'70 LeMans 4-door 4-speed
 

My brother (Dan) and I bought the '70 LeMans from John (gto4door) a couple of weeks ago and been having fun tearing her apart, fixing things here and there and just generally in awe of owning a real 4-speed LeMans 4-door sedan (post). It is an amazingly cool car, having never seen one before in all my years of being in the Pontiac hobby (40 years at least). It has remained all original since day one and nothing has been altered or cobbled over the years, with the exception of body work and paint color. We both thank John for finding and rescuing this unusual Pontiac and especially for selling it to us. It has the original WU code 350 2-bbl engine, M-20 trans and hurst shifter, 3.23 Saf-T-Trak rear end, factory gauges & tach (all work great), PDB, manual steering with the wood sport wheel, and working rear window defogger (fan). It also was ordered with an AM/FM radio (front speaker only) and the Decor package (full size hubcaps and wheel opening moldings???) The original radio is gone and the dash was cut open for a modern CD unit. It has it's original XE stamped 14x6 steel wheels under the deluxe wheel covers. It's too bad the original person who ordered this car didn't check off the 400 4-bbl WT code 345 hp GTO motor and dual exhaust (probably would've been mandatory with the WT engine).

Anyway, the reason I'm posting is we are in need of a '70/'71 4-door post sedan body with doors and deck lid that are rust and dent/damage free. After closer inspection, we thought it would be easier and more cost effective to get a better body. A roller is fine as is a complete running car. We are open to anything. The car was Atoll Blue (now a color close to Bermuda Blue) with a blue vinyl interior, so any cars like that out there meeting our requirements, please pm me. For the meantime, we are going keep the original body for the next few years and when we get really serious, swap sheet metal then. It really doesn't look bad until you get within 20', primarily the drivers rear quarter panel. It's our intention to keep the car the way it was ordered, enjoy it now as is, and restore it later.

We are also looking for the plastic interior pieces that go between the doors and in the back seat areas behind the doors and kick panels as well. We will be replacing the headliner, carpet and rear parcel shelf with new reproductions soon. We also are looking for a Tempest/LeMans post coupe dash that is unique in that it doesn't have the side vents like the GTO/LeMans Sports have.

I did post this in the Wanted section, but wanted to get more exposure posting here as well. We hope to get the Lemans ready to drive in a month or so. I try to post a couple of pictures of the car with the full wheel covers and us trying some dog dishes too. Sorry about the rant, just excited to share with you all.

Dennis & Dan Jensen

I hope I did this right. DJ

Very special car you have there Dan!

See you later this Month at Martin PSD's

i have a decklid if you decide to piece it together..i havent seen a 4 door parts car or even a driver in so long...5+ years..but i will start looking...theres a guy in wichita that has lots of 4 doors.i will be down there next week, i will see him and if he does, i'll hook ya up with him

Marxjunk,

Thanks for being on the lookout. PM me about your deck lid condition and price.

Dennis

Yeah, where did all the 4-doors go anyway??? It's amazing that you don't see them at all anywhere. I'm guessing donor cars, demolition derby, and crushed since minimal perceived value. I guess they're becoming collectable now.

Dennis

Hi Rich,
This is Dennis, but Dan says hi. We both have a penchant for oddball Pontiacs and we couldn't pass this one up. I do believe Dan will be at Martin and I hope to make it down to spectate. It's been a couple years since I've been there to watch. It looks like 65 cars will be there.

Dennis

Dennis (and Dan),

While I can't help with any car pieces, I will keep on the lookout. It's a neat odd car. I'll see you guys in a few weeks at Martin (I really hope the car is ready by then).

Chris

Dennis,try allmusclecars.com i think he has a couple 4 doors Lemans. I'm glad someone like you got that car,i wanted it but being i just bought a Ventura i couldn't swing the funds.Here is a pic of the 4 door lemans i had,
www.allmusclecars.com

that car need a 69 judge type/simular stripe and some magnum decals and a set of 400 fender embs...i bet it would draw more attention than a ramIV judge sitting next to it...

Sweet car! I am going to North Carolina sometime this year to get a 1971 Lemans 4 door sedan to part out. Hopefully it will be solid and have parts to selll off of it.:)

"we are in need of a '70/'71 4-door post sedan body with doors and deck lid that are rust and dent/damage free."

Have you called Steve Barcak (Pontiac Heaven) in Arizona? (Or for that matter, scoured Craigslist in the dry part of the USA?)

