RE: Pontiac Firebird: Spotted

RE: Pontiac Firebird: Spotted

Author
Discussion

anonymous-user

53 months

Tuesday 14th May 2019
quotequote all
300bhp/ton said:
I think you are the only one shifting goal posts and not just this thread. As said, you are hard work.

What 1980 Capri had over 200hp and cost anything close to the MSRP of the Firebird????

And yes the entire point of saying a 5.0 litre made more than a 1.8 is EXACTLY the point. It doesn't really matter what the specific output of the engine was, it still as a rule made a heck of a lot more power than other similar sector/priced vehicles did.
Ok then, whatever you say. Hard work, based on our one online conversation?

I was interested in correcting the claptrap you were spouting about power figures in your obsessive irrational attempt to defend anything american, but I'm really not interested in an argument with you, based on what others seem to have to say about you.

So have a good one. But I suspect you won't. You don't strike me as a happy man.

Dave Hedgehog

14,541 posts

203 months

Tuesday 14th May 2019
quotequote all
AmosMoses said:
Mr E said:
Didn’t they turbocharge these at some point?
Yes they did and it had a whopping 210bhp laugh
there is no substitute for cubes

except perhaps technology lol

irish boy

3,523 posts

235 months

Tuesday 14th May 2019
quotequote all
Great cars, always been a fan of American muscle. I bought one as having admired them for years, a white bull nose. They just drive so well, very useable.





Because it was lying in a museum in America for years before I got it, it started leaking oil etc. Pulled the engine out, painted it and replaced all the seals.





Then by coincidence my mechanic also builds film cars for game of thrones and similar, was contacted by Rhianna's film crew to get a car for the video 'found love in a hopeless place'. So it became famous overnight as the single topped the charts.








Sold now, didn't make any more money due to the fame unfortunately but it did make it sell quicker I reckon. American cars can be hard work to sell in the uk.

LuS1fer

41,086 posts

244 months

Tuesday 14th May 2019
quotequote all
A lot of early magazines tested ringers - cars the factories tweaked without telling anybody so the figures are not entirely representative, not that anyone cared.

While many belittle the power of post 73 cars, the fact is that the Yanks were actually trying to save the planet with catalytic converters and unleaded petrol while the Europeans didn't much give two hoots. Were it not for the Americans standardising cats and air bags, who knows what we'd be driving now.

The main reason for the 70s and 80s power drop was a huge decrease in compression ratios, something like 8:1 rather than the much higher compression 60s and early 70s engines (which were quoted gross hp) which required, let's not forget, 5 star leaded fuel.

So aside from the low compression, unleaded fuel and EGR crap, the early 70s Yanks changed quoted hp from gross to net so there was what seemed to be a huge drop which wasn't entirely true. Bear in mind the engine also had to power compulsory air conditioning and the way forward had to be large capacity engines to provider adequate power.

Ford Europe actually tried their hand in the US with a Ford Capri (II), badged as a Mercury. In 1978, it had an 88hp 2.3 V6 and a 110hp 2.8 V6. Why? because it had to comply with US regs. After 1998, the Mercury Capri changed into a Fox Mustang based car. So back then, the Europeans couldn't really compete on home turf when the Yank V8s had a mighty 140-150hp.

Anyway, I had a 1985 C4 Corvette which had 235bhp. It may seem comical now but it was a 150mph car that hit 60 in 5.7.
I also had a 1987 Camaro Z28. This sported the 5.0 LG4 with 170hp but it still hit 60 in 7.9 seconds and the performance was pretty effortless next to European cars.
The Americans evolved their cars and came on in quantum leaps and bounds such that my 1998 Camaro Z28 LS1 had well over 300hp and would run a quarter in 13.8 and their modern V8s are north of 400hp and some over 700.

Back to "Smokey" and the first film used the 6.6 TA.
The sequel used the 1980 four nacelle model with the crappy 4.9 Turbo.

However, oft forgotten but now highly sought after was the 3rd gen 1989 Firebird Turbo. this used the 3.8V6 Turbo from the legendary Buick Grand National GNX which had a McLaren developed engine and had 276hp/360lb ft torque hiting 60 in 5.4
In the lighter Firebird, it had a claimed 250hp but when tested, hit 60 in 4.6 seconds, standing quarter-mile in 13.4 seconds at 101 mph, indicating another GM "false claimed hp" estimated to be nearer 300 hp (The later LS! engines had a claimed 300hp but it was nearer 350).

s m

23,164 posts

202 months

Tuesday 14th May 2019
quotequote all
irish boy said:
Great cars, always been a fan of American muscle. I bought one as having admired them for years, a white bull nose. They just drive so well, very useable.





Because it was lying in a museum in America for years before I got it, it started leaking oil etc. Pulled the engine out, painted it and replaced all the seals.





Then by coincidence my mechanic also builds film cars for game of thrones and similar, was contacted by Rhianna's film crew to get a car for the video 'found love in a hopeless place'. So it became famous overnight as the single topped the charts.








