That’s not a 1977 Pontiac Grand Prix in the picture, it’s a time machine. No DeLorean and no flux capacitor are needed because every time I lift the handle and open the 2 ton door, every time I slide onto the vinyl bench seat and put that square-head GM key in the ignition and hear the Delco-Remy starter fire up the 455, and every time I look down that mile-long hood at the “GP” hood ornament, I’m a 16-year-old high school kid again.
My brother is 7 years older than me and in the fall of his senior year in high school in 1983, he purchased the Grand Prix. The GP replaced his first car, a brown 1973 Camaro that had been (poorly) hot rodded with the standards of the late ‘70s/early ‘80s street machine era, including side pipes, N50s, traction bars; the works, on top of what was probably the stock 350 2 bbl.
(not his car but close; lose the cowl induction hood and add sidepipes and slapper bars and that’s pretty close)
Anyway, as a result of its poor shadetree mechanical ‘improvements’ made by its previous owner, the Camaro wasn’t very reliable and didn’t last long. My brother is not a car guy and wanted something more stable and less hot rodder-ish but still cool for a high school kid. So, he and my Dad set off car shopping, and as a car-crazy kid, I often tagged along. We spent most of our time looking at Colonnade-era Cutlasses and Grand Prixes at all of the used car lots on Long Island’s south shore, and I remember him saying that he liked the pre-downsized cars.
Much to my dismay, the Camaro was sold and his search was narrowed down to two favorites here at CC: a beige 1976 Cutlass Supreme and a Firethorn Red 1977 Grand Prix. Since the Grand Prix had very low mileage, something like 10K, even though it was 7 years old at the time, and the reason for its low mileage has been lost to time, but given its low mileage and near immaculate condition, it won out over the Cutlass and became his high school ride just before Christmas.
(Unfortunately, all of my “back in the day” pictures are at my Mom’s house 500 miles away, so all of the pictures here are either current or lifted from them internets, but minus the vinyl top, this is what it looked like when he bought it in ’83)
It’s a lightly optioned base Model J, with a bench seat, column shifter, roll up windows, and manual door locks; it doesn’t even have the half-vinyl roof that so many Colonnades have, and which also helped contribute to their deaths from roof rust. It does have air conditioning and power steering and brakes but I think that was pretty much all standard on GPs by the mid ’70s. It had a 350 4 bbl, which was the first level engine option in 1977 after being the standard engine in 1976, with the 301 being the base engine and the 400 as the top option in 1977. The only other option I that I can tell it has are the Pontiac Rallye wheels.
The Grand Prix served him well for several years. He graduated high school in 1984 and commuted to a local community college for a couple of years before going away to college for his last 2 years, taking the GP with him and coming home on the weekends. He put a decent stereo in the GP with a cassette deck, which was a must-have in the ‘80s.
My brother was a big rock fan and he turned me on to all the great bands of the time-Van Halen, AC/DC, Scorpions, The Cars, U2, and my favorite, Rush. In the fall of 1984, he took me to my first concert, which was Rush on the Grace Under Pressure tour at the Nassau Coliseum, and we went in the Grand Prix. Often, he would take me with him to the record store to check out the new albums.
(Not my picture but that was our engine, a 1973 American LaFrance, my all-time favorite fire truck)
When he turned 18, my brother became a volunteer fireman in our town and was very active with the department, and I remember him racing off to fire calls in the Grand Prix. Sometimes he would take me with him and thrill of hearing the Poncho engine roar going through the gears of the Turbo 400 through town coupled with the adrenaline rush of running to a fire call to save the world were intoxicating. I was hooked and I knew what I wanted to do when I grew up. I remember him doing donuts in the snow with me in the Grand Prix just before Christmas one year just after he gave me my first beer with his fire department buddies.
I turned 16 in 1989, which was my junior year in high school, and just as the wild and wonderful 1980s were coming to a close, two life-changing events took place. First, I scheduled my road test as close to my birthday as I could and passed the first time out, so I now had the freedom of a driver’s license.
Then I also joined the same volunteer fire department as my brother. I got totally into the fire department; I got hooked on the rush and the brotherhood and camaraderie of the emergency services world and subsequently discovered my career path. And what a rush it was! Back then, we could still ride on the tailboard of the trucks. I got onto the department drill team where we ran the hose and bucket races. Back then, in the small towns on Long Island, the volunteer fire departments were a big deal and it seemed like the whole town would come out for our parades and drill competitions.
In May of ’89, my brother graduated from college and had been hired as a cop, and he was about to start the police academy. After 5 1/2 years, the GP had run its course with him, and even though the car was 12 years old at that point, it only had about 80K miles on it. He bought a gold 1986 Cutlass and offered me the Pontiac for whatever I had in savings at the time, which was maybe a couple of hundred dollars. Even in 1989, $400 didn’t buy much of a car, much less one that had been a member of the family with a documented service life, so it was a no-brainer for me to take the deal.
