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THE WAY IT WAS: 1969 Hurst-Olds Prototype

DODGE CHALLENGER From Trans Am to Oval Track and back : The rebirth of a racing Mopar

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(Volume 7, Issue 2)

EDITORIAL/SALES Publisher/Editor Terry Denomme

Editorial Assistant Patty Denomme

BOX/TOP/BEAUTY: The R-code ’63 1/2 Galaxie “Fastback” is a muscle car legend and that was part of the inspiration for Rick Clough’s 1963 Galaxie 500 XL hard top — PG 34 Photo by Terry Denomme

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BLOWIN’ SMOKE: Publisher’s column BARN FINDS & BONE/

6 YARD/RESCUES: 1965 HiPo Ford Falcon Hurst Olds: The 8 1969 Elephant Tusk prototype H/O Droptop: One 14 ’69 of just three that were built

Muscle Pontiac: ’67 18 Big Pontiac Grande Parisienne 1963 Ford Galaxie 500 XL: Challenger: Trans 24 ’70 Am raced Dodge is restored 34 Tribute to the R-code stars C is 1970 Chevy Camaro SS396: 32 MUSCLE/MEDIA: 40 for Chrysler Racing Bought new in BC and never restored EDITORIAL CONTRIBUTIONS are welcome, but best to query us first. If an article is accepted, payment will be made upon publication at our current rate. All photos and stories in this publication are the property of My Car Publications and may not be reproduced or otherwise used without the express written consent of the publisher.

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by Terry Denomme, Publisher/Editor

ny job worth doing is worth doing well. That’s what they say but I think there should be a little wiggle room. Maybe what they should say is some jobs worth doing are worth doing as well as you can. Yeah, that’s more like it.

Take for instance Project Strato Cheap. The $300 purchase price was initially my 1962 Pontiac Strato Chief 2door sedan’s most appealing trait. But then I got to know it and the more I did the more I loved it. Soon the idea of making a quick flip changed to a desire to make it a ’60s street brawler using parts mostly already on hand.

If you picked up the Spring 2021 issue you know I kind of sidestepped the budget on some new rear suspension pieces. The engine/trans, rear end and even front disc brakes and spindles are parts already bought and paid for long before the Pontiac came into my life. But once you develop feelings for a car it’s sometimes hard to cut corners during its refurbishing and that’s presented me with a dilemma.

While I don’t intend to do any bodywork or exterior paint for a while, I’ve decided everything beneath the car and under the hood is going to be refurbished, repainted and basically restored to like new condition. This car may not look like it when it’s back on the road but it’ll have a solid foundation. If I do that can I still call it Project Strato Cheap? I’ll leave you to debate that.

Recently the Pontiac was rolled into the shop to prepare it to be separated from its original frame and dropped on the newly refurbished chassis that once resided under my ’62 Bel Air “Bubbletop” Project. That project also donated all those other parts listed above as at some point in my life I’m going for a correct 409 tribute car with that restoration. (Again, we covered the chassis refurbishment in the Spring 2021 issue which is still available to purchase in either print or digital version at https://www.canadianhotrods.com/bonestockmagazinesubscription.php).

The Pontiac’s front clip was removed and the front and rear seats and rubber floor mat were stripped out of the interior to better assess rust issues. The floor rot is extensive and includes the entire front floor brace, both inner rockers and basically all the footwells. People smarter and more experienced than me say “just patch it and drive it.” The underlying message is that this is supposed

to be Project Strato Cheap not Project Complete Restoration.

Good advice, but it brings me back to the phrase any job worth doing is worth doing right. Patching it, in my mind, is not right. After some research the determination was the right thing is a complete floor pan that replaces the original from the toeboards to under the back seat and includes inner rockers. It’s relatively cheap ($649US) to order this piece from Classic Industries (via Old Car Centre, Langley, BC) but many would argue not really Strato Cheap.

But cheap will be served because I’m going to install the floor pan. It’s in theory an easy job but for me it’ll be the first time attempting it. I can use a welder but extensive sheet metal surgery is not my strong suit. Besides the floor pan replacement, there’s also a rear body mount (inset photo, inner driver’s side wheel well) that’s completely rotted away and portions of the trunk panel those body mounts attach to which also need repair. Admittedly, I’m a little intimidated by the work ahead and doubtful about my ability to do it right and well. I know people who do these kind of repairs every day of the week and received some advice from them. I’ve even contemplated paying those pros to do it, but that is definitely not Strato Cheap behaviour.

Budget decisions are part of any project and your skill level will always be part of the equation, but so is your tolerance for imperfection. Some people have none, but it often seems those people either have a ton of skill or a ton of cash. Like many gearheads, I have neither.

When it comes to installing this floor, I can live with some imperfection. Time to break out the cutting wheel and spot weld cutters.

Wish me luck.

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This Manitoba-based 1970 426 HEMI Coronet R/T IS ONE OF 14 produced but it’s the only one that came to Canada!

MUSCLE ON DISPLAY: Spied at the show & shine BLOWIN’ SMOKE: The musings of a chronic gearhead

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Oshawa-built, Calgary-based ’70 Pontiac is loaded with options

A look back at marketing ’60s & ’70s Buick Muscle

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EAST & WEST Mopar Show Coverage

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Story Terry Denomme/Photos courtesy Mark Williams

This is how the car looked in the early ’80s when Art Carsw ell bought the car sans original dri vetrain

ace cars, even the rarest of the rare, live tough lives and often meet ignoble ends. The drivers and owners of the day mostly regarded cars as a means to an end.....winning races and paying the bills. There is no loyalty when the next best thing comes along so down the road the car goes. Best case scenario it is well maintained and lives on to race for many more years, but most often it gets used up, parted out and left to rot. Worst case scenario it’s crashed and shipped off to the scrapper to become the raw material for a toaster or a wheelbarrow.

Luckily that didn’t happen to the 1965 Ford Falcon Futura you’re about to read about here. It’s one of just three HiPo 289, 4-speed 1965 Ford Falcons that were built by Ford Motor Company of Canada Ltd and converted to B/Factory Experimental specs for the 1965 racing season.

Owned for the last 20+years by Ottawa, ON’s Mark Williamson, this special Falcon was advertised for sale in the early ’80s in the Auto Trader where it was listed incorrectly as a ’63 Falcon. The straight axle and fibreglass body parts tipped off Art Carswell to the car’s special

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pedigree and he snapped it up, doing the homework to identify the car’s special status as Don Haver’s Mr. 289 car.

Carswell never got around to restoring it and a divorce prompted the sale to Williamson who is gathering parts and has plans to soon begin a restoration to the Falcon’s original B/FX specs. So, what are those specs?

According to a Paul Eyman-penned article in a 1965 issue of Canadian Track and Traffic, these cars were the result of brainstorming by Thornhill, ON racer and speed shop owner Don Havers, racer and mechanic Brad Francis, and John Philipps, Performance Advisor, Drag Racing for Ford Motor Company of Canada, LTD. Ford had great succes with their R-Code 427 ’64 Ford Galaxies (Francis had campaigned one and was reportedly never beat) and the trio wanted to create an only-inCanada built car that could beat the US-based Comets and Galaxies that would be running in B/FX. The article states the ’65 Ford Falcon Futura 2-door HT was chosen because of its shorter wheelbase and “less frontal area than the Galaxie and can therefore throw

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From the factory this ’65 Falcon was Prairie Bronze but Havers, who owned Don’s Speed Shop in Toronto, which at the time was Canada’s largest speed shop, had it painted in this yellow hue. This photo is from ’66 as Richard Kirkpatrick is now listed on the front fender as the main mechanic.

Current owner of the car, Mark Williamson, hasn’t been able to determine if this yellow was an OEM colour or a custom colour. The creation of the HiPo 289, 4-speed ’65 Falcon was thanks to the colloboration of Havers, mechanic Brad Francis and John Philipps, Performance Advisor at Ford Motor Company of Canada. Just three were built to race in B/Factory Experimental classes. For the first two or three years in B/FX it ran with the HiPo 289 fed by four, 2-barrel Weber carburetors. The car got a straight axle for the 1966 season and then by 1968 the 289 was sold and the car got Mopar power with a blower and fuel injection, below left, and the car ran in the mid-10s with this configuration. The beefy custom rear suspension, pictured lower right, was inspired by the 1964 Thunderbolt Fairlane setups.

more weight on the rear wheels coming out of the chute and also pushes much less wind.” It also didn’t hurt that a 2-door HT Falcon had a curb weight of about 2,800 pounds. Thanks to Havers’ prompting, powering these cars would be the high revving, solid lifter, 271hp HiPo 289 which debuted in 1963 under the hood of about 200 Ford Fairlanes. Known as the K-Code option in Mustangs and Fairlanes, it wasn’t available in US-built Falcons. Philipps convinced Ford execs to make the engine available in Canadian-built Falcons under code 992. Also part of the package would be 4-speed manual transmissions, with 9” rear ends with Detroit Locker differentials. These special Canadian-only cars, sans the fibreglass body parts, were predicted by Philipps in the magazine article as being tough competitors in the C stock class. Only seven, possibly eight, HiPo ’65 Falcons were built and that included the three B/FX cars. Under B/FX rules quite a few modifications, including to the engine, were allowed.

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The HiPo 289 already came standard with beefy connecting rods, screw-in rocker studs, wider main caps, valvespring pockets for stability, bigger balancer, dual point distributor and special 4-barrel carb. The stock cam featured an aggressive 310° duration with .460 valve lift.

They were little screamers but the B/FX versions turned them in 400+HP monsters.

Havers received one of the B/FX cars out of Eastgate Ford of Hamilton, ON. Rankin Ford (London, ON) received one which became the famous The Wild Child, campaigned by shop foreman John McIntyre and driver Ev Rowse. The third went to Wood-Larkin Ford and was campaigned by the dealer’s performance manager Mike Woods. Woods would later team with Chuck Beatty to form the iconic Woods Beatty Performance.

Havers immediately tore down his engine and had it balanced and blueprinted.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 48

mong the hundreds of significant muscles cars in The Brothers Collection are two rare ’69 Oldsmobiles stylized

by Hurst Performance. One of them is the prototype for all ’69 H/O cars and the other is one of only three H/O convertibles produced that year.

Story and photos by Tim Costello

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Linda Vaughn and the Hurst Performance Hurstettes in 1969.

Vaughn is perched on the iconic shifter platform and before its restoration, our featured H/O convertible still had scuff marks on the bumper where the platform was mounted. At right, an original photo of the prototype car. Notice the semi-transparency of the rear window stripe.

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Gene Baker’s Elephant Tusk spoiler was radically different than the spoiler, below, that ended up on the production ’69 H/O cars. The Hurst/Olds logo under the prototype spoiler, right, was originally designed to light up when braking.

Over the years, Hurst Performance has been known for making shifters that far exceed the quality of the production units. Racers and performance enthusiasts have been using them for years. As with most businesses, the company started off small in little automotive repair shop outside of Glenside, PA. George Hurst and Bill Campbell created Hurst-Campbell and by the 1960s they became a legendary part of automotive history. Their products were so good that even OE manufactures started to allow them to come in as standard equipment on their performance products. As the business continued to grow, Hurst added to their portfolio with wheels, line loc units, brakes, and even clutches too. At racing events, they offered a “Hurst Performance Clinic” which not only educated their customers on new products but helped them repair their cars as well. The marketing of the company was brilliant and was always looking to sell more products.

