[gto4door]

Since we haven’t had much activity in the ’73-’77 A-Body Section lately, I thought I would start this thread. This is a “who cares” subject, but I thought I would post this tidbit of Pontiac info anyway.

As you know, Pontiac’s new for 1973 Colonnades were met with a lukewarm welcome from the car buying public. With the success of the more formal and elegant 1973 Grand Prix (siblings Monte Carlo, Cutlass Supreme and Regal), Pontiac Product Planners at the last minute offered a new “formal roof window” option on the Lemans and Luxury Lemans series for model year 1974 capture the Grand Prix “opera window” look that was in vogue at the time.

In the 1974 Pontiac Lemans brochure and accessory brochure, the Formal Roof Option was available only if a vinyl top or vinyl landau top was ordered with it. However, sometime after early1974, you could order the Formal Roof Option without a vinyl top covering. Why? This is where you are going to see some really “cheesey” body work, or as we would say down here in the south, some “Southern engineering rigging”. See attached pictures and you will understand why the vinyl top was mandatory.

Fisher Body had not tooled up in time to produce an A-body quarter panel with the formal window option in time for the beginning of the ’74 model year, so the plant “improvised” until the new formal window quarters were stamped.

In the “early version” of the ’74 formal window option. Note how a blank triangular panel was installed over the colonnade rear triangular glass window and body filler used to fill the gaps. On the interior side, an upholstered triangular panel was used to cover the back side of the triangular window to achieve that “formal opera window look”.