We’ve had a somewhat unusual amount of GM colonnades appearing at the Cohort lately, and here’s one more found by nifticus392. Do Colonnades come out in the spring? Or is it just an odd coincidence?
In either case, this generation of Pontiac Colonnades has been covered at CC before (links below). Just last year I posted a sinister-looking ’73 and talked about its flamboyant 1970s styling. Others have covered the model’s specs and background.
But we’re talking 1970s Pontiac here, when their LeMans/Grand Am Colonnades (and Pontiac) were trying to be everything to everyone. Just for ’74, there were several to choose from, in all sorts of flavors. There was the Luxury LeMans, the LeMans Sports Coupe, the plain LeMans, the Grand Am and the GT; all with different features, trim, and the usual assortment of engines and trannys.
Today’s find is the GT, making its first CC appearance (I think). And this one carries a 400 CID V-8. Other choices for the GT included the 350 and 455, and shifting was by a floor-mounted 3-speed. And does this one still wear its factory-original decals?
Well, I’ve no idea what’s up with this spring and Colonnades, but let’s see if some more show up before summer arrives.
Related CC reading:
Curbside Classic: 1976 Pontiac LeMans Coupe – A Strong Start To A Weak Finish
Auction Classic: 1975 Pontiac LeMans – 40 Years On, A Kinder View
Curbside Classic: 1973 Pontiac LeMans Sport Coupe With Floor Shifter – A Victim Of Fashion
Johnny Lightning put out a 1/64 diecast model of this very car a year or so ago. I have that model in blue with the GT stripe on it.
This car would/could/should have been the GTO. I don’t think I’ll ever understand why Pontiac moved that vaunted name down to their X-body.
The mid-sized muscle-car market had collapsed by 1973, but smaller, cheaper cars like the Plymouth Duster 340/360 were still afloat.
Insurance dodging surely played a part, same reason Dodge R/Ts became Rallyes.
The Grand Am was really the logical GTO successor in my eyes, the 73 Collonade GTO had a forlorn second fiddle look to it compared to the endura clad Grand Am. This model is really the collonade successor to the GT-37 that was sold alongside GTOs in the previous body. Stripe and all.
“Insurance dodging” says it all. For those in the know, the LeMans GT with a 400 (or, better still, a 455) would have been the last gasp for the true, intermediate Goat (unlike the Ventura version of the same year).
And it would have a complete no-brainer to tell your insurance man the engine was a 350. No one would have been the wiser.
My Dad had a ’74 GP with the 400/4V, and it was very quick for the time.
My Mom had a ’75 Lemans Safari with the 400/2V, and by contrast it was wheezy and slow, though very good-handling for a wagon of that era.
I hope that GT has the 4V version of the 400!
” ’74 GP with the 400/4V, and it was very quick for the time.”
Potentially dual-exhaust, no catalyst.
” ’75 Lemans Safari with the 400/2V, and by contrast it was wheezy and slow”
Exhaling through single exhaust, plugged-up with a restrictive pellet-style catalytic converter. (GM used pellet-style converters into the 1990s instead of the more free-flowing monolithic/honeycomb cats because the pellet-style could, in theory, be “rebuilt” using a glorified vacuum cleaner, and a bag of fresh pellets. There were threaded plugs on the converter shell, the vacuum cleaner sucked the old beads out, and sucked the new beads in.) There was a metal-mesh screen that supposedly kept the beads in position within the catalyst shell, but it was common for the mesh to rot-out which ended the service life of that catalytic converter. You’d see cars idling at stop lights, spitting an occasional pellet out the tailpipe. The muffler would rattle like a maraca when smacked with a fist.
Some vehicles came with a “flag” on the odometer assembly; at a pre-determined mileage (30K?) the flag would drop and cover many of the digits of the odometer. That was the signal to the owner that the beads had to be replaced in the catalytic converter. Not only did the catalyst need service, but the instrument cluster had to be diddled-with to push the flag back up so the full mileage of the vehicle was visible again. I’m thinking that the emissions performance had to be guaranteed for 50K miles, so the first time the flag dropped, the service was “warranty”, but all subsequent drops were customer-paid.
The difference in performance may have been partly the engine, but also the exhaust system. And–of course–state of tune, production variations, extra weight of the wagon vs. the 2-door body, etc.
Awful what the new bumper regulations did to styling. Pontiac lost it with this design when it made so many beautiful cars before this.
I think as much as the battering ram bumpers the single headlights did these no favors in the looks department either. That corporate wide switch in the name of neoclassical fashion may have worked for Olds, Buick and cars like the Monte Carlo and to lesser extent Grand Prix(in my opinion the single headlight 71-75s were less attractive than the 70-71 and 76-77). For Pontiac’s A body line though it just looked like the division got the crumpled up Cutlass ideas from Mitchell & co.
Regarding the dual headlights – I believe you may have meant ’69-’70 and ’76-’77…
Yep 69-70, my bad!
CC effect strikes again. Drove from Ottawa to Petersborough today. Two Colonades. One Le Mans (no photo) and this Monte Carlo at Smiths Falls
One ‘O’ short of being a GTO……
Big Block Engines were down on compression by 1973, something like 7.6 for some of those GM ones and 8.2 to one for the Mopar 400 & 440 magnum engines that were still avail. in the Charger Rallye or Plymouth Road Runner models. Buick GS still had a 455 avail. and was a strong performer. Those mid -sized cars still had a lot of torque and more power could easily be gained by increasing their compression alone and other tuning mods. The Pontiac SD455 was a strong engine, but I believe it was only avail. in the Firebird Trans Am.
Perhaps because they appeared in my burgeoning car conscience as a kid, but the ’74 Lemans (or Grand Am) were my favorites of the Colonnades (followed by the ’77 Cutlass and Regal). I liked the well-defined side sweeps and the waterfall taillights.
My mom bought one same year, brand new, only it was a luxury lemans, 400, brown, cloth interior, it had the small opera window on the b-pillar, cool car!!
look at that recessed licence plate!
@ Schurkey,
Interesting that the ’75 was underpowered.
We had a 1973 lemans safari with the 400, Q-Jet 4 barrel, dual exhausts and a turbo 400 transmission, and it was a different animal. It was downright quick for the times.
Only thing was it had a weird distributor that was on that engine alone, not the one with the window where you could adjust the points with an Allen wrench. I believe there was another 400-4v above it in the horsepower hierarchy.
Also, this engine didn’t have a smog pump from the factory, the exhaust manifolds were not drilled and tapped.
But it needed constant tuning to run right, but when it did it was almost scary.
I have always been amazed how extensively Pontiac revised the tail ends on these for 1974. They even revised the quarter panels to remove the wheel lip flair so that the fender skirts would be better integrated. The tail end of the 74 is one of my favorites.
Was this done primarily to increase luggage space? The decklids in the ’74-77 cars are a bit taller than in the ’73s, but not enough so that it seemed worth the cost of making the changes.