The exterior pics are nice... it would be REALLY cool to see the INterior / dash shifter areas (hint hint)...

Dash Pad

http://forums.maxperformanceinc.com/...d.php?t=667454

Nice! A few interior/engine shots would be appreciated ;)

Thanks Chris...see you at Martin!

Bandit,

That is one sweet LeMans! Is that silver? I'd love to hear a little more about it. Do you know where it went or who owns it now?

Dennis

Marxjunk,

Wow, how did you know? We are thinking of swapping the 350 out for a WT code 400 4-bbl motor that we have lying around. We already installed the "400" emblems on the rocker panel mouldings and are installing a good flowing 2-1/4" dual exhaust system. I wish the original person who ordered this car did check off the 400 motor since he already got the 4-speed, 3.23 Saf-T-Trak, gauges & tach, power disc brakes, and the wood sport steering wheel with maunual steering. It's so close to a 4-door version of the GTO that it hurts.

Dennis

2002Z4CSS,

Keep me posted. Bellville isn't that far away from me and my brother (GR and Portland).

Dennis

Engine-Ear,

Thanks for the tip. I didn't think about Steve Barcak. I'll contact him. The interior is toast and we have it all apart now. The dash looks like a dried up lake bottom, all cracks and alligatered. We are in the process of replacing the carpeting, headliner, parcel shelf, and the seat upholstry. I think I have an early shot of the interior. If I find it, I'll post it.

Dennis

pggto,

I pm'd him already, but thanks anyway.

Dennis

MescaBug,

I'll see what we have and post them soon. The engine is the original 350 2-bbl with its original 2-bbl air cleaner, so nothing exciting to look at (yet).

Dennis

Will do Dennis.:) I am about 2 hrs from GR. :)

Interior and Engine Pics
 

OK All,

Here are some photo's from Ebay that John took for the ad. Enjoy!

Dennis

Engine, etc.
 

Here's the rest....

DJ

WOW. This car is crazy. Why not warm up the driveline that's in it? There are PYers that swear by the 350 as a performer...try one of their recipes and dig it, man.

I think I saved a drivers side quarter cut from a 70 4-door, that I parted years ago, if your interested i can see if I still have it??

Engine Ear,

We are going to run the 350 for a little while (next year or two) and are putting dual exhaust on it soon. We may install the '70 4-bbl intake and 7040263 carb just to complete the image. The motor has a slight lifter tick, so we may install a new cam (068-ish spec) and lifters, and maybe the #12 heads, kinda like a '70 350 HO. We're just having so much fun with this car.

Dennis

Scott w,

If it's solid and damage free, we'd be interested. Did you cut it out like an N.O.S. panel with the door jamb, trunk lip, etc.? Thanks for offering.

Dennis

Dennis , it would be cool to build a stroker 350 with 12 casting heads.

I like what you have planned for this car Dennis and Dan. What a cool car it is too, would like to know what the original owner was thinking in regards to the way the car was ordered.

Here is an old early 80's pic of my Dad's 70 LeMans Sport 4 door.

70Steve, That is a nice looking Sport! Do you recall what options it had? Looks like it had dual exhaust at least, and the Cordova Top and Rally II's. I would've never thought we would be so interested in 4-door LeMans' a few years ago, but the wierd ones are facinating and collectable, maybe not really valuable, but collectable. You don't see them anywhere, even at the national Pontiac events (POCI, Ames, etc.).

We will try to search for the orginal owner someday soon. We know the dealership it was delivered to in Santa Rosa, CA called Talmadge-Wood Pontiac. They still exist today as Wood Subaru, or something like that.

I too want to know what this person was thinking, basically ordering a 4-door GT-37 with the 350 motor, and almost a 4-door GTO if the 400 was ordered. We just replaced the old disc and pressure plate along with the flywheel that got damaged from the worn units rivets. We'll post more pic's as we make noticable progress.

Dennis

se428bandit, That's an intriguing idea, but we are on a tight budget and using parts we have on hand. Still a great idea if we wanted to keep the numbers matching. To take it a step further, we could install bigger valves in the original 350 heads (can't recall the casting #) along with the '70 4-bbl intake and carb. I believe the intake port volume on all D-port heads were essentailly the same, so would flow similar numbers with tehe same size valves. Just combustion chamber cc's varied.