Even though I was (and am) primarily a Mopar fan, I always genuinely liked his Grand Prix; its a nice car to look at and ride in, plus it had a non-computer controlled, carbureted Pontiac V8 in it that had its own distinctive sound. I studied its beautiful, classic Bill Mitchell lines-there is not one body panel that doesn’t have some kind of crease or design line, which makes these cars a nightmare for painters but gorgeous to look at. By the late 1980s, cars had become style-less blobs that have carried over into today but this was a car that was a throwback to the era from when cars were “styled.” I had my first car.
(It doesn’t look bad when its wet)
So, I was a pretty good kid in high school. My grades weren’t great (I was mostly a C student) but I never smoked dope or cigarettes and only drank occasionally under the radar, mostly with my brother and his friends. I played sports and depending on the year, it was either football, lacrosse or baseball; I wasn’t a star player but I was happy just to be on the team. I was a Boy Scout until I joined the volunteer fire department, plus I worked part time jobs after school and on the weekends, so I really didn’t have time to get in trouble even if I wanted to. But, every kid has some kind of rebellious streak and mine was that I was a die-hard gearhead.
My parents knew it and probably secretly dreaded me getting my license and a car. My Mom liked cars and had some nice ones in her time as she grew up in an old Southern family in rural South Carolina but, you know, she is Mom, so she wanted me to focus on school and my grades. My Dad, on the other hand, was from New York City and grew up riding the subways and therefore had no use for cars other than for transportation. Meanwhile, my walls were plastered with pictures of all the hot Pro Street cars of the ’80s as well as all the race cars and musclecars that I tore out of every Hot Rod and Car Craft magazine I could get my paws on. I had more than 100 model cars, all hot rodded appropriately. To top it off, my part time job was pumping gas at a full service station in town with 3 service bays. So there I was, a kid with a new drivers license, a car of my own, and no money but access to a shop and tools. Here we go…
I drove the Grand Prix mostly without any drama for the remainder of my junior year as it was a good, solid reliable car and I don’t remember having to make any serious repairs other than having to replace a leaky radiator, which was solved with a $25 trip to the junkyard and about an hour of labor. I had my gas jockey job but because of sports and the fire department, I didn’t work a whole lot of hours, mostly just Saturdays and the occasional weekday afternoon so I didn’t have the money to do any real serious damage to the car yet. I’m a bit of a loner and prefer spending my free time by myself, but I had a couple of friends here and there and spent weekends cruising in the Pontiac if I wasn’t hanging around the firehouse, burning what gas money we could come up with and blaring Ozzy Osbourne and Motley Crue tapes.
I was a lacrosse player in my junior and senior years, and after long practices and late games, it was so much nicer getting into the quiet confines of my own car and listening to my own music to unwind rather than ride the late bus home and have to deal with the antics of the other kids. I remember getting into the Pontiac after one of our first practices of the year, freezing cold and shivering after a shower as it was early March in New York, and the car’s heat was a treat that the school bus would definitely not have. My face had a habit of breaking out as I was a teenaged victim of oily skin, coupled with sweat from my helmet and I looked into the rearview mirror to pop a zit. I was giving one of my teammates a ride home and I remember commenting that I always wanted to pop a zit in the rearview mirror of my own car.
When it came to dating, I was a bit of a late bloomer and didn’t really have a girlfriend until the spring of my junior year in high school. By the grace of God, towards the end of the school year, she was willing to ‘welcome me into manhood’ one night in the front seat of the Grand Prix when we were parked in a secluded spot in the woods. Why the front seat? Remember, it is a bench seat/column shift car, plus we here at CC know how cramped the backseats of the Colonnades are. There’s also that grab handle on the dash.…
Heading into the summer of 1990 was such a good time. It was my last summer in high school and my first summer with a driver’s license, I had the Grand Prix, a somewhat steady girlfriend and a cool car-kid job at the gas station. Warm summer nights were spent driving the GP to hang out at the firehouse waiting for a call to go out or with my girlfriend at the beach. Like I mentioned, Rush is my band and just before the summer kicked off, I went with my brother in the Grand Prix to see them at the Nassau Coliseum again, this time on the Presto tour; but now it was my car and I got to drive. I picked up a promo bumper sticker from WBAB, the local rock station, and stuck it in the window, where its still today.
As I started my senior year, I was still working at the gas station. By that time, in addition to pumping gas and fixing flat tires, the owner trusted me enough to do light mechanical work that was leftover from the full time mechanics from the week when I came in to work my shift on the weekends. Things like tune ups, brakes, oil changes, and occasionally a water pump or an alternator here and there; I could knock those out pretty quick. Sometime early in the fall, I had some money saved up and headed over to one of my local junkyard haunts and found a 1973 Grand Safari wagon that still had its 455 intact. I borrowed the engine lift and the Chevy shop truck (pickups were not common on mostly suburban Long Island in 1990) from the garage I worked at and relieved the wagon from the 455 (if I remember correctly, it was dark brown and in otherwise pretty good shape and Im sure it was crushed not long after; poor car).
