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The Macho Trans Am from DKM Design and Performance. Here is a little of what I know about the DKM Macho Trans Am. Dennis and Kyle Mecham back in 1977 wanted to improve the breed of Trans Am that were coming out of the Pontiac Factory. They turned out to be a limited number of Macho TA's in 1977 and were sold through their father's Pontiac dealership and moved very quickly out the door. Due to their tremendous success, they formed DKM Design and Performance, Inc. in 1978.
The Macho Trans Am would include the following:
Macho Name decals and badges inside and out
Plaque in the center console to signify the car was modified by DKM
DKM Logo on the center steering wheel button
Each Macho Trans Am was numbered from the year
The Macho Trans Am from DKM
The Macho Trans Am from DKM Design and Performance. Here is a little of what I know
about the DKM Macho Trans Am. Dennis and Kyle Mecham back in 1977 wanted to improve
the breed of Trans Am that were coming out of the Pontiac Factory. They turned out to be a
limited number of Macho TA's in 1977 and were sold through their father's Pontiac
dealership and moved very quickly out the door. Due to their tremendous success, they
formed DKM Design and Performance, Inc. in 1978. They made 203 1978 Macho Trans Am
and another 200+ in 1979 using the Pontiac 400 engine. In 1980, they stopped using
the Pontiac 400 and used the Turbocharged 301 in 1980, which didn't sell all that
well due to lack of performance and fuel constraints.
For the 1978 Model year they used the W72 Pontiac 400, but modified the
carburation, ignition, and added Hooker Headers with dual catalytic converters and
no mufflers for a net increase of about 50hp. You could also order a Rayjay
Turbocharger which produced about 7p.s.i. of boost. In 1978, there were only 8 Turbo Macho
Trans Am's made and only 22 in 1979. You can tell the Turbo ones from the outside
because the word "Turbo" replaced the Trans Am name on the rear spoiler. People have
asked me before about a Turbocharged Pontiac 400 and I always told them that there
never was one.... Well, I guess I was wrong. DKM also opened up the hood scoop to
restore full breathing to the modified engine. They also modified the oil system by
using what was called an "oil pressure restorer" by H-O Racing Specialties. It
consisted of a canister with a one-quart oil capacity mounted on the firewall and
pressurized. If oil sloshed away from the dry-sump oil pick-up in the oil pan, a
valve opened up and oil surged into the engine to fill any gaps in oil pressure. The
Macho Trans Am could receive 4-speed Borg-Warner, an optional 5-speed Doug Nash
transmission, or the automatic transmissions were reprogrammed for quicker shifts.
Also, the dash got a 160 MPH speedo and a 8000+ RPM tach.
The suspension was also modified by a set of Koni shocks set at their softest
rate, front springs tempered for rake and recalibrated for geometry. They also
included the wider wheels and heavier sway bar much like the WS6 Performance package.
DKM also added a few comfort features as well like Recaro or Scheel seats, Fosgate
radio, a lift-off or tilt-up hood made out of fiberglass (help shed 60lbs.) and also
a custom paint job in a variety of non-factory colors.
Each Macho Trans Am was numbered on the rear spoiler, front bumper and side
fenders. The center bird on the steering wheel was replaced with a DKM logo and also
a plaque was added to the center console to indicate that the car was modified by DKM
Design.
If you want to do a little research you will find road tests and track tests of
the Macho Trans Am's in Hot Rod magazine July 1978, Motor Trend magazine June 1978,
and Auto week magazine February 3rd 1978. Hopefully this will answer some questions on
what exactly a "Macho" Trans Am was.
September 26, 2016 - AllGenTransAms.com™
Story courtesy: Mike McNessor; Hemmings Muscle Machines Oct. 2008
Unless your knowledge of Pontiac performance cars runs deep, you'd probably mistake
those Macho T/A callouts for the work of some time-warped customizer. But the Macho
is a bona-fide collectible today and was originally the handiwork of two
entrepreneurial brothers frustrated with the state of factory performance in the
Disco era.
Back in 1977, Dennis and Kyle Mecham built 26 performance-tweaked Trans Ams that they
dubbed Macho T/As and initially sold through their family's Pontiac dealership,
Mecham Motors, near Phoenix, Arizona. The modified Trans Ams were a hit and the
fledgling company, DKM Design, Performance sold all they could build, so they ramped
up production in 1978 and marketed the cars through other Pontiac dealers. Sales of
the warmed-up Firebirds soared to 204 units. But, uh, what of that oh-so-Seventies
name?
