Gary C. Man, they are great. I have a 68 ra3 400. Came stock with 345 ho and 450 ft/lbs. it’s a beast. Especially with a cam and adjustable valve train.

Robert LaPointe it’s a #16 head. Bored .60 over. 412 ci. Headers, ra4 cam, adhustable valvetrain, 7/16 screw in studs, full headers, performer intake, 800 cfm edelbrock carb. Will smoke tires in second and chirp third gear. All with a mismatched stall converter. A bunch of stuff I’m forgetting. Had it since I was 17. I’m 40. My daily driver is a modded Subaru wrx about 340 hp. I love both but in different ways. Lol.

Gary C. Pontiac was definitely something special. So many great cars. It showed that they took pride in their cars.

Robert LaPointe it’s easy to get 340 hp from a 4cylinder turbo charged motor with ecu tuning

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Benevolent Protector Sounds like a great car. Was it Verdoro green? My favorite color from those years.

@@terry-zi7ehYep, that deep metallic green is beautiful. I traded in my 1964 Olds 442 (I'm still kicking myself about that) to get my Firebird, just after I got married in 1971. Other than the original "cruiser drive train", mine had a black vinyl top, console and bucket seats. We lived in Newark Calif. and just a few miles from Fremont Drag strip ...and to tell the truth.. after I replaced the engine/tranny, I was never beat while racing on the street or by any stock production muscle car while on the 1/4 mile.

Benevolent Protector A first year 442, came right on the heels of the GTO. Great cars!

@@terry-zi7eh Yea, they're both great cars. The GTO had longer development time, with a bigger engine and offered an optional 3 x 2 intake. While the 442 was Oldsmobile's response to the GTO but in spite of the smaller 330 engine, having a single 4 bbl carb on both cars, the 442 was actually faster in the 1/4 mile. Mine had the 330 Rocket engine w/B09 option (dual snorkel air cleaner, hotter cam and 10.5:1 "Ultra High Compression") ..320 HP was listed on a decal on the air box and performance was actually really good, it ran 15 flat at Fremont drag strip.

Benevolent Protector Wow, the HO 330 was rated at 310, I did not know there was another option above it. And faster than a Ram Air III? It’s so cool to hear from guys like you who owned and drove the cars. I just read about and lusted after them.

Interesting, thanks for comments: lot of Dealer Stuff & unique add ons......

Friends big bro had one. New he fliped it

I remember reading about that they had a few of the birds with 428's I think It was one of the dealerships that was adding the Royal Bobcat kits.

Everyone new this and bent the stop till secondaries were WOT. I had same year same color w/Pmd mags that when engine blew I put a RAIV engine in. Plenty in the junkyards in totaled cars. With biased ply tires and all that torque they were like drift cars. This Green wasn't my first choice but every time I see one all those memories come back. Awesome car !

@@mfsb8473 Oh the 70-73 cars are the better package. But on looks and style alone, especially a black 68 convertible, not much can touch it.

400s and 455s tend to break 4 speeds, Th400s are faster and hold up much better than Muncie M20/21 4 gears. The weak suck chevy feels faster because you can dump the clutch and you need deep gears, but a Pontiac likes a highway gear and around a 2200 stall. I've gone mid 11s with a 3.42 gear and a 1900 stall in a 3900lb car, with a very mild 224/228 cammed 455. Bottom 12s with a very mild 400 is super easy using the same gears and stall. I'll chop down the tree with a 4 gear, but they don't live long behind my engines, gotta granny shift them. A Th400 or Th350 takes lots more abuse for lots longer, and they cost me less than $300 to rebuild, vs $1200+ for a broken 4 gear. Yeah, I build my engines and transmissions. My 3 speed autos will rip your head off.

@Moon Pie an M22 is considerably more rare and quite different from the M20/21 and the Super T-10 that came in most 4 speed cars, that makes them more expensive and harder to find. They only came in round port cars. The saginaw that came in most chevys can be shattered within an afternoon behind a mild 455. I have only ever seen one in the wild. The Th350 is stronger than all but the M22 and the Th400 is stronger than the M22, and with a couple inexpensive mods, stronger than a TKO600 if it isn't already, some Th400s behind chevys were almost as weak as a Th350, fewer friction and steels in the clutch packs because the low torque chevy doesn't need more.. The BOP Th400 is stronger than all the chevy versions, and the 427/454 versions were about equal if they were in trucks. Then you have torque multiplication from the converter, and a manual doesn't have that. A converter can turn 500ftlbs at the flexplate into 1000ftlbs at the input shaft, which is why autos don't need as much rear gear as a manual to be faster. When your engine doesn't have much bottom end, like a 350 sbc, its kinda moot. With a 400 or 455 Pontiac, it makes a big difference. Like 11.50s with a 3.42 gear and a 2200 stall. Considerably more driveable than a 4.33. It might have lost a tenth with a 3.08 gear or run the same, never got to try it. I enjoy ripping through the gears, but driving something I can break easily without thousands in mods, makes me far less prone to want to put a manual in. Getting an OD means spending $3k at least, and I can put a built 700R4 or 2004R in for $800, and it will be faster.

Yup, mine as well. At leas it’s a th400 though.

@@SweatyFatGuy Very true, I was forced to switch my M-20 out of my 68 over to a cast iron case Borg Warner super T-10 with a 2:88 first gear ( out of 74 super Duty Trans Am), then blew out every clutch disk & pressure plate I tried until I had Hays build me a custom sprung hub 4 paddle bronze disk with a 3,600 pound plate. Then I twisted the drive shaft up & built a chrome molly extra tick wall shaft with Hemi U joints , then blew out the BOP 10 bolt 8.2 posi rear and replaced it with a 12 bolt and 4:11s Needless to say with 255/70/15s on 8 inch rims Pontiac rally rims the 400 is in the low11:s but after 46 years I still own the car, and it's a convertible with no frame connectors so it's a real hand full !.

I have a 68 with a parchment strato bench seat.... trim code 275 special order. Most people wanted buckets understandably but I think the bench seat is the way to go... armrest is great while cruising.

I had a 400 and after a few tweaks is was one of the fastest cars on the street. Only thing I could not beat was the Hemi road runner and 440 GTX Everything including LT1 vettes were horse meat KEY TIP: Pull the secondary rods and file the ends a little at an angle. It would choke for a second on the extra fuel then explode straight to 5500 It would light up in third passing cars I got into the 12's which was really fast for those days. I think the HP numbers were WAY underrated so as not to piss off GM Chevy lover execs, but if I was beating LT1 350/350hp 3200 lb vette I HAD to be pushing 400 hp plus stock, but it was rated 325 hp

Yeah I watched a vid with Jay Lenno Has a really nice one .

Sorry about that typo

LOL. Formula was actually quicker car cause it was missing all that bling !

RAII came with round port exhaust... Was race prepped.

@MaxxRPM given the same mods, the Camaro. It would take the RPMs. The RA II could not. Add headers to both and as nearly the same gearing and slicks. That Camaro had best not snooze or hesitate on a gear change or over rev it too far. Game over Firebird gets the win. On your game, Camaro, but not by a run and hide margin. They were a tight race.

he said 120 or 130......were built with that option