Then I ordered the cheapest, biggest camshaft kit I could find in the PAW catalog (remember those?) and in one weekend I swapped the cam out in the junkyard 455 and had one of the mechanics show me how to look it over to see if it was salavageable; we pulled a cylinder head, and it all looked OK so it went right back together and I did a quick rattlecan sprayjob. The next weekend, I pulled the Grand Prix into the shop on a Saturday after my shift and by Sunday night, it was running with the 455 just in time for class on Monday morning. I don’t remember where the original 350 went, I think it just went to the scrapyard. We even bolted it to the original single exhaust and catalytic converter because I didn’t have the money for a new dual exhaust.
The 455 sounded so cool with the rumpity cam, although with the smog heads and single exhaust, it probably wasn’t all that much faster than the original 350, but in high school, it doesn’t matter as long as you look cool, right? I would go hunting for 5.0 Mustangs and Grand Nationals but all I did was make a lot of noise. I did feel like the king of all creation when I pulled into my high school parking lot that Monday morning with my new engine rumbling and echoing off of the brick gym wall that faced the student parking lot.
(Mine was nowhere near this nice, but that’s what it was except it had Rallye II wheels)
But as luck (good, bad or otherwise) would have it, about a month later, I came across a clean, solid 1980 Firebird for $200 with a 231 V6 that was on its way out due to oil pressure issues. It was a base model and it was white with a red interior. One more weekend in the shop later, and I pulled the 455 from the Grand Prix and swapped it into the Firebird. Luckily, the 455/TH400 and accessories slipped right into the Firebird without me having to buy any more parts, although I did have to scrounge up a couple of hundred dollars for an exhaust and I had to get the driveshaft shortened. My parents were having a fit, thinking that I was spending too much time and money on cars and not enough time on school work and college applications and/or some kind of post-high school plan, and of course, they were right, but it led to some heated arguments.
I parked my beloved Grand Prix under a covered lean-to behind my parent’s garage so it was out of the elements while I tore the streets up in my Firebird. That lasted for about 3 months before I spun out on an icy road while doing stupid teenage boy stuff one night and crashed into a fire hydrant, bending the rear axle and severely damaging the quarter panel and obviously my parents were furious. I was becoming an expert in Pontiac engine swaps, as I once again swapped the 455 from the Firebird back into the GP and I scrapped the Firebird.
(Again, not my car but that’s what it looked like, except someone put a 1972 hood scoop on it and it had steel wheels)
Right around the same time that I wrecked the Firebird, which was in January or February, 1991, I found a 1971 Dodge Demon 340 with a 4 speed for $1500. It was originally FY1 Top Banana yellow with a black interior and stripes but had been painted metallic blue and someone added a ’72 twin snorkel hood scoop and painted the bumpers black, but it was a real 340 4 speed Demon. Remember, Im a Mopar guy, but the Demon came and went by the time I graduated in May, since it was, in fact a $1500, 20 year old, used and abused musclecar, so you can imagine what kind of shape it was in. In short it was too much car, both in power and in need of repairs, for a 17 year old with no funds to keep up with; it just needed a little bit of everything, and since it was a factory 340/4 speed/bright yellow car, I’m pretty sure it eventually got the restoration it deserved.
Meanwhile, it was on a very cold morning in January, 1991 at Fort Hamilton that, after spending most of the day duckwalking in my underwear and getting poked, prodded and examined in all kinds of new ways I didn’t care for, I stuck my right hand up and took the oath to support and defend the U.S. Constitution against all foreign and domestic enemies and to break ice and scrape buoys to the best of my ability by swearing into the United States Coast Guard. I enlisted into the Delayed Entry Program, which meant that I would be shipping off to boot camp in May, where I would be leaving the Pontiac behind at my parent’s. After boot camp, I was stationed only about an hour and a half away and came home pretty often, but being in the military, I now had a steady income and relatively few expenses, and went through a string of cars that I will talk about in another COAL. The Pontiac now entered a 17 year sleep hiatus, thus ending Part 1 of the story.
Its intermission time:
Welcome back. Fun stuff, right? Part 2 starts with the unexpected passing of my Father in 2006 from a sudden massive heart attack. To say my family and I were devastated is an incredible understatement but I will talk more about my Father in another car story. Within 2 years, my Mother remarried, moved in with her new husband and was selling the house. I had to come get the car which had essentially sat in the same spot I left it in 1991, or it was going to the scrapyard. I had since gotten married, had a couple of kids, added a few cars, made a couple of cross-country moves and was now living in Virginia in a house on a couple of acres so storage wouldn’t be a problem. I went up to NY with my car trailer one weekend in the fall of 2008 to rescue my old car.
(It wasn’t quite this bad but it wasn’t that far off either)
I opened the Pontiac’s door and all of a sudden, the memories… But unfortunately, memories are fleeting and reality is always there-my Dad was still gone.
Another reality was that it was 2008 and not 1988, and as soon as I sat down on the bench seat, the entire vinyl seat cover cracked. Time does not forgive.
Since it was factory undercoated and it was what seemed like a rare ’70s A-Body without a vinyl roof, it was spared from any significant rust and therefore did not succumb to the cancer like so many other cars from the era where the New York salted roads and Long Island salty sea air eat cars alive. Not that the car wasn’t rusty; there was quite a bit of rust on the leading edge of the hood and in the bottoms of the doors, both common areas of rust on these cars but the structural body panels, floors and frame seemed to be OK.