"At that time, macho was the 'in' word in the Southwest," said Dennis Mecham, now
president of Mecham Design, Performance. "Everything was macho. In desperation, I
said, 'Why not call it Macho T/A?' It was almost tongue-in-cheek. It may not be the
best name, but how can you forget it?" Buyers certainly approved. Mecham recalls a
leasing company that wanted to purchase several of the car's sans the Macho lettering.
But at DKM's urging, they purchased three without the decals and three with.
Customers greedily snapped up the lettered cars first.
The recipe for the Macho T/A was straightforward: DKM would purchase new Trans Ams,
perform its modifications, and resell them as used cars to Pontiac dealers. Under the
hood, DKM would richen the jetting of the stock Quadrajet and change the
distributor's curve to bring in 36 degrees of advance at 2,500 rpm. DKM also opened
up the sealed shaker hood scoop, increasing airflow to the stock airbox, and
installed screen over the opening. A set of off-the-shelf Hooker Headers were bolted
up and plumbed up with a 2.5-inch dual exhaust with a crossover tube and two
catalytic converters eliminating the restrictive stock system.
"No mufflers or resonators are found, though the exhaust remains reasonably mellow,"
Hot Rod magazine wrote in its July 1978 review of a Macho T/A. "In fact, a decibel
meter may disagree, but to the human ear, a Macho T/A sounds no louder than a
stocker, which runs one converter and a pair of mufflers." DKM also dropped the front
end by 1.5 inches, installed Koni adjustable shocks at all four corners, and put 60
series tires on the factory rims. Color combinations were left up to the customer's
discretion and, while there were two dozen interior/exterior color combinations
listed in the DKM brochure, an additional $150 allowed that customer to choose a
special color. Add another $150 and the graphics would be applied using DuPont's
Imron paint. "If it sounded reasonable and the guy wanted it, we'd do whatever they
wanted," Mecham said. The young Mecham stumbled on the idea of building a post-
factory Pontiac super car (at least by late-'70s standards) quite by accident. He was
running a weekly newspaper that his family owned and driving a late-model Pontiac
Catalina when the urge to act his age became too strong to ignore. "I thought, if I
don't stop driving Catalinas, pretty soon I'll be old enough to actually want
one," Mecham said!
Mecham and his friend Mike Garrett began tinkering with a 1975 Formula 400 HO. They
managed to wake the car up by fattening the lean factory jetting, opening up the
airbox and working some advance into the distributor. Mecham did more of the same
mods to his new 455-powered 1976 Trans Am--a car that his father, the late Evan
Mecham, took a liking to and saw some sales potential in.
"My father came down and I had the 455 T/A in my garage," Mecham said. "He took it
for a ride and said, 'I wish I could sell a car like that to our customers.' " So as
an experiment, the brothers Mecham added headers and aftermarket wheels to their list
of Trans Am mods and put a fresh example on the showroom floor. It sold in three
days. Working part-time in 1977, they built and sold 26 cars, making a tidy profit on
each.
Thus, one of the few Disco-era performance legends was born. In fact, it would've
lived on for many more years had Pontiac not installed the 301 in the Trans Am--an
engine that simply didn't have the latent potential that the 400 and 455s had.
"We stopped making them in 1980 because the car was no longer viable," Mecham said.
"If you got any real horsepower (out of the 301), you were rebuilding a hand
grenade." Throughout the 1990s, the cars of the 1970s were regarded disdainfully by
collectors, but something funny happened one day on the way to the car show--'70s
machinery, particularly Trans Ams sporting black paint and gold eagles, became not
just collectible, but hot.
Riding the tail feathers of this trend are DKM's Macho T/As. Mecham's warmed up
'Birds have attracted a cult following among collectors who fondly remember the days
when clothing and furniture manufacturers were vying with the Bee Gees to see who
could sell the most vinyl. Rich Robert of North Tustin, California, definitely enjoys
the machismo his special Trans Am imparts to curious onlookers.
"Macho T/A? There are so many ways you can take that," Robert said. "Some people look
at you like you're nuts. Why would you write that on your car?" Robert, who is
president of Knorr Systems, a swimming pool contractor specializing in commercial and
municipal work, was actually searching for the aforementioned bird of the black and
gold feather when he happened to spot the DKM machine.
"I was looking, before they got so popular, for a black-and-gold Trans Am and, in the
process, I came across the Macho," Robert said. "I said: 'My god, these are the ones
to have!' " Robert bid aggressively on his car in an online auction, only to lose it
to another hopeful suitor--one who apparently had more interest in bidding than
buying. "There are very few (Macho T/As) around, so when one popped up on the
Internet, I went for it hard, but didn't get it," Robert recalled. "But I told the
owner, 'Listen, if the deal falls through, let me know. I've got the money and I'd be
glad to come up.' "
Assuming he'd missed one of the few opportunities he'd have to buy a Macho T/A,
Robert purchased a '77 Trans Am that he wasn't in love with and quickly forsook it
when the phone call came in about two weeks after the Internet auction ended.
