HQuackenboss

I think the orange is the bell housing. I think if you rotate the picture sideways so the fitting is horizontal that it will be easier for you to orient everything. The tube is a header pipe.

A picture is worth a thousand words.

Regarding the dry sump, Mike K has it right but here are some more details. The first motors in the Tempest were actually wet sump, then we went to a dry sump. The dry sump system used the same mechanism that was described in the 2nd part of the Pioneers of the Pontiac V8, which I believe is still available online at hotrod.com. This design was also frequently mentioned in articles about the later SD-455, available in the Firebird and Pontiac Grand Am in 1073-1974. The SD455 block had a provision in the casting, but required machining and adapting a Turbo 400 automatic transmission pump to be adapted for the pressure side of the dry sump. The ones use in the Tempest (later 1971), the black Firebird driven by Tony DeLorenzo (Lime Rock) and Milt Minter, and the Pontiac NASCAR Cup Grand Am were based on special cylinder blocks originally developed for 366 CID (6 Liter) NASCAR rules, which we used in the 1973 NASCAR Grand Am, and in 303 CID configuration for the Tempest and Firebird. Actually, we ran one 1973 Trans-Am race in the Firebird with a 366 CID motor, which was legal under the much more liberal 1973 rules, which also allowed 427 CID Corvettes. These motors also had the provision for the dry sump based on the Turbo 400 Transmission pump. the pump is located on the rights side (passenger side) at the back of the block, and it is driven off of the camshaft. The Tempest today has one of those motors. All you see externally is an AN fitting coming straight out of the block, with a line to the dry sump tank.

One final anecdote about that visit by Motor Trend. As you know, I wasn't in any of the photos or mentioned in the article, and lived and worked in Ann Arbor for a small computer company. The story in Blood Sweat Gears about how i got connected to the team is wrong, and if you read the epilog, it wasn't until after the team broke up that I went to Honeywell. The day the pictures were taken for that article, Herb and Sandi (Mrs Adams) had A.B. Shuman and I cannot remember who else from Motor Trend at the house, and invited me to join them. I was still only a few months from getting to know those guys, but in hindsight, I think Herb wanted them to meet me (and vice versa). It was probably a Thursday, and the Waterford session was that weekend. We wre sitting around the dinner table, which was directly over the garage, and A.B. or the other guy asked, "So tomorrow, do we get to go see where the car was built?". It was apparent that the Motor Trend believed the gossip going around that it must have been built at Pontiac, and this whole story about it being built in Herb and Sandi's garage was a baloney cover story. Herb didn't respond to A.B., instead he nodded at me. "Tell'em. Harry." "Downstairs." I pointed, "It was built in the garage below us." A.B. grinned at me, "So the story is true?" at first, testing me. We all laughed. And A.B. changed his whole approach to the article.

Mike K, I am attaching a couple of pictures, among several my dad took at Waterford Hills during the session where A.B. Shuman drove the car. If you know the end of the article, you now the story behind these. I will leave it to you to tell the rest of the readers about that. I am the one in the dark short sleeve shirt and Ray Ban sunglasses in the picture with the car. PLEASE NOTE THE IMAGES ARE THE PROPERTY AND COPYRIGHT OF H QUACKENBOSS AND ARE PROVIDED WITH THE RESTRICTION THAT THEY NOT BE POSTED OR USED IN ANY OTHER PUBLIC FORUM OR VENUE, INCLUDING FACEBOOK, INSTAGRAM OR TWITTER, OR ANY OTHER WEBSITE.

A colleague just told me that the Petersen Museum has a searchable photo archive. Go here: https://archive.petersen.org/pages/search.php In entered :1971 Trans-Am and found a bunch of photos of the Tempest, including an underhood shot that clearly shows the aluminum inner fenders are painted.

