A 62 Pontiac Tempest Convertible came into the local wrecking yard last week. When I looked under the hood, I found a 195 cid 4 cylinder with a 4-barrel carb and chrome valve cover. 166 HP at 4800 RPM. Cost $34.00 extra. Thought some might find this interesting.
Damn, that is complete and there has to be some hard core Pontiac guy looking for one of those. Yes, outside of the aircleaner that appears to be the factory setup. My roommate in trade school had a Tempest around that year with the mild 4 banger and was always tearing up those spaghetti driveshafts in the thing.
Yes, a rare setup. From the appearance of the carb, though, it looks like someone strapped an AVS from a '66 Chevy 327 on it. Also, that's a '67 or newer valve cover stolen from a GTO or Firebird.
Here are pics of the car. Crazy with a trans axle and auto trans. Not sure what is going on but maybe the gears have been removed? It was too muddy to take a look.
It looks like someone snagged the rear springs out of that one. Some of the Pontiac guys I was around Saturday would have latched on to that whole car in record time before it hit the wrecking yard. It looks pretty restorable yet.
I owned one in nearly that same condition, for about a year. Sold it to a local HAMBer, who in turn sold it to his neighbor. No four-barrel, but otherwise an identical car. I do not know if it's back on the road yet.
Back in the 70's the guy, that owned the shop I worked in, had one of those stashed aside. A buddy of his stopped by after work and talked him into pulling it into the shop with his "contractor" pickup. Planks sticking out of his truck hit the windshield and broke it. My boss was so pissed he walked around that car with his bench hammer and smashed out every other window then proceded to work out his frustrations on the body panels. It went to the scrape yard.
It is, literally, half of a 389 V8. You could hop it up with one Pontiac V8 performance head and header.
Yes, the engine mounts were made from Jell-O pudding in an attempt to keep it from transferring to the body. I had a '62 2 door for a winter car one year. Mine was an automatic with a shifter on the dashboard that looked more like a heater selector. I wonder if this one's a four speed?
This one is an automatic on the dash. I understand it was operated by using a cable setup. The Tempest might be restorable or maybe just for parts but it does have a good title from the 70's.
Not many of those dual plane 4bbl intakes around, not to mention the throttle cable, linkage, and bracket. A freind of mine runs one of those 4 banger Pontiacs with a blower at the drags, very cool!
My buddy had one with that engine and a four speed. I had a '63 with a 1 barrel and a three speed. Mine was OK but his was pretty quick. Both had 10 to 1 compression and I think he had a better cam. But that was a long time ago.Maybe I'm mixing it up with something else.
Pontiac did offer all sorts of combinations, like 10.25:1 with a one barrel OR four barrel. One thing you've got to say for Pontiac; between this and the OHC 6, they weren't afraid to try something different.
That's cool, looks like the yard has some other good stuff too. Haven't been through Otley in decades, is the "Otley LuRch" sign still there? How about the house with all the mopars in the yard?
Back in the day there was a well known engine builder, can't remember who, any way he took a 4 cyl. and sawed it in half and made a 2 cyl engine and put it in a small rail. It was quite fast.
So what are you going to do with it? Scrap it or save something? Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
Hey - The Otley Lunch is long gone. Not sure when but is now home to CO-OP gas pumps. House with all the MOPARs is still there and still has cars around it. I came to this area in 1968 and they were there then. I think some might have been sold. The yard that holds the Tempest has lots of good old stuff and it is all for sale - not saving it into rust/dust and the owner will let you look around all you want. Lots of his inventory have good titles.
Yeah, a guy I knew in high school had one and it was still a fairly new car. His had the four speed, and while no rocket, it could take most sixes and four cylinder sports cars of the day. I don't know about a restore, that car's crying out for a 421 transplant.... LOL!
Wow that's good to know. Next time I'm back in the area to see family I may get the info from you and go there. I see you have a few Chevies for sale, strange question, but did I buy a hood for a Challenger from you back in the 80s?? Plum crazy with stars all over it? Sorry to hijack the thread everybody! Here's blown Tempest 4 posted by beebing to keep us on topic!
Gary from southern Michigan..... If you're on the Hamb, why not post pictures of your red 61 Tempest wagon. It's a 4 cyl 4bbl with automatic too.
Whoa...that thing is pretty rad! I bet you would get a lot of people doing double takes when you lift the hood on that car.
Some guy named thompson played around with them for a while back in the '60's, didn't he? (Mickey loved Ponchos of all kinds: V-8's, Tempest 4's, even half-Tempest 2's came out of his shop at one time or another!!)