In the early 1960s, GM’s Oldsmobile and Pontiac divisions responded to the burgeoning personal luxury market with re-trimmed B-body hardtops, the Oldsmobile Starfire and Pontiac Grand Prix. Both were restyled for 1963, taking different aesthetic approaches to the same mission, with very different degrees of aesthetic and commercial success. How did the 1963 Grand Prix and Starfire compare? Let’s take a detailed look.
In its heyday, General Motors spent a remarkable amount of time, energy, and money competing with itself. It could scarcely do otherwise — in this period, GM controlled more than 53 percent of the U.S. market, and it was only in certain segments that its domestic rivals posed any significant commercial success. GM’s mid-price divisions went at it hammer and tongs, and they had a unique talent for stealing each other’s lunch money as they vied for supremacy in more or less the same market segments.
Originally available only as a convertible, the Oldsmobile Starfire had debuted in 1961 as a sporty personal luxury car, aimed in the general direction of the trend-setting Ford Thunderbird. Unlike the T-Bird, which had its own unique body shell, the Starfire was essentially a well-trimmed Olds 88 convertible with bucket seats, a center console, and big swaths of brushed aluminum side trim. Sales were modest, but Olds kept at it, adding a Starfire coupe for 1962 — the model’s best year, with production totaling 41,988 units.
For 1962, Pontiac got into the act with its Grand Prix. Offered only as a hardtop, the ’62 Grand Prix was essentially a well-trimmed Pontiac Catalina with the obligatory buckets and console and a level of interior trim approximating that of Pontiac’s flagship Bonneville. This first Grand Prix did okay, selling 30,195 units.
For the redesigned 1963 Grand Prix, Pontiac design chief Jack Humbert pulled out all the stops and pulled off most of the exterior trim, leaving a cleanly chiseled shape highlighted by a stacked-quad headlight treatment and a crisp new “formal” roof — both highly influential.
Stripping off extraneous trim was a standard customizer trick, but it wasn’t the usual order of things. For one, the auto industry had long relied on brightwork to signify a model’s position in the hierarchy; the higher the price, the heavier the “gorp” (as stylists called bright trim). Having a pricier model with less chrome could make the sales force very uneasy. For another, as comics artists and graphic designers will tell you, the fewer lines you draw, the more right each of those lines had better be. Here, Humbert’s exquisite draftsmanship really paid dividends. Even with its lack of trim, I would hesitate to call the the 1963 Grand Prix “subtle” or “understated,” but it was supremely confident from nose to tail, with no need for costume jewelry.
By comparison, the 1963 Starfire was (with due apologies to author John Irving) another refugee from The World According to Gorp. Its signature brushed aluminum side spear adds a couple of levels of clutter to a design that already looks overly busy, with its peaked fenders (each topped with a line of stainless steel trim), demi-fins, and crucifix taillights. There’s a nervous fussiness to this design that reminds me of Chrysler products of this era.
It wasn’t helped by the fact that in profile, the Starfire’s hardtop roofline looked an awful lot more like a 1963 Dodge Dart GT than I would prefer given the difference in their prices.
Although their sail panels were different shapes, both the Starfire and the 1963 Grand Prix shared a concave backlight. I suspect the tooling for what automakers call the “roof upper” was also common to both models. However, I don’t think the average observer would grasp that the Starfire and GP both used the same GM B-body shell — they didn’t look at all similar, despite the common rear window design.
Their exterior dimensions weren’t the same either:
| Model | Length | Wheelbase | Width | Track, F/R | Height |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grand Prix | 211.9 in. | 120 in. | 78.2 in. | 62.5/64.0 in. | 54.1 in. |
| Starfire | 214.5 in. | 123 in. | 77.9 in. | 62.0/61.0 in. | 55.0 in. |
These weren’t huge differences, or enough to prevent the bodies from sharing significant chunks of their inner structure, but it helped the cars look different from one another.
