 1969 Motor Trend article featuring the Silver Prototype,talked to Gene Winfield who designed the Trans Am with Harry Bradley in 1968.Gene Winfield actually installed the parts he made(fiberglass hood,rear spoiler & side extractors)in the engineering dept.and spot painted the silver car with John Delorean watching over his shoulder,pulled the dash and found Oct16 1968 stamped on the tach.so that put the time line in line.Gene told me he made bunchs of these parts.Found a article that states 10 Trans Am's were at Riverside raceway in Dec.1968 with 10 GTO Judges for the press day.Anyone have pics or info on this.Still hunting history!!!!

 

I always figured the best way to prove something was try to disprove it first. So,after my talks with Eric Dahlquist(writer of the 1969 Motor Trend article that showed the Silver TA,Jerry Titus and one of Titius\Godsal Racing 1969 Trans Ams) I always wondered why the Silver car was even in the picture...Well that is because its his car! He is showing the street TA and the race car. According to Rick Titus his father bought 6 cars from Royal Pontiac in early 1969,5 cars that TG racing turned into race cars and the Silver car. It was wrecked in the left frt suspension according to Rick when Jerry bought it(hence the big discount on the PHS) and the car was taken to TG and repair by Jerry himself. His signature welded steering box bolt washers he did to the race cars is present on my car as well and the steering box that displays P "prototype" with stamped id numbers not cast and contains 16-1 ratio blueprinted internals. Rick says that Paul Lamar took the car and areo tested it. I talked to Paul and he said he had it at ElMiage drylakes and Stardust in Vegas testing the downforce & lift for both street car & TG's race cars. Talked to Steve Kelly(writer of Hot Rod article)about his test,he said that John Delorean himself called him and brought the Silver TA to him for a 2 week test drive. Steve said he had the car at Riverside twice for press tests and that John D told him that they were behind on the car compaired to the Judge and would him do the article. All these happened before Jerry got the car. Rick said the Silver car was his senior prom date car and that later in the summer of 1969 Annie Titus(Jerrys wife) traded the car for $2500 at Universal City Datsun for a new Datsun and he would drive by and see it sitting on the Used Car lot and was so mad that she got rid of it like that. Thats is when it turned into just another muscle car sitting on a car lot and not a protoype,magazine test car or a Trans Am Racing Superstars dailey driver.
What I still am trying to track is who bought it from that point. Its just amazing the number of people that touched this car are still around and that they remember this stuff. I was connected by Rick to Doug Innes,DustyRhodes they were TG employees and talked about the 1968-69-70 Trans Am season and have sent me some amazing photos of back in the day stuff. Pontiac sure was quite the ringer so to speek using the chevy 302 in rebodied 69 to 68 cars in the 69 season and NOT the 303. It has been an amazing discovery for me and Im not done yet and so far NOTHING has proved that this is not the car.

 

That's some cool stuff!

 

That is really interesting history. Thanks for sharing.
Steve