Sold now, didn't make any more money due to the fame unfortunately but it did make it sell quicker I reckon. American cars can be hard work to sell in the uk.
What a great story!

Quavers

211 posts

76 months

Tuesday 14th May 2019
quotequote all
Remember John Wayne in McQ? He had a brewster green example.

s m

23,164 posts

202 months

Tuesday 14th May 2019
quotequote all
Quavers said:
Remember John Wayne in McQ? He had a brewster green example.
Not to mention Thunderbolt and Lightfoot

Don’t think either were SDs though

J4CKO

41,287 posts

199 months

Tuesday 14th May 2019
quotequote all
LuS1fer said:
A lot of early magazines tested ringers - cars the factories tweaked without telling anybody so the figures are not entirely representative, not that anyone cared.

While many belittle the power of post 73 cars, the fact is that the Yanks were actually trying to save the planet with catalytic converters and unleaded petrol while the Europeans didn't much give two hoots. Were it not for the Americans standardising cats and air bags, who knows what we'd be driving now.

The main reason for the 70s and 80s power drop was a huge decrease in compression ratios, something like 8:1 rather than the much higher compression 60s and early 70s engines (which were quoted gross hp) which required, let's not forget, 5 star leaded fuel.

So aside from the low compression, unleaded fuel and EGR crap, the early 70s Yanks changed quoted hp from gross to net so there was what seemed to be a huge drop which wasn't entirely true. Bear in mind the engine also had to power compulsory air conditioning and the way forward had to be large capacity engines to provider adequate power.

Ford Europe actually tried their hand in the US with a Ford Capri (II), badged as a Mercury. In 1978, it had an 88hp 2.3 V6 and a 110hp 2.8 V6. Why? because it had to comply with US regs. After 1998, the Mercury Capri changed into a Fox Mustang based car. So back then, the Europeans couldn't really compete on home turf when the Yank V8s had a mighty 140-150hp.

Anyway, I had a 1985 C4 Corvette which had 235bhp. It may seem comical now but it was a 150mph car that hit 60 in 5.7.
I also had a 1987 Camaro Z28. This sported the 5.0 LG4 with 170hp but it still hit 60 in 7.9 seconds and the performance was pretty effortless next to European cars.
The Americans evolved their cars and came on in quantum leaps and bounds such that my 1998 Camaro Z28 LS1 had well over 300hp and would run a quarter in 13.8 and their modern V8s are north of 400hp and some over 700.

Back to "Smokey" and the first film used the 6.6 TA.
The sequel used the 1980 four nacelle model with the crappy 4.9 Turbo.

However, oft forgotten but now highly sought after was the 3rd gen 1989 Firebird Turbo. this used the 3.8V6 Turbo from the legendary Buick Grand National GNX which had a McLaren developed engine and had 276hp/360lb ft torque hiting 60 in 5.4
In the lighter Firebird, it had a claimed 250hp but when tested, hit 60 in 4.6 seconds, standing quarter-mile in 13.4 seconds at 101 mph, indicating another GM "false claimed hp" estimated to be nearer 300 hp (The later LS! engines had a claimed 300hp but it was nearer 350).
The MK1 Capri also was sold in the US, I was there in 1991 working in Rhode Island and was out on a night out with a couple of my colleagues in one of their cars, a Ford Tempo, a highly forgettable saloon car of ineffable greyness, he was filling it up at a Gas Station in Cranston and in burbled an immaculate green MK1 Capri, I was a little tipsy and had got out to go and get some Vividly coloured and strange tasting American confectionery which was still a massive novelty.

I accosted the slightly bewildered owner and had a chat, I thought he must have imported it and it was super rare but he said that they had never been a massive seller but they had been sold in the US, I asked about what the engine was and he showed me the V8 that now sat in the engine bay.

aeropilot

34,299 posts

226 months

Tuesday 14th May 2019
quotequote all
s m said:
Quavers said:
Remember John Wayne in McQ? He had a brewster green example.
Not to mention Thunderbolt and Lightfoot

Don’t think either were SDs though
Correct, neither were SD's, 'just' ordinary spec 455's.


s m

23,164 posts

202 months

Tuesday 14th May 2019
quotequote all
Older Firebird 400

Still respectably quick


Jimmy Recard

17,540 posts

178 months

Tuesday 14th May 2019
quotequote all
BathyThermo said:
It is, yes, however the 90bhp is another American car. You were comparing to British cars. A British contemporary would indeed be the Capri, which could be had with over 200bhp if you so desired. Yes, it's hardly the only British car, it's merely a single example, that makes the point very well.

You're good at shifting goalposts, I'll give you that.

You turned it from "Twice as much power as anything European" to "Twice as much as the American version of the single European car I'm berating you for choosing, as it fks my point"

laugh
The only fair way to do it is “the American version of the European car”.

In European spec they didn’t have the smog controls that strangled the engines. The American spec shows what they could do, given the same constraints