Strictly as a contest of design, I think the Grand Prix wins hands-down. This was a style-driven segment, and the GP’s outstanding tailoring is more appealing than the Starfire’s cluttered and sometimes dated detailing.
Let’s also see how they compare in other significant areas.
Contrast With Line-Mates
Unlike the Thunderbird or the 1963 Buick Riviera, the 1963 Grand Prix and Starfire were dressed-up B-body hardtops, so it’s reasonable to ask how they compared with the cheaper models in their respective lineups, which offered the same mechanical package and most or all of the same features.
The Grand Prix was fundamentally a plusher Pontiac Catalina with a different roofline and different trim, so family resemblance was hard to avoid. A 1963 Catalina hardtop was also a handsome car, and as a practical matter, its chrome side-spear would have some value in crowded parking lots. However, the Grand Prix looked like it had dressed for dinner, whereas the Catalina looked like it might be more comfortable parked outside a Bob’s Big Boy. The GP didn’t obsolete the Catalina (good news for Pontiac, which sold a lot of the latter for 1963), but the Grand Prix was definitely the better-dressed, more prosperous brother.
By comparison, the 1963 Starfire doesn’t strike me as an improvement on the basic Olds Dynamic 88 Holiday Coupe, whose simpler side spear, less-cluttered grille, and sporty pseudo-convertible hardtop roof (shared with the Catalina Sports Coupe) were more on-trend for 1963. I am a documented sucker for the buckets-and-console interior treatment on the Starfire, but when it comes to the exterior, the Starfire just didn’t look as good as its cheaper brother.
Price
At first blush, the Starfire and Grand Prix wouldn’t seem to be in the same price class: A Starfire Coupe started at $4,129, while the Grand Prix started at only $3,489 — a sizable difference in 1963 dollars.
The Grand Prix seems to have been positioned to compete with the Chrysler 300 two-door hardtop, which started at $3,430.
However, the Starfire had a lot more standard equipment, including power steering, power brakes, Hydra-Matic, and a number of other features. Most Grand Prix buyers ordered those things anyway — only a dedicated drag racer or a fool would order a new full-size Pontiac with manual steering or three-speed manual transmission in 1963 — so the actual price difference for typically equipped cars was more like $200.
Nonetheless, unless you ordered the Grand Prix with one of the H.O. engines or got really carried away with the dealer-installed accessories, the Oldsmobile was likely to be more expensive.
This DIDN’T extend to resale values: After three years, the Grand Prix would command an extra $100 in trade compared to the Starfire Coupe. Today, a nice GP is worth a good deal more than the Olds as a collector car, with the hotter powertrains commanding even higher prices.
Performance
Given Pontiac’s performance reputation, you might assume the Grand Prix would easily win this category, but it wasn’t quite that simple.
The Starfire was available with only one powertrain: a high-compression four-barrel version of the 394 cu. in. Olds Rocket V-8, with 345 gross horsepower and 440 lb-ft of torque, linked to a three-speed Model 375 Hydra-Matic transmission with a 3.42 axle. (Oldsmobile marketing in this period was still trying disingenuously to claim this was a “four-stage” transmission, an assertion that continues to mislead fans; the Model 375 was NOT a four-speed automatic like its predecessor.)
Base engine in the Grand Prix was the four-barrel 389, which made 303 hp and 430 lb-ft of torque while requiring premium fuel. A regular-fuel economy engine with 235 hp was a no-cost option with Hydra-Matic. There were also various optional engines, including the rare Super Duty 421s, which were ill-suited to street use. For civilians, the top choice was the Tri-Power 421 H.O., with 370 hp and 460 lb-ft of torque. Pontiac also offered 21 axle ratios, half obviously aimed at racers. With most of these engines, the Grand Prix came with a heavy-duty three-speed manual transmission, which for $231.34 you could replace with either a four-speed manual gearbox or the three-speed Hydra-Matic. The latter was the same Model 375 Roto Hydra-Matic used in the Starfire, which went into 92.9 percent of all 1963 GPs.
