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New (or old?) car!

Blogs > Torenhire
Post a Reply
Torenhire
Profile Blog Joined April 2009
United States11681 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-07-04 01:53:53
July 04 2011 01:37 GMT
#1
So my birthday present to myself this year was buying the car I've always wanted to have!

Warning: Blog is going to be picture heavy and full of car jargon.

Writing like Torte does, I have decided that I shall write a blog to gather my thoughts on my newest acquisition. I also would like to mention that Torte writes in italics pretty often in his blogs. Ergo, I will write in italics as well, because then I would be like Torte. I also will explain myself ten times, as Torte does this too, just like he always writes in italics. Torte also likes to write in big paragraphs, but his paragraphs are not always in italics, however lots of his blogs contain italics. That being said, I will explain myself multiple times, but differently than the previous times, while being long winded. I also wrote in italics, because I felt like it captured the essence of Torte, mostly because his blogs have a lot of italics, and paragraphs, not not necessarily both together.


Right off the bat, here's the new car!

1978 Pontiac Trans Am
[image loading]

Looks great! She's beat up, I only paid a few thousand for it, which included it being shipped over to me (got here at 11pm last night!)

I named her Justice, after RedJustice on TL, because she picked it out for me. Sort of, I gave her a list and she picked her favorite. Took me about 5 tries to finally get one!

It's kind of funny, getting old cars like this. It's kind of like solving a mystery, or a crime. You have little to no information and you need to figure out all sorts of things. My plan was to bring it back to 100% stock, like it rolled off the assembly line. Depending on the car club running the shows, some are more/less strict about what "stock" means. Some will disqualify you for having non-matching numbers...basically each car was stamped with a number, engine with a number, carb with a number...so on. Others will take off points for having a non-original paint color. We'll get to that in a bit.

Hopefully my 2002 doesn't get jealous.. same make/model, just newer. You can kinda see how the styling is mostly the same, just kind of evolved with the times.

v - Sup thumb, lawl
[image loading]

The 78 gets the driveway priority.


The thing has seen many different owners, I think. The last person did an okay job of maintaining it and such, however he didn't really finish the job, nor tell me he didn't finish. There's a lot of stuff wrong or missing, or just really poorly done. I kinda of figured he was leaving information out or not telling me, you kind of have to assume that with cars this old, but it's in fantastic condition when you consider it's been on the road since 1978..

Here's a little walkaround, pardon my unsteady hand.

http://s199.photobucket.com/albums/aa80/Torenhire/Car Album/78 Trans Am/?action=view&current=VID_20110703_160201.mp4

Here's what I call the "cloverfield edition" of the sound! I absolutely fell in love with how the car sounded...

http://s199.photobucket.com/albums/aa80/Torenhire/Car Album/78 Trans Am/?action=view&current=VID_20110703_124138.mp4

The reason I call it the cloverfield edition is because I can't hold my camera steady for the life of me, and my stop button apparently broke while I was out there because pressing stop didn't stop...so that's why my thumb shows up for a moment, cause I'm like WTF how do I stop recording!?


So I've done a little research on the car, decoding the VIN number (which basically is a key that says your car should be this year, this is where it was built, this is the engine, this is the number your car was in sequence, so on.) and the Cowl number (which basically tells you what options your car came with. Color, auto/manual, interior color, that sort of thing.).

This is where things have gotten kinda confusing. So...when you look at my car, you see a black Trans Am, right? Okay. Now if I show you this picture...
[image loading]
You notice the red stripe...how odd, the car doesn't have a red stripe on it. So I concluded this...the car was black, then they put a red stripe on it, then it got repainted black. Maybe in between owners or something. HOWEVER - I didn't take pictures of this cause I suck...if I scratch away the black paint on like the engine compartment, the insides of the doors...it shows red paint underneath.

At this point, I am fully convinced this is what happened. Red car, someone painted it black but left a red stripe down the center - whoever did this paint job paid a LOT of money for it because they painted the car professionally, not just a crap shop job - and then the next owner didn't like the stripe and paid a cheap company to paint over it.

Seams feasible, right?

The Cowl Tag says that car came out of the factory with a GOLD paint job. This cowl is stamped into the body, and can't be wrong. Or it's 99.999999% never wrong. So...what the hell? There's not a fleck of gold paint on my car ANYWHERE that I can find. It would be under the red that is under the black. I'm really confused, but at this point I have no idea what the hell color my car is/was/is supposed to be, but I know it started gold.

It should look like this based on my findings, except I don't have the T-Tops option on this car. Otherwise it should look exactly like the picture below...

+ Show Spoiler +
[image loading]

lolwut.


Anyhow, there's a ton more pictures in the album here, if people care to check it out..

http://s199.photobucket.com/albums/aa80/Torenhire/Car Album/78 Trans Am/?start=all

Still working on tagging all the photos with what they are and what's going on...this thing is a bit larger of a project than I anticipated it being, but it's going to be a lot of fun, and educational to boot. I had to call my dad up to ask about some of the older components I've never really dealt with...Also still unsure what to do about the color. The car needs to be repainted, whether gold or red or black or whatever, that's for sure...just need to decide if I want to do the all stock thing...which would require me putting in a new engine, as the engine that was put in there is a different engine than the original...haha.


