Didn't want to highjack Bruno's p[ost on the Firebird as Pontiacs are and always been my secret love.....but being older...it's the full sized cars from 59 through 64, with 1962 being the all time favorite in my book. I had about a half dozen very neat ones years back when you could pick them up for pocket change..($100-$150)...and about another half dozen non hot rod ones from a 58 Chieftain (pink and white) to a 68 Catalina wagon. Anyhow here's what happened at GMPG between Olds and Pontiac engineers that resulted in the Ramrod W31's being put into production immediately. It was in the Fall of 1968 and the dealer sponsored teams were ready to kill Olds for screwing up the 400's in the 442's. From my archives: Big improvement in intake manifold design, too. Olds has that pancake shape that's torturous. I was told by THE expert on making GM cars run fast, that it isn't the exhaust manifolds that's holding back an Olds big block in F.A.S.T., using the chambered W and Z manifolds on all 69-72 442's, it's the intake. Small block (including W31)being competitive in either F.A.S.T. or Pure Stock/Factory Stock is a joke. There it IS the exhaust manifolds holding it back.......and why they didn't even bother trying to maximize the W31 performance with manifolds. Who in their right miinds would ever do anything to a W31 before getting a good set of headers on it? Shim up the rockers, better ignition, and a set of tires and you're easily in the 12's if you launch it at 6000 or above. BTW, that little episode between the Olds and Pontiac engineers happened at GMPG at the monthly Chief Engineers' get together. Each month one of the divisions was assigned to do some sort of presentation to the committee, and it happened to be Pontiac's turn that month with the assignment to show what they're going to do to regain the street performance which had been totally highjacked by Mopar. I believe it was a GTO, not a Firebird and it was a 400 Pontiac engine with Ram Air something coming out. They were egged on after they showed a few Bruno style smoky burnouts on the skid pad. One of the lower life Olds engineers had the assignment to ask them how it would do in a head to head match with another car in a drag race. The bait was set and taken. One of the Pontiac people said "bring on one of your 442's", knowing a good Catalina would probably run away from it. Olds guy said they don't have a 442 available but there's a 350 Cutlass here that would do fine. They called in whatever car was running around at the time fully warmed up. It was the jade gold/willow green F85 post car that got so famous in the magazines, Motion Markowitz ads, etc. Just happened to have open headers and a set of slicks on it (not by accident, was a total setup). It was running one of Olds' 5.00 12 bolts, too. After 3 straight annihilations by the little Olds (with the Pontiac engineers under the hood of the GTO looking for what's wrong, they must have finally figured they's been chumped. "Yeah, but that's not a production car".....Big guy from Olds (not sure who it was, not Stempel) smiled and said...."it is now!" The Ramrod W31 was released right away and rushed in to production. The package had been under development as far back as at least 1966, (I drove a test car 66 F85 post at Onondaga). There were aq few oversights due to the way Olds released things back then (some by model series, some by option content, all done manually with IBM punch cards. 2 of the obvious items were the lack of a fan shroud and also the boxed rear arms with the rear sway bar. The shroud was part of the C60 A/C option, not used on heater only 350 cars, and the rear suspension (F41, I think) on the Cutlass series had all the same front suspension pieces as the 442, but not the rear. They raced 50 of them through the plant in January, 1968 that ended up mostly as race cars and test cars (coupla display cars) and the balance of the 500 car special build in March and April, 1968. They wanted to be ready for the Spring Nationals where they cleaned up and set new records in F stock. All were torn down for tech inspection (as they knew they would be protested immediately)...and all found to be legit. Engines were very specially built with very special parts (especially the heads) at an outside shop and shipped into the plant. All engines were sent to Engineering for dyno proveout and records were kept including a copy of that dyno curve. (I have a copy of mine somewhere)....Engines were delivered to the assembly plant on dollies and held beside the line until that chassis came through. They made a lot more engines than cars, so I think that's where Dennis Casteele got the info on 732 or 742 cars built total. All the race teams got at least one spare motor and many others shipped around. I don't recall any more 1968's built after that 500 car build was completed. By then we were more than busy with the Hurst program in the plant. In 1969 and 1970, the W31's were changed and built in the normal engine and assembly plant process, totally in house. Most of the changes were adding options and correcting the oversights of that hurry up run in 1968. Same parts, just not treated with "white gloves". BTW, I seriously doubt that the 68 Hurst would have ever been built in production if the regular 400 442 (including the W30) performed anything like the 65-67's. I know from first hand knowledge that the Ramrod never would have.... Oh, and the Olds division's assignments for subsequent monthly chief engineers' metting at the grounds was all emissions, emissions, emissions. Most of the real gear heads behind the hot rod Olds were reassigned to emissions development by Bob Stempel........Some left the company (like Rich Powers)....... :beers2: :beers2:
You better delete those pictures. Dave H. has been known to fall into epileptic seizures at the sight of the all-yellow Rallye 350. If he sees the red/orange interior of that Olds, he may go off the deep end!
No, rallye 350's are in a category all their own. I think it's probably because we knew the musclecar era was coming to a close by then and clown cars like that started changing the image. If they had permitted any kind of performance package in them (spell that W31 or at least a 455 like the Indy Pace Car convertibles) it may have been dofferent. I actually like the ones whose owners have yanked the original 310hp 350 and put in something that runs.Otherwise..........:moonu: Don't know anything about that Appollo car, certainly wasn't built in the plant that way. There were other like the Mod Rod (68 442 convertible with a trick interior with 4 bucket seats) with scalloped pearlescent paint that I did see coming through Product Delivery for resale to some dealer or collector. Hope he lived in a sunny, dry climate as they had to remove the convertible top mechanism to get those rear buckets in there. I really like black and red, that isn't so bad....
Dave, It's great hearing the inside view. Most of the time ,those stories never get told. Thanks for sharing them. Olds Rocks!!!:beers2: Rich C.
Thanks. Back in the heyday (I was there from 1966-1973....as far as I'm concerned the heart of the muscle car era), the three divisions of GM (Olds, Pontiac, and Buick) were more in competition with each other than with Mopar or Ford. Fought over the same 2 million car market, and also in performance. All the talk in the Engineering garage and at Onondaga Dragway every Friday night was more of what we had new for Pontiac, and what they probably have for us. There were a few VERY fast 442's and GTOs that just happened to meet each other at one of the nearby Dragstrips on Sunday. (Detroit Dragway, Milan, Motor City, others). These were really engineering test cars, but had no markings on them including "civilian" plates. GM Corporate did acknowledge the competition from Mopar and Ford, as did Chevrolet. I don't recall Chevy getting down and dirty with Olds, not sure about Pontiac and Buick. Was surely a lot of exciting fun then. :bglasses: Ended overnight it seemed, and wasn't fun any more. Many of us left then to pursue something else.
I don't think GM -- or most other conglomerates, for that matter -- have any idea how beneficial that level of internal competition is. It spurs on the employees, and it differentiates the products, thus expanding the customer base. In my opinion, GM's death spiral started when they started trying to leverage the commonality between divisions instead of leveraging the differences. That might make sense when you look at your cost structure, but I don't think they had any idea the effect it would have on their employees and customers.