They started building feature cars like the Hurst Hairy Oldsmobile, which was a twin-engine, supercharged 442 and the Hemi Under Glass Barracuda. They hired Linda Vaughn, along with the Hurstettes to step it up even further and this marketing put the company in the forefront of performance products.

One thing George Hurst had always dreamt of was to build his own muscle car that would forever cement the “Hurst” name in the performance history books. He reportedly first approached John DeLorean at Pontiac with thoughts of creating a 1968 H/O Firebird but it didn’t happen. Oldsmobile liked the idea, though Hurst’s vision included installing a 455ci V8 in the mid-size Holiday

Coupe. GM corporate policy at the time was “no mid-sized cars were to be built with more than 400 cubic inches” so the work around was that the car’s would be built by an outside contractor. Hurst put in an order for 500 cars and Oldsmobile tapped Jack “Doc” Watson to manage the program, as the first of many Hurst/Oldsmobile (H/O) projects. The cars were delivered to Demmer Engineering in Lansing, MI where the 455’s received a a better cam, tuned Rochester 4bbl carburetor, special distributor, and 3.91 gears. With these modification’s the H/O’s cars produced 390hp and 500+ftlbs of torque making an H/O capable of running in the mid 13s at 104 mph in the quarter mile. Demand for the car became quite apparent when 2,600 orders were made, although only 515 of the Peruvian silver H/O’s made it out the door.

Realizing they had something special in their hands, Hurst decided to create another car for 1969 but they wanted something a bit flashier. Bob Larivee Sr. and his company, Promotions Incorporated was responsible for the creation of several long-running car shows, including the Detroit Autorama. Hurst being a supplier of custom parts knew the show quite well and was excited by one of the participants, a designer/builder by the name of Chuck Miller. His company Styline Customs in River Rouge, Mi has been responsible for quite a few custom cars that debuted at the Autorama over the years. Some standout builds included the Red Baron show car, the Zingers half scale cars and the Chrysler RTS show cars. Hurst tapped Gene Baker, who designed the Rambler Scramblers for AMC and Hurst, to come up with some concepts to pres-

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ent to Miller. Unlike the 1968 cars, Hurst wanted something that screamed fast and dropped off a shiny white 442 from the production line to Miller’s Styline Customs.

Within a month Miller and his team had it back at Hurst for an engineering review.

From the front the car had a handmade, sheet metal twin forced air hood scoop with full functioning snorkels which gave it not only an aggressive look but helped the 455 H/O breath. The scoop had a bold red arrow on the top with black “Forced Air” lettering and a Fire Frost Gold stripe which started on the nose continuing up the hood and ending on the scoop. There were also two small spoilers on the rear of the hood near the windshield. The gold stripe continued over the roof, onto the rear window and down the deck lid. Along the sides of the car a thick gold stripe with black pinstripe started at the leading edge of the fenders ending at the rear quarter glass. A gold stripe was also added to the rockers. Out back a wild 3-piece rear spoiler, from Baker’s sketches, stretched across the trunk and down to the quarterpanels. The two quarterpanel spoiler extensions looked like elephant tusks so the car quickly gained the Elephant Tusk nickname. The review

went pretty well but due to tooling cost and possible alignment issues, the Elephant Tusks were rejected, as were the twin hood spoilers. The twin snorkel scoop received some design tweaks, including the elimination of the “handle” at the top of the scoop as well as the Forced Air lettering and red arrow. The gold stripe on the rear window was rejected due to fears the DOT would see it as an obstruction to the driver’s view.

After the review, the car was sent back to Styline Customs and the elephant tusk spoilers were taken off the car and literally tossed in the trash. The holes in the quarter panels were welded up and a new Hurst designed spoiler was added. A fresh coat of pearl white was applied to the car to make it pop. The gold tint stripe was removed from the rear window. While factory ’69 H/Os would get gold-painted Olds Super Stock II wheels, the prototype was dressed in a set of Cragar SS wheels and then traveled around with the Hurst road shows to promote both the car and the Hurst brand. Demmer Engineering was again tasked with taking factory-built 442 Holiday Coupes and turning them into Hurst Oldsmobilles.

The W-46 option code added $683.94 to the purchase

The prototype scoop, recreated during the restoration, was originally fabricated from sheet metal though for budget purposes the production model 1969 H/O scoops were fibreglass. The production H/O scoops, above right, were also quite different than the prototype design. At the photo top of page you can also see the two spoilers at the back edge of the hood, near the windshield, that didn’t make it onto the production models. Miller ended up putting them on his personal 442.

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In 1969, all factory Olds V8s were painted a bronze colour, but the H/O 455s received their own red paint. Factory 4-4-2 cars were only available with the 400ci V8. The HO’s got the 455ci normally only available in Toronados or Delta 88s. The factory L-32 455V8 had 10.25:1 compression but the H/O version was rated at 10.50:1 compression. The H/O 455 got the same D-port cylinder heads featured on the ’68-’69 W30 400ci engines.

These heads sported 69.75cc volume and 2.072/1.625-inch intake/exhaust valves. The H/O’s hydraulic cam spec’d out at 285/287 degrees duration with .472” lift on both exhaust and intake side. A special cast iron 4-bbl intake manifold was said to be the prototype for the aluminum version that debuted on the 1970 W-30 cars. Bolted to that intake was a specially jetted and tuned 4-bbl 750 cfm Rochester carburetor. While the prototype got a set of long tube headers, the factory versions received mildly tweaked factory exhaust manifolds. The distributor was also specially built to increase low-end response. Chrome valve covers were standard on the H/O. The ram air flapper setup was vacuum operated. price. For the money, buyers received a tweaked version of the factory installed L-32 455ci V8, special paint/decal package, hood scoop, ram air setup, rear spoiler, badging, an anti-spin differential and a Hurst Dual Gate shifter linked to a Turbo 400 3-speed automatic transmission.

Since these cars were based on the 4-4-2 they already had dual exhaust as well as heavy duty suspensions, including beefy front and rear sway bars.

Sales almost doubled with the ’69 H/O version, as 914 (plus three convertibles, but more on that later in this story) were built. So what happened to the prototype car?

Eventually it became Hurst sales manager Don Morton’s car. Morton would soon after become general manager of Hurst Performance Research and the ’69 HO was his personal daily driver. As you can imagine the car drew a ton of looks around the Detroit area and even saw a bit of street racing action on the famous Woodward Ave. As time went on, Morton was given a new Hurst car and the H/O Prototype just sat out behind the shop. In 1972, it was eventually sold to an Oldsmobile dealer in Wisconsin where the special gold flake pearl paint caught the eye of dealer employee Gary Cox. Shortly after purchase, Cox filed a warranty claim due to the original 455’s habit of belching smoke. It was replaced but it led to a falling out with the dealership owner and Cox decide to make a life change, moving his family to Oregon with the H/O even

pulling a trailer loaded with belongings for the trip.

Within a couple years of the move, he sold the car and it bounced around and ended up in Michigan when sometime around 2011/12 Missouri’s Marc Jungerman found it for sale. It had all the H/O trimmings so he knew the car was a Hurst car but the low production number didn’t match up with the other 911 H/O’s known to have been produced in 1969. After going over the car and doing some sleuthing he began to suspect he had lucked out and purchased the prototype 1969 H/O. As Jungerman back-tracked the owners, he was put in contact with Morton, who though skeptical the car was the prototype came around once certain specific clues, most importantly the evidence of repairs to the quarter panel where the original “Elephant Tusk” spoiler end caps mounted, were confirmed. Established as the prototype car, Jungerman had the car repainted by Cox using a similar gold flake pearl paint to the original. After that, he barely drove the car due to its pedigree and in 2015 decided to sell it at the Mecum Auction in Indy. Morton and Chuck Miller met up with the Jungerman at the event.

Miller stuck his hand down in the quarter panel and found the welded-up holes in the quarter panels where the elephant tusks once resided. He also noticed that when they removed the original stripe from the rear window little pieces of gold paint still existed on the inside of

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the glass. They both inspected the car and agreed it was the first car. As with all Mecum auctions, the excitement of the crowd could be felt in the air and when the hammer dropped the car sold for $150,000US to the Brother’s Collection out of Salem, Oregon.

After the auction, it was sent to Level One Restorations where Gary Riley and his team tore the car back down for a full rejuvenation. A decision was made to set the car back to the way it was originally sketched by Gene Baker. With a copy of the original pictures, they set out on the journey of restoring the car back to the way it once was shown, including the wild Elephant Tusk spoiler and gold paint in the rear window.

The car was wearing a modern pearl paint but during the restoration, Geoffrey Kelley the lead painter at Level One stumbled upon some original paint on one of the doors and the car was painted to match. (All production ’69 Hurst Oldsmobiles were Cameo White & Firefrost Gold). Frank Peterson was brought in to build the Elephant tusks. Peterson is based out of the Colorado area and is no stranger to building hot rods. In 1970, he took a 1969 Tornado to the Pikes Peak hill climb and won his class! Hayden Brown, a level one fabricator handled the creation of the custom Force Air hood scoops and Legendary Auto Interiors along with some NOS material made the interior shine like new.

About a year after starting the restoration, Riley and his team unveiled The Elephant Tusk H/O at the 2018 10th Anniversary Muscle Car and Corvette Nationals. Miller made a special trip from Detroit to Chicago to check it out and was happy with the results. The restoration is outstanding and was a crowd favorite at the event.

The restored 1969 H/O was revealed to the public at the 2018 Muscle Cars & Corvette Nationals held annually in Chicago, IL.

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he 1969 H/O cars were a great success with more than 900 H/O coupes being built with the base price of just over $4,100. Originally no convertibles were planned by Hurst but they decided a little more promotion wouldn’t be bad and came up with a unique way to do it. An order was placed with Oldsmobile for two 442 convertibles. One car would cover the east coast and one for the west coast, to save on transporting cars back and forth. A platform was created that could be hung off the rear bumpers/trunk that allowed a giant 6-foot plus Hurst shifter to be placed upon it. The cars were paraded around racing events in front of packed stands. Legendary Linda Vaughn or one of the other Hurstettes would hang on to the giant shifter and wave to the approving crowd. It was a great success and the Hurst giant shifter was a crowd favorite.

Very early on the “West coast car” was destroyed in an accident so another replacement was ordered and this is the car you see here. Although the convertible was equipped like other H/O's, it was heavily optioned: Power

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windows and locks, vanity mirror, map light mirror, tilt, electric trunk release, A/C, and rear seat shoulder belts. It is the only H/O to get the gold-colored Super Stock II wheels, along with a prototype Hurst Auto Stick shifter being added along the way. The interior was stepped up with gold carpeting when the Auto Stick was installed, and on the outside huge Hurst logos adorned both doors.

The car represents a significant part of Hurst history as it was the very last 1969 Hurst/ Oldsmobile to be built.

Hurst’s VP and General Manager, William Wheeler, was lucky enough to get it as his company car in California.

He loved the performance of the 455 H/O not only on the drag strip but also on the twisty windy roads on his way home from work. As the years past, Mr. Wheeler was given a new car and the Hurst convertible was passed on to a new owner. It bounced around over the years until it landed in the Brother’s Collection and that’s where it resides today.

On Christmas Day 2011, Gary Riley at Level One Restorations received the convertible to bring it up to the

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This is the car that replaced the original West Coast 1969 H/O convertible and as you can see it differs from the coupes that were available to the public in that it has gold wheels, Hurst Performance logos on the doors and also got a gold carpet interior with a Hurst Auto Stick.

high standards The Brothers Collection expect. Upon arrival, it was in good shape but had a well-used life. The drivetrain was still original though the engine was sent to Verle Stevens in Arvada, Colorado to be rebuilt. Legendary Auto Interiors was called on once again to help with recreating the interior using NOS material. The roof however is something unique with the gold stripes from the hood and deck lid continuing up and over the roof.