"I bee-lined to the owner's home in Beverly Hills and I cut a deal," Robert said.
"The car was all complete, but kind of weathered and tired. It led a pretty good
life. It only has 80,000 miles and for the last 10 years, (the seller) hardly drove
the car. Some of the internal plastic was faded and the paint is original but faded."
Robert's Macho T/A is equipped with an optional lift-off fiberglass hood that is said
to save 60 pounds over the stock unit, a firewall-mounted oil pressure restorer
device that holds a quart of oil in reserve and forces it back into the crankcase in
the event that the engine's oil pressure drops, a color-matched four-point roll bar
and four-wheel disc brakes.
Since purchasing the Macho, Robert has performed some housekeeping, such as
repainting the Macho T/A graphics on the doors, dyeing some interior panels, and
installing bushings in the Hurst Competition Plus shifter, but he has been hesitant
to dive into a complete restoration that would erase the car's originality. "There's
only one thing left to be done to make it really good," Robert said. "It needs a
paint job. I'm battling with myself about whether to take the plunge or keep it
original. I want someone who's done one to take it apart. So, in the meantime, I
don't do it. "That would be the last thing. It's a great car from five or six feet
away, but the paint is cracking a little here and there and the fiberglass hood is
faded to a slightly different color." Robert also contacted Mecham and received a
letter authenticating his car. Mecham has since signed the T/A's glovebox door, as
well.
Also, here's an interesting bit of trivia about the car, which can neither be
positively confirmed nor denied: Robert believes that it was used in photographs on
the cover and inside of DKM's brochure. Mecham says it's possible, but he has no way
to be sure. "The car runs hard and really well," Robert said. "They're scarce and
they run a lot faster than a factory Trans Am. These things kick it for a big, heavy
car! If a Bandit guy drove a Macho, he'd say, 'Why did I pay $40,000 for this thing?'
"
In 1978, Hot Rod was just as enamored of DKM's tuned-up T/A, wringing a low 14 second
e.t. out of Macho T/A number 3 (All of the Macho T/As bear their series number on the
spoiler and lower front fenders.). "What the customer gets is, in effect, a brand-new
Trans Am, delivered right from a Pontiac dealer with everything he needs to blow a
stocker right into the weeds," Hot Rod's Dave Wallace wrote. "At least, this was
certainly, the case with 1978 Macho T/A No. 3, which collected a remarkable time slip
of 14.29 seconds at 98.79 miles per hour on the best of 17 good runs at OCR. (The
very next day we watched a four-speed 49-state '78 Trans Am clock steady 15.20s at 96
mph, which is the best performance we've seen from a stock 1978 automobile under
virtually identical conditions at the same facility.)"
Hot Rod went on to rave about the car's handling and DKM's use of readily available
parts to put some respectability back into the Trans Am's performance. "But quarter-
mile acceleration is only the beginning of the Macho's appeal," Wallace wrote. "A
combination of heat-treated front coils, Koni shocks all around and careful
suspension tuning gets the Macho around corners quicker, too. Throw in a dealer
service agreement (sure to include special provisions concerning non-OEM components
and obvious operator abuse) and you've got about the best Poncho performance bargain
since the Super Duty days." Robert, of course, is already a true believer and is
convinced that Mecham's star will rise on the wings of the Macho.
"As time progresses, Dennis Mecham and his DKM machines will be honored like the
tuner gurus a decade before him," Robert said.
What about the SPECS you say?