With the milder engines and axle ratios, the Grand Prix was definitely slower than the Starfire. The white GP in this post has the Tri-Power 389; this version of that well-known engine didn’t have the hotter camshaft used in the later GTO, so it was rated at only 313 gross horsepower, just 10 hp more than the standard GP engine. The 421 H.O. engines were a different story, but ordering a 421 H.O. cost an extra $290.84 with a four-barrel carburetor (353 hp) or $403.71 with Tri-Power (370 hp).
Here are some comparative acceleration times. The Starfire and 313 hp Grand Prix figures are from Car Life (February 1963 and May 1963), the 303 hp base and 421 H.O. Grand Prix are from Motor Trend (May 1963 and June 1963):
| Acceleration (2 aboard) |
Starfire, Hydra-Matic |
Grand Prix, 303 hp/Hydra-Matic |
Grand Prix, 313 hp/Hydra-Matic |
Grand Prix, 370 hp/4-speed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0–30 mph | 3.6 sec. | 3.3 sec. | 3.5 sec. | 3.0 sec. |
| 0–60 mph | 8.5 sec. | 9.9 sec. | 9.5 sec. | 6.6 sec. |
| 0–100 mph | 22.4 sec. | N/A | 31.5 sec. | N/A |
| Standing ¼ mile | 17.2 sec. at 89 mph | 18.1 sec. at 80 mph | 17.3 sec. at 81 mph | 15.1 sec. at 94 mph |
The Starfire was clearly no slouch, but if you wanted go as well as show (and were prepared to pay for it), Pontiac had more to offer.
Brakes and Chassis
Neither the Pontiac nor the Oldsmobile was very good at slowing down. Both had 11-inch drum brakes whose swept area (310 sq. in. for the Olds, 311 sq. in. for the Pontiac) was meager for these 4,200+ lb cars.
Pontiac offered a partial fix in the form of its familiar 8-lug aluminum wheels with integral drums, a highly worthwhile $122.13 option on the Grand Prix. Stopping distances weren’t exceptional with these brakes, and like all drums, they were prone to pulling to one side if heated unevenly, but fade resistance was greatly improved, so if you wanted to be able to stop from 70 mph or more, they were a must. Oldsmobile didn’t offer any such relief, and the Starfire’s standard power brakes were excessively sensitive, demanding a light touch to avoid premature lockup.
Like most big American cars of the time, both the Starfire and the Grand Prix were tuned for a cushy ride at the expense of handling composure. However, it may surprise you to learn that the standard Grand Prix suspension was actually softer than the Starfire’s, particularly in roll control — Car Life called the standard Grand Prix “a real handful if pressed.” This wasn’t to say the Starfire handled especially well: In addition to stiffer front springs, Oldsmobile had specified a stiffer 1.09-inch front anti-roll bar, which ensured pronounced understeer. Car Life complained that “the deceptiveness of the silent ride and easy speed can betray the driver when he discovers that a corner is sharper than he had anticipated.”
The closest thing the Starfire options list offered to a heavy-duty suspension was stiffer rear springs, intended for trailer towing and probably not very helpful otherwise. Pontiac was more accommodating in this regard, offering both medium-duty and heavy-duty suspension packages for the bargain prices of $3.82 and $6.24, respectively. Car Life thought the higher-rate package was probably too stiff for most people, but felt the medium-rate set-up provided a big improvement in handling and body control with little sacrifice in ride.
Bottom line: The Pontiac could have better road manners and brakes, but only if you selected certain extra-cost options. In standard form, both of these cars were soft, clumsy, and had very marginal stopping ability.
Interior
Because the Grand Prix had a significantly lower base price than the Starfire, its interior trim wasn’t as lavish.
The Grand Prix cabin was hardly plain, especially in this example’s white Morrokide …
… but it lacked the Starfire’s fancy-looking swaths of brushed metal trim.
The Starfire also had real leather upholstery, although how much of it was actually “Barcelona-grain leather” and how much was Moroceen (vinyl) is an interesting question.