I hadn’t started the 455 in years so I didn’t dare try to start it cold. I winched it up on to my trailer and thankfully the wheels hadn’t locked up. After getting it home, I assessed the damage, and while it was rough, it wasn’t too far gone. The paint was faded almost to bare metal in some spots, the interior was all but destroyed by time and mice, but it started and ran.
It didn’t need much to get back on the road; a new set of tires, fresh fluids, a tune up, a heater core, a set of ball joints and the dual exhaust I had wanted since I was 17 got it rolling again. By the time I got the car back on the road, I was back on active duty at Camp Lejeune, nearly 4 hours away. The last time I had driven the car, I was a high school kid about to ship out to boot camp and now, after having gotten my commission in 2001, I was an older, wiser, saltier officer, and boy did I take a lot of ribbing from the other officers, most of whom drove late model pickups, SUVs and CamCords so they didn’t get what it meant to be a car guy. The enlisted guys, however, loved me and the rumble of the 455, plus the fact that that I didn’t mind getting my hands dirty, and I spent many late nights in the base garage working on the car, just like I did in high school. The faded paint and crusty interior ensured that I wasn’t asked to drive when we would all go out for lunch, which was an added bonus, but I did cover the seats with Mexican blankets and old bedsheets.
By 2010, my marriage was failing and I needed to keep my mind clear, so I got active with the volunteer fire department again; I guess playing with my high school car and doing what I enjoyed doing in those years helped keep my mind in a good place. Plus, I just loved the fire department. The camaraderie and thrill of jumping out of the car and into gear, grabbing a hose or a tool off of a truck and trying to save someone’s home, car or even their life is still a rush.
Just like with my Charger that I talked about previously, I spent many hours piloting the big ol’ Grand Prix on the 200 mile drive between home and Camp Lejeune for several years and spent those hours rebonding with my car, listening to the 455 rumble along on the highway along with great music and putting more miles on it then then I ever did in high school. In September, 2010, Virginia and North Carolina had a record 6 days straight of torrential downpours, causing the rivers and creeks to overflow the roads with major flooding and sinkholes, but the big heavy Pontiac with its “Radial Tuned Suspension” held steady and laughed at lesser cars that ended up in ditches on the side of the road.
On a very hot August afternoon in 2009, I interviewed for a defense contractor position and when I pulled into the parking lot, the temperature idiot light lit up and steam came pouring out from under the hood; the radiator was almost completely dry. Good job on that early warning, idiot light. The car cooled off during my interview and I filled up the radiator at a gas station across the street and made the 3 hour drive home without any further issue. Immediately after, I found a factory Rallye dash bezel with working gauges. And that overheating incident possibly helped lead into…
In June, 2011, I was coming home from duty on a Friday afternoon, and when I was about 20 miles from home, the car overheated again but this time it was a blown head gasket. Stick a fork in it, my high school junkyard-find 455 was done. I had it towed home and then the car sat for a couple of months before I was able to pull the engine and send it out to the machine shop for a rebuild, This time I did it right-I built the engine to be a low compression torque monster perfectly suited for highway driving; ported 6X heads, an Edelbrock carb and intake, a good HEI ignition, GTO exhaust manifolds, (I hate headers) and an RV-style cam really woke the engine up and now that legendary Pontiac torque pulls it like a freight train without being obnoxious.
Performance-wise, it has the stock OE rear end which is (I think) 2.73 gears so its not going to pull the front tires off the ground, but punch it from about 30 mph and, just like my high school girlfriend found out on that magical night in the spring of 1990, you better hold on to that grab handle on the dash for a good time.
Good, torquey things are happening here. The hood is so long on these cars that I had to remove the tire and pull the engine from the side because the arm on my engine lift isn’t long enough to clear the front end of the car.
It just ate a Camry.
Since now, mechanically, the car came together and was working soundly, it was time to start making it nice to look at again. While aftermarket restoration parts are finally starting to turn up for the Colonnade cars, ‘soft’ resto parts like dash pads and door panels are limited and I needed to basically restore the entire interior of the car as not much was salvageable. Because these were big, heavy, smog-era cars, unless they had one of the big engines that could be easily swapped into a more desireable LeMans or Firebird (just like I did back in 1990,) they were generally scrapped and crushed so parts cars these days are hard to find, and the ones that I did come across had the same issues as mine. Nice, original Grand Prixes are getting quite pricey as well.
Finally in 2015, after several years of looking, I found a complete 1976 Grand Prix parts car in central NC that, except for the year, was an exact copy of my car-it was Firethorn Red with a red bench seat interior, no vinyl top and a 350, and it had all the parts I needed. It was a low mileage theft recovery car with no title and a seized engine. As a theft recovery, the steering column was dismantled so I couldn’t steer the car, which made it a lot of fun trying to get it on my trailer. It was actually too nice of a car to part out, but without a title, there wasn’t much else to do with it.
The interior was near perfect. The dash and door panels are especially vulnerable on these cars and they looked almost new. As time permitted over the course of a few months, I swapped the entire interior from the ’76, as well as the bumpers, doors, fenders, windshield, hood, and trunk lid, onto to my car. I guess that’s about as close to a rebodied car as you can get.