Price
Base price: (Macho T/A) $9,610
Base price: (Trans Am) $7,331
Options on car profiled:
Specialty items supplied by DKM: lift-off fiberglass hood
roll bar
Pontiac options: Trans Am special performance package, $324
Engine
Type: Pontiac OHV V-8, iron block and cylinder heads
Displacement: 400.14 cubic inches
Bore x Stroke: 4.121 x 3.750 inches
Compression ratio: 8.1:1
Horsepower @ rpm: 220hp @ 4,000 (stock) 270-290 @ 4,000 est. (with DKM mods)
Torque @ rpm: 320-lbs.ft. @ 2,000
Valvetrain: Hydraulic valve lifters
Main bearings: 5
Fuel system: Single 800cfm Rochester Quadrajet
Lubrication system: Pressure, gear-type pump
Electrical system: 12-volt
Exhaust system: Single catalyzed exhaust, crossflow muffler (stock) Hooker headers,
dual 2.5-inch pipes with crossover tube and two AC catalytic converters (with DKM
mods)
Transmission
Type: Borg Warner Super T-10 four-speed manual
Ratios 1st: 2.43:1
2nd: 1.61:1
3rd: 1.23:1
4th: 1.00:1
Reverse: 2.35:1
Differential
Type: Corporate 10-bolt housing with Safe-T-Track limited-slip differential
Ratio: 3.42:1
Steering
Type: Saginaw recirculating ball, power-assist
Ratio: 14.3:1
Turns, lock-to-lock: 2.4
Turning circle: 38.9 feet
Brakes
Type: Hydraulic, four-wheel vented disc
Front: 11.0-inch disc
Rear: 11.1-inch disc
Chassis & Body
Construction: Unit-body
Body style: Two-door coupe
Layout: Front engine, rear-wheel drive
Suspension
Front: Independent, unequal-length A-arms; coil springs; telescoping shock absorbers,
anti-roll bar
Rear: Rigid axle, semi-elliptic rear leaf springs, telescoping shock absorbers,
anti-roll bar
Wheels & Tires
Wheels: Aluminum Pontiac WS-6 "Snowflake"
Front: 15 x 8-inch
Rear: 15 x 8-inch
Tires: Goodyear Polysteel Radial (original)
Front: 225/70R15
Rear: 225/70R15
Weights & Measures
Wheelbase: 108.2 inches
Overall length: 196.8 inches
Overall width: 73 inches
Overall height: 49.3 inches
Front track: 61.3 inches
Rear track: 60 inches
Curb weight: 3,750 pounds
Capacities
Crankcase: 6 quarts (with oil-pressure accumulator)
Cooling system: 22.9 quarts
Fuel tank: 21 gallons
Transmission: 3.75 quarts
Rear axle: 3.75 pints
Calculated Data
Bhp per c.i.d.: 0.7
Weight per bhp: 13.275 pounds
Weight per c.i.d.: 9.29 pounds
Production
DKM produced 204 Macho T/As in 1978
Performance*
Acceleration:
0-60 mph: 7.8 seconds
0-100 mph: 22.8 seconds
1/4 mile ET: 14.29 seconds @ 98.79 mph
Top speed: 120 mph
*According to a July 1978 road test from Hot Rod magazine
The DKM Macho Trans Am & The MR MSE Trans Am
The history of the Macho Trans Am dates back to 1977 when two brothers, Dennis and
Kyle Mecham, sons of a Phoenix area Pontiac dealer decided to begin modifying
Firebirds to restore some of the missing performance brought about by the addition of
more and more emissions equipment on factory cars. The brothers began by adding
turbochargers in 1977. In 1978 203 Macho TAs would come out of the DKM shop. A
W72/L78 engine was used as a baseline, the carb and ignition were modified and a set
of Hooker headers and twin catalytic converters were added for a net 50bhp gain. An
optional turbo-charger could also be added for a 7psi boost. Interestingly, the TAs
were all sold as used cars. This was required because Federal law prohibited any
modifications to the emissions system on a new car. The dealership, Mecham Pontiac,
sold the new cars to Mecham Performance. The modifications were performed and the
cars were then sold to the public. They had virtually no miles on them and had no
tags but were sold as a used car because they had already been titled by Mecham
Performance.
Production continued in 1979 where both the 400 and 403 versions of the Trans Am
received the modifications required for a Macho Trans Am. DKM performed several other
modifications including modifying the hood scoop to make it functional. Suspensions
were also modified by adding Koni shocks, front springs retempered for rake and re-
calibrated geometry. The visual appearance was also changed. Macho options included
Recaro or Scheel seats, Fosgate stereo, different wheels and tires, fiberglass hood
and the new paint scheme that varied by color. Every Macho TA also received a
production number
1979 also saw the release of a very limited run of a new offering from DKM, the DKM
Tallon Super Tourer. This Firebird could be ordered with a turbo-charged 400 or a
normally aspirated 350 Chevy. The Tallon received fiberglass fenders, hood, rear
quarters and bolt-on air dam. American Specialty wheels with 50 series tires were
installed. Hooker headers, a 5-speed Doug Nash tranny, Koni shocks and the WS6
package was also added. At significant additional cost ($7600) a Traco-built Chevy
350 rated at 460bhp could be installed.
DKMs efforts continued through the '80s with the MR MSE TAs (Mecham Racing Motor
Sports Edition) which were produced from 1982 to 1986. In 1997 Dennis was approached
by a Macho fan and owner about producing a new Mecham TA. After some initial
discussions the decision was made to produce a few cars and that effort continued
throughout the 2002 model year. A Mecham T/A and a Mecham Formula were both offered.
You can visit his site at
www.mechamperformance.com