Swede70, Here goes. If i missed anything, ask again. A key point about the blue paint is that at least two different paints were used, and neither was an actual Pontiac paint. One thing I didn’t know until the restoration was how it ended up silver with a blue interior. Herb Adams had some chartreuse paint he wanted to use, but the team outvoted him. The color scheme choice was to honor a series of lightweight drag racing Catalinas, known as the Swiss Cheese Catalinas from the 1963 model year. There were, I think, eighteen of them, and all but a couple were painted a Cadillac optional paint color, Frost Silver, from the Fire Frost (a Dupont trademarked name, later changed to Firemist). None of those paints are available, but there was plenty of unmolested out of the sun silver on the car (like inside the trunk lid) to match. The color is very close to the modern replica of the Corvette Sebring Silver, which was another Firemist coating. All of those Catalinas had blue interiors. Hence, the color scheme on the Tempest. The blue paint used in the trunk, underhood, and interior was picked to be like one of the Pontiac bluebut it was actually an aftermarket paint. Tom Nell (since passed away), who was half of the powertrain team told me he painted the motors with spray (Duplicolor?) engine paint from the auto parts store. I didn’t learn this until I had spent many hours learning about the various Pontiac engine paints. For the interior, underhood, inner fenders, the frame, and suspension pieces, trunk, and interior, a self-catalyzing epoxy was used. Again, not a Pontiac paint. My recollection is that the inner fenders were painted from the beginning. The fiberglass on the floor was not a patch. It was an insulator added, I think, after the 2nd race at Bryar, which would have been the first race where heat was a problem. Foam, if I recall, an expanding urethane, was poured, then cut to make it sort of flat (with a hand saw), then woven fiberglass cloth was laid on top and painted the same blue. The decision was made during the restoration to leave it out, at least for now. I don’t recall an orange differential color, but in the September 1971 Motor Trend article, you can see it is a light color, but with black and white photos, I can’t tell what color it was. My recollection is that the Motor Trend interviews and photo shoot were done between the 2nd (Bryar, NH) and 3rd (Mid-Ohio) races. The interior panels were production ones, which you can see in one of the pictures from the September,1971 Motor Trend. The original car wasn't a black interior, as I recall, it was dark green. My recollection was they were painted with vinyl upholstery paint (again, from an auto parts store). The restored car has reproduction panels. The current interior including colors, the checkerboard sanding on the dash (in the spirit of the much finer pattern GTO production dash) is quite accurate with the exception of the seat. The original seat was designed and built by Herb, and the frame was fabricated from square steel tubing and sheet metal with rectangular bolsters in the center, spaced with air gaps, and with side bolsters to provide upper torso lateral restraint. John Hildebrand wisely decided to fit a modern race seat during the restoration. The original wheel finish was plain flat black. I doubt very much if it was high temp paint, probably done with spray cans. Other than occasional touch up, The only noticeable change in color scheme was to paint the centers blue. I personally did it with a brush after practice at the Elkhart Lake event. We never ran coolers on the transmission or the rear axle. The ignition system was Delco. The front bumper was mounted closer to the body, so it was modified somewhat. One thing missing from the restored car. We used a simple vertical air dam made out of plain aluminum, which regularly scraped. Later ones had a rubber lip made from machinery belting. The shoulder belts indeed did run to the back. Attaching the belts to the floor is not a good idea because in certain types of crashes you don’t want all of the vertical load on the shoulders. During the restoration, John opted to add a horizontal shoulder-height bar to reduce potential belt stretch. Regarding the dry sump tank, there was no attempt to disguise it. I wasn’t party to the discussion about where to put it, but I am sure they didn’t want it forward of the firewall for weight distribution reasons. I have no recollection if the rules prohibited installing the tank behind the driver. The SCCA rule books are available online if you hunt, but my recollection is 1971 is the first year dry sump systems were permitted. A few other comments: You are right about Mike Matune's article. I was the informal PR guy on the restoration, and approached both Mike and Vintage Motorsport about doing the article, and Mike and I and others involved including Herb Adams, Joe Brady, and Bob Tullius had many conversations. It is 100% accurate except for Dan Hardin's name being misspelled, which those of us that proofread it missed. The posts got cut out after Lime Rock. I think the fact it did so well inspired the team to really work harder, although still constrained by a very limited budget. Getting it down to minimum weight was the reason the posts were removed. Also, if you are trying to get the position of the various sponsor stickers (Classic Wax, Heuer, Quaker State) exactly correct, they got moved around. Also, somewhere mid-season a black dart design was painted in the center of the hood. It was done in, I think, flat black by the college-age daughter of one of the friends of the team. I think that was done at the Brainerd MN race. I have attached a poster I did in August 2016 which has some additional history and a picture of the car in A Sedan form from late 1970 at Waterford Hills, where it won the Detroit News Trophy big bore production race, with a low-budget 303 built by Jeff Young, a turbo-400 automatic transmission built by Tom Nell, and Herb Adams driving. It beat several Corvettes, including at least one 427 driven by a Chevrolet engineer (not the Owens-Corning cars, which I expect would have been faster). Gray Ghost Poster 1.6 20160819.pdf Gray Ghost Poster 1.6 20160819.pdf