As Im writing this, its the end of 2018. Its the 35th anniversary of my Dad and my brother finding it on a quiet car lot in New York. Unfortunately, as far as the space/time continuum is concerned, it hasn’t worked as a time machine anywhere except in my head, as I’m thicker around the middle, greyer on the roof, retired from the Coast Guard with the aches and pains to prove it, I coach lacrosse now instead of playing, and now my oldest child is a senior in high school like I was when I was when I was raising hell in the Pontiac. But guess what; not only am I still driving my Grand Prix but Im still driving it to respond to fire calls and blaring Rush on the radio just like my brother and I did in the ’80s. My brother now drives a Pacifica and likes Maroon 5.
I’m still an active member of a moderately busy volunteer fire department, but I’m doing more on the leadership and administrative side these days than I do as a ground pounder. I’ve had my glory days and I have no problem letting the young bucks lead the interior attacks and wield the Jaws of Life but I’m always there when they need me. Despite having several other vehicles including a late model 4X4 pickup that’s perhaps better suited for emergency response than a 42 year old Pontiac, I still use it as my ‘primary response vehicle’ for fire calls today; my gear is in the trunk, my fire radio is wired to the car, and there’s always a lingering hint of a smell of smoke inside the car. Again, no flux capacitor needed.
Just for Paul, here is our Caterpillar powered ’89 Ford/Grumman engine, still hard at work, and by far the best truck in our fleet.
And here it is on the day I wrote this, still doing daily battle on the roads on a regular basis. What a good old car it is. There’s only about 96K on the odometer but with half the body and interior coming from my ’76 donor car and the engine is a ’73 455, you can interpret that as you see fit. Hard to believe that car has been a big part of my life for 35(-17) years. Now that it runs and drives great, the interior is done, and the body is straight, its finally due for a paintjob at my favorite body shop this coming year.
And of course, it will be Fire Engine Red.
A buddy of mine had a Grand Prix like above. It was originally red over red, but the prior owner had painted the exterior silver. We made several cross country trips in Texas with the car. I remember it being the quietest car I ever rod in. I attribute this to the body on frame design and a lazy V8.
Great story ! Your red Grand Prix brings back memories of one of my neighbors and their Grand Prix. They were a pretty well to do older professional couple that were extremely down to earth. The husband was a total Pontiac guy, and always brought new ones every few years, even though they could of afforded Caddys. Well back in 1976, they brought a fire engine red Gran Prix. It was a total base model…. dog dish hub caps with white walls, no power windows or door locks, had an AM radio, no vinyl top.. I mean this car was as basic as can be. But, it looked beautiful with its red vinyl seats. A few days later, a white dealer installed landau top was added. It was not even a passed top!
Long story short … it was stolen a few months later.. The car was found a few days later totally smashed with most of the parts removed. The insurance company totaled it, and the couple replaced it with a 1977 model, same color red but with a white interior. This one had a few more options including wheel covers and power windows. It was another beautiful car and lasted them a long time and luckily it wasn’t stolen.
Excellent read! Your Pontiac has given you a lifetime of memories! Love the Rush sticker – also my favourite band. A buddy of mine back in the day had a Grand Prix, of this vintage. Here it is next to my Dart Sport. In comparison with a Caprice another friend had, I did like the Grand Prix over the Chev for riding comfort and ‘attitude’.
Gee, I’m not sure that we were living in the same GTA neighbourhood!
Very similar! My buddy’s house is pictured, it was in Brampton. I was in Mississauga by this time.
Too funny! My picture was taken in 1989 in the “M” section of Brampton. Small world.
I imagine that if you’re from Ontario, Rush is required listening.
We rode the rails with Rush about 8 years ago. They were travelling from Toronto to Casino Windsor for a gig, and some of our group chatted up the various members and struck up a conversation with them. From what I recall, they were stand up folks, I don’t know why, but I expected Rock Stars to be travelling in some sort of Prevost bus that’s done to the nines!
Everyone I know of that have actually met Alex and Geddy have said that they are the nicest guys and love talking to their fans. Neal is a lot more stand-offish, and given what the guy has been through, I don’t blame him
Great story, and neat that you have the time and desire to keep it running and solid. I have a ’75 Monte that I’ve had since 1988, but still running on its original 350/350 combo. Currently at 268K miles, I hope to keep it as a “forever” car for another 30 years. I did the same interior swap that you did, but upgraded to the custom interior over the base bench seat. Please post updated shots when you have it painted to complete the tale.
Dean I love your MC. Here’s to many more miles together.
I did come across a couple of parts cars with buckets and consoles that I could have used but I wanted to keep the bench. I’m weird. I actually prefer bench seats, even with 4 speeds.
Thanks!
I too have cruised the junk yards for 30-odd years looking for parts to my various GM fleet (+1 Crown Vic), and I recall seeing colonnade G/P’s very rarely. My favourite scrappie had a base ’73 G/P in light metallic green that was a low mileage, completely clean and original car that was being harvested for its driveline, but that was 25 years ago. A crying shame, because it would have followed me home. Your submission and JP’s write up on the Buick Century had got my 2019 reading off to a great start.
