[JLHarper]

Thanks to Keith Seymore, who has graciously spent his time and replied to my PM with very interesting and informative information regarding these factory "show" cars.

This is a 72 Lemans 455 with low VIN of 00009.

There was only one PHS that the few sellers and myself had seen.
Story was this car was "shown" in some capacity at some point in its life.
Maybe in the lobby of some PMD building, as one story goes.

I contacted Jim Mathison and told him the story.
He was happy to help, and after a long search he found TWO additional PHS docs as seen below (poor quality)

First PHS: PONTIAC MOTOR DIV-SHOW CAR PCCL dated: 12-03-71
Second PHS: PONTIAC MOTOR DIV FACT CC CAR dated: 12-14-71
Third PHS: PETER TOTH HEMPSTEAD RD, PONTIAC, MI: 8-31-72

So now with three PHS docs, what was this car used for?
The third shows it being sold to a Mr. Toth with many thinking he was a employee.

Enter Keith Seymore. I PM and told him some of the story. What a super guy!
He took his lunch hour and went looking, finding a Pontiac dealer (Auburn) on Hempstead Rd.


Posting his replies below for historic and entertainment value. Very good stuff!
Thanks again Keith!

[JLHarper]

KEITHS REPLY ABOUT SHOW CAR QUESTIONS:


Let's lay it out this way (chronologically in order of level of refinement):

Mule vehicle: this is a previously completed vehicle that is modified by cutting/pasting/cobbling the new content. Typical usage is for engineering development/concept development.

Integration vehicle: can be either a modified existing vehicle or ground up build. Parts will be production design intent (mostly) off either prototype or production tooling. Can be either stall (stationary) build or line built. Typical usages are for engineering development or validation/durability testing. In the old days these might be called "Prototype" vehicles.

Manufacturing Validation Build - Nonsaleable: these are built in the assembly plant. Parts are production tooled (hopefully) but not saleable status yet. Purpose of the build is to validation the manufacturing process, highlight build problems that need to be fixed before mainstream production. Vehicles are fairly refined but have a "nonsaleable" (ie experimental) VIN and cannot be sold or titled. Typical usages are for Engineering and early Marketing uses. In the old days we might have called these "pilot" vehicles.

Manufacturing Validation Build - Saleable: built in the assembly plant. Parts are production tooled, fully saleable status, suppliers have proven they can meet production line rates. Purpose of the build is the next level of refinement in the validation process, continue to surface build problems that need to be addressed, and gain confidence in the ability of the process to meet line rate. Typical usages are for Engineering, Captured Test Fleets, and more formal Marketing events. We would call these "pilot" vehicles, too.

Lastly there is the Start of Regular Production: these are the real deal. Regular high volume vehicles released to the public.

I say all this in order to categorize your car: I would consider it a Pilot vehicle (ie, an early saleable build). You are correct that probably nobody knows what the show usages are/were. They can be as informal as parking the car in the lobby, used for press events, marketing rides, etc all the way up to the actual vehicle on display on a turntable at the Motorama or New York auto show. We probably would never know unless a photo or some other documentation surfaces that would show such a thing (as an aside, Brad Connelly owns the Buick GSX prototype car - VIN 001 - and has photos of his car on display).

Peter Toth - my first thought, too, was if this was a relative of employee and collector Dimitrie Toth. Dimitrie owned George Delorean's '63 SD Tempest coupe at one time. He was a friend and coworker of Dad's and actually offered the coupe to us when he sold it (...we couldn't afford it then, either). He is still around so I might be able to get in touch with him and see what he knows/thinks.

As I have stated (somewhere) previously my expertise and personal experience starts to taper off about 1968. I would suggest you start a separate thread with this detail. I'll send an advanced copy to John V at his home email so that he can get a head start looking at this info. His expertise and passion centers around the 1964 model but a lot of the codes and info translate well into the later years. We'll see what he says.

I am going to meet my Mom for lunch today in Auburn Hills; perhaps I could drive by this location in Pontiac on my way back and see what it looks like -

K

Second PM FROM KEITH

On the cowl tag, is there a build date code (ie, "09A"). Is there an "X" after the build date?

K

[JLHarper]

JH: I will check cowl tag and post.

Keiths Third PM:

I had lunch with my mom in Auburn Hills today, so I took a little tour on the way back. I couldn't find "Hempstead" on Yahoo or on my NAV radio in the truck and was quite disappointed. It did show me a "Homestead" (over by my favorite Chinese take out) but that didn't make any sense since it is a small, one block long residential street in a fairly poor part of town.