Pontiac offered only Morrokide vinyl upholstery, although the brochure sniffed, “Expanded Morrokide, you know, is softer and more pliable than leather.”
In back, a longer console and taller center seat padding effectively made the Starfire a four-passenger car. (I guess you could stuff a fifth person back there for short trips, but no one would be happy about it.)
The Grand Prix was a bit less restrictive in back, and it included a folding rear armest.
Both cars’ dashboard treatments were very shiny, but fell short of ideal in a number of respects:
The horizontal speedometer seems out of place in both cars, a cost-driven choice that betrays these models’ kinship with their cheaper siblings.
Also, I’m not sure I understand Pontiac’s logic in providing an ammeter, a fuel gauge, and a clock, but NOT a coolant temperature gauge. I can’t help thinking how much more appealing the Grand Prix interior would be with something like the Rally Instrument Cluster later offered on the GTO, with a round speedometer, an in-dash tachometer, and secondary gauges (although that setup had gauges for everything but battery).
A center console was standard on the 1963 Grand Prix, and entitled you to one awkwardly placed console-mounted gauge. With manual transmission, this was a tachometer; with Hydra-Matic, you instead got a manifold pressure gauge, positioned for the amusement of a small child sitting in the rear center position.
Even with Hydra-Matic, you could still order a tachometer (for $53.80), in this case rather crudely lashed to the left side of the instrument panel. In this position, it’s easier to see, but still feels like an afterthought.
The instrumentation situation was even worse in the Starfire, which had only the horizontal speedometer, a fuel gauge, some warning lights, and a clock.
You did get a tachometer on the Starfire, although its position at the forward end of the console meant you would be lucky to see it, much less read it. On the other hand, the three-speed Hydra-Matic didn’t encourage much manual control anyway, so perhaps Oldsmobile wasn’t entirely wrong to treat the tachometer as a cosmetic item.
Conclusions
The 1963 Grand Prix and 1963 Starfire had similar origins, a similar marketing pitch, and broadly similar prices, but I don’t think it’s a stretch to say the Grand Prix was the more successful in execution: It still looks great, and with a careful selection of optional equipment, you could order one that was indeed capable of, as Pontiac put it, “grand touring in the best North American manner.”
Factoring in the lower price and higher resale values, it’s not surprising that the Grand Prix outsold the Starfire by about 3 to 1 (72,959 units to 25,890). In fact, for 1963, the Grand Prix even outsold the Ford Thunderbird, which was then in the last year of a three-year styling cycle. (That ranking would be reversed for 1964.)
By comparison, the 1963 Starfire lacked much of a USP beyond its bucket seats and center console. As a collector car, its cluttered styling and fancy interior are quirky and fun, but in a year of exceptional automotive designs, it was not impressive, an uneasy melding of ’60s angularity and ’50s over-decoration. If you could live without buckets, a regular Super 88 Holiday Coupe was more tasteful, and little different to drive.
Both these cars have their shortcomings — Roto Hydra-Matic is a big one, with the lack of suitable instrument panels another — but when it comes to the basic question, “Which would you rather have, then or now?” the grand prize goes to the Grand Prix.
Related Reading
CCOTY Nomination: 1963 Pontiac Grand Prix (by Kevin Martin)
Curbside Classic – 1963 Pontiac Grand Prix: Another Time, Another Place (by Aaron65)
Curbside Outtake: 1963 Pontiac Grand Prix – Soldiering On (by Ed Stembridge)
Vintage Car Life Road Test: 1962 Pontiac Grand Prix 421 Super Duty – “The Fastest Accelerating Stock Production-Line Car We’ve Ever Tested” (by Paul N)
Vintage Car Life Review: 1969 Pontiac Grand Prix Model SJ – “Tiger In Tuxedo” (by me)
1962 Oldsmobile Starfire Coupe Vs. 1962 Oldsmobile Dynamic 88 Holiday Coupe – Thunderbird-Fighter Or Just A Fancier Olds? (by me)
CC Outtake: 1963 Oldsmobile Starfire – The Pageant Loser, But Good Enough For Denise Huxtable (by Laurence Jones)
It’s telling that Pontiac didn’t feel the need to put their name in letters across the front. Olds hadn’t yet found its face.