Dennis

I'm like Engine-Ear; I'm digging this car! Talk about a sleeper - stroke that 350 and keep some quite mufflers on it, and suprise a few chebbies! Even better - do it while wearing an old granny costume. :D

BJ

very nice car!...looks damn good in the photos...did I read correct?, you need a whole new body?

very nice options indeed.

The color looks very similar to my 70 Lemans Sport, mine is also an original 4-speed car with 3:23 rear gears and blue interior, 350 engine. we enjoy driving it all over.
Attachment 246560

Dennis,the '70 350 heads are "11" casting # and i think are around a 75cc with press-in studs.I ran a 068 cam in my,it was a little lazy with a 2.78 gear but after it was rolling it pull pretty good. It outran alot of pesky lil hondas on the highway.

Thanks Overuld, Dan and I are digging it to. I like the idea of quiet mufflers. I have an old set of 21" long Walker Turbo mufflers that we are going to use on the car along with a nice pre-bent complete dual exhaust system I pulled off my '70 Judge 20 years ago before the age of mandrel bent systems. It's one of the best made-to-fit systems I've seen with very minimal compressions at the bends. It should flow well enough for the 350, let alone the WT 400 we have planned (with the std. log manifolds). I hope we can surprise everybody, especially ourselves. Just an interesting side note, the weigh distribution on the V8 4-doors is 50/50, much better than the 55/45 on the 2-doors! Remember the Tijauna Taxi?

Dennis

Wrenchmen, yeah, we are looking for a complete body that is clean and straight. But for now the original body is pretty good. It has rust through in the drivers floor, side of the front cowl, lower front renders and quarters, and damage from a minor rear end collision years ago. The former owner (before John) replaced part of the trunk floor with a flat piece of sheet metal and did an admirable job of it to. The rear parcel shelf is rusted through as well from a leaky rear window. The original color was Atoll Blue and was repainted a color close to Bermuda blue.

I'd love to see more pics of your nicely optioned LeMans Sport. It looks great in your avatar. What other options does it have?

Dennis

se428bandit, Thanks for the reminder for the head casting number. I was thinking that the combustion chamber volume was around 75-80 cc's to get anywhere close to 8.8:1 advertised compression. Is that the motor you have in your Ventura? I think the 068 cam would be great with some compression and 3.23 gears or higher.

At the Pure Stock Drags, Tom Miller's killer '69 350 HO Firebird ran 13.40's with an 067 cam (Turbo 400 car) and 4.10 gears. His HO only had 10.5:1 compression, so there was some HP left on the table. That car could run high 12's with 11:1 compression, 068 cam and factory 4.33 gears.

Dennis

Check your mail.

It is factory white with the black top and a blue interior, 350, T350 and 2.56 rear, Options on the build sheet (still got it too, Dad found it under the back seat in the 70's and filed it away) are, power windows, door locks, power bench seat, electric trunk release, tinted windshield, front and rear floor mats, door edge guards, power front discs, power steer, rally II's, G78 White Walls, trunk light, clock and AM radio. It was factory single exhaust, that was replaced by the twin system early on.

It was imported new and converted to RHD and sold as a new car. It was ordered, IIRC, about 28 to 30 cars after my 70 GTO, but my GTO was early Nov. and this one's early Feb! I guess the U.S. dealer, Kahn Motors in NJ, wasn't a high volume dealer.

Dad bought it in the mid to late 70's with about 30k miles, I think it's got 95k on it now. It's been off the road for awhile, but atleast it is still in the family. Dad bought a GTO hood to put on it and also liked the idea of the GTO splitters and rear valance as well. The old man passed away last December and, I tell ya, it was so damn hard digging this out of the shed to bring to my house :(. It's turn will come.

Hey, would you be interested in a pair of rear quarter panels on their own? I saw some advertised in Ca.

70Steve, Sorry to hear about loosing your father. We just lost our mother a month ago and it is hard to comprehend that she's gone, but she lived to be 90 and was always spunky.

Wow, that is a loaded LeMans. I imagine all the sheet metal is solid being in Australia. That is one place I want to travel someday with my family. My kids think that is the best place to live. Yes, we'd be interested in rear quarters on there own. Thanks!

Dennis

My Ventura has the "7H1" heads which cc'ed at 91. I have the motor out of it and it's being freshen up a bit (Cam,oil pump,timing chain,factory 4 bbl intake). Because of the lack of exhaust bolt holes in the 7H1's i going with some 6x 4's that are being cut and the block decked to bump up the comp.
I think the 068 would work great in the the 350 you have with the 3.23 gear and the 4 speed.Plus your brother is one of the best tuners around so i can't wait to see how that Lemans runs after yall are done!

