#41  
Old 11-17-2008, 05:45 PM
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Originally Posted by Old Blue 66 View Post
I cant believe I never saw this thread. Great story and tribute to your dad.

And the car aint so bad either...LOL. NIce ride Keith!
Paul - I can't believe you never saw it either!

Thank you -

K

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Old 11-17-2008, 05:48 PM
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Originally Posted by Jerry H. View Post
I can't believe you would get your car that close to those idiots at an Auto Zone store!!!

Jerry - It's actually quite a bit more secure than it sounds...

It's not an "Autozone" like the car parts store; that just happens to be the name of this particular bookstore/memorabilia shop.

The cruise, which is every Saturday in the summer, draws a lot of high end, interesting and rare cars. In fact, one of the participants has a whole fleet of exotics and sports cars (Ferraris, Bugattis, etc). To give you a feel for his level of spending, for his latest purchase he bought his (unfortunately, now deceased) cousin's business: Lingenfelter Performance.

My stuff is pretty humble compared to some of the cars that roll through there.

K

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'63 LeMans Convertible
'63 Grand Prix
'65 GTO - original, unrestored, Dad was original owner, 5000 original mile Royal Pontiac factory racer
'74 Chevelle - original owner, 9.85 @ 136 mph besthttp://www.superchevy.com/features/s...hevy-chevelle/
My Pontiac Story: http://forums.maxperformanceinc.com/...d.php?t=560524
"Intro from an old Assembly Plant Guy":http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=342926
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Old 12-10-2008, 11:10 AM
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I had to laugh when I saw this article in PE:

During my growing up years, the "secret" hiding place for birthday and Christmas presents was the trunk
of the GTO (lol).

We carried on the tradition this year by putting our presents in the trunk of the Grand Prix.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

K


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'63 LeMans Convertible
'63 Grand Prix
'65 GTO - original, unrestored, Dad was original owner, 5000 original mile Royal Pontiac factory racer
'74 Chevelle - original owner, 9.85 @ 136 mph besthttp://www.superchevy.com/features/s...hevy-chevelle/
My Pontiac Story: http://forums.maxperformanceinc.com/...d.php?t=560524
"Intro from an old Assembly Plant Guy":http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=342926

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Old 12-10-2008, 11:20 AM
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LOL, i keep pop in the trunk of the FB.
Wife and kids dont check there.

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  #45  
Old 01-29-2009, 03:14 AM
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Once again, thanks for your diligence and hard work in assembling all this info and making it available to the Pontiac enthusiasts.

Your dad's biography brought up a question in my mind. He seemed like the traditional shadetree mechanic who focused on just his car. On the other hand, working for a car company, he had a hand in advancing the progress of the of the fleet of cars produced through the next production cycles.

I see the progress as being internal and external. But I do think that a lot of progress is only possible after a new cohort of engineers gets their real education from techs, mechs, and draftsmen. Then they can go change the world.

My uncle had a million stories about dealing with new engineers with a common punchline: They all agreed that he had been right all along and if only they had listened to him........

Please advise if you percieve to care and feeding of engineers in a similar manner as what I have seen <G>

regards

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Old 01-29-2009, 09:01 AM
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Originally Posted by citydesk175 View Post
My uncle had a million stories about dealing with new engineers with a common punchline: They all agreed that he had been right all along and if only they had listened to him........
LOL!

Your observation is "spot on". Just because I was his son it did not make me immune to the "...those darn engineers!..." rants.

In fact, I like to think he is up there now, looking down and saying: "...if you had just let me tune on that Quadrajet a bit more you wouldn't have to be runnin' that big ole Dominator..."


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'63 LeMans Convertible
'63 Grand Prix
'65 GTO - original, unrestored, Dad was original owner, 5000 original mile Royal Pontiac factory racer
'74 Chevelle - original owner, 9.85 @ 136 mph besthttp://www.superchevy.com/features/s...hevy-chevelle/
My Pontiac Story: http://forums.maxperformanceinc.com/...d.php?t=560524
"Intro from an old Assembly Plant Guy":http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=342926
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Old 02-16-2009, 04:35 PM
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Thumbs up Keith Seymore's story

I like that story so much that I printed it to send to my son in Iraq/Marines to read ! thanks, its a great story..right up my alley !

  #48  
Old 03-04-2009, 08:47 AM
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...they turned the corner and behind the building was a beautiful dark blue '63 Catalina. He learned it was spec'd as follows: Built as a Super Duty car, it was converted over the counter to an "HO" car so that Dad could run B/Stock with it. It had aluminum fenders, hood and decklid; doors were steel as were the rad support, fender inners and bumper brackets. It had a regular production (ie, "non swiss cheese") frame. Probably the most notable feature, however, was the paint scheme: it was the car that Wangers developed the "Bobcat" appearance package on*. Nocturne blue with the tri color Ventura interior, it had an extra silver stripe around the spear side trim, and silver around the rear face of the deck lid. Eight lug aluminum wheels, with the area between the fins painted blue, the top of the fins painted silver and part of the cap painted blue too.

*Jim had taken a special interest in this car while it was in the Royal paint shop. A second car followed, a green one, as well as a third red car.

