Junkyard Find: 1973 Pontiac Luxury LeMans
We’ll follow up yesterday’s ’73 VW Super Beetle Junkyard Find with another car from the same year. The Super Beetle listed at $2,499 and the Luxury LeMans four-door hardtop at $3,344… but now they are just so many tons of scrap metal.
The LeMans and its GM A-body siblings got a lot bigger in 1973, and— thanks to Malaise Era legislation under the watch of noted eco-socialist Richard Nixon— cleaner at the tailpipe… at the cost of engine power.
This Pontiac 350 was rated at 150 net horsepower, versus 250 for the 350 in 1971. Some of this was just the difference between gross and net horsepower, and some was the result of a big drop in oxides-of-nitrogen-producing engine compression.
Still, these were nice discount-luxury machines in their day, even with fewer horses under the hood. Unfortunately, certain events late in 1973 really trashed the resale value of cars like this one.
Even in the 5% humidity of Great Plains Colorado, GM cars of this era still manage to rust around the rear window.
If you’re bothered by the confusing climate-control interfaces in modern cars, check out this vent-control lever.
The same goes for this one-speaker “sound system.”
Billy Preston would have sounded just fine on this radio— who cares about those embargoing Arabs when you’ve got music like this on every station?
For free junkyard wallpaper images in all the popular computer monitor resolutions, check out the wallpaper downloads at the headquarters of the Murilee Martin Lifestyle Brand™.
Murilee Martin is the pen name of Phil Greden, a writer who has lived in Minnesota, California, Georgia and (now) Colorado. He has toiled at copywriting, technical writing, junkmail writing, fiction writing and now automotive writing. He has owned many terrible vehicles and some good ones. He spends a great deal of time in self-service junkyards. These days, he writes for publications including Autoweek, Autoblog, Hagerty, The Truth About Cars and Capital One.
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In the mid-70's while other teens were lusting over screaming chicken Trans-Ams and it's F-Body sibling Camaro Z-28 I said negatory good buddy to those because my heart raced for the 73-75 Pontiac Grand Am. It was only available with the 400 or 455 big block Poncho. TH400 auto or 4 speed. Standard buckets, gauge pkg and console too.I always found it to be far more stylish and technically ahead of it's time with euro handling/suspension package and Endura nose which eliminated the battering ram look and made the federally mandated 5MPH bumpers look very stylish and unobtrusive. Same goes for the equally stylish Chevrolet Laguna S-3. Build quality on 73-77 Colonades was quite subpar. Lousy paint and leaky window and door weatherstiping. I had a neighbor who had the Regal 2dr with the Luxus pkg in maroon. Nice car but paint oxidation and window leaks got to it after only a few years.
Does anyone know of a company that sells body parts for 73-77 A bodies? My heart is set on a 1976 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme Brougham, but I don't want to be stuck hand-fabricating patch panels if rust attacks.