Fortunately, in America, we can STILL have our own opinions. Not sure how much longer 😕. This is a fair and comprehensive post. But IMO, having a Too much is NEVER enough philosophy, The Starfire outshines ( no pun intended) the Grand Prix. I first saw a 61 Starfire convertible on a vacation with my parents and have loved them ever since. Àt car shows I often see a 61 or 62 Starfire, but Don’t recall seeing a Grand Prix.
FYI, the “woodgrain” steering wheel in the GP pictured in this article isn’t factory. That’s a relatively recent aftermarket wheel.
I figured as much, and I’ve appended the word “aftermarket” to the caption.
I love these comparisons! Please consider at least also including a table for data comparisons — it becomes tedious to ferret out, say the wheelbases or the overall lengths from the prose.
FWIW, the GP had a 120″ wb and the Starfire 123″. They both shared the same basic B-body, but Olds and Buicks had a longer front end, where that extra 3″ of wb was. The longer front end of the Starfire is fairly noticeable in profile view.
So the GP got the Olds 88/Jetstar 1 wheelbase and pricing scheme… interesting…
No. All full-size Oldsmobiles except the 98 had the same 123″ wheelbase.
I hate to bring this up but your batting average on comments is really low. Maybe you shouldn’t go to bat so often?
Great article, interesting topic! Magazine-worthy quality. Put my vote down for the GP, though I do have a soft spot for the Starfire due to it being a model I built as a kid in the 80s, when Johan models were still available off the shelf. In fact, several years ago I found an unpainted body at a swap meet and redid my old model with much better paint this time.
I agree that the Starfire (and all full size 63-64 Olds) definitely have tailfins. Not that I mind that at all, it just seems a little passé for the time. The GP is a car more of its time and undoubtedly had trend-setting, cool styling. The Starfire had more fifties-style flash.
I built that kit too!
Roto hydramatic the torque converter would shift into two ranges, first and second, giving the transmission 4 speeds. Same principle as a Dynaflow, no one would say the Dynaflow is a single speed transmission.
This is entirely wrong.
Roto Hydra-Matic was a three-speed transmission. It did not have dual driving ranges like the earlier four-speeds. Whether the dump-and-fill coupling qualified as a torque converter is arguable (I think it did, although not a conventional one), but it was designed so that it could only provide a very small amount of torque multiplication, only in first and reverse, and only for maybe three or four car lengths in initial acceleration. Once the car is in motion, the coupling quickly loses the ability to multiply torque because its reaction member is splined to the output shaft.
Dynaflow was a dramatically different animal. In a mechanical sense, Dynaflow WAS a single-speed transmission, using its torque converter as a CVT.
I prefer the Poncho Grand Prix although I remember a 1964 Olds coupe a friend’s brother had in the 1980’s, I thought it too looked pretty sharp .
When the Grand Prix was new I was drooling over a blue one parked on front of our house on Center Street, my middle class mother was very derisive of it .
I’d love to see GM go back to that supposedly bad divisional infighting .
-Nate
It was really hard to top Pontiac at its own game in the early to mid 1960s. While the Olds has points in its favor, the fresh styling of the Gran Prix showed the way to the future, whereas the Starfire wasn’t quite ready to leave behind the excesses of the late 1950s.
What struck me immediately is the boxy profile of both cars in the first two pictures above. These pictures underscore the fact that both cars share the same body shell despite all the sheet metal and detail differences. At the same time, curved side glass introduced in the 1965 model year made for a far sleeker profile in all the GM lines (although they eventually pushed that look too far in the 1971-76 B and C bodies).