This is currently my only photograph of the car. I do have some images from old home movies that I am working to recover:
Thanks to Mike Noun I now have the video footage as mentioned in post #3 of this thread. You will see a fairly decent walk around of the car; there is a second walk around of very poor quality but (to make up for that) Mike also included some home movies of drag racing at some local tracks here in the early 60's. Thanks Mike!

YouTube video of '63 Catalina: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mj0M4DQhXKE

This car was scrapped in 1964 after the front end was removed to repair Jim's Swiss Cheese car (which had been involved in a towing accident).

K

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'63 LeMans Convertible
'63 Grand Prix
'65 GTO - original, unrestored, Dad was original owner, 5000 original mile Royal Pontiac factory racer
'74 Chevelle - original owner, 9.85 @ 136 mph besthttp://www.superchevy.com/features/s...hevy-chevelle/
My Pontiac Story: http://forums.maxperformanceinc.com/...d.php?t=560524
"Intro from an old Assembly Plant Guy":http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=342926

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  #49  
Old 03-04-2009, 09:37 AM
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All kinds 'o cool in that one, Keith!

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Old 05-04-2009, 08:01 AM
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The local bookstore cruise is underway once again; stopped by Saturday in the Grand Prix to kick off the season...









Jim Kennedy's "Fireball Roberts" commemorative edition '62 Grand Prix:



I'm usually pretty elusive, but managed to find my way into this picture. I'm in the flannel shirt standing in front of my '63 Grand Prix (...behind the guy that looks PO'd )



K

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'63 LeMans Convertible
'63 Grand Prix
'65 GTO - original, unrestored, Dad was original owner, 5000 original mile Royal Pontiac factory racer
'74 Chevelle - original owner, 9.85 @ 136 mph besthttp://www.superchevy.com/features/s...hevy-chevelle/
My Pontiac Story: http://forums.maxperformanceinc.com/...d.php?t=560524
"Intro from an old Assembly Plant Guy":http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=342926

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Old 05-04-2009, 10:32 PM
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I have read this thread probably 10 tmes. It is great ! Thanks again Keith. MIke

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Old 05-18-2009, 08:48 AM
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Thanks, Mike.

Got my advanced copy of the latest Darwin Holmstrom/David Newhardt book in the mail over the weekend. I was pleased to find the GTO was mentioned (by name) and a couple photos present on page 99. These are a sampling of the shots from the aforementioned November 2007 photo shoot with David Newhardt.

Other PYer's who figured prominantly in the book were: Eric White (67 GTO convert) and a big "thank you" from the author to Dr Eric Schiffer (whose '68 convertible is also featured). David Anderson and Mr Wangers are also called out, as well as Jim Kennedy's '62 as shown above.

The book is getting rave reviews from those who have seen it, including Mr Wangers, and I highly recommend it for any GTO enthusiast.

K










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'63 LeMans Convertible
'63 Grand Prix
'65 GTO - original, unrestored, Dad was original owner, 5000 original mile Royal Pontiac factory racer
'74 Chevelle - original owner, 9.85 @ 136 mph besthttp://www.superchevy.com/features/s...hevy-chevelle/
My Pontiac Story: http://forums.maxperformanceinc.com/...d.php?t=560524
"Intro from an old Assembly Plant Guy":http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=342926

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Old 05-18-2009, 10:00 AM
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Wow, congratulations Keith, your car still looks wonderful.

I think I've read this whole thread more than a couple time, and I don’t remember reading anything about those "numbered prototype wheels" nor "4.88:1 gears".

Could you please give me (us) more details about it? what about the wheels? and how do you get to have that short-short gear!

Regards!

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Old 05-18-2009, 10:29 AM
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Wow, congratulations Keith, your car still looks wonderful.

I think I've read this whole thread more than a couple time, and I don’t remember reading anything about those "numbered prototype wheels" nor "4.88:1 gears".

Could you please give me (us) more details about it? what about the wheels? and how do you get to have that short-short gear!

Regards!
Sure -

The Rally I's are just an early set, which have the wheel number sequence hand stamped on the back side (I still have one wheel which has never been repainted). Basically that means that the build quality is lower than a production wheel and that the slots aren't formed very well or very evenly...

The 4.88 gear is left over from the car's racing days. It was ordered and equipped with the 3.90 axle. As it gradually got faster and faster the rear axle ratio was stepped up, resulting in 4.88 gearset that is still in there. In it's heyday, Dad would shift at 7000 rpm, which is when the hand would sweep off the tach face, and go through the traps just shy of that (with a 28x9" tire, IIRC).

So basically how you get to have those short-short gears is you have to lay in the driveway and swap 'em out!



I do still have the original 3.90 gear set in the basement.

K

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'63 LeMans Convertible
'63 Grand Prix
'65 GTO - original, unrestored, Dad was original owner, 5000 original mile Royal Pontiac factory racer
'74 Chevelle - original owner, 9.85 @ 136 mph besthttp://www.superchevy.com/features/s...hevy-chevelle/
My Pontiac Story: http://forums.maxperformanceinc.com/...d.php?t=560524
"Intro from an old Assembly Plant Guy":http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=342926
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Old 05-18-2009, 10:18 PM
Old Blue 66 Old Blue 66 is offline
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Originally Posted by Keith Seymore View Post
Thanks, Mike.