Nice MC Dean! We have had a ’76 Malibu with the 350/350 combo in our family for nearly as long as you. It’s been a rock solid car and is still in the family. The Malibu has a bench seat too, and I have thought about swapping to buckets (main to get leg more room), but all the younger people today think the bench is cool when they see it. So maybe it will stay a bench and it will keep the car original.
Vince
I was in a bit of a quandary. The original base interior had 200K miles and was really beat. I found one in the Brantford junkyard with an immaculate custom interior in the same colour, and all panels, including doors, and various surrounds were replaced. The first picture is what the original looked like (taken in my twin Monte), and the latter is how it now looks. Changing to the buckets would have been a lot more work.
The original Monte with changed custom interior
Wow, nice improvement Dean! I can’t believe you got an interior that nice out of a wrecking yard. What yard in Brantford area was it? I go to that area quite often, and it if has some old Colonnades, I’d definitely visit.
I noticed you swapped over to the A/C style dash too. Are the A/C vents just dummys? And is that a dash cap on your car? If so, where’d you get a coloured one? All I have found were the black ones.
Vince
The wrecking yard was A1 in Brantford, but the interior was obtained about 20 years ago, when these cars still roamed the earth, Both have dash caps mounted and were painted using SEM to match the interior. The original dash was literally burnt black and crisped. The cap was originally bought from Barry’s Upholstery in Mississauga, but can be bought from OPG, Cross-Canada, or other body shop suppliers. The last one came from a London supplier a few years ago and I believe it fits a/c and non a/c cars. Attached is a shot of colonnade alley at A1 back in the day, and dash shots attached to your other post.
Thanks for the info Dean. I didn’t realize it was 20 years ago you got the parts, I thought it was more recent. I am sure those Colonnades are all long gone now. Thanks for sharing the junkyard pics though, they are great.
I have to say that the GP of this generation was a real swashbuckler. There is heavy, heavy sculpting everywhere, but it all kind of works for me. The beltline is just fabulous. None of that “let’s try to make this dip subtle” like on the Monte Carlo. This car is all “Ya wanna see a beltline dip? Well here’s your ‘effin beltline dip.” A combination of class and attitude that shouldn’t work at all but somehow does.
And what a great story. Not only did you manage to keep your high school car, but you have kept it in shape for those fire runs. The big torquemaking 455 sounds like it would be a blast. Count me as another who can’t wait to see this one with a fresh paint job.
Paint will be done this year I promise! At least it will be in the shop anyway. They are primarily a collision shop so the restoration cars have to take a backseat to get the late models out. It took him 8 months to get my Charger done but it needed a bit more work than the Pontiac. The GP doesn’t need any rust repair, just some panel straightening from when I bounced it off a few trees when I was 16.
I also have to pick the right color. The factory Firethorn Red is a little flat to me. Toyota has a very pretty similar red that pops a little more that I might use.
I have to agree with you on the Firethorn Red, there is something about that shade that never appealed to me. Too subdued for a proper red but it lacks the richness and depth of some of the lighter maroons GM used around the time. The only problem with a metallic red that really pops will be the itch you start experiencing to change out that interior for a white one. 😊
As hard as it was to find a proper interior donor for this car, I can assure you that wont be a problem! Once its in paint, I will label it a Done Car.
Lovely story, and a great car to keep with those memories. Thanks for sharing!
Thank you for a great Sunday morning read. I was an adult (at least in theory, I was in the Air Force) when these models came out and, at the time, I was not impressed. Back then my automotive tastes ran towards smaller and lighter cars that were more fun to drive. Now, after 40 more years of accumulated wisdom, I find myself appreciating these more and more. Yes, then are big on the outside and small on the inside but for just cruising down the road nothing beats a huge under stressed torque monster that is barely off idle at highway speed. Some days, when my knees and ankles don’t hurt very much, I’m tempted to buy a Grand Prix or a Cutlass and set about restoring it to its former glory. Then reality sets in and I remember why my days of serious wrenching are passed. Perhaps when I win the Power Ball I can find one in good enough condition to just buy and drive.
They are not hard cars to like. I think all of Colonnades look great, with decent tires, they handle pretty well for big cars, theyre certainly comfortable and it isn’t hard to get respectable power out of them. I wouldn’t recommend restoring one from the ground up though.
I’ve mentioned this before – my favorite GM Colonnade car is the ’77 Grand Prix. Make mine a two-tone SJ without a vinyl roof but with a moonroof and all the other goodies.
“It just ate a Camry”
That’s an awesome caption. But don’t eat mine, there’s a good chance Rush is on the stereo. I saw them live several times from 2002 to 2015. They knew how to bring it in concert.
Fantastic read all around, LT Dan, thanks.
Indeed, and if you got to see them in 2015, you are lucky since that was most likely the last time they will tour.
Great story — that’s one lucky Grand Prix. I hope you’re able to take your brother for a ride occasionally.
And while the paint and interior have faded, that WBAB bumper sticker looks brand new, which is pretty remarkable.
I loved the “It just ate a Camry” caption as well — definitely made my day.