When the car was restored, the top was masked dyed and then pinstriped to reproduce the original look. The original giant shifter and the platform were long gone so a replacement needed to be recreated. Riley hired Frank Peterson again to fabricate the platform, shifter, and Thandle. Using original photos as guides, Peterson’s efforts were a success. As luck would have it, the original rear

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bumper still showed scuff marks from where the platform used to ride so that helped. After doing some more research, he was able to track down one of the original shifters in a museum. They allowed him to take measurements to help reproduce it. Although they were not willing to let it go, this was very helpful. The restoration came out fantastic and amazingly within a year of receiving the car, it was complete. The convertible was unveiled at the 2012 Muscle Car and Corvette Nationals where Linda Vaughn stood on the platform just like she did many years ago. It was quite the impressive display and she signed autographs in front of the famous car. Both cars, the first H/O and the last H/O convertible are now residing together again in the Brother’s Collection, prolonging the great Hurst heritage.

MAIL BOX GREAT PURE STOCK DRAGS COVERAGE On a trip last summer to Minnesota’s Iron Range cities of Chisholm and Virginia, I was pleasantly surprised to find the Spring 2020 issue of Muscle Cars. You’ve put together an excellent, factual magazine with cool backstory insights about a period of time near and dear to my heart (not the first time you’ve heard this, I’ll bet).

As a teen growing up in the Twin Cities during the late 1960s, I was fortunate enough to own an L79 1966 Chevy II with headers, 4.10 gears and M21 4-speed. I ran pretty much everyone down up to about 85 mph and with slicks could turn 12.90 (best ever). I especially liked showing my taillights to Road Runners and GTOs, as I knew I had the right gearing and lighter load for some quick stop light action and they almost always didn’t.

I also worked at a gas station where the owner’s son unfortunately died during a street race with his 1967 440 GTX. We had worked on his car extensively over a couple years, and although I was a Chevy guy, I was always secretly longing for the 440 power.

The spring 2020 issue really hit home for an old street racer, both with the 327-powered Impala and the GTX articles. The article on the Silver Bullet was especially good. I had read about the Silver Bullet previously, so knew a little about Addison’s battles on Woodward, but I’m anxiously looking forward to the next issue with Part 2. I’m pretty sure I had a copy of the Car Craft issue with Ro McGonegal’s articles, but it’s unfortunately long gone.

email your comments, thoughts or ideas to info@musclecarsmagazine.ca

Yep, you’re right Bill. Messed up on that one. Our apologies.

MAILING LABEL REQUEST Please try to get the Canada Post mailing address stickers put on the back cover of the magazine. They always ruin the beautiful cover photo.

Philip Osanic via email Hey Philip, thanks for letting us know and we appreciate your support, but unfortunately the back page is a paid advertiser area and part of the deal is the ad is not obscured.

The label should be placed in the lower right or left area of the magazine cover and we’ll check with our printer to make sure they make sure of that in the future.

FAN OF 1962 PONTIACS

Gary Sjoquist Apple Valley, MN BIG BLOCKS WERE STILL AVAILABLE IN 1973 I thought I would write after reading the FALL 2020 issue. First off, thanks to your back issue process, I have all but one or two of your issues. I enjoy the magazine very much; the cars, stories and photography are great.

Regarding the ’73 T/A story; it was interesting to see one in the unusual color of Brewster Green. Can’t say I ever heard about the color or saw one. The thing that I was not too keen on was the caption under the main photo that states there were no other muscle cars with 400+ci engines in 1973.

I think the author needs to reconsider and maybe apologize to all owners of the following cars. In ’73 there were: Century Buick GS & Riviera w/455, Olds 442s and Hurst Olds w/ 455, the Chevy Chevelle and Corvette w/454, Dodge Charger Rallye and Plymouth Road Runner with the 440.

I suppose some of these may not really be muscle cars but I would beg to differ on that. Some of them even had a higher horsepower rating than the T/A. So, in the future please consider the history we have with all (US) auto makes.

Bill Daub Milwaukee, WI

After seeing our Project Strato Chief ’62 Pontiac online and in the pages of the magazine, Dave out of Ontario sent us some pics of the ’62 Pontiac he raced back in the ’70s. He is a fan of the Chevy 6-cylinders and raced his with a .030 over 292 with .120 milled off the head, which was also ported and stuffed with stainless valves. A solid cam, Clifford intake and 4bbl holley were other upgrades. The car ran a 4-speed and posi differential and Dave even had an outfit that built canoes create a 5-piece custom fibreglass front end including a side-tilt hood.

“We used to show it at the Pontiac National meets,” writes Dave. “The Americans got a kick of of the “Pontolet”. I have always been an inline engine fan and raced a dirt B Modified, 255 ci limit in NY state and in St Catherines, ON.” Thanks for the pics and story Dave.

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PANTHER PINK PRAIRIE RAISED ’70 Swinger 340

Oldsmobile engineers designed this 1969 W31 Cutlass S to be a potent weekend warrior and a stylish, comfortable daily driver during the week. 50 years later it’s still doing its thing.

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1969 Cougar Super Cobra Jet ordered by Canadian Drag Racing legend Barrie Poole.

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Photos by Britton Ledingham Story by Cliff Guinand with Terry Denomme nly in Canada, eh? Pity. Yep, but we aren’t talking White Rose tea here. Our American readers might be confused with both the iconic Canadian television commercial reference and the 1967 Pontiac Grande Parisienne we’re featuring on these pages. Go to YouTube to check out the 1977 commercial reference but read on if you want to learn more about Canadian-built Pontiacs, specifically Stew Smith’s 1967 Grande Parisienne 2-door sport coupe.

The sans Grande, lower model Parisiennes resembled the US Pontiac Bonneville but at first glance this Grande Parisienne resembles the USbuilt Pontiac Grand Prix. If you were to take out a measuring tape you’d find some differences. Both cars are 215.6” in overall length and 79.4” wide, but the Grande Parisienne’s 119” wheelbase is almost 2” shorter than a Grand Prix. The Grande Parisienne sports a 62.5” track width up front and 62.4” out back which differs from the Grand Prix with a 63” track width up front and 64” out back. Something’s up, but what?

Prior to the signing of the 1965 Canada-US Auto Pact, trade deficit issues meant US-built vehicles had heavy tariffs applied to them when imported into Canada. The Auto-Pact would eventually change this but in 1967 GM of Canada operations were in one way still operating as they had pre-Auto Pact. Pontiac dealers could always import the US cars to sell and they did.

Afterall the Muscle Car wars were in full swing in 1967 and the Made-Inthe-USA only GTO and newly bowed Firebird were hot sellers. But as far back as the late 1930s, GM of Canada had a work around that both saved the company money and gave Canadian buyers a “cheap” Pontiac to purchase at the dealership.

That work around was building Pontiacs on Chevrolet chassis and using Chevy drivelines. These Canadian-built Pontiacs would cosmetically look like Pontiacs, with similar grilles and similar (but sometimes not exactly) sheet metal, but they were all Chevy under the skin. GM kept doing it because it worked really well with Pontiac being third, behind only Chevy and Ford, in Canadian car sales for decades.

In 1967, Canadian-built Strato Chiefs/Laurentians/Parisiennes and Grande Parisiennes were built on the Chevy B-body platform, which included the Biscayne/Bel Air/Impala/Caprice lineup. This accounts for the wheel base and track width differences noted above.

Canadian-built Pontiacs also had many of the same engine options available to Chevy buyers. While the base engine in the upscale 1967 Grand Prix was Pontiac’s 350hp, 400ci V8 in Canada the base V8 was the 327ci small block Chevy but you could also order the 396ci/325hp BBC which is what is nestled under the hood of Smith’s car. Called a Turbo Jet in Chevys, it was labeled the Astro-Jet V8 in Pontiacs. The 327ci/275 hp V8 was named the Astro-Flame and the 427/385hp big block was called the JetFlame.

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This 1967 Pontiac Grande Parisienne has style and luxury but with a 396 Chevy big block under the hood it’s also sporty when you want it to be. The Grande Parisienne model was featured on the 1967 Pontiac B-body lineup brochure.

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The L35 396 CID 325hp 4bbl Astro Jet V8 was the base model 396, but there were a few other 396 options in the Chevy bin, including the L34 350hp version and of course the vaunted L78 375hp version. The L35 sported two-bolt mains, hydraulic lifters, Rochester carb on a cast iron intake manifold and a 10.25:1 compression ratio.

The Grande Parisienne model arrived in 1966 as the top dog in Pontiac’s Canadian B-body lineup and as mentioned earlier closely followed the 1967 Grand Prix in outward style though some body panels were reworked and messaged to fit the Chevy Caprice frame. Most of the interior, save for the Pontiac Grand Prix dash, is Chevy, featuring Caprice upholstery and an Impala steering wheel, console and shifter.

“As the Grand Parisienne was an upscale version of the Parisienne, its American cousin, the Grand Prix had similar appointments and had two engine options – the 400 and the 428,” Smith explains. “This 396 would be the US equivalent to the 400.”

According to Bill Cole, who owned this Canadian Poncho before Smith did, GM of Canada wanted to have an upscale Parisienne, and with the introduction of the

Caprice option in mid ’65 — in gained model status in the 1966 Chevy lineup — Canadian Pontiac dealers thought they needed an equivalent model. “So, in ’66 the ‘Grande’ Parisienne was debuted and was styled after the US Grand Prix with front, rear and roofline treatment,” says Cole.

One Grand Prix vs Grande Parisienne fact is that the Grande Parisienne got the vent window but the Grand Prix didn’t – unless you ordered the 1-year only convertible version. “I’m thinking they took the door from the Grand Prix convertible and used it on the Grande Parisienne, then built the car around it,” says current owner Smith. Who could argue with that thinking because none of the other body components are Grand Prix or Bonneville, they are Parisienne through-in-through. One clue is the hood and cowl on the Canadian Grande Parisi-

If the Grande Parisienne’s unique front end wasn’t enough for you to realize this was no mere Parisienne, Grande Parisienne script was featured on both quarterpanels, the tailpanel along with GP emblems mounted on the stainless rocker panel mouldings.

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The upholstery on the Strato Bucket seats and back seat is all original, as are the door panels, dash pad and headliner. Only the carpet has been replaced. The odometer read 39,528 at the time of this shoot but it’s believed it’s turned over once so actual mileage is 139,528. Certainly it was gentle use as the interior survived well. That Pontiac tach is a sweet piece.

enne..there is no cowl on the US Grand Prix. The hood goes right to the base of the windshield and hides the wipers. The Grande Parisienne’s setup, with cowlmounted wipers in full view is more reminiscent of the 1967 Chevy B-Body design. There’s some conjecture on websites such as the Canadian Poncho page as to how these Canadian cars were built but nothing is conclusive – they are truly a Canadian curiosity.

When it comes to the drivetrain, it was all Chevy, but not all Canadian Chevy according to Byron Valcourt, who owned and refreshed this beauty earlier in its life. He is also one of the go-to-guys when it comes to Canadian Pontiacs. He says virtually all GM of Canada engines, save for BBC, were made in the St. Catherines, ON plant. The 409, 396 and 427 were shipped up from the Tonawanda Engine Plant in Buffalo, NY. Once in between the shock towers in Oshawa, the chrome air cleaners were adorned with

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Canadian Pontiac decals, calling out the Astro-Jet 396.