I aborted my search and was heading back to the freeway when I passed Auburn Pontiac. I recalled someone saying that Auburn Pontiac was formerly Packer so I pulled into a parking lot to take a couple pictures when I saw the street sign: corner of Hempstead and Opdyke Rds (why Yahoo and the NAV didn't find it I'll never know). I did check UltimatePontiac when I got back to my office. The dates don't quite line up but it does say Packer used to be at Livernois and 7 mile (Dealer code 07-074) until 1976, when they moved to AH and changed the name (Dealer code 07-607; 500 S Opdyke Rd). I'm wondering if this Hempstead address is a former business address for Packer Pontiac at this location (especially since Hempstead dead ends in the dealer parking lot).

Does any of this help/make sense?

I also got some pictures of the Engineering building and the Administration building in Pontiac on Joslyn and will post those in various threads as appropriate.

K

[JLHarper]

Keiths Fourth PM

And lastly, here is the response from JohnV to my email I sent: I remember the original post about this car. I would agree that Peter Toth was likely an employee who purchased this previously licensed car, still owned by PMD and most recently used as a Company Car, for $3000 at the end of Aug. '72 when the car was nearly a year old. If I was JL Harper, I would be attempting to track down Peter Toth (or a family member) in the Pontiac, Mich area pronto. Since he has an address, that would be a good place to start. According to the Invoice Identification No., Mr. Toth paid cash to acquire the car. But basically, Mr. Toth paid $3000 to buy a GTO that showed $4141.70 on the Window Sticker, before Destination amount, so he got a pretty good bargain for a car that probably had low miles. The License & Title cost plus a 4% (if I read it correctly) cost at $114.07 for some Misc thing have been added to the Total Cost of the Car & Options to get a Total of $2974.36. To that they added a Charge of $12.70 in a Box labelled I think "D & H AMOUNT". The Total "cost" is then $2987.06 How that played in to the $3000 Price paid by Peter Toth, I'm not sure. The D & H AMOUNT seems to be explained in a notation on the 2nd Invoice that shows this as some sort of pass thru cost related to the Manufacturer of Tires, indicated as a tax on the weight of new tires. Note, all of the FDH amounts have been deleted from the 3rd Invoice Record. Couple odd things based on the sequence of the three Invoice records. Earliest record shows the Car "Sold To" the PMD Show Car Pool, Zone 35 (PMD Engineering best I know). "Dealer No." 996. "Date of Execution" is Dec. 3, 1971. Strange (to me), the Invoice ID No. is 908377. Earlier years, the ID No. was sequential for the Model Year, would have been very low in Dec. '71. I have very few '72 Invoice records, but I do not think this changed for the '72 Model Year. Consequently, I suspect the coding of this ID Sequence No. is specific for a car that was being "invoiced" for internal accounting purposes.
In other words, the leading digit "9" can be ignored and this was perhaps the 8,377th internal "transaction" that was invoiced (or more appropriately, charged to) to a PMD Dept.
Next, the 2nd Invoice has a "Date of Execution" of Dec. 14, 1971. ID no. has advanced to 909194.
The 30% amount has been reduced from $3216.40 by deleting the $237.16 FDH Amount and adding back the $12.70 D & H Amount. But I do not know how the "30% Amount" is determined to start with.
The Car has now been identified as a Factory CC (Company Car) Car. It is still shown in "Zone" 35, but now "Dealer" 997. This may suggest that the car was now switched for accounting purposes from one internal Dept. to another, again strictly for internal budget accounting. Probably the car was now licensed and ultimately the cost of those tags was reflected in the cost of the vehicle when finally sold, which probably had tax implications. PMD was able to show essentially no profit when the car was sold to Peter Toth. Note, the 2nd Invoice deleted the FDH Amounts for the Car and each Option, same as seen on the 3rd Invoice.
It is conceivable to me that the car was originally used for Shows and then put into service as a Company Car. I would think "Shows" could have included the Michigan State Fair, and perhaps some others. When was the Detroit Auto Show that year?
Finally, on Aug. 31, 1972, it was sold to a "customer" and taken off the Books as a PMD Asset.
Note the "Zone" is now 50. This is not associated with any actual Zone that I can determine, however, may have been used for "direct" sales whereby no Retail Dealer was involved in the transaction.
Note the ID No. is 739595, this is more in keeping with how many cars PMD likely invoiced for the '72 Model Year by Aug. 31, 1972. What is somewhat odd to me is that the car would have been produced much earlier (I assume) than Dec., yet not Charged To an internal dept. until then. How was the car accounted for prior to that, or perhaps there would have been an even earlier Invoice Record? Maybe the 1st Invoice was intended to reflect the "cost" hit that went against the Dept. responsible for the Show Car Pool fleet and generated when they eliminated it from their fleet?
I suspect the best way to learn the early history would be to locate Peter Toth. At best however, he may be elderly now. I'm not sure how "special" this car can be considered. I suspect PMD had multiple models they would exhibit. Most Assembly Plants exhibited the cars they were producing in some sort of display, I'm guessing the Pontiac Plant was no different, though those cars may have been charged to the Plant until sold. The most "interesting" thing about some of these "company cars" is that they are usually pretty loaded. That should be no surprise as the cars could then "show-off" many of the available options that Buyers might be induced to order.
__________________

