Poverty cap style wheels . . .
 

Got a wild hair to put plain steel wheels and my NOS '72 poverty caps on either my WW5 car or my Sundance GTO.

My question is - can anyone tell me for certain whether the plain steel wheels were body color or black? Seems like I saw somewhere that SOME '72's used body color wheels and some used black, depending upon the color of the car.

Any input or advice would be MOST appreciated.

TIA!

Well, thanks to my good friend John Chung (gto4door) for jogging my memory.

Attached is a wheel color chart from Eric White's '72 GTO information I have saved on my PC. According to this chart, there were only six wheel colors, and only two of those were RPO colors on a '72 GTO - Wilderness Green and Brasilia Gold. The other four wheel colors - Antique Pewter, Starlight Black, Cumberland Blue and Cinammon Bronze - were special order colors on a '72 GTO.

So - I am assuming (if Eric's information is correct) - that all other color poverty cap '72's would have been equipped with Starlight Black wheels. If this is true, then I'll be painting the wheels black. I just got off of the phone with Wheel Vintiques and ordered up four 15x7 plain steel wheels.

Sorry for the small size and fuzziness of the chart.

Thanks, John!

I can't see the chart, but my question is that info true for 71 as well?

Dan Jensen has steelies on his CC 71 T-37 with pc caps and his are color coded, and also color coded on his quezal clone T-37.

My 71 GTO came with steelies and pc caps and are long gone replaced with honeys. It is a Cameo White, and the question is should the steelies be Black or White?

My Silver T-37 ('71) came with dark metalic green. Don't know about '72

Interesting that they did NOT come in the body color, NOR black. Hmmmmm . . .

I'll have to see if I can find my '71 assembly manual, might find some info on '71 wheel colors there?

But then again it was built in FREEMONT and we know what went on there. LOL

There were only a few colors that were avail with color keyed steel wheels no matter what plant the '71 Pontiac A-body was produced in .

I still have the complete original set of steel 14x5.5 wheels & poverty caps off a O5D '71 built Pontiac plant T-37 that I parted 20 years ago. Easily, one of the most unmolested '71's I've ever parted. Also have the original buildsheet. This T-37 was castillian bronze & had original Pontiac-Pontiac poverty caps & the original steel wheels were/are black.

Hauled in & parted a 2 owner '71 T-37 4 door Sedan in 2002. It was original Limekist green with 3 of its original Pontiac-Pontiac poverty caps on original black steel wheels. Don't remember the date built, but was a Fremont built car.

Close to 14 years ago, hauled in & parted a '72 LeMans 2 door post. Adriatic blue with bright door trim. Still had all 4 of its '72 poverty caps & again no color keying on the original 14" wheels, just black.

Have hauled in & parted others, but know these all to be original wheel & poverty cap cars. For over 15 years, everytime have ran across someone who owned an original '71 poverty cap equipped Pontiac A-body, have always asked them if car originally came with Pontiac Motor Division or Pontiac-Pontiac poverty caps. Jack is the only orig owner so far I've run across who has had original poverty cap wheels that were a color other than black.

BLACK, on a white car

Have a question along the same lines...

'71 T-37, Lemans, GTO... factory Cardinal red car.
Anyone ever run across an original '71 this color, that was/is a factory poverty cap car???

Actually, Dans Canyon Copper T-37 has Castillion Bronze wheels. I can't remember which colors, but there were only like 4 or 5 colors that were used as wheel colors in 71.

I spoke with Jim Mattison and told him that Jacks T-37 came with green wheels on a silver car, he said that had to be a factory F***-up. Should have been black.
If someone isn't concerned with points judging or 100% correctness, In my opinion they should be painted to match the car, looks much,much nicer.

I originally thought mine were black until I was looking close at them one day when switching to mags and realized they were not black. Sure wish I had kept them. Oh if we could only see the future from the past better than we do.

I though it was odd that the color of the wheels were not black or color matching. I do have a couple of pictures that show they were dark but didn't think I would need pictures 35 years later. LOL

Don't do it Lloyd, I'm sure the intended look is the "Wolf in sheep's clothing" but all you are going to get is the Wolf with bad shoes look.

They are both monster cars, nobody is going to think they look stealth with the steelies.;)

Well, since I've already got the wheels coming I'm gonna do it. Just gotta decide whether to paint 'em Sundance or black!

I like Tom's idea, I really like the matching color look when I see 'em on COPO Camaros, Hemi 'Cudas, and the like!

I have gone through my entire '71 Assembly Manual. Quite a bit of wheel info, but no mention of colors. I've also looked in Zazzarine's GTO Resto Guide, and for '71-'72 GTO's, he shows that only black was used on the steelies.

72 Wheels
 

I have 72 Lemans Post Laurentian Green with Wilderness Green Wheels 14x6 this is an Oshawa built car.

LLOYD,be sure to drive it though a couple mud puddles before you toast your 1st victum. with the dirt and the caps, it will look like grammas car turned daily driver.;) :bolt: might wanna pull a headlight out to aid the beater look.

I totally dig the poverty cap look... which is why I'm doing it to my '70 Formula
(it's really too bad I'm having such a hard time finding 14x7" steelies! - I'll probably just end up ordering Wheel Vintiques 14x7 steelies...)

Wheels are here and being painted Sundance Orange as we speak.

A new set of G60x15 Polyglas GT tires are coming from Kelsey at a substantial discount - THANKS to Glen Stringfield.

Pics will be posted up as soon as I get 'em on the car. Gonna put the Rally II's on my WW5 car. They'll really wake the look of that car up.

Guys, I'm sure many of you know this already but you can get steel wheels made to order for your cars if you're having trouble finding the size or backspacing you want.

I'm having a set of wheels (15X5 & 15X8) built right now for one of my '64 A-body cars. They will be powdercoated black and will be run with no caps at all.

I sent a set of wheels to them (1956 Chevy 15X5s) so they could use the early wheel centers for the '1960s stocker' look I wanted to achieve, but you can always get your centers from them too. I would suggest sending the centers that you want though, so you'll end up with exactly what you want.

GOOD for you!!!:beerchug: I have a 68 Nightshade Green GTO and will paint the 15x7's I found the Nightshade green in lieu of the factory black, after all, they are bigger anyway, so I will be different. The sundance color will be cool with the dog dishes...I love the look of teh Mopars and Camaros that have that look too.

I guess this means I have to get the Rally II's off my LeMans soon...:D