As Canada isn’t a big market, we have to know these cars, or any of these Canadian market Pontiacs, are few and far between. As for these Grande Parisiennes, there were just over 2,700 2-door versions made and this one is one of 325 hard tops built with the 396ci Astro-Jet and one of 290 with buckets seats and a 396. Our feature car has a TH 400 3-speed automatic and we don’t know the breakdown between automatic and 4-speed equipped cars. As this was a luxury car it’s likely safe to say the majority came from the factory equipped with automatics.

We don’t know who originally ordered this Grande Parisienne but thanks to the Vintage Vehicle Services GM of Canada Document we known it was shipped to the GM of Canada Regional Zone Office in Calgary, which back then was on Blackfoot Trail and 42nd Ave. It was built on May 4, 1967 in Oshawa and as mentioned is one of 325

Grande Parisiennes built with the L35 396 CID 325hp 4bbl Astro Jet V8. The car still has its original drivetrain and 12 bolt rear-end. It was shod with 14” white wall tires on steel wheels with full Parisienne specific hubcaps. It still has white walls but the Pontiac Rally II wheels, which debuted in 14” form in 1967, look better according to Smith.

It was ordered in Capri Cream with a black vinyl top, and yes, it the fender skirts were standard, emulating the Grand Prix. It also came with a number of options but not loaded, like bucket seats, tinted windshield, remote LH rear view mirror, power brakes, power steering, power antenna which was wired to an AM pushbutton radio with auxiliary rear speaker. A couple other somewhat odd options were ‘Deluxe’ front and rear seat belts, along with a Speed Warning Indicator. It almost sounds like this car was going to be used by a driver to shuffle around GM executives and they had to strap themselves in with real nice seat belts. Then god-forbid, if the driver was to speed, thus warning indicator. But more than likely it was used as a demo for an executive there at regional office.

By all indications, it initially stayed close to the Calgary Regional Office because according to Valcourt, it was then shipped to a Pontiac/Buick dealership in Olds,

AB a year or so later. That dealership then sold it to a local family who kept it for well over 30 years. When the original owner passed away the car was willed to a younger family relative who after a couple years decided to sell it. This car was kept up and always garaged so it was almost cherry when Valcourt, in 2000 (who partnered with his brother Rod), bought it off that young man.

Valcourt brought it to Alternative Restorations, a highend resto shop known for specializing in Canadian Pontiacs, for a look see the guys were pleasantly surprised at just how clean this big ol Pontiac was. But, as all ‘resto’ guys go, especially ones that specialize in body and paint, he had to give it a few new coats of Capri Cream paint. He did find a couple spots that needed patching and replacing but said the metal is 90% original and the interior is totally stock, except for a new carpet. So, we can’t say the car was restored, as it was so nice to start with, but Valcourt brought everything back to factory original with a lot of elbow grease and man hours.

The brothers had the Grande Parisienne for a little over three years before selling it to a Calgary-based collector.

Unfortunately that collector allegedly ran into some financial difficulties and much of the collection was sold

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off by the bank. When it was sold off by the bank, all the original paperwork that came with it was lost. Ouch. The car changed hands a number of times and even ended up in BC for a while. During that time it was sighted a number of times by previous owners from Alberta. In the early 2000s, current owner Smith remembers seeing it and chatting with the then BC owner at the Goodguys Northwest Nationals in Spokane, WA. Then, not long after, Rod Valcourt was vacationing in Kelowna, BC when he saw it at a used car lot. Amazingly, all of the owners to this point had not touched the car and it was exactly as he remembered it. We know this because the car was up for sale at the Electric Garage Auction in around 2009 when Calgary collector, Rick Hoinkes, who only collected ’67 Canadian Pontiacs, bought it. So, it made it back home and was in his ’67 Canadian Poncho only collection, until he passed away. It was then purchased by Bill Cole off of the estate in 2012. Cole, another Canadian Pontiac aficionado, cherished the full figured Grande Parisienne and thoroughly enjoyed it for four years.

Enter Smith who’s a very good friend of Bill Cole and somehow in 2016 convinced Cole to sell him the Grande Parisienne. Smith drives his cars and this Grande Parisi-

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enne car is seen often at shows in and around the Calgary area. In fact, the first year of owning it, he and a bunch of Pontiac guys drove down to Sandpoint, Idaho for their ‘Lost in the 50s’ show. As there were a number of Canadian Pontiacs that made the trek, the local Americans were blown away by these weird Poncho versions and a lot of explaining had to be done. After the show and as they were returning on a two lane highway, they came on a slow moving tractor heading down the road. When it was Smith’s turn to pass he saw a big semi approaching from the other way, so he punched it hard and as it lurched forward, it lurched too quickly and just about creamed the left rear tire of the tractor. Whew! Smith instantly learned his 396-powered Pontiac had a lot more poke than he anticipated.

“When I took the car to Sandpoint for its first showing, I got an award and boy this pissed Bill off as he showed it four times prior and got nothing,” laughs Smith. “My comment to him was ‘Geez Bill, all ya had to do is clean her up’ lol.” He also says that the big girl has won her fair share of hardware since he’s had it.

This is one Made in Canada product that’s easy to be proud of.

The above photos were taken shortly after Jack Watters purchased the car in 1974. Below you can probably see the restored version has a slightly different hue of orange. That’s because the car was painted Chevy Hugger Orange in the early ’70s but Tim Watters is a devout Mopar guy and he says he couldn’t live with having a Chevy colour on the car so he used Hemi Orange for the restoration.

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Photos by Kenny Kroeker/Story by Terry Denomme

im Watters grew up in a Mopar-loving, racing family so it’s no surprise the Lyon’s, ON native dreamed of racing one day himself.

Back in 1955 and 1956 his grandfather Harvey Watters actually sponsored a couple of cars that competed at NASCAR’s Daytona 500. In ’56 with Jim Wilson behind the wheel Watters sponsored a new 1956 Dodge Custom Royal Lancer D-500. The special D-500s were powered by Dodge’s 315ci Red Ram Hemi V8, fitted with an Offenhauser dual quad intake manifold. The engine’s were good for just under 300hp in stock form. This was when part of the Daytona track was still sandy beach and Wilson rolled the car. He was fine

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and the car was actually returned to the street after the race and driven by Harvey’s son Joe. You can see the rollover, Wilson’s driving car 576, on Youtube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJpDFHbUYnY. It was no surprise Harvey’s oldest son Jack became a racer, building cars for the quartermile and by the late ’60s for oval track racing.

In 1973 Jack campaigned a ’69 Dodge Dart in the Limited Stock class at Delaware Speedway and finished the season a disappointing 11th overall. That had him searching for something new for ’74 and he found it in this ’70 Challenger, or rather his son Tim found it depending on whose memory you trust.

This photo was sourced from the Historic SCCA Pro Racing Trans-Am Series Fan Group Facebook page and shows our featured ’70 Challenger, driven by Dick Brooks, during a practice session at Riverside International Raceway in Riverside, CA before the March 1971 Trans Am race. Judging from the tire smoke it seems Brooks went into the corner a little hard and locked the front brakes. On race day the Challenger completed just 12 laps before the engine expired. It only competed in that one race and by 1974 Jack Watters of Lyon, ON, below, found it for sale in the US and went down and bought it. He painted it Petty Blue and raced it at London, ON’s Delaware Speedway in the Limited Stock class. A mid-season race program driver profile says he was fourth in points at the time the article was published. It seems it was a decent combo but he found the Challenger a little nose heavy and in the offseason began to work on an engine setback which was never completed. The car didn’t see the light of day again until 2005 when his son Tim Watters started the restoration which was completed in the summer of 2020.

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This is how the car looked before Tim Watters started the restoration.

Jack Watters was a fan of Petty and those early ’70s Mopar strobe stripes. Look closely in the rear wheel wells and you can see the car has full floating rear axles which were installed when it was first built as a Trans Am car in 1970. The door cage visible at right was installed by Jack but the floor and under dash bars integrated with it were installed by Mark Schwien the original builder of the car. Those big rotors up front are actually late ’60s Ford/Lincoln 12” units.

Watters was only 12 at the time but he says he and his dad, who was just shy of 78 when he passed away in 2017, would argue about who found the car. “I think I put him onto it somehow. The way I remember it he was looking for a ’Cuda to race and I’d seen this Challenger. He denied it but I was younger so I argued my memory was better,” says Tim. The Challenger was originally built in 1970 by Brandywine, Maryland’s Mark Schwien. Schwien was a former NASCAR mechanic, builder/fabricator and had been the mechanic on Rusty Jowett’s Trans Am Camaros. Schwien was building the car for a Canadian driver named Grant Clark. Watters says the Challenger was purchased new at a local dealership and then driven to Schwien’s shop where it underwent the transformation to an SCCA Trans Am car. The car was a gold colour, low option Challenger

with a 318 and a 4-speed. Schwien stripped the interior and had the car blasted with pecan shells to strip off all the paint and seam sealer before incorporating the standard Trans Am modifications.

Chassis work included moving the rear leaf springs inboard to enable a bigger tire — Schwien also beat out the rear wheel openings to aid in tire fitment, something Watters discovered during the restoration —and Koni double adjustable shocks replaced the stock items. The 8 3/4 rear end got full floating rear axles and Hurst Airheart disc brakes.

Up front, Schwien adapted ’69/’70 Lincoln 12” rotors to work on the Mopar spindles. Watters says this was a common upgrade on all the Mopar Trans Am cars. The stock E-body ball joints were spliced with beefier C-body ball joints for endurance and a custom sway bar was installed.

The 4” exhaust pipes were “nestled” in the rocker...which back in the day meant beat it in with a hammer. H.E. Day, aka Carl Day and R.G. Rawlings out of Atlanta, GA, bought the car from Mark Schwien to go Trans Am racing but it only competed in one race in ’71. It didn’t get sold until 1974 so not sure what it was doing between ’71-’74.

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The bare bones of the original steering column remain but Watters installed the quick release mechanism during the restoration. The the rear brake line and positive battery cable run through the interior. The seat is an aftermarket item original to the 1970 Schwien build.

The dash, door panels and rear seat side panels are original to the car. Stewart Warner gauges in dash are all from original 1970 build and include fuel and engine oil pressure, oil accumulator pressure, water temp and amps. The tach is a cable driven Jones Motorola unit though it’s not the original as Jack Watters installed it in other cars. It got dinged up so Tim found one in better condition for the restoration. Note aluminum panel in the trans tunnel covering the original A833 shifter location. At some point, a ’64 vintage 4-speed was installed prompting a shifter relocation.

For rolling stock, the stylish, and now iconic, Englishmade 15x8 Minilite aluminum wheels were chosen and wrapped in Goodyear Blue Streak Sports Car tires 6.00x15 up front and 7.00x15 out back.

Eagle eyed ’70 Challenger lovers will notice something amiss with the rear spoiler; it doesn’t extend fully onto the quarters. That’s because it is actually a 1968 Camaro rear spoiler adapted to fit. Watters says Schwien told him they could get a Challenger spoiler quick enough so they just used the most readily available spoiler they could get.

