0408Musclecar Of The Month'70 Pontiac GTO[Photos 116-0804.SCUP 1]There's no doubt that the best year for the Chevelle SS was 1970 when it was available with the epic 450hp LS6 454 V-8. This was also the best year for Buick's and Oldsmobile's muscle machines, was the year the Hemi 'Cuda debuted, and the year Dodge introduced the Challenger. In fact most muscle scholars (if there are such things) would peg 1970 as the peak of the musclecar era generally. But as good a year as it was, it's an open question whether or not it was the best year for the Pontiac GTO.
With the lifting of GM's ban on engines larger than 400 inches in a midsize car, the '70 GTO could finally be had with engines displacing up to a full 455 ci. But the 455 was rated at 360 hp (not bad, but hardly monstrous) and 500 lb-ft of torque (quite good). "If Oldsmobile, Buick, and Chevrolet were going to have engines over 450 cubes in their A-body cars," wrote Car and Driver after driving one of the first 455 GTOs, "then the GTO had to have one too. They could have screwed on the big port heads and plugged in the long-duration camshaft from the Ram Air IV; that stuff will all fit. It probably would have made the GTO go like a nickel rocket too, but they knew better than to do that. The business of collecting up the spent GTOs that would have fallen along the wayside after a short, dazzling flash and reloading them on warranty was out of the question. Consequently the 455 is a torquey, low-revving device that makes very little ruckus and works great with an air conditioner-which is the way the test car was set up." In sum, the 455 wasn't stunningly quick. Car and Driver's four-speed 455 go to 60 mph in 6.6-seconds and 15.0 at 96.5 mph in the quarter. Not bad for 4,209-pounds of Goat and about as well as any stock GTO ever ran for a contemporary magazine test. But that's far from the 13-second quarter-mile times the LS6 Chevelles were regularly achieving.
Of course the 455 wasn't the only GTO for '70. The base GTO still had a 400ci engine breathing through a four-barrel and rated at 350 hp. Above that were the 366hp Ram Air III and 370hp Ram Air IV 400s. All those engines were also available in the returning Judge as well. And with new ample sculpturing along its flanks and a new face with headlights separated from the grille, the '70 GTO was a good-looking machine, too. But was it better-looking than the perfectly clean and lean '65? Better proportioned than the '66 and '67? You decide.
With insurance rates starting to tamp down sales (fewer '70 GTOs were sold than any year since 1964), the GTO was starting on the glide slope to oblivion as the new decade began. Obviously it was still a great car, but the times were changing around it.
Quick Facts'70 PontiacProduction total: 40,149 (32,737 hardtop GTOs, 3,615 convertible GTOs, 3,629 hardtop GTO Judges, and 168 convertible GTO Judges)
Engine: 400ci, OHV, four-barrel V-8. 350hp (Std.); 400ci, OHV, four-barrel V-8. 366hp ("Ram Air III" Opt.); 400ci, OHV, four-barrel V-8. 370hp ("Ram Air IV" Opt.)
Transmission: Three-speed manual (Std.), Four-speed manual (Opt.), Three-speed automatic (Opt.).
Base price: $3,267 (hardtop GTO), $3,492 (convertible GTO), $3,604 (hardtop GTO Judge), $3,829 (convertible GTO Judge).
Buick Velite Over Zeta[Photos 116-0804.SCUP 5A through 116-0804.SCUP 5D on disc.]All those rumors about a new generation of rear-drive, mid- to full-size GM cars are apparently true. Buick's Velite concept car, displayed at April's New York Auto Show, is built atop the new architecture which has been given the code name Zeta.