Got my advanced copy of the latest Darwin Holmstrom/David Newhardt book in the mail over the weekend. I was pleased to find the GTO was mentioned (by name) and a couple photos present on page 99. These are a sampling of the shots from the aforementioned November 2007 photo shoot with David Newhardt.

Other PYer's who figured prominantly in the book were: Eric White (67 GTO convert) and a big "thank you" from the author to Dr Eric Schiffer (whose '68 convertible is also featured). David Anderson and Mr Wangers are also called out, as well as Jim Kennedy's '62 as shown above.

The book is getting rave reviews from those who have seen it, including Mr Wangers, and I highly recommend it for any GTO enthusiast.

K









I saw this book over the weekend Keith. As I was looking through the pages, I thought, gee I know whos car that is. Congrats!

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Old 06-22-2009, 01:24 PM
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This Father's Day weekend I had the opportunity to participate in the "Eyes on Design" event, held at the Edsel Ford Estate.

The show is an "invitation only" event (cars are chosen by a selection committee) and benefits the Detroit Institute of Ophthalmology. The show is also unique in the way cars are judged, not by how well they are restored (or survived) but by how the design (ie, styling) created trends, enabled technology or reflected the culture.

The theme for our specific display was the advertising artwork of Art Fitzpatick/Van Kaufman. I was asked to bring both the GTO and the Grand Prix. As you might expect the vehicles were displayed with the corresponding advertising art.









At any rate I won a "Design of Distinction" award, based at least in part on the car's originality.

Here is the "elusive" Keith Seymore, posing with judges (and former GM Design heads) Bill Porter and Kip Wasenko:






I started a separate thread in the "Car Shows/Events" forum. The complete set of photos can be viewed here (caution: there are about 170 photos!):

http://forums.maxperformanceinc.com/...=1#post3686978

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'63 LeMans Convertible
'63 Grand Prix
'65 GTO - original, unrestored, Dad was original owner, 5000 original mile Royal Pontiac factory racer
'74 Chevelle - original owner, 9.85 @ 136 mph besthttp://www.superchevy.com/features/s...hevy-chevelle/
My Pontiac Story: http://forums.maxperformanceinc.com/...d.php?t=560524
"Intro from an old Assembly Plant Guy":http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=342926

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Old 06-23-2009, 01:45 PM
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One more update and then I'll be quiet for a while....

The weekend prior to "Eyes" was the 21st annual Widetrackers Chapter of the POCI "Dustoff" car show in Davisburg Mi.

There were a couple special awards this year, including the first "John Sawruk" award, presented by Marge and their sons John and Jeff. We were also on hand to present the 4th annual "Van Seymore" award, this being the first year that I personally got to pick the winner (in the past the award was chosen based on popular vote).

I chose the stunning '65 GTO belonging to Ron and Shelly McDonald, shown below. As I say, this is the first time I got to pick and it seemed like a fitting recipient (...it's probably pretty obvious why I might think that...).

K




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'63 LeMans Convertible
'63 Grand Prix
'65 GTO - original, unrestored, Dad was original owner, 5000 original mile Royal Pontiac factory racer
'74 Chevelle - original owner, 9.85 @ 136 mph besthttp://www.superchevy.com/features/s...hevy-chevelle/
My Pontiac Story: http://forums.maxperformanceinc.com/...d.php?t=560524
"Intro from an old Assembly Plant Guy":http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=342926

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Old 07-06-2009, 01:05 PM
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...this was the best looking '65 GTO in the parking lot at work today!





Total miles: now up to 4821.0

K

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'63 LeMans Convertible
'63 Grand Prix
'65 GTO - original, unrestored, Dad was original owner, 5000 original mile Royal Pontiac factory racer
'74 Chevelle - original owner, 9.85 @ 136 mph besthttp://www.superchevy.com/features/s...hevy-chevelle/
My Pontiac Story: http://forums.maxperformanceinc.com/...d.php?t=560524
"Intro from an old Assembly Plant Guy":http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=342926

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  #59  
Old 07-07-2009, 04:46 PM
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...this was the best looking '65 GTO in the parking lot at work today!


I won't park that car anywhere near that truck either! lol

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  #60  
Old 09-11-2009, 07:13 AM
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Today is my GTO's "birthday"....

It was 45 years ago today that Dad and I headed down to Royal to pick it up.

Incidently, September 11th of 1964 fell on a Friday, just as it does today.

K

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'63 LeMans Convertible
'63 Grand Prix
'65 GTO - original, unrestored, Dad was original owner, 5000 original mile Royal Pontiac factory racer
'74 Chevelle - original owner, 9.85 @ 136 mph besthttp://www.superchevy.com/features/s...hevy-chevelle/
My Pontiac Story: http://forums.maxperformanceinc.com/...d.php?t=560524
"Intro from an old Assembly Plant Guy":http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=342926
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