My brother couldn’t care less, lol. He isn’t sentimental and isn’t a car guy and he still says I “ruined” it. He enjoys his leased Pacifica with the multimedia infotainment center and cruising with his kids jamming to Kelly Clarkson
This brings a very real meaning to Car of a Lifetime!
What a neat story of a car which has been with you forever. The longest I’ve managed to keep a car is 11 years before something fatal happened to it. I’m apparently much harder on cars than you are. A 455 engine! I wonder what young people think about that now, each cylinder has almost as much displacement as an entire engine in a lot of cars nowadays.
What a neat story about a neat car. The longest I’ve ever had a car is 11 years before something fatal befell it. I’d love to have something as long as you have kept this car. A 455 engine! What do young folks think of that nowadays? Each cylinder has as much displacement as a lot of modern cars entire engines.
Great story! Lifelong cars are the coolest. I wish I had a relationship that long with a single car.
Good to hear from a brother firefighter. I’m professional, but we’re all one big family, right? I dig the 89 Ford pumper. That’s pretty old for a working rig, but would you believe that here in the fourth largest city in the country that we are still using some 20 year old E-One pumpers and 22 year old ladders? A few even as front line units still (the rest back up reserve).
I’m also a big Rush fan, as I suppose are most musically inclined men who grew up in the 80’s. I’m jealous you got to see them on Grace Under Pressure tour, an underrated album, but one of my favorites. I did see them on the Presto tour, like you. Unfortunately the only time, but I have most of their DVD’s. The original window stickers on your GP are kick ass, as we would say back then.
Post an update after you get her painted. She’ll look great! Might I suggest you do a write up on the Ford pumper? That would be interesting (to me, at least).
Thanks Jon.
The Ford is a secondary engine and given the size and capacities of most modern engines it’s more of a glorified brush truck now but it’s a great truck nonetheless. We make all the new engine operators break in on it since it’s the only non-computer controlled truck we have, it doesn’t even have a pressure governor. I call it a fireman’s fire truck. For a volunteer department, we are pretty well-equipped and well-trained; besides the Ford, our next oldest truck is an ’05. Unfortunately, the Ford is due to be replaced next year by some new monster truck and us old timers will miss it, it really is a good old truck that does everything we ask it to do.
Glad to see another red hat on here.
I forgot to mention that I’m also jealous you got to work when it was still allowed to ride the tail board. I came in long after the NFPA outlawed it in 1991, IIRC. Not that the NFPA is law, but that’s another topic…Did your department stop in 91, or was it later?
I agree it’s unsafe, but it sure looks fun. A friend in another department did a sister city trip to Mexico. They can ride the tailboard there and he got to do it.
I don’t remember the exact year but it probably wasn’t long after NFPA 1500 came out in 1987. When I left the VFD for the Coast Guard in 1991, the guys were still riding on the backs on the old trucks but when I came back 2 years later, we had gotten a couple of new trucks with fully enclosed cabs and shorter tailboards so you couldn’t ride the back of the trucks even if you wanted to (which is a good thing but not as fun.) But I do also remember riding the backs of the old ALFs and jumping off to wrap the hydrants into the early 1990s.
I cribbed this picture from the NFPA website. I love the looks on the guy’s faces as they’re hanging on for dear life. Its definitely the way it used to be.
Wow, great stories. A friend in high school had a ’76 Buick Century. I briefly owned a 73 Century Luxus. Both had faded factory original red paint and looked remarkably like the GP in this story. The Collonade coupes are great cars, and just about the last GM vehicles where style was the primary feature. I found them to be solid and durable, my friend dished out idiotic teenage antics on his Buick but it never broke. It was built as strong and heavy as a pick up truck.
BTW, I agree about Rush. Great band, even though they are not quite to my taste. I marvel at how well crafted every song was, with a breathtaking level of musical sophistication. They deliberately updated their sound with each album, remaining fresh and relevant every time. Right now I can’t think of another band that did things so well and for so long.
I was in elementary school when these Prix’s came out. They were always among my favorites along with the Monte Carlo’s , with the ultra long hood. I think they have aged well. I think it’s great that it has been with you for so long and that you daily drive it. I am late in life Rush appreciator. I resurrected an old turntable and buying vinyl again and have a working eight track player. A great find for me is an LP of 2112, track 1/side 1: epic. These guys are I think the best ever rock power trio. I missed out when they came to Detroit in 2015. Now it looks as though Neal Peart is fully retired though Geddy and Alex haven’t ruled out touring or recording individually or the two of them plus a new drummer. Let’s hope so.
Rush is a very fan-oriented band. I can see them getting together to do a few shows again but probably not a full scale tour. I just heard an interview with Geddy Lee where he said he was looking forward to working with other musicians again and wanting to do another solo album.
Dan, what an awesome story, and a cool car. The Colonnade GP’s have always been one of my favorites. Of the personal coupes, I thought It was the nicest looking. The GP also transitioned to the rectangular headlights really well. They didn’t looked added on like other Colonnades. Am I the only one who associates these GP’s with the Blues Brothers’ (Carrie Fisher’s car)? You should get a fake rocket launcher for the trunk…
Like you, I spent much of my teenage years in a Colonnade coupe, although mine was just a Malibu. Regardless, like your GP, it’s been in the family for the majority of it’s life, and I have tons of memories with that car. It is one of the great cars of our family, and provided many years of reliable service.