The build was in full swing when Chrysler pulled all their sponsorship from Trans Am racing and Clark apparently abandoned the car with some significant money owed for services rendered. Schwien was stuck with the car so put it up for sale and it was purchased by Carl (H.E.) Day and H.G. Rawlings out of Atlanta, GA. They teamed up with another gentleman and managed to get a Keith Black-built engine to power the car so they could race it at the February 1971 SCCA Trans Am race at Riverside International Speedway in Riverside, CA. Black was building all the Dodge Trans Am engines and Dan Gurney built all the Plymouth engines. The base was a T/A 340 block which had a beefy bottom end which could be redrilled to make it a 4-bolt main block. Keeping the stock 340 bore size (4.04) the engine was destroked to 305ci using a custom forged, cross-drilled crankshaft and stuffed with lightweight forged rods, custom pistons and a very high revving cam of unknown specs. (More on that cam later).

A single 730 cfm Holley 4bbl carb was perched on an Edelbrock LD340 aluminum intake and the custom headers were built using 1 7/8 primary tubes which went to a 4” collector. The heads were the standard T/A heads which were cast with the pushrod holes relocated to allow for oversized porting on the intake runners. This is why T/A heads have the offset rockers and Keith Black did generously port the heads.

Before heading to Riverside the car was painted Chevy Hugger Orange but wasn’t even fully lettered up by the time it arrived in California to compete at Riverside.

Day and Rawlings employed 1969 NASCAR rookie of the Year Dick Brooks to drive the car at Riverside, but the

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Keith Black engine expired after just 12 laps. The Challenger’s lone claim to fame was that legendary auto writer Brock Yates accompanied the team to Riverside and wrote an entire chapter about the race and the car for his book Sunday Driver.

Whether Day and Rawlings ran out of money or interest we don’t know, but after the engine expired they managed to get another Keith Black engine under the hood but never raced the car again and it sat untouched until Jack Watters bought it and brought it up to Canada in 1974.

When Jack got it back to Ontario he promptly cut portions of the cage out of it in order to install a stock car cage. Instead of cutting up the doors to accomodate the cage, he was either prescient enough or respectful enough to take the original doors off and store them away, fabricating a sheet metal skin to close in the area. He cut out some of the bracing on the hood, removed the hinges and installed hood pins. Then he painted it Petty Blue, complete with Lee Petty’s #42 on the side and went racing. The car was nose heavy and quite a bit wider than the ’69 Dart he’d raced previously which made it a little more difficult to manuever through traffic but an article that ran in the

The original fuel cell with Firestone bladder, survived all these years so they were reinstalled.

Delaware Speedway (London, ON) program during the 1974 race season mentioned he was currently in 4th in the points race. We don’t know where he finished on the season and Tim, being just a kid at the time, doesn’t really remember much about the car when it was racing. When the season was over, Watters pulled it in his shop and cut the cowl and firewall out of the car to accomodate an engine setback for the ’75 season, but Jack wither lost interest or changed his mind and the car was left sitting.

“In about 1978 our cousin wanted to go racing and dad started building a car for him and then he built three or four cars with him and they raced,” says Watters. But the Challenger was simply pushed aside. Watters himself raced go karts until he was 17 but never did fulfil his desire to race cars. He says girls, work and eventually family life took over until about 2005 when he started thinking it was time to go racing.

“It was around the time that I got my first computer and I found the historic Trans Am group,” says Watters.

“I always knew what the car was but I never really knew what to do with it. After finding that website I knew what I wanted to do.” Not only was he going to go racing, he was going to do it in style in a vintage Trans Am car.

Luckily, almost everything he needed to put it back to the 1971 Riverside configuration was either still on the car or somewhere in the shop.

After removing all the Petty Blue paint, there wasn’t a lot of sheet metal work to do. “It had some bumps and bruises and I ended up replacing the taillight panel and of course the firewall and cowl,” says Watters, who purchased a complete parts car to get parts he needed. The parts car also came in handy as Jack had cut out the inner fenders of the car for stock car racing.

“I had to put a patch between the driver’s door and the rear well and I also put a new rear valance on it,” adds Watters. Seems back in the day when they bashed out the rear wheel wells for tire clearance it buckled a spot on the driver’s side from the door back to the wheel arch. They simply filled it with about 3/4” of mud.

The original Hugger Orange painted doors were still in the attic, complete with #32 still painted on them. “Everything he took off the car, including taillights, he just saved them and they went in the attic or the shop.” Even the custom made fuel filler neck, which extends through the rear tail panel and had been removed when Jack Watters raced it, was found outside the shop in a pile of other parts.

Watters did buy another hood, but only to dissect the support braces from it that his dad had removed back in the day. The hood skin is original to the car and so is the

back bumper, though the front bumper is a replacement.

All the stainless and trim on the car is also original. “I still have the original front bumper but I haven’t straightened it out yet,” says Watters. “It’s still got dints in it and rubber marks and I left all that.”

Watters cut out the stock car cage his dad built and rebuilt a cage to original Trans Am specs using photos and some leftover clues from the original. “Dad cut out most of the original cage but he did leave the bars that go down the A pillar and through the dash and the stuff underneath the dash,” says Watters, who in the end only saved some bars in the trunk where they welded to the frame and rebuilt the rest. “I just cut them and put a dowl inside and then rebuilt a new hoop. There were still little nubs of the original left when dad cut it out so I knew where things went.”

Back in ’74 the car came with two sets of 15x8 Minilite aluminum wheels and Goodyear Blue Streak tires and one set of wheels is still on the car. Two of the original Goodyear Blue Streak tires — one front and one back — survived but they were not used in the restoration.

When it came to that second Keith Black engine that had come with the car only the top end was useable.

“That engine blew and destroyed the crank and everything in it,” says Watters, who sourced a 340 2-bolt main block for the rebuild. He used everything from the top end, including the 915 casting heads, original Edelbrock intake, Holley 730 cfm carb and custom built headers. The cam, however was not reused.

Bill Little built the motor for Watters and they discovered something interesting about the cam. Little said it was much too big for such a small cubic inch motor and he figured the engine would have had to run 10,000 rpm to make any power. That led Watters to believe that maybe that second Keith Black motor had some NASCAR history behind it. Dick Brooks, who drove the Challenger at Riverside, also drove a 1970 Dodge Daytona for Mario Rossi in the ’71 Daytona 500. NASCAR had ruled that the Chrysler aero cars couldn’t run unless they used the smaller cubic inch motors. “I read an article about Dick Brooks racing that car with a Keith Black motor and he said he knew he was over 11,000 rpm at times,” says Watters. Whether that motor ran at Daytona or not is just speculation but it’s a neat story.

For the bottom end, Watters had King Crankshafts in North Carolina build a custom billet crank with custom length Carillo rods attached to JE pistons. The compression ratio is about 12.3:1. The cam is also a custom grind.

The 915 casting T/A heads (2.02” intake valves, 1.60” exhaust valves) were reused but Keith Black’s porting had

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The 340 engine was known to have oil starvation issues, especially while being slung around on a road course, but SCCA rules didn’t allow for dry sump systems, so an oil accumulator system could have been rigged up to provide extra oil when engine oil pressure dropped below a certain psi. This unit wasn’t originally on the car and Watters added it mostly to add extra oil on starup. On the dyno, this engine put out 450hp and 406-ft-lbs of torque which comes in at about 3,500 rpm. That original Keith Black decal, inset, on the driver’s side valve cover is highly desirable and impossible to find these days. to be toned down so Bill Little filled them in a bit.

Little also found the custom headers, with 1 7/8 primaries flowing into the 4” collectors, were not ideal for the engine though Watters retained them because they were original to the car. Back in the early ’70s they were still learning a lot about V8 engines but when it came to exhaust bigger was often regarded as better. Almost 50 years later engine builders know that’s not true. Little figures 1 5/8” primaries and a 2.5” to 3” collectors would work better with the now 307ci motor and maybe even gain up to 20hp.

When it came to time to paint the car Watters found himself in a bit of a quandary about the original paint colour. As an avid Mopar guy, he had a hard time with the Chevy Hugger Orange paint originally sprayed on the car. In the end he decided he just couldn’t do it, so he sprayed the car Chrysler Hemi Orange and also painted the numbers. Danno Drouin hand-painted the rest of the lettering.

The project took 15 years to finish as it was done when time and money allowed. Sadly, Jack Watters passed away before the car was completed. He says his dad knew he was working on the car but didn’t talk about it much or even offer up much information when asked during the build. “He never talked too much and was always one who thought you should figure things out for yourself,” says Watters. “I guess I did sort of anyway, I don’t know but I got it done.”

Watters says the car rips. “I’ve been down the road a few times in it,” he says with a laugh. “It makes pretty good torque for a little engine and it makes lots of noise and sounds good.”

Sadly, his plans to race it won’t be coming true. “The more I got into it the more I learned how much it was going to cost to race,” says Watters. He said he did the math on racing it one weekend at Mosport’s Vintage Racing event and he figured it would cost up to $6,000 just to race it in the four, 20-minute races. “You’re going to burn about 12 gallons of race fuel in 20 minutes,” he calculates and with racing fuel costing up to $100 per 5-gallon pail that’s $800 in fuel for the weekend. “The Challenger is about 3,200lbs and from what I hear you go through a set of tires on the weekend, so their’s another $1,600.” That’s almost $3,000 before you calculate food, travel and lodging into the equation. “It’s a rich man’s game,” says Watters.

“So, it’s up for sale and someone else can race it.”

Hopefully for more than 12 laps this time too.

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THE NEW HOME FOR F ‘70-’71 CUDA RUBBER BUMPERS B AND SSHAKER CO COM MPONENTS O S

340, 383, AND 440 SHAKER HAKER KITS , PAINTED SHAKER BUBBLES BUBBLES, 2X4 HEMI BASE-PLA AT TES AND 440-6 PACK BASEPLAT TES , GRILLS , AIR DOORS , FASTENERS AND OTHER HARDWARE .

1971 CUDA Elastome eric Bumpers

TOMMYTHECH HRYCO.CA

By Cliff Guinand

ace on Sunday! Sell on Monday! Dodge and Plymouth cars were competitive from the dawn of the horsepower race, and for all intents and purposes, Corporate Head Office was behind this new found marketing niche. Their downsized 1962 Plymouth and Dodge models didn’t sell well to mainstream buyers but their dimensions and light weight were a perfect home for Mopar’s potent 410-bhp 413-cid V-8. With this new found marketing angle, BBDO was tasked with pitching that Corporate Chrysler was serious about racing.

Their racing reputation grew for '63 when racing enthusiasts could order a number of cars in the Dodge and Plymouth line-ups with a competition-ready 425-bhp 426-cid Wedge Head V-8, also known as the Max Wedge. But before we go any further, we have to look back even further when in the late ’50’s a few groups of Chrysler engineers started playing with performance. Known as the Ram-

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chargers with Dodge and Golden Commandos for Plymouth, these teams generated notoriety and the racing program got serious with sponsorships going out to a number of racers soon after. Cars with names like ‘Melrose Missile’, ‘Lawman’ and of course The Ramchargers, were then used in ads to herald the performance feats and the profusion of wins these racers were racking up.

Then of course, Plymouth had a NASCAR superstar they could utilize in their ad campaigns, Richard Petty, so they summoned their agency, N.W. Ayer & Son for ’66, to take advantage of the amazing accomplishments King Richard was achieving. The ads essentially wrote themselves as he dominated NASCAR. A year before in ’65, Chrysler also installed a few 426ci race Hemis in their lightweight race prepared Coronets and Belvederes that put the drag racing world on notice. Then, we had the release of the Street Hemi in ’66, and both BBDO, who did

C=CHRYSLER RACING

both corporate and Dodge marketing, and N.W. Ayer & Son with Plymouth – let all 8 barrels loose in touting the 426 Hemi on both the drag strip and wide ovals.

There was no holding back, and as the horsepower wars kept growing, the marketing kept driving that home.

