1970 Trans Am vintage SCCA race car
 

I happened across a 1970 Trans Am race car that was purchased new and shipped out to Little Falls New Jersey to be fitted for SCCA A-Sedan and PHA "hill climbing" road course racing.

The owner had previously purchased a brand new 1967 Z/28 Camaro which he raced from 1967 thru 1969 and then sold. This car has also been found and has been talked about over on the Pennsylvania Hill Climbers forum.

The original owner was Doug Moorhouse of Upper Montclair, N.J..

The car has been traced back to Leader Automotive (George DeLorean & Tom Nell) who supplied the custom built Ram Air type engines. One of the motors is a 1969 WH coded hybrid Ram Air IV/V engine.

Yes the car has PHS, an early production Ram Air III car, M20 four speed and 3.73 rear gear. White with blue interior.

Where or how is the best method to do research on such a vehicle and in general what type of venue is best suited to sell such a vehicle?

The second owner, who after doing some research has multiple patents filed under his name. I believe made this seat bolster in the attached picture.

I believe it was designed to help keep the driver in place as the car was raced in the east coast hill climb sanctioned type races.

Originally the car had a four point roll bar, the original bolt hole pads are still welded in place in the floor. Is it possible to trace a vehicle in the SCCA venues based on said roll bar or vin number?

I believe you would need the cage number to do any tracing which sounds like it is no more... the number on the cage is what the different sanctions kept track of. They didnt really car about VIN. and a 4 point seems a little light duty for SCCA?

Let’s see more pictures of it!

-mark

Be cool to know what happened to the engine it was raced with.Tom

1970 TA Pennsylvania Hill Climb race car
 

Here is a copy of the original article on the car from August of 1992 High Performance Pontiac magazine.

From my research with talking with people that know the car and based on the parts that are with the car it is believed to be originally powered by a 1969 RA IV block modified to run Ram Air V heads. Some of these pieces are still with the car along with other parts based on the pictures in the article.

The current crank in the 1969 four bolt main block is a forged "Ram Air VII" variety which would be the 3" main with a 4.21" stroke. It sports a set of custom 455 SD connecting rods and newer style forged pistons.

Also attached are two pictures of the car in action.

I will try and post more pictures as time permits.

I have well over 100 pictures of all the parts and pieces.

Some of the hand fabricated racing parts are still in boxes.

You might find some more people who might remember the car from back in the day on the Pontiac Performance Years website.
https://forums.maxperformanceinc.com/forums

I remember the 1992 article. Thats about it.
70 TA is my favorite car and its cool that this one was campaigned.
There are some SCCA type folks on the PY Forum
70-73 TA/Bird section is the best bet for starters.
Good Luck to you

Pontiac gave one of the SCCA Officials a new 1972 TA - special painted Red.
It was never raced, and rarely even driven.
Still exists in excellent condition

Slow assembly of the 1970 TA
 

After cleaning up everything that was in the interior and stuffed in the trunk it was time to clean her off and put some of that sheet metal back where it belongs.

The whole underside of the car has been restored and sealed in red oxide primer. The original COZ 12 bolt rear end still resides in the original place.

Here is a picture of the roll bar pads, still in place after all these years.

Some of the hand crafted parts made back in the day
 

Here are a couple of shots of some of the original race car parts that were fabricated back in the day along with some of the aftermarket parts added to again either enhance the performance/reliability or dress the vehicle up during the time period.

Almost looks like two old aluminum bread pans welded together to create a fuel filter or fuel line cooling tank.

The front SS braided brake lines.

The M/T valve covers and unknown brand cast 12 bolt Chevy rear end cover.

Probably one of the most important pieces in the upper right corner of the parts picture is the dual oil filter housing with very large feed and return lines.

Looks like what appears to be a fabricated battery tray. Similar bar stock also holds the dual oil filter housing unit.

The 1970 Ram Air IV/V distributor
 

Here are the pictures of the 1112011 9G9 1970 Ram Air IV distributor with the Ram Air V distributor sleeve.

After talking with a bunch of great Pontiac historian's, racers and avid collectors it would seem that the reason behind this setup is for the following reasons.

The Ram Air V program utilized the heavy duty 80 psi oil pump, to drive that oil pump the GM engineers discovered that they needed a larger diameter distributor gear to stabilize the timing and longevity of the cam gear.

To do this they had to enlarge the distributor housing hole in the block.

Since this engine does not have any tell tale signs of Ram Air V cylinder bore "chamfers" it would make more sense that the block and distributor combination were used to insure good oil pressure during acceleration, deceleration and wide open throttle runs with the Ram Air IV cylinder heads.

If I may digress I have had the opportunity to drive both a 1970 GTO Judge Ram Air IV four speed with 4.33 rear gears as well as a couple of Ram Air V equipped vehicles. I can't imagine the power that a larger 455 cubic inch motor with the ram air IV heads would have produced back in 1970.

I bet it has to be similar to a 455 with E-heads making north of 500 Hp.

The 1969 Ram Air IV engine
 

This is a very interesting part of the car and the history of what may have gone down back in the good ole days of parts and racing.

This is a 1969 400 block code WH Ram Air IV W/ manual transmission

The EUN is 847453

The date code appears to be I 04 9 so September 4th of 1969

The as raced white painted shaker
 

Here is a picture of the TA shaker scoop that originally on a Polar white car would have been blue, but was painted white and seems to parallel the pictures of the car on the racetrack and in the magazine article.

You can see on the upper right corner where the white paint has peeled away uncovering the original blue factory paint still intact.