I am glad you guys appreciate the input. The folks involved in the original car aren't going to be around forever, and this place is still likely to be searchable somewhere on the future Internet, so for me it's a good place to capture some of the details. Mike Matune's article is really accurate because he had access to everybody involved. The only thing wrong, which several of us missed proofreading it, was misspelling Dan Hardin's last name. Those of us involved marvel at how much attention the car got over the years, and we chuckle about it is going to outlive all of us. And we are humbled by those of you that are honoring its past by making accurate models of it. If you guys are interested in some color on the team, there is a book, written by David Barnes, entitled, Blood, Sweat & Gears: The Story of the Gray Ghost and the Junkyard Firebird. David was general counsel of American Axle & Manufacturing, and read a piece in the employee newsletter about Herb Adams, who also worked there at the time. David had always wanted to write a book, and tracked Herb down. His original idea was to write a documentary, but he changed his mind to create what he calls, fact-based fiction. It is written more in the style of a Hollywood screen play but the names of those involved, and most of the anecdotes are real.

A couple of brief comments: You are right about Mike Matune's article. I was the informal PR guy on the restoration, and approached both Mike and Vintage Motorsport about doing the article, and Mike and I and others involved including Herb Adams, Joe Brady, and Bob Tullius had many conversations. The current interior including colors, the checkerboard sanding on the dash (in the spirit of the much finer pattern GTO production dash) is quite accurate. If you have specific questions, fire away. The posts got cut out after Lime Rock. I think the fact it did so well inspired the team to really push on, although still constrained by a very limited budget. Getting it down to minimum weight was the reason the posts were removed. The blue paint used in the trunk, underhood, and interior, and the wheels was picked to match one of the Pontiac engine paint colors (there were several) but it was actually an aftermarket paint, and Tom Nell, who was half of the powertrain team told me he painted the engine with rattle can engine paint from the auto parts store. The fiberblass on the floor was not a patch. It was an insulator added, I think, after the 2nd race at Bryar, which would have been the first race where heat was a problem. Foam, if I recall, an expanding urethane, was poured, then cut to make it sort of flat (with a hand saw), then woven fiberglass cloth was laid on top and painted the same blue. The decision was made during the restoration to leave it out, at least for now. Also, if you are trying to get the position of the various sponsor stickers (Classic Wax, Heuer, Quaker State) exactly correct, they got moved around. The interior panels were production ones. The original car wasn't a black interior, as I recall, it was dark green. My recollection was they were painted with vinyl upolstrey paint (again, from an auto parts store). The restored car has reproduction panels. I have attached a poster I did in August 2016 which has some additional history and a picture of the car in A Sedan form from late 1970 at Waterford Hills, where it won the Detroit News Trophy big bore production race, with a low-budget 303 built by Jeff Young, a turbo-400 automatic transmission built by Tom Nell, and Herb Adams driving. It beat several Corvettes, including at least one 427 driven by a Chevrolet engineer (not the Owens-Corning cars, which I expect would have been faster). Gray Ghost Poster 1.6 20160819.pdf