That Race on Sunday, sell on Monday slogan continued well into the ’70s but the pure ‘racing’ type marketing fell off and both Dodge and Plymouth started their own marketing programs – Scat Pack and Rapid Transit System. As things moved on in the ’70s, Chrysler Corporate introduced an internal performance and racing arm called Hustle Stuff, soon replaced by Direct Connection and more recently, Mopar Performance.

So, Corporate still has skin in the game even today, and as things move forward, we can only hope racing and performance is part of the mix.

Rick Clough’s ’63 Box Top Galaxie 500 HT is a tribute to one of Ford’s best ideas.

UNREAL R-CODE Story and photos by Terry Denomme N 1963 Ford found itself behind the power curve in the burgeoning Detroit cubic inch and horsepower wars. Chevy’s 425hp, dual quad 409 and Mopar’s dual quad 413s and 426ci Wedge motors were leaving Blue Oval cars in their dust.

Ford’s Tripower-406 FE engines, introduced in 1962, pumped out 405 hp but that wasn’t good enough. Ford engineers got to work on the venera-

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ble FE keeping the 406’s 3.785” stroke but boring the cylinders to within an inch — less really — of their lives to 4.23” and by mid-1963 Ford introduced the dual quad, 427 ci V8, aka the R-Code V8, under the hood of the newly revamped “fastback” Galaxie 500. There were a host of other goodies as well, including a solid lifter cam, forged crank and 11.5:1 compression ratio. Success was instant.

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In the 1960s, 427 was a number that would strike fear into the hearts of potential combatants and for good reason. Ford’s R-code, dual quad 427 pumped out 425hp with 480 ft-lbs of torque. Clough’s 427, left, might not be a real R-code but it’s just as potent.

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Clough found his black on black, possibily original paint, 390ci, 3-speed automatic transmission ’63 Galaxie in North Vancouver, BC in 2013. The car was a lower mainland car its entire life until Clough brought it to the Island. It was a floor shift automatic car and though the black interior was original, Clough said it was one of the first things he knew he’d change. “It had to be red all the way,” he says.

Tiny Lund won the Daytona 500 in a 427-powered Galaxie and the next four finishers were also behind the wheel of 427-powered Galaxies. Lightweight 427 Galaxies also made an impression on the drag strips and a legend was born.

Victoria, BC’s Rick Clough was just six years old in 1963 but his dad Dave was a big Ford and NASCAR fan so the magical 427s definitely made an impression that was passed from father to son. Still, it wasn’t a ’63 1/2 Galaxie that first impressed a 12-year-old Clough, it was his dad’s ’55 Meteor 4-door. He loved the lines and when he was 14 he started looking for a ’55 Ford or Meteor of his own.

“My dad and I looked at a bunch and I found a Crown Victoria,” says the now 64-year-old Clough. “I was working my Saturday job and I didn’t know it but my dad arranged to get it and had it towed home so it was in the car port when I got home.” That was a good day.

The Crown Vic’s 3-speed manual transmission was shot and there was a tuckered 292ci Y-block under the hood but father and son got to work. Clough ordered a set of wrenches from the SEARS catalogue and the next week he and his dad pulled the transmission and replaced the clutch, flywheel and pressure plate. By the time he earned his driver’s license, the Crown Victoria was ready to go. “It was a floor shift because the guy we bought it from had swapped it from 3-on-the-tree so it was pretty cool car for a 16-year-old to be driving to high school...at least I thought so.” says Clough. Throughout high school Clough made changes, including upgrading the Y-block to a 312 out of a 1957 Ford, adding Cragar SS wheels and later a Top Loader 4-speed. “Back in the day DGs Auto Supply was the local speed shop and one day I walked in there and Jack (Chin) said ‘Hey Rick, I’ve got a Top Loader sitting here for ya..$350’ I had a motorbike and I sold it for $350 so I could buy it.”

Eventually the ’55 Crown Victoria was showing its age and it got parked in 1979 with plans to do a full restoration at some point. Other cars came along, including a few Corvettes and then one day Clough was talking to his dad about those 427 Galaxies and NASCAR. “I thought you know what I wanted to fine one,” says Clough.

Now a real deal ’63 1/2 R-Code Galaxie wasn’t in the budget. Just 3,857 R-Code 427 Galaxies were built, in part probably because the R-Code 427ci engine was a $570 op-

Clough says he was in his Grade 12 year when this photo of him and his Crown Victoria was taken. tion and a base Galaxie already listed at a hefty $2,730.

The 1963 1/2 Fastback Galaxies climbed in value even without the R-Code addition. But that was OK, because Clough more desired the roofline of the ’63 Galaxie 500 Box Top hard tops. “I always liked the ’63-’64 Ford style and my dad had a ’64 Ford 4-door and ’64s were cool but there’s lots of them.”

Around 2013 he started looking. “I was looking for just a quick project because my ’55 was going to be a while and I wanted to get out there and do car nights with the guys and take my dad for a drive in it” says Clough.

He found this one just a BC Ferries ride away in North Vancouver, BC. It was a black on black car with a factory 390 and a console shifted 3-speed automatic. Clough believes the odometer has rolled over once and at the time of our photo shoot it read 59,291 miles. His plan included changing to a red interior and swapping over to a 4-speed Top Loader mated to a 427ci engine.

Despite the mileage the Galaxie only needed lower rear quarters and he got his friend of 41 years, Chris Bennett at AutCom, to do the work and spray the car a generic black using base/clear products. The Thunderbolt fibreglass hood scoop addition was a nod to those drag strip RCode 1963 Galaxies. The chassis was stripped and repainted black. The stock front coils were replaced with 2” lower coil springs and the front A-arm setup rebuilt.

The factory power steering box was refurbished. Out back

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An aftermarket stock upholstery kit was installed by Bo Horvath and the 4-speed pedals were an eBay score. “They were very hard to find,” says Clough. From the factory the console housed an automatic so Clough had to be carefull cutting the plate to house the Hurst Competition Plus 4-speed shifter. He was able to figure it out after finding a ’64 Ford 4-speed Galaxie 500 in a private museum near Penticton, BC. The old gentleman who owned the cars let Clough step over the ropes to get inside the car and take all the photos and measurements he needed. the leaf spring suspension were retained, rebuilt and 2” lowering blocks were installed. Knowing a seriously brutish 427 was planned the stock 9” rear end got a locking differential with 4.30 rear gears and Calvert Racing CalTracs traction bars were installed to eliminate wheel hop during moments of enthusiastic acceleration. Knowing what was coming, a brake upgrade seemed prudent.

The stock drums were ditched in favour of a budgetfriendly aftermarket kit which came complete with master cylinder, power booster and 11” rotors and 1-piston calipers for all four corners. “I was saving my money for

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the 427,” says Clough.

The core of the build, the 427, wasn’t easy to find. The original R-Code 427s were known as side oilers because Ford engineers needed this engine to live on NASCAR tracks where high revving engines were king. Standard 427s were top or centre oilers, meaning oil was pumped through a passage under the camshaft and up to the valve train before the crank was oiled. The “fix” was to add a special oil passage along the left side of the block which directed oil to the crank first, and then up to the cam and valve train.

Of course the side-oiler 427 is a rare, expensive beast and Clough did find one in Seattle but the price was too high so the search continued.

“I searched for a while and and even bare blocks that needed sleeving because they’d been blown up weren’t cheap,” says Clough, who finally found what he was looking for in Vancouver. “I guy had bought a spare motor for his Cobra but I guess he came into money and bought a Roush-built 427 so he didn’t need the spare motor anymore,” says Clough. It was a complete motor and the interesting thing was it had never spent a day of its life in a car to that point. “It came out of a Chris-Craft boat,” explains Clough.

Seems that back in the day the bean counters at Ford tried to find a way to pay for the costly R&D that went into creating the side-oiler 427s. Ford didn’t really want to put them in the passenger cars because of warranty issues so instead they made a deal to sell the crossbolt casting 427s to Chris-Craft to be used in boats. According to a thread on the Ford Truck Enthusiast

Forum, these bolts were the crossbolt casting 427s used to create side oilers but the oil passages were not machined to make them “true” side oilers. “They never saw more than 3,000 rpm in boats so when I took it apart it was super clean inside,” says Clough. The 352 style heads and intake installed on Chris-Craft 427s were destined for the scrap pile as Clough had accumulated a bunch of FE parts over the years for the build. He had an Isky solid lifter camshaft (the Chris-Craft 427s weren’t drilled to accept hydraulic lifters) with a rowdy 298° duration and .512 lift on both intake and exhaust.

The connecting rods are stock but the pistons are 10 to 1 compression Keith Black slugs and the block was bored .030 over to accomodate them. An Ford factory dual quad finned air clean was installed with valve covers to match. Dave Conway handled all the machining and put the short block together.

Clough also already had a set of Edelbrock Performer aluminum heads he’d picked up from the original buyer. They’d never been out of the box until they went on his 427. An Edel-

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brock aluminum dual quad intake manifold was sourced and twin 550 cfm 4-bbl Edelbrock carbs were bolted to it.

A Canton 7-quart oil pan was installed for extra oil capacity. While he wanted to run long tube headers, he was scared off by possible fitment issues he’s read about on the internet so instead installed a set of Headman Hedders ceramic-coated shorty headers. They flow to a 2.25” dual exhaust system with Performance World electric exhaust cutouts and old school glass pack mufflers.

For wheels he kind of went old school. “When we were young I remember a friend saying ‘you know you’re doing well when you have a leather jacket, Cragar SS wheels on your car and can go to the Keg on Saturday night,’” says Clough. “But I didn’t want Cragars on it. I had those on the ’55 but I always liked the Torque Thrust D wheels with the cast grey centres.” In the end he decided to go with the 15” polished versions because they look classy with the black paint. The fronts are 15x7 wrapped in 225/70/15 BF Goodrich Radial T/A and the rear wheels are 15x8 wrapped in 275/60/15 BF Goodrich T/A radials.

The car was on the road by May of 2019 and while his dad had been able to see the car throughout the build he passed away in 2018 so didn’t get to ride in it. “I had wanted to take him for a spin and show him what a performance car really was,” says Clough. “But I did end up taking one of my dad’s best buddies who he’d grown up with for a ride.”

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Clough says he hasn’t really opened it up yet but the power is on tap if he wants it. “I don’t know if I’ve had it over 5,000 rpm yet,” admits Clough, wary perhaps of rowdy moments that lead to expensive fixes.

His favourite moment with the car so far was taking his wife Michelle out for the Galaxie’s maiden voyage. “My wife wasn’t much of a car girl but when I was working on the car the standing joke was I’d come in from working on it and she’d ask ‘Is it ready yet?’ and I’d say, ‘nope, not ready yet.’” says Clough. “Every time more car parts would show up at the door she’d shoot me a look and say ‘Really, more car parts?’”

The day came when it was finally roadworthy again and he and a couple of buddies put the finishing touches on the car. “Michelle was out so I went and got plates and got home, cleaned up and when she got home I said we’re going on a date in the car. She was excited but she didn’t like when I gave her a taste of the 427’s power,” laughs Clough. “But I gave her the fob for the cutouts and she had them open more than they were closed. We were going past the cops on Government Street and I had to tell her to close ’em. Now she’s a car girl.”

So, there you have it. The key to a girl’s heart could possibly be a Box Top ’63 Ford Galaxie and the dulcet tones of an open-header 427 Ford.

Hey, it’s worth a shot.