Thanks for this comparison. It’s very helpful to see two different takes on the same concept as the Detroit Three attempted to move toward a sportier definition of luxury in the early Sixties. The Chrysler 300 mentioned above and perhaps the Ford Galaxie XL were two other possibilities a buyer interested in a car of this type may have considered, though the Chrysler still suffered from some weird styling cues in 1963 and the Ford brand may not have communicated the buyers’ aspirations to higher social status as well as the two GM offerings.
I’m not really feeling the Olds’ similarity to the Dodge Dart, but there would seem to be one strong connection, and that’s the concave rear window of the GM products being the inspiration for the even more curved rear window of the 1967 Dart hardtop.
I always thought it was more along the lines of an ersatz, cheaper copy of the 1966-67 GM ‘tunnelback’ rear window but that would seem more directly related to the 1968-70 Dodge Charger.
The Dart hardtop, instead, got a version of the rear window from the 1963 Grand Prix and Chrysler kept it for ten years, all the way up to the final 1976 Mopar A-body hardtop.
I was talking specifically about the shape of the rear sail panel, and the way the leading edge of the panel slopes backward and then sharply turns forward and down. The left side view of the Starfire has a little too much sun washout in that area, but gives it a very similar side window shape to the Dart.
The comparison is very stark, with the Starfire losing the styling aspect by a country mile. It’s a bit surprising that Bill Mitchell allowed Olds to keep the Harley Earl school of slathering on more brightwork going this long.
I would be interested to know just how this unique-roof variant of the B body came about. Who instigated it: Olds or Pontiac? My guess is that it was a sop to Olds for Buick getting the lovely Riviera, and Pontiac got in on the action.
The GP was a big deal in 1963. Obviously it was no Riviera, but it was more affordable and it was the crowning touch to the superbly restyled ’63 Pontiac line. I would put 1963 as the best year ever for full-size Pontiacs, and the market responded enthusiastically. Sales increased strongly in’63 and ’64, the peak year for full size Pontiac sales ever (except 1955) with 528k units. A stellar performance.
Olds hadn’t found its distinctive mid-late 60s look, so it needed something to avoid confusion with Chevrolets when they all have similar profiles and greenhouses. They spent the 80s-early 90s catering to people who liked the out of fashion brougham look. Maybe they were aptly named.
I still prefer the ’65 Pontiacs for being 2 years ahead of the others, but I also saw more of them growing up.
Obviously you favor the Pontiac , follow the Gm order Chevrolet Pontiac oldsmobile buick Cadillac for the most part marketing was correct really not comparing to each other but as a price point and also why all these divisions were made Chevrolet being the cheapest and certain people bought these and so on anyway oldsmobile was always a nicer car than a Chevrolet or Pontiac and even buick at times as buick was portrayed as a old man’s car but then Cadillac was the ultimate that gm had and kept it that way forever along side oldsmobile being the innovative division until Gm lost its way pretty much , The Stafire was a better looking and all around better car , your comparing two different types of cars , the startfire is a personal luxury coupe and the grand prix is a sports coupe period
It must have been quite interesting to be a GM corporate executive at the time. You would want/need the various divisions to be different, yet competitive with each other. But not *too* different, because that’s expensive, and whether Joe Carbuyer buys a Starfire or Gran Prix, GM gets to log a sale.
I would argue that the Starfire was not really wedded to the 50s, but was instead a gigantic leap forward from the 1962 version, which I have always seen as a stylist’s stew. The silver side trim was pared way down, but was probably seen as a defining feature of the Starfire, and therefore required in some form.
Comparing the hardtop roofs of these cars with those on the standard 1963 B bodies, I see the standard roof as a common theme with the outgoing Y body coupes, and the GP/Starfire as predictive of the 1964 A body counterparts, so a much more modern look.
Pontiac was at its styling/identity peak around this time, while Oldsmobile was still a few years away from its own. I will confess a soft spot for 1963-64 Oldsmobiles owing to first noticing them as related to our 64 Cutlass, the first new car I can remember in our family.
“The silver side trim was pared way down, but was probably seen as a defining feature of the Starfire, and therefore required in some form.”