Buying used classics is always a lot of fun.



PS: go STX.



*****
SirJolt: Well maybe if you weren't so big and stupid, it wouldn't have hit you.
Torte de Lini
Profile Blog Joined September 2010
Germany38463 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-07-04 01:47:19
July 04 2011 01:41 GMT
#2
*Not the best cameo at all

Hey, great blog and Happy birthday ;D Thank God it didn't come in Gold at all, Jesus that's horrendous (wait: So... what? Gold to red to Black or...?)

Oh and no offense, not fond of the 2002 model~
https://twitter.com/#!/TorteDeLini (@TorteDeLini)
Torenhire
Profile Blog Joined April 2009
United States11681 Posts
July 04 2011 01:52 GMT
#3
I dunno, I kinda like the gold...but only because it would have made the car a LOT rarer. Way less golds were made than of the other colors. It was like a semi-special edition.

But the car went from Gold, then I assume to red...there's red paint all over the car...underneath a coat of black paint. It's all very mysterious. I'm trying to figure it all out, still.

Only thing I can 100% confirm is that it rolled out of the factory as a gold Trans Am. And now it's black.

It matches my 02 :D Which is an awesome car, you take that back. Flip up headlights should have never gone away.
SirJolt: Well maybe if you weren't so big and stupid, it wouldn't have hit you.
Zlasher
Profile Blog Joined February 2010
United States9129 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-07-04 02:09:43
July 04 2011 02:08 GMT
#4
I still can't believe that happened, the whole color/paint job thing. Would have been best case scenario if the factory color were black. I remember 2 summers ago my manager at the pool I lifeguarded at drove a green pontiac firebird, and I remember seeing that firebird decal on the front and everything lol.

PS: How much did the car cost you?
Follow me: www.twitter.com/zlasher
Torenhire
Profile Blog Joined April 2009
United States11681 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-07-04 02:19:26
July 04 2011 02:18 GMT
#5
$3,500 roughly.

Overpaid for it based on what I know now, however that's a really good price for these cars nowadays. Go on ebay or any other site that deals classics and you'll find anything under 10k is either something that doesn't run, or something that's got what I like to call the...

"Flintstones Package"


aka the car is so rusty the floors have rusted through completely leaving a huge hole in the bottom.


1st and 2nd generation Firebirds and T/As are very rare nowadays. I can go to 500+ vehicle car shows, and see under 10 of them. The last car show I went to had two Firebirds in it, out of 275 cars.


My 2002 Firebird was one, and there was a 1971 Firebird there. That's it. Camaro is the more popular F-body, so you'll find a ton more of them. Plus they are just in general more popular.
SirJolt: Well maybe if you weren't so big and stupid, it wouldn't have hit you.
Binky1842
Profile Blog Joined July 2004
United States2599 Posts
July 04 2011 02:18 GMT
#6
now everyone is obligated to watch smokey and the bandit
"The zoo could not confirm that Binky was the attacker, but only Binky had blood on his face following the incident"
Torenhire
Profile Blog Joined April 2009
United States11681 Posts
July 04 2011 02:23 GMT
#7
Hehe. Yep.

The Bandit was actually a car that Pontiac sold, if you bought the special edition. Which is kinda funny, as the car was named before the movie :p


Basically there is tiers to the firebird line.

Firebirds are like zerglings. Lots and lots of them, nothing real special about them other than they are muscle cars.

Firebird Formula, or Firebird Espirit look exactly the same as the base line Firebirds, except they have a V8 engine, plus some other performance mods.

The Trans Am basically makes the Formula/Espirit look way more aggressive and gives them other enhancements...

Then there are special edition T/As...such as the Bandit (appearance) and the Macho Trans Am (best name ever, but this thing was like two cars smashed into one epic car)

SirJolt: Well maybe if you weren't so big and stupid, it wouldn't have hit you.
RedJustice
Profile Blog Joined February 2011
United States1004 Posts
July 04 2011 02:42 GMT
#8
She's so prettyyyyy! <3

And you should not paint her gold. >.> That gold paint looks ugly like my grandmother's living room. Red or black is the way to go (partial to red).
Zlasher
Profile Blog Joined February 2010
United States9129 Posts
July 04 2011 02:43 GMT
#9
3500 sounds like a really good deal for a classic like that IMO, especially if the guy didn't lie about the "stock" status of it lol.
Follow me: www.twitter.com/zlasher
Torenhire
Profile Blog Joined April 2009
United States11681 Posts
July 04 2011 02:53 GMT
#10
Well... the engine that he put into my car is bigger than the original engine so I can't complain about everything he did haha.
SirJolt: Well maybe if you weren't so big and stupid, it wouldn't have hit you.
Dusty
Profile Blog Joined December 2010
United States3359 Posts
July 04 2011 04:35 GMT
#11
Sweet car dude :D looks really nice. Also, happy birthday!
Whole
Profile Blog Joined May 2010
United States6046 Posts
July 04 2011 08:19 GMT
#12
Happy birthday. I updated the baller fanclub for you a few days ago as a present!

(yeah, let's go with that)
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