71 455HO RA Formie
 

This one is cool..red with stripe, ac, optioned nice for cruising.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/1971-...item45f429cac3

Anybody know this one?

Question, is this a stripe you could get from the factory? Never seen one.

Jody

Nobody has thoughts or have seen this car??

I heard it was a numbers car, and it is stated to be a survivor with repaint. Originally Quezal/White top car.

Texas car and now AZ. Fender looks like a later model?

Mike thats why I responded with everyone has there own opinion to what they consider to be a survivor car.Color change is not one of them.#'s matching does not mean it is a survivor in my opinion.I look at survivor's as to having original paint,interior,and unrebuilt drive train. Minor mod's somewhat acceptable.JMO......

I agree concerning definition of survivor. The engine bay has definately been freshened up. No 90k mile car is going to have that bright of a painted engine. DOesn;t men it isn;t a great car though. 71 HO formulas are my favorite formula.. I would love this car even more if it was originally silver with the black interior. Man.. that would be a great color. Plus, I prefer the ralley wheel look vs the honeycombs.. JMO..

also, does look like the pictures show the edge of the fender to rad support stablizer bars from the 73 up cars. Hard to tell, but looks like newer fenders..

Agree with you on this one Jim. I like the car and really hope to get a Formula to work on when the CA$H CRUNCH finally ends. Nice car, but I would have to lose the stripe. Mike go buy it quick and then you can hang out with the COOL F body guy's. LOL Mike hope to see you at Seans Pre Party on Friday. Here's hoping for a clear day!!

I have never seen that stripe on a car in person, but there is a picture of a 71 Formula in the book "The Fabulous Firebirds" which has that stripe. They are available from Phoenix Graphix.

http://www.phoenixgraphix.com/gm/1971fb.htm

I parted out a very rusty orange 71 Formula 350 many years ago that had that stripe. The car appeared to have the original paint, but was very rusty.

Mike

It most definitely was an option in 71 and in 72 also. Instead of the vents sticking thru the stripe, the emblems do, doesn't look quite as cool as the 71. Same stripe, it appears. I like them. I can envision my 72, Springfield Green with a white stripe and white Ram Air callouts on the hood.

Thinking about the above, they must have dropped the emblems lower on 71 fenders due to the faux vent, as the 72 stripe has the emblems sticking thru that hole.

I too have seen that stripe on 350 formulas in 71. Both were in calif.
Guess its time to dig out the parts manual, Im sure its there, but unsure if its a dealer install or a factory job. I dont see an RPO for it, so far..so dealer option makes sense.
I bet any 71 non TA could have had it installed.

I remember those stripes on a formy owned by an acquaintance from my High School days. Pretty sure his was a 71 as he got his about the time I got my 71 LeMans.

Like this car but agree it really does not qualify as a survivor by my definition of what that means. Mike is right though - nicely optioned car for cruising. I would definitely not kick it out of my garage and frankly, the color change really doesn't bother me either.

BJ

EDIT: I went back and looked at the photos again and it definitely has a 73 and up fender on the passenger side - you can see the bolt holes for the stabilizer bar that 70RAIII questions.

Neat car with a lot of options.... but shame that someone changed the colors, got rid of the VTop, added the stripe, etc.

Quezal Gold with deluxe white interior would have been pretty striking, and more interesting than red exterior / black interior....

The only problem isn't the car
 

is descriptions that use 'unrestored' and 'survivor' when the car has a exterior AND interior color change, lost its vinyl top, and has had the later-style rear spoiler added.
Maybe 'unrestored' is meant as to not go back to original as various owners made small changes? Radio, spoiler, color.

Odd no picture of the super-rare rear console box, or if all the deluxe interior trim pieces are still intact.

That said, I'd drive it.

More and more, I might not need the various spoilers I've been collecting...

Stripe is a factory option...there are a couple of pages referring to its fitment in my 71 assembly manual. The fender vents and aprox 1/4" around them as well as the rear marker light and aprox 1/4" around them are supposed to be painted the stripe colour.

For me if it was the "survivor" car noted and was repainted original color/top with original interior it would be better. IMO

Not a survivor in my book. Lots of mods to car

Hah - that car used to be owned by my business partner, Craig Mueller. SMALL world!

Craig bought the car running but rough, and did some of the resto work. He then sold the car unfinished to a local friend by the name of Russell Nix in the early to mid 90's - for around $5K.

Russell changed the color to red when he had it sprayed, dunno who changed the interior from Ivory to black, though.

When Craig was working on it, he replaced the hood and both fenders, etc. amongst lots of other parts.

Lost track of it after Russell painted it.

EDIT: Obviously, NOT a survivor!

Survivor to this seller equates to running and plated as opposed to dead in a junk yard or crushed and sent to China to make some crappy stuff no one needs.

People, this MUST be the car that sold last year on ebay for $30K! It was a 71 455 HO from Texas, red, black interior and all those options.

Gold would have been more cool for sure as red is so expected. A 71 would have plain wheel center caps and would not have trim rings.

Yep!

Bidding has reached $25K without reserve being met.