In 1970, Pontiac offered the same basic midsize coupe in several gradations of grooviness. In ascending order of desirability, the lineup went like this: Tempest, LeMans, LeMans Sport, GTO, and GTO Judge.
The car in the picture is a '70 LeMans Sport convertible in Starlight Black. The base engine in the ragtop LeMans Sport was a Chevy-sourced 250 cubic inch OHV inline six, rated at 155 SAE gross horsepower. Also available were an optional 350cid 2bbl V-8 or the 400cid V-8 in 2bbl (265hp) or 4bbl (330hp) flavors.
The rocker panel badges on this one indicate it's got the 350 cubic inch Pontiac Small-Journal V-8, which was rated at 255 SAE gross BHP. While there's no straight conversion factor that can be applied to go from SAE gross numbers to SAE net, you'll usually be pretty close if you assume that the net rating is about seventy-five to eighty percent of the gross numbers*. Figure probably around 200 horsepower in modern terms, to lug a 3700 pound convertible away from stoplights. But it looks good doing it!
The late '60s and early '70s had some of the nicer examples of Detroit styling, before the sharp angles and straight lines of the later Formal Period that produced such stylistic snoozers as the Granada and Aspen.
The one in the picture was snapped in May of 2023 using a Canon EOS-1D Mark IV and EF 24-105mm f/4L IS zoom lens.
*There are notable exceptions, especially with the higher performance motors, whose numbers were often dramatically exaggerated for marketing reasons or wildly underrated for insurance reasons or to perpetrate drag racing skulduggery. With motors like the Hemis or Super Cobra Jets, "BHP" may safely be assumed to stand for Horse Power as measured at the Brochure.
Unfortunately, the OHC-6 was discontinued after '69 and the Chevy 250 L-6 was used from '70 through '76. One contributing factor was that the OHC wouldn't fit under the hood of the redesigned Firebird.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the correction! I'll fix that!
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