Isn’t that quintessential Fifties thinking: side trim required as a defining feature? It wasn’t totally wed to the Fifties, of course, it doesn’t have two-tone paint and the shape is pretty square, but those tailfins are a pretty big throwback. Olds truly divorced the Fifties and eloped with the Sixties with the Toronado.
See, when it comes to the regular 1963 B-body Oldsmobile, I think it looked reasonably modern — not a standout design by 1963 standards, but crisp and tasteful. The regular Dynamic 88 or Super 88 hardtops were handsome cars that I think were well-attuned to Oldsmobile’s market position. The Starfire clutters up the trim (especially the grille), I don’t think the new roofline on the coupe is very attractive, and there’s a general sense that the decor was driven by the Harley Earl “If you see an open surface, stick something shiny on it” school of chromification rather than it having a cohesive theme.
I don’t dislike the Starfire, but it reads as kitsch rather than as a coherent design.
Nice article and have to agree with the assessment – even though I’m an Olds guy.
WRT exterior styling, interesting to note that this somewhat flipped in 1965, when the Starfire went fairly clean-cut and the GP went coke bottle curvy. I know there are a lot of 65 big Poncho fans but they always struck me as a little bloated.
The ’63 GP clearly points to the future, especially the 1965 Pontiac lineup, The ’63 Starfire clearly has one foot in the ’50’s and one in the ’60s. Again, Oldsmobile catered to an older more conservative set of drivers.
In the 1950s and ’60s if you cut my Dad he bled Oldsmobile. I was such a thick-headed kid I abused his Antique Rose Starfire…dumping it into a back road ditch and lowering the garage door while pulling in thus scraping the roof nicely. And I shouldn’t have been allowed anywhere near 345 hp and accompanying torque. (Boy could one chirp the tires with a timely kick-down.) Fifty years after his passing I still feel the guilt.
I’m sure he knew the risks of letting his teenage son drive his powerful late model car, accepted them, and knew you’d learn from any mistakes. Giving you those lessons was more important than protecting his car. Relationships over possessions is a good way to live.
Maybe I’m wrong and those weren’t his thoughts, but you shouldn’t feel too bad. Doing dumb things, especially with cars, is pretty much required of teenage boys.
The ’63 Pontiac Grand Prix was the first car(IIRC) I truly fell in love with and started my love for automobiles as a young kid ( when you could buy this car for a song). At my age of almost 60 years, I still want one of these machines that was my first love for automobiles, but I wouldn’t kick that Olds Starfire out of my driveway either.
Looking at the cheaper models – the Catalina and Dynamic 88 2-door hardtops – Pontiac’s sharp new styling worked against it as it highlighted how dowdy, frumpy and overwrought that faux-convertible-uptop roof stamping was.
The Olds seemed more of a piece, even if it seemed more of a 1961 piece. I think if I couldn’t stretch to a GP I’d be getting the Catalina as a 4-door hardtop or a post sedan.
JAMES
I don’t agree with the statement that the 63 GP has far less side trim than the 62 GP. They both have only a stainless rocker molding. The sheet metal on the 62 was sculptured and the 63 was almost flat, perhaps giving it the impression of being less cluttered. I had a 62 GP with the SD 4 barrel 333HP engine in the mid to late 60’s and my best friend drove his dad’s 63 Starfire coupe. Good Times. I presently have a 62 GP 303HP with a 200R4 trans that replaces that weak Roto trans.
At GM, the Sixties belonged to Pontiac. They made a range of cars that were more attractive than their GM siblings, even the ones from the more expensive divisions. A lot of people who would never have considered a Pontiac, bought one because of the Pontiac mojo. By the Seventies Pontiac lost their advantage. Later they became generic GM cars.
I love the looks of pretty much any GM car with stacked headlights. Pontiac beat Cadillac to it by a couple of years. I enjoyed this comparison article.
Keep these comparison articles coming, Aaron! I really enjoy them.
