The Ford Mustang and Chevy Camaro “pony cars” might have just barely survived the darkest days of the Malaise era, but so-called “muscle cars” met a quick end. These two-door family sedans with oversized engines simply couldn’t exist in a world where big motors–or even powerful ones–were gone.
One of those brands responsible for the legend of arguably the best-known muscle car almost succeeded in bringing the traditional muscle car back to life in the seventies, but the idea turned out to be doomed from the start.
For today’s Pontiac Pthursday, we’ll explore the ultra-rare attempt at a latter-day GTO: the 1977 Can Am.
G. T. Nooooo
Look, I’m well aware that many Hemi-powered Road Runners or Super Bees would “tach it up” and absolutely shut down even the fastest of Pontiac’s fabled muscle cars back in the day. What can’t be argued is that Dodge and Plymouth didn’t have Jim Wangers behind them, the marketing impresario who was instrumental in bringing enough hype to make the GTO the first name you’d think of in factory street machines.
Employed by Pontiac’s ad agency at the time, Wangers tirelessly worked with then-division head John DeLorean to promote the “Goat”, getting it on the cover of Car and Driver with artwork showing this big coupe in an imagined battle with the Ferrari GTO; in the road test, the Pontiac reportedly generated a 4.6-second zero to sixty time.
Few people believe that figure was real; former Mopar engineer and later Car and Driver writer Larry Griffin has written extensively about heavily modified “ringers” from GM at the time, and this almost-certainly fictitious performance figure tainted the GTO with some Mopar-or-no-car street racers. You know what? It didn’t matter. Much of the public then and now still sees the “Goat” as the G.O.A.T., whether it’s true or not.
Within a mere eight years, however, it was all over. When the 1972 LeMans on which the GTO was based got replaced by the new 1973 “Colonnade” bodystyle, the malaise era had truly begun. The hot 300-horsepower 455 CID V8 in that car now only pumped out 250 horsepower as cars slowly and steadily lost power in an effort to improve gas mileage. The new styling didn’t immediately find favor with the public either, and the launch of the Lemans-based euro-styled Grand Am meant that the “muscle car” style-GTO was out of step with Pontiac’s marketing plans for the mid-sizer, so this “Goat” barely lasted a year.
Surprisingly, things got worse for 1974. The GTO lived on for twelve more months as a package for the little Ventura. The sole powerplant was a 200-horsepower 350CID V8; Motor Trend could only get a 9.5-second zero-to-sixty time out of their test car (another magazine was able to get a 7.7-second time from a four-speed example). Beyond the hood scoop and badges, little distinguished this GTO from other run-of-the-mill lowly Nova clones. The idea of a super-compact “muscle car” with virtually no visual pizazz fell flat, and the GTO was now officially dead.
In these dark times, if anyone could resurrect the “Goat,” it would have to be the person who helped create it in the first place. Well, he certainly tried to, at least.
They Got His Goat
By the mid-seventies, Wangers was actually doing more than promoting cars: he was building them. I could say that Wanger’s Detroit-area-based Motortown Corporation was an outside contractor making “muscle cars,” but it’s hard to use that word to describe the vehicles he modified into things like the Mustang II Cobra and Dodge Aspen R/T. Yikes. Ever the promoter, the cars did at least look the part of racy performance machines if you didn’t realize how anemic they were.
Naturally, the old GTO remained close to Wanger’s heart, but a by-then-John DeLorean-free Pontiac division initially didn’t necessarily want to hear of it. However, while 1973-on Buick Regal, Olds Cutlass, and Chevy Malibu GM “Colonnade” mid-sizers were selling strongly, the Pontiac LeMans was struggling in the market. Pontiac internally tried to spark interest in the car with a Bicentennial-themed show car called the All American. White with red and blue stripes, it sounded awful, but legendary GM stylist John Schinella made it into a rather appealing piece with awesome color-keyed honeycomb wheels, air deflectors at the wheel openings, and a tasteful ducktail spoiler.
Wow, that interior. If anyone ever asks, “What were the seventies like?” Just show them that picture.
Despite being well-received, Pontiac felt there was an overload of red, white, and blue 1976 editions on the market then, and the All American went nowhere.
By this time, though, the Grand Am sold so badly that it was dropped from the lineup, and the continued LeMans sales drought caused then-General Manager Alex Mair to finally reach out to Wangers to see what his Motortown facility might be able to do with a publicity-generating special edition LeMans. Unfortunately, Wanger’s initial proposal was an orange-and-black GTO Judge tribute with a shaker hood scoop that Pontiac management instantly rejected. Undaunted, Mair let Wangers have another go at the job with marketing manager Ben Harrison.
Working with Pontiac stylists, Wangers basically combined the All American concept and the rejected Judge mockup into one car. Better yet, this limited-run LeMans was going to have something special under the hood: the new-for-1977 T/A 6.6 liter (400CID) slated for the great Trans Am that would ultimately serve as a blocker car for a tractor-trailer full of Coors beer. Also, you can be damn sure that Wangers would make the connection to Pontiac’s old performance legend (according to Jim, the ad below is the only time Pontiac ever acknowledged the “Goat” nickname in print) with what they would call the “Can Am”.
The ’77 nose was more aggressive and visually worked far better than the “beak” on the earlier cars.
Orange, gold, and yellow stripes replaced the patriotic ones on the All American, while white Pontiac “Rally II” wheels complemented the hood scoop and new rear spoiler. Sure, it’s as cheesy as an episode of CHiPs, but it’s still a rather handsome car that’s not too over the top for the period.
Why did Wangers and the Pontiac team select “Can Am” as the name for this creation? As silly as it sounds, it’s reported that Ben Harrison took scissors to leftover “All American” decals still sitting around from that prototype car of a few years before (scroll up and see the similarity in the font). The letters A-M and C-A-N were cut out of the old stickers and applied to the prototype. Name chosen.
A three-speed automatic was the only transmission option, but the “Radial Tuned Suspension” and fat sway bars helped elevate the lowly LeMans chassis. With only 200 horsepower in a car much bigger and heavier than the Firebird, that W72 V8 was never going to offer old-school muscle car performance. A zero-to-sixty time of around ten seconds was only about as fast as the previous year’s LeMans with the by-then-discontinued 455 V8. Still, it wasn’t horrible for the time and was easily