ONE O Above left, Dale Roosen’s new ’70 Camaro SS396 at his parent’s home shortly after he bought it in the spring of 1970. Still looks good a few years later in right photo.

ots of gearheads can claim to still have the cars they were driving when they met they wives, or drove their daughter home from the hospital in.

Not many can say it is a one-owner, original paint, 1970 big block, 4-speed Camaro. Langley, BC’s Dale Roosen can. He owns this unrestored, all original SS 396 Camaro which has just 66,000 original miles on its odometer and it’s driven now more than it was when new.

Imagine growing up at the dawn of muscle cars and deciding in the early part of 1970 that you want to trade your automatic-equipped 1968 Camaro SS in for a new car with a 4-speed. There was no shortage of good looking Muscle Cars to choose from in 1970. In the Bowtie realm the Chevelle had refreshed sheet metal and was available with the iconic LS6 454 that made it one of the king’s of

the street. The newly bowed Monte Carlo could be had in SS trim with a 454 for the “business man on the go” but a 4-speed wasn’t an option. The newly designed 1970 Camaro and Firebird also caught his eye, as did an L78, 396 4-speed Nova. But it wasn’t just the Bowtie brand he looked at. The AMX, new Dodge Challenger and Plymouth ’Cuda caught his eye, as did the ’70 Cougar and Sport Roof ’70 Mustang.

Some of the cars were not test driven, but while looking in the Spring of 1970 the Boss 302, Plymouth Cuda and L78 Nova were all test driven. One Chevy dealer, Mussallum in Maple Ridge, BC was offering a very good trade in value if Roosen would buy a 1969 Camaro that they had taken in on trade. It was one of the COPO Camaros sold new in the Lower Mainland. Although the availability of the 4-speed, 427ci monster appealed to Roosen, it was a pretty plain car with limited options. But he did get to

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WNER CAMARO

Story and photos by Cam Hutchins The holy grail of a car’s paper trail, the Protect-O-Plate, left, is just one of the documents Roosen has held on to.

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drive a COPO Camaro, not many people get to say that.

Though tempted by some of these cars, Roosen waited.

The new 1970 Camaro wasn’t released until February of 1970 because of problems stamping out the rear quarter sections of the new bodies. Generally new cars are delivered in the late summer/early fall of the previous year.

This is why 1970 Camaro’s are often referred to by many as 1970 1/2 Camaros but Chevrolet certainly did not refer to them that way. The problems, according to www.camaro.net were “Fisher Body had lots of troubles drawing the 1970 quarter panels without wrinkles and splits.” The lengthy delays probably caused the dealers to scream for cars, so G.M. did the unthinkable. They ordered all their suppliers to start making parts for the 1969 models and started selling more 1969 Camaros. Apparently this was not an unheard of situation. The delays in producing the 1958 Thunderbird, caused Ford to start making more 1957 models, but painted them in the new for 1958 colours.

The production lines started producing more 1969 Camaros in August of 1969 and stopped in November after more than 40,000 Camaros had been built. The suppliers had produced almost all the parts for the 1970 models except for Fisher not being able to produce quality body stampings. Now the suppliers were tasked with building 1969 parts, some were supplied by new suppliers, as long standing G.M. Partners were already committed to other projects.

There is one ad showing the 1970 Chevrolet “Performance line up” with a 1969 Camaro awkwardly sitting amongst the new 1970 performance Chevrolets. When the

1970 Camaro launched in February dealerships had to sell brand new 1970 Camaros alongside “brand new” 1969 Camaros.

The Second Generation Camaro was seen by many as a vast improvement over the 1967 to 1969 models. Some critics mused that the first generation of Camaros were rushed and could have been much better, but the first generation Camaros sold pretty well. The fact that so many are on the road today (including newly minted bodies courtesy Dynacorn or Golden Leaf in Canada) proves Chevrolet did something right with the first gen models.

For the 1970 model Chevrolet and Pontiac worked closely to come up with a brand new F-body platform.

Chevrolet was quick to note the similarity between their new car, and the then, 10-year-old Ferrari 250 GT design.

Long hood, short trunk, egg-crate grille, the similarity is slight but the inspiration is apparent, or so said Chevrolet.

Initially, plans for two variations of 454ci V8s were in the works, but scrapped by the time the car was produced.

In the March, 1970 issue of Road and Track Magazine, only one 454, along with a 6-cylinder and five other V8s — ranging from 307ci to 402ci — were listed. For some unknown reason the 402 was still listed as a 396. The “L34” 396ci (402ci) produced 350 horsepower while the L78 version produced 375 horsepower and were both optional with the “SS” package. On the options page of the actual 1970 Camaro brochure the 375hp version of the 396 was not listed, but clearly cars were sold with the higher horse, solid lifter engine. Confusing times.

The original owner’s manual, complete with sleeve reminding owner’s to take the key with them. So cool. He even has the receipt from his cash payment.

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The new Z28 package came with 360-horse Turbo-Fire 350 V8. The May 1970 Issue of Car and Driver magazine said this about the new for 1970 Z28 mill, “The Z/28 is richer by 48 cubic inches and 70 rated horsepower (tough break for those with insurance worries).” The reference to insurance companies was all important to the sales of a new car. If your customer cannot get insurance at a reasonable rate, the cars don’t sell. Ford Mustangs available 428 Cobra Jet sold almost 75% less in 1970 than in 1969, and Dodge and Plymouth were not selling masses of 440 and 426 Hemi cars. So by coming late to the party, Chevrolet might have seen the writing on the wall, and shelved any plans for 454 V8s in Camaros.

The 1970 Camaro represented the changing of the guard as far as powerful American cars were concerned.

Straight line brute strength was, for many new car buyers, only part of equation. Buyers also wanted their cars to handle curves and Chevrolet was eager to advertise the road hugging capabilities of its new Camaro. Road handling was in part credited to the 1970’s front and rear track width which at 61.3” front and 60”, was 2.3” and 2” wider than the ’67-’69 models. The ’70 Camaro was the same length (188”) but almost two inches wider (74.4”) than the 1st Gen Camaro, though the 108” wheelbase remained.

Part of this new road handling ability was a newly designed steering setup which had the steering linkage mounted forward of the ball joint mid-line instead of behind it like most cars. As ROAD AND TRACK magazine wrote “the compliance toes the wheels in an understeering direction which contributes to more manageable transient handling.” The 1970 Camaro’s steering feel was also improved thanks to a special “high-effort steering gear” which didn’t mean the driver had to work harder to steer the car. Instead, it meant the steering was more responsive making it less prone to oversteering. The wider track width and new body design also meant the ’70 Camaro had a lower body roll angle then the 1st Gen models and that is always a good characteristic for a car to have.

Advertising called the Camaro the Vette’s cousin and said it handled the road so well it was a “Super Hugger”.

Cringeworthy by today’s marketing standards maybe but it got worse. A two page spread magazine spread, announcing the Camaro’s arrival as Feb 26, 1970, had a headline that boldly claimed “Now our competitors know how the captain of the Titanic felt.” The Camaro’s sales

TRIM: 716 (Black Custom comfort weave) PAINT: 65 (Hugger Orange) PRODUCTION PLANT: Van Nuys, California MODEL NUMBER: 12487 - 8 cyl/2dr sport coupe DEALER: Bill Green Motors, Abbotsford, BC 1970 Camaro SS The car came well appointed and was an SS model with the 4-speed and L34 402ci “396” V8, producing 350 Horsepower. The list of the equipment on this car was typed up on the invoice as follows: A01 B93 D35 D55 D80 G80 L34 M21 U14 U80 ZJ7 U63 ZP5 Z21 Z87 Z27

Soft Ray Tinted Glass all windows ($37.95) Guards, Door Edge ($5.30) Mirrors, sport right and remote exterior ($26.35) Console ($59.00) Spoiler Rear Deck ($32.65) Positration, rear axle ($44.25) Engine, 396ci/350hp Turbo-Jet V8 (SS only) ($152.75) Transmission, 4-speed close ratio ($205.95) Special Instrumentation ($84.30) Speaker Rear Seat ($14.75) Wheels, Rally ($42.15) Radio AM pushbutton ($61.10) Auxiliary Lighting Group ($13.70) Style Trim Group ($52.70) Custom Interior ($115.90) Super Sport Package ($289.95)

Prices were found online and are in USD but the Canadian dollar was close to par in May of 1970.

brochure starts out with “Let’s get something straight right off. If you think a sports car is a family sedan with performance bolt-ons, put this catalog back where you found it.” They hadn’t even mentioned the Z/28 option yet. “This is the Camaro Z28. It’s not for everybody,” the brochure beings. “We recommend if for the guy who always wanted a performance car that he could drive to work.” Then after a basic list of the go-fast parts on the Z/28 it challenges you. “If that isn’t enough to get your adrenaline flowing, there’s a Corvette catalog not too far away.”

The 1970 Camaros did not offer hide away headlights as part of the RS package, but did offer a great looking split bumper treatment with a big yawning grille to gobble up the competition. The brochure describes it this way “Now take a good long look at the Camaro Rally Sport. Up front there’s a blacked-out grille. It looks so big and mouthy, that it makes Camaro’s wide stance even wider. And it’s surrounded with a resilient, color-matched frame that Yes, that’s the original spare tire and trunk mat.

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acts as a bumper. Then, there’s a vertical bar down the middle of the grille. It’s resilient too, (a special kind of rubber). So, if someone gives you a klunk, there are no bruises. And no hurt feelings. But that’s not all the bumper you get. There’s a split-bumper that wraps clear around to both sides of the front end.”

There was no convertible option but the ’70 Camaro did offer five colours of vinyl roof — white, black, dark blue, dark green and dark gold. For 1970 Chevrolet offered 15 paint colours. Three of the 1969 colours came back, Cortez Silver, Daytona Yellow, and Hugger Orange but Tuxedo Black didn’t make the cut. There was also still a choice of white exterior paint, but 1969’s Dover White was now 1970’s Classic White.

CAR AND DRIVER magazine mentions how, although the car has grown in nearly every way, its trunk space shrank. They also mention they found the missing trunk space in the huge space between the radiator and the front of the car. Road & Track also mentions that if we did not have the influence and availability of foreign cars, the 4-speed transmission might never have been offered on American cars. That being said, it is curious that Chevrolet would even still offer the floor-mounted 3-speed manual transmission.

Now that we know a little more about the 1970 Camaro, let’s get back to Roosen and his featured Camaro.

While we mentioned earlier that Roosen had looked at a

lot of cars before buying the Camaro, it’s interesting to note he had been saving up for a Corvette but changed his mind. As GM’s own literature called the Camaro the Vette’s cousin, his Camaro purchase makes more sense but the purchase really came down to fate.

Taking time away from hunting for the perfect car, Roosen went out for a drive with his uncle to get some furniture in Abbotsford, BC. On the way, they drove by the local Cheverolet dealership, Bill Green Motors. On display on the front lot was our featured Hugger Orange 1970 Camaro SS. Roosen was smitten. After dealing with the furniture Roosen drove back to the lot and took the car out for a drive. The combination of the big block Chevy and 4-speed sealed the deal.

The average new car cost $3,500 in 1970, and the median price of a house in 1970 was around $17,000. This car cost $5,343.55 and they offered Roosen $3,443.55 for his Corvette Bronze with Houndstooth interior 1968 SS 350 Camaro.

The Super Sport package included: SS emblems on steering wheel, fenders and grille (except when combined with RS) dual exhaust, Turbo-Fire 350 engine with available 396 engines. (396 equipped SS Camaros have rear tail panel painted black), power brakes, 14x7 wheels; black painted grille; hide-a-way windshield wipers, underhood insulation and the optional engines were the L34 396 and L78 396.