[Keith Seymore]

Originally Posted by JLHarper

Posting his replies below for historic and entertainment value. Very good stuff!
Thanks again Keith!

You are quite welcome...

I should mention we posted John V's response before I got permission, but I assume it's ok.

I should also point out that I had to reformat and edit John's reply slightly to get it to fit under the 5000 character maximum for a PM (you were at about 5400 characters there, bud!). His original post was a bit more readible, so I apologize for that.

K

[Keith Seymore]

Originally Posted by JLHarper

I also got some pictures of the Engineering building and the Administration building in Pontiac on Joslyn and will post those in various threads as appropriate.

K

Posted 'em here, if anyone is interested:

http://forums.maxperformanceinc.com/...=380990&page=4

[JLHarper]

Some of the known Dealer Codes on Ultimate GTO Site:

http://ultimategto.com/art18.htm

Helps break down Dealer Codes and Zones, per Johns reply above.

HURST ENG in there also as are some other interesting ones.

[JLHarper]

Found this in the car yesterday.

Anyone know what it is?

[R68GTO]

GMI (General Motors Institute) was and is a well known engineering school. I know several guys that went there in the late 1980's.

[Keith Seymore]

Originally Posted by JLHarper

Found this in the car yesterday.

Anyone know what it is?

Originally Posted by R68GTO

GMI (General Motors Institute) was and is a well known engineering school. I know several guys that went there in the late 1980's.

Yeah... I know what that is....

I think I still have one of those!

[Keith Seymore]

GMI (now Kettering University) was/is one of the highest ranking Engineering schools in the nation.

It was a tough, tough school. I graduated 10th in my class (of 400) in High School and didn't figure I'd have any trouble at GMI, but because it was the "creme of the crop" of High School students across the nation the competition was very tough.

I really struggled the first three years or so (it's a five year program) but graduated with an average, but respectable GPA.

I like to think I make up for my mediocre scholastics with my above average mechanical aptitude...

[Keith Seymore]

Originally Posted by JLHarper

Found this in the car yesterday.

Anyone know what it is?

Heh, heh...

I wondered if I had kept mine. Found them in an old shoe box, with my report cards and other "memorabilia"

[Keith Seymore]

I'm draggin' this thread back up because of some recent (relevant) finds:

Found these pictures over at V8Buick.com; these are of the 1970 Chicago Auto Show. You can see how some production vehicles are displayed, as well as concept cars and other "one offs".

The Buick GSX prototype has been found, restored and is owned by Brad Conley. He is quite active over at V8Buick, and in terms of owning and maintaining a well documented factory show car he is my hero...

K

http://v8buick.com/showthread.php?t=150479

http://v8buick.com/showthread.php?t=150539

http://v8buick.com/showthread.php?t=150541

http://v8buick.com/showthread.php?t=150552

[JLHarper]

Nice old pictures, thanks Keith!

Are those Olds wheels on the OO looking GTO?

[Keith Seymore]

We've been having discussions about show cars and brochure cars and it made me think of stories regarding a couple modern photo shoots that I personally was involved in.

I added them over at the "old wive's tale" thread, if anybody is interested:

http://forums.maxperformanceinc.com/...=1#post3438654

BTW, I don't think those are Olds wheels on the OO Judge (they look like regular production honeycombs to me).

K

[chicagoland]

I went to the 1970 Chicago Auto Show when I was 8 and was 'Disneyland' to me!