There was no 350 4bbl option in 1970. If you're trying to keep the car "Pure Stock" you'd need to bump up to the 400 to run a 4bbl. ;) The heads that came on 400 4 bbl in the Tempest/T-37/Lemans were small valve 16s

Hi Goatless,

Yes, you are correct about no 350 HO in 1970, but I was just "what-if-ing" since we could make one somewhat easily with the parts we have lying around (using the '69 HO engine casting numbers as a guide and transcribing them with '70 numbers). It's a fun exercise on paper at least.

As far as we know, you could get a 400 4-bbl WT-code motor in front of a HD M-13 3-speed or M-20 4-speed even in the 4-door A-bodies, just like you could in the 2-drs. I'm not sure about the wagons, though. I'm also not sure if you could order 3.90/4.33 rears with the M-21, but that sure would be cool if they were available and a real car was built. You are correct about the XZ-code small valve 400 4-bbl engine being the only high compression 400 for automatic equipped non-GTO A-bodies for '70. We looked at a very nice GT-37 so equipped in Ohio about 20 years ago, Cardinal Red with black top and interior. We also have the parts to make a 400 WT motor for the LeMans as well, and it is very tempting.

Dennis

se428bandit, Dan and are still haven't decided which is the best way to go, but we always like to make the cars something the was actually available from the factory, so that means we'll put the 350 in the corner and build a WT 400 that will probably have an 068 cam variant in lieu of the 067 cam. I taught Dan everything he knows (just kidding), so it will be a good runner when its done, but not sure when that will happen.

The 350 seems to be experiencing lower than preferrable oil pressure and the bottom of the oil pan is pretty beat up, so the oil pump pick-up screen is probably blocked hampering oil flow. So, I think we are going to bite the 400 bullet this fall after the Pure Stock Drags. Dan's pretty busy until that event is over.

Dennis

Have you tried Memory Lane collector car dismantler in Wilmington, CA?

http://www.oldparts.com

800 281-9273

PMDRACER, Thanks for the link. We'll check them out. Dennis

An Obscure Question
 

Do any of you LeMans experts out there know what chrome trim or brite metal work came standard on a regular LeMans? Ours has the chrome trim around the door window frames, on the back edge of the hood, rocker moldings, and wheel opening moldings. It was ordered with the Decor Group (324 - $62.14) and came with the deluxe full size wheel covers. What was standard on the Base LeMans and what did the Decor Group option get you (other than the wheel covers). I almost forgot, it has the pedal trim (gas, brake, and clutch) too. Thanks!

Dennis

Dennis,
I really like what you and Dan are planning for this car. I am glad it went to a good home. From what I recall the Lemans series 4-door sedans came standard with the side window reveal moldings and rocker panels. All of the other bright trim work......roof drip, belt window and hood molding, body side, door edge and wheel well moldings were optional. Not really sure what the 324 Decor Group consisted but I would guess it consisted of all of the other brite work that you mention other than the standard side window reveal and rocker panel molding. I am not sure if this was a Lemans or Lemans Sport only molding in 1970, but some cars have a trunk lip and quarter edge molding as well.

Hi John,

Thanks for selling the LeMans to Dan and I. We have been enjoying tearing it apart and examing it to the 'enth' degree. It was amazingly complete after all these years and not many things were changed or missing. We did pop in a new clutch assembly and flywheel since the pressure plate rivets ended up biting into the original flywheel. But, we have a couple of resurfaced spares to use.

Thanks for the info on the brite-work. I know it's somewhat trivial, but we were trying to figure out what was standard vs. options on the Tempest, LeMans and Sport models.

We are thinking of keeping an 067 style cam in the WT 400 primarily to offset the 3.23 gears needing a little more bottom end torque to get the car off the line better. Did you know that the 4-door V8 A-body has 50/50 weight distribution vs. the 2-drs 55/45? Another interesting fact about the 4-drs is they weigh about 200 lbs less than a comparably equiped GTO. A Tempest, LeMans, or LeMans Sport 4-door ordered with the M-20, 400 4-bbl (345 hp WT motor), and the 3.55 Saf-T-Trak rear (std. gear w/ 400 4-spd?) would be quite the sleeper and insurance beater, not to mention would humble the "Humbler".

Dennis