I was involved in both the original car, and consulted with the new owner, John Hildebrand, in Northern California during the restoration process. A couple of corrections: The car was built at Herb Adams' home in Waterford, Michigan, not Rochester, Michigan. It definitely was not a joke. In the aftermath of the tragic death of Jerry Titus during a practice session at the Elkhart Lake Trans-Am race in 1970, Herb and fellow Pontiac engineers wanted to build a Firebird, but when their management got wind of the project, made it clear that the corporation viewed the idea so negatively that anybody involved would lose their jobs. Why? In this era, GM had a no racing policy, and whether or not this was a privately funded on their own time effort, it would likely be perceived by the auto racing community as a stealth factory effort. Herb already owned a 64 Tempest LeMans, which in 1964, was the same model that the GTO option was based on. In later years, the GTO became its own model, but in 1964, it was technically an option. When the GTO option was created in 1964, Pontiac actually filed the FIA homologation papers to qualify the GTO as an FIA Touring Car class race car. Later, in calendar year 1965, Pontiac filed the FIA paperwork for an additional homologation for the 1964 model GTO as a GT car. Since the SCCA Trans-Am rules required FIA homologation as a Touring Car, the car qualified as a legitimate Trans-Am race car. The car Herb owned had been driven 70,000+ miles by his parents, its first owner, and his wife, after he bought it from them, before he turned it into a budget A Sedan class racer at the local Waterford Hills race track. The car was restored beginning in late 2015, and debuted at the Monterey Motorsports Reunion in August, 2016, where it finished 6th out of 38 cars. There was no Trans-Am class in 2017, but in 2018 it finished 3rd. It also won the Vintage Trans-Am race, which was a Sunday preliminary event at the Sonoma Raceway (Sonoma, California) IndyCar finale in September, 2018. A picture in Victory Circle is attached. In its only year as a Trans-Am racer in 1971, in the dry, when it finished, it ran in the top 4 or 5, finished 4th in the second race, and had two 5th-place finishes. Engine reliability was an issue. In the rain, it was two seconds faster than all the competitors. Having been heavily involved in both the original effort (although I was not a Pontiac employee), and working with the car in the vintage events since restoration, my personal opinion is that the car had a few inherent disadvantages compared to the Mustang, Javelin (which in 1971 were getting far more factory support than all other entrants) and other competitors. The disadvantages were aerodynamics, and weight distribution (although it was very close to the minimum weight, it was, we think, front-heavy). It also had a disadvantage compared to cars with leaf spring spring rear suspension in managing wheel spin when accelerating out of a corner. It did not have a power disadvantage. But in hindsight, its biggest weakness was the lack of development and test time compared to the Mustangs, which had gone through several years of development, and the Javelin (s), which we were told did heavy testing at some, maybe all, of the tracks before the event. Between a limited budget, and equally important, managing limited and monitored vacation time to get the the events made it infeasible for us to do anywhere near as much testing. One final point about the details on the car. Since most of the published photos of the car were from the early season races, they show the wheels with black centers. Beginning at Elkhart Lake, the wheel centers were painted blue, which is the way they were on the restored car. As restored, the car uses exhaust pipes that exit straight out the back running under the rear axle. This configuration was used mid-season in 1971. One significant difference between the car as raced in vintage events from 1971 is that, because of an agreement among the competitors that race in the vintage class, the tire sizes are the same among all competitors. The rear tires used are smaller in both width and overall diameter than what was used in 1971. In 1971 Goodyear and Firestone made front tires that were smaller than the rears. The Tempest used the rear tires on the front. As raced in vintage events, the Tempest uses the smaller front tires in accordance with the agreement among the competitors. Consequently, if you look at the pictures of the car today, the flared wheel arches look disproportionately large.