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This car, like the Z/28 had a thirst for premium fuel, but it still was only .30 or .35 cents a gallon back then. The 4speed tranny was a Muncie M-21 close ratio and the rearend gears were 3.31:1 ratio. The M-21 transmission was $205 extra, the L34 engine option was the cheaper of the big blocks with 350 hp for an extra $152 while the L78 cost you $385. The black interior was deluxe comfortweave, there is a push button AM radio and even a rear speaker for the radio. Interestingly the AM/FM pushbutton radio cost $133.80, almost as much as the 396ci, 350hp Turbo-jet V8 at $152.75. I prefer the music the big block mill makes!

The side view mirror on the driver’s side is remotely operated while the passenger side is not. There is the roof mounted shoulder harness and the dash is well appointed with a tach, ammeter, water temp and gas guage, clock and oil pressure warning light. The auxiliary lighting option gives you extra lights under the dash on both the driver and passenger sides, a lighted trunk compartment and a light in the engine compartment. For 1970 front disc brakes are standard, but the 4-wheel disc brake option from 1969 wasn’t available in 1970.

The Hugger Orange car, with black interior came with Firestone Wide Oval raised white letter tires. The tires have been replaced by Radial T/A’s but everything else on the car is original, even the exhaust system, which is no mean feat seeing how they used to rust away by coffee time back in the day! General maintenance over the past

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50 years has also seen the waterpump and starter get replaced. As of the summer of 2020, the car has 66,000 miles on her. The furthest Roosen has driven the car is to Seattle, quite often back in the day to visit friends.

The car led a pampered life at first, as Roosen drove either his plain Jane Dodge Demon, or his VW Beetle to work at the MacDonald Cedar sawmill in Fort Langley. In the late ’70s the Camaro got driven as a daily driver to and from work for a number of years before getting put back on its pedestal when the daily driver became a 1967 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme. He also was no kid when he got the car and did not drive it too hard and never raced it — not even on the street.

The car was first shown at a car show in 1997 at the old Vancouver Camaro show at George Preston Arena, in Langley. He met Gary Grant, the owner of Triple G Muscle Cars, and found out Grant was restoring the COPO he test drove. Although his Camaro SS sees its regular duty as a show car, it now has to share that duty with Roosen’s latest prize, a 1965 GTO. He bought the car from the original owner’s family. That owner bought it new at Lou Villa Pontiac in Elmira, NY and the car never left the family. It came with a trunk loaded with extra parts, PHS documentation, records and receipts for gas, parts, and every service the 55-year-old Poncho ever experienced. Except for paint, the bottom in 1976 and the top in 2004, it is as original as the Camaro. Some guys have all the luck and some pretty good taste in cars.

Steve Wyatt’s ’69 Mach 1 Mustang roasts the tires at the 2017 Armdrop Drags at Picton, ON. PHOTO COURTESY BILL SAMUEL

Mach 1 does street and strip duty Steve Wyatt is an Automation Engineer in the Southern, ON and he’s been a fan of Ford’s Mustang since the mid 1960s. This 1969 Mach1 is the one he decided to restore, drag race and it is his passion. Here’s his My Car Story. he car is originally from California and was dirt tracked in the ’70s but I found it in Streetsville, ON in October 1994. I knew exactly what I wanted to do; restore the car from the frame up, maintain the near perfect OE interior and exterior then restomod the powertrain. The paint and body were done the first year in Keswick, ON at Billy Harry’s Autobody.

In 2004 Paxton released a Novi 1200/1500 supercharger kit for the 1969 351W as a tribute to Carroll Shelby’s early 289 cars and as a Shelby fan I just had to have it.

T

The Novi 1500 was chosen for the larger 398ci homebuilt stroker using CHP stroker kit parts. An Extreme Velocity 4” hat is used on an Edelbrock Pro Flo4 multipoint fuel injection system. The dyno session just after supercharger install with CSU850 carb yielded 533/541 at 4 psi boost running a Torker 2 intake. With a 9.7:1 compression ratio going up to 6 psi boost meant adding a Snow Performance Methanol injection kit and Super Victor EFI intake, set for 2 psi activation. Horsepower is now estimated at 560 at the rear wheels resulting in low 12 second ETs at 119 mph.

Over the 25 years I have had the car, there have been a lot of fun events such as Armdrop Drag Racing and Mustang Days at St Thomas Dragway.

At Armdrop (armdropdragracing.com) I designed a

Wyatt’s 1969 Mustang won’t break the sound barrier but with a Paxton Supercharged 351W under the hood it’ll do low 12-second 1/4 mile times at 119 mph. Photo at left is courtesy Jim Toye.

SUMMER 2021

Photos by Daniel Marchione.

wireless ¼ mile timing system with Drag Tree and Web Display (see mach1timingsystem.com). Another highlight was Ford of Canada’s Mustang Celebration April 17, 2014 when I was included in the “50” Mustang picture formation and on TV. PARTS LIST 9R02M 1969 Sports Roof, Mach1, 351W 4V, San Jose, CA assembly Options: PS, PB,AC,Front Disk, Fold Down Rear Seat, Black Knitted Vinyl seats, Rim Blow Steering Wheel Paint — Chrome Yellow and Black Sikkens base clear

by Billy Harry Interior — original with Stewart Warner and Innovate Motorsports Gauges Engine — 398W , 393 stroker .060 over, Power 600HP+, 650FT-LB @7PSI (Dynoed at 4 PSI 533/541 RW 2015), Scat Crank, Eagle I beam Rods, Probe SRS Forged Piston, AFR205 Heads, 58 cc, Comp Cams XE288HR Retro Roller

SUMMER 2021

Camshaft, .555/.574 230/240, Edelbrock Super Victor Intake EFI, Edelbrock Pro Flo 4 Injection, 60 lb/hr injectors, Aeromotive Phantom Fuel Delivery System, Paxton Novi 1500 Supercharger, 7 PSI, Meth. Injection – snow performance stage 1, Tremec TKO 500 MMR Rear end — 9” Ford with Detroit Locker Differential, 3.50 or 3.89 Gears Suspension — 1” lowering springs, Caltracks drag shocks Wheels — 15x8 back, 15x7 front, Magnum 500 (Chrome and Alloys) Tires — Front, Mickey Thompson Sportsman 235/60/15 back when on street, SS Drag Radial 275/50/15. Strip, Hoosier Quick Time Pro 27x10.5x15 Bias Ply.

Submit your My Car story and photos to info@musclecarsmagazine.ca.

launch!

Havers was an avid weight lifter and here he’s lifting the Falcon during its straight-axle transformation.

Later on he became an avid body builder who even trained in California with Arnold Schwarzennegger.

HiPo FALCON CONTINUED FROM PAGE 7 The HiPo cam was replaced with a Comp Cams roller cam of unknown specs. The heads were milled seven thousands to bring combustion chamber volume down to 47.7cc and 12.1 compression ratio JE pistons were installed. (Though a 1965 memo to the NHRA from Philipps states the B/FX engines had 14 to 1 compression). The heads also received larger intake and exhaust valves. The crankshaft was polished and balanced to enhance durability during 8,000 rpm runs. A magneto replaced the distributor and a Shelby American aluminum intake was fitted with multiple Weber carbs. The article stated the engine modifications likely added 150 horsepower to HiPo 289.

Francis, noted in the article as one of Canada’s top mechanics, built the engine, including fabricating the wild “bundle of snakes” headers pictured above. Francis died a couple of years ago but Williamson did get to talk to him a few times. In one of their conversations Francis stated while the wild header array likely did add a few horsepower, it was a pain in the butt when it came to working on the engine’s bottom end. “It sounded amazing apparently,” Williamson says. “You could hear the difference as the whole idea was to balance the cylinder pulses and get them working together but Brad said it wasn’t worth all the aggravation.” After working with Havers for a season, Francis would go on to become a legend in North American racing circles, working in a variety of motorsports, including stints with Richard Childress Racing, Jacques Villeneuve and finally Roush Fenway Racing where he was a key reason for numerous championship efforts. Francis is a Canadian Motorsports and Canadian Drag Racing Hall of fame inductee. Rick Kirkpatrick replaced Francis as lead mechanic on the car going forward.

B/FX rules allowed for fibreglass parts and Philipps had Toronto-based Plaza Fibreglass manufacture the parts which he assigned Ford part numbers. Parts included doors, fenders, hood and front bumper. In a second Eyman article the Havers car is described as also receiving plexiglass side windows, quarter windows and windshield. CONTINUED ON PG 49

age

@burnouts ga @burnouts_garage

SUMMER 2021

The suspension would all be heavy duty, like on the 427 Galaxie and included a 9” Ford housing stuffed with a Detroit “locking-type” differential and the shorter, more heavy duty Galaxie driveshaft. The rear suspension was far from stock and in fact was inspired by the 1964 Ford Thunderbolt Fairlanes which terrorized Factory Experimental classes the previous year. Up front the spindles were lengthened 2.5” to get the nose up and aid weight transfer. The rear end was moved 2” forward, as B/FX allowed a 2% shortening of the factory wheelbase. There was no mention in the Canadian Track & Traffic article of the front wheels being moved forward though in some later photos they appear to have been. A heavy duty T&Cprepped, full synchro Ford 4-speed with an 11” inch clutch handled the gobs of power coming from the “little” 289.

The interior in the B/FX cars was stripped down and there was no seam sealer or sound deadener. Special racing bucket seats with Ford part numbers were installed.

A simple hoop/downbar was installed for safety and Hurst supplied the 4-speed shifter.

All three of the B/FX cars — as well as the four, maybe five, other C/Stock HiPo Falcons — were very successful and amazingly two of the three survived. (Five in total are known to stil exist). The Wild Child is owned by American Joe Germann but was restored to its 427 SOHC gasser configuration. So far the Wood-Larkin Ford car is considered destroyed in a racing accident but Williamson hasn’t been able to confirm it.

Williamson did talk to Havers many years ago but Havers couldn’t remember exactly when he sold the car or

to whom he sold it to. We don’t know if it was ever raced again once it left his possesion. Havers is still alive but sadly was diagnosed with dementia many years ago. Best guess is the Falcon was sold sometime after 1968. By this time the HiPo 289 had been sold to Doug Nash — yep that Doug Nash — and Havers, living in Kitchener, ON at the time, replaced it with a supercharged and injected big block Mopar engine spinning back to an 8.75 Mopar rearend. Williamson said Havers told him he never legally owned the car but was given a free hand when it came to modifying it. It was for sale for a time at Eastgate Ford but it wasn’t sold via the dealership.

Williamson says the car is basically still the way it looked in that 1980s Autotrader ad and while the original engine and tranny were long gone all the fibreglass parts managed to survive. Williamson, along with a co-owner, last year finished restoring the 1972 Motown Missle Pro Stock Barracuda. That car came up to Canada in the mid’70s and was campaigned by Woods & Beatty and went through a few hands before Williamson bought it.

With that restoration behind him he’s ready to start on the Falcon and is looking for a number of period correct or date-code correct parts. The list includes the proper 2V Weber carbs, Shelby 4-carb intake, Toploader 4-speed and more. He’s also looking for any information people might have on the Havers car from 1969 to just before Carswell bought the car. You can check out his B/FX Falcon album on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.101532259598 98622&type=3

Darryl Loose Calgary, AB

(403) 547-0605 1-866-547-0605 wheelmasterclassics.com email:wheelmaster@shaw.ca

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