I didn’t like the looks of either really, and would prefer the ’61 Starfire over the ’63 GP. This article has swayed me toward the Grand Prix exterior in a comparison of 1963 models. Which would I choose? They’re both too large for my tastes, I’d like a Buick Special with the aluminum 215.
I’d prefer though. I disagree that the ’63 Starfire looks worse than the Dynamic 88. To me, the 88 looks like a stripped spinster’s car. On the inside, I concede that the GP is more useful but both interiors are ugly. There are few Sixties interiors that look well done to me but I think that Chryslers do well. I like the multi-color Fifties interiors but anything’s better than today’s basic black/gray with acres of leather-grained plastic.
These Pontiacs are over sixty years old now. What do you do when your fancy aluminum integral brake drums are in need of replacement? Do they make reproductions? Can’t be cheap but I’ve always thought those were good looking wheels.
Yes, there are modern reproductions available.
“… would prefer the ’61 Starfire over the ’63 GP. ”
100%.
I came to say this, so I’ll just agree. That 61 Starfire is Beautiful. That’s my pref.
Of course, I’m a GM fan in ‘General’, so I’d take any of these.. but man that 61..
I honestly prefer the exterior styling of the ’62 Grand Prix over the ’63. I have never been much of a fan of stacked headlights.
Remove the peaks on the fenders and I prefer the ’63 Starfire over the ’63 Grand Prix. From the side the Grand Prix looks a bit like ’65-67 Ford Galaxies.
One can argue the merits of both cars forever, but only one of them, brand new and in bright red with a red interior, was driven by my 3rd grade teacher. I was in love … with the car and the teacher. And I was in heaven when I got to ride in it once, in the front seat next to her.
Which one? The Pontiac of course.
Since the Chrysler 300 was in the same price range it would be interesting to compare it to them: Superior transmission, superior unitized body, superior suspension and possibly superior engine. Certainly better looking than the Starfire
Remember, Chrysler introduced the non-letter 300s in 1962 and that was the Grand Prix’s direct competition. $3430 for a base 300 two-door, $3489 for the base Pontiac. The 300-J started at $5184. I would guess that you could option the 300 closer to J spec.
The 300 offered a 360hp 413 for $551, the 300-J’s engines started 373hp and ran up to 425hp and none of those were available in the non-letter car. No 4-speeds and Torqueflite only above the 383 2bbl. The Grand Prix topped out at 350hp for the tri-power 421 ($635 with the 4-speed).
Frankly, I’d choose the Pontiac. Probably equal performance with the top engines and the GP looked lots better.
Thank you, Don. I had a ride of about an hour in a ’63 Chrysler wagon (I believe it was a Newport) and was more impressed than I was of my father’s “63 Dynamic 88 4-door.
My grumpy Grandpa drove Pontiacs of that generation, so I associate them with grumpy grandpas. I road in his often. They just don’t seem special beyond the exterior design. The interiors were nothing special. Their performance was adequate.
I preferred the Oldsmobile’s exterior brightwork. I like the rear end treatment. The interiors were handsome comfortable and attractive with real leather. It outperforms the Pontiac in key areas.
Yes the rear sail panel is shaped similarly to a Dart, but wasn’t the stacked Pontiac headlights like the stacked headlights in the old 1957 Nash?
You obviously preferred the cheaper Pontiac right away in this comparison, but there is a lot to like about the Oldsmobile. Having the Oldsmobile is more exclusive and seeing them at a car show today is less common than a Pontiac.
The Pontiac looks nice. The Olds looks fun.
The Pontiac is a very handsome design, although it needs the eight-lug wheels to really work.
The basic 1963 Oldsmobile looks too plain, and for some reason, the wheels and tires on both of the Oldsmobiles look too small for the car. The Pontiacs do not have this problem.
The best looking full-size Oldsmobile, however, is neither the Dynamic 88 or the Starfire, in my opinion. It’s the Ninety-Eight, which received unique quarter panels, taillights and C-pillars that year.