That is cool that you use this car as your fire car. I have some family and friends on volunteer fire departments, I have heard them speak of the same camaraderie. In fact my brother in-law met his wife that way (one of the guys set him up with his sister). I have actually thought of joining up but my township has a poorly run organization, so I have had my hesitations.
Your 455 with highway gears and a RV type cam must make for a real nice road car. I too enjoy the high torque engines in these old heavy cars, and my current engine build has a similar recipe. I’d rather have more power under the curve than just top end peak power on a street car.
I am looking forward to seeing the car repainted!
Original Monte with a/c.
Non-a/c dash. I believe the vent openings are the same. Is the Malibu the same?
Yeah, the Malibu has the exact same dash.The only difference is the round gauges were optional. It came standard with a horizontal sweeping speedometer. My car is a non-A/C car too. Thanks for the info on the dash caps. I guess dying to color is the only way to go. I know Rock Auto has some parts for these cars now too, including the dash caps.
Thanks Vince. I remember you talking about the Malibu but didn’t know what the status was. I vote for you keeping the bench seat but a pair of swivels from a Monte Carlo would be very Colonnade cool. The Malibu is probably quite a bit lighter than the GP so it wouldn’t take much to get it moving down the road
This was the donor Monte that I got my interior out of. I also pinched the bumpers as they were very clean. The ’73 Green G/P that was poached for its driveline is directly behind the Monte.
Dan, I own the Malibu now and I plan to do a write-up on it sometime this year. I like the looks of the bench seat, but it’s not the most comfortable. The swivel buckets were an option in the Malibus too. They had very similar interiors to the Monte Carlos.
Another great write-up, Dan. I’m really glad you decided to share these with us, and looking forward to more. You’ve done what I would have liked to do in an alternate reality. I remember vividly regretting letting my first car go (a ’63 Monza four speed), knowing then (in 1973) that someday I would want it back. But my life was so chaotic and I had no place to stash it.
I really appreciate how you’ve been able to manage the care and feeding of your cars without spending the big bucks over the long haul. You’re keeping it real.
Yes, I do love those Ford C Series, and a whole lot of them were used at second-tier fire departments, as they were a bit more affordable than the custom-bodied ones.
Having driven my 16 year old nephew’s ’77 Camaro Z-28 today (post coming) it’s easy to forget how different these cars feel on the road compared to contemporary cars.
Looking forward to the next installment.
Thanks Paul! And I appreciate the kind words.
Every car has a story, right? I’m having a blast telling mine. Thanks for providing the opportunity. I like idea of doing a write up on our old Ford pumper, I might just do that when I’m done with my cars. It has some stories to tell…
Great story!
While I lived in Brooklyn at the time, I’d visit friends on Long Island all the time, so a lot of the details are very familiar to me. Lots of memories! Yours is just the kind of car that high school kids would buy back then. I could have just as easily had one of these Pontiacs for my first car as the Monte Carlo that I ended up with.
There’s also a parallel in how you put your first car on hold for 17 years before bringing it back into your life. In my case, I had to let my first Monte go, then found a second, nearly identical one, after 15 years. But sometimes I still think of them as the same car.
I still have a few of these WBAB stickers somewhere, the same design but with various different band logos. Everybody that went to rock concerts then used to get them, though the sticker that actually went on my bumper at the time was from K-ROCK.
A ’79 Monte with a K-Rock sticker! That’s the ’80s that I remember. I remember reading about your MC here as well; here’s to many more miles together!
Wow I made it onto BangShift! Hello Bryan!
Thank you all again for the kind words.
WBAB! I had one of those stickers on my VW Type 2. That brought back a ton of memories. And Grace Under Pressure was highly underrated.
LT Dan, this was another really entertaining read from you – stellar piece. While I was reading, I was almost holding my breath waiting for some tragedy to befall your GP. I’m so glad its story continues to be written.
Thank you JD. Its only tragedy is that I don’t drive it enough! I promise it will not fall to the same fate as the Buick that JP wrote up earlier.
Quite late to the party, but this was great. The ’77 has always been my favorite of the Colonnade Grand Prixs, perhaps my favorite Pontiac of the 70s.
Also a thank you is in order….the parents of an elementary school friend had a ’77 Grand Prix and I distinctly remember the burble of its 350 in all manner of situations. And a friend of my mother’s had a red ’77 without a vinyl top – that car was stunning.
May you have many more miles with your Pontiac. Keep these coming! And, from what I can see in the background, you’ve got a lot of cars left to tell us about.
Thank you Jason.
Good eye my man. If you’re looking at the ‘wet’ picture, except for the Malibu off in the corner, I haven’t written any of those cars up yet, and they are all CC-friendly with some more neat stories to tell.
What a satisfying read; sort of Boy’s Own meets Dazed and Confused meets Mark Donohue. Riding on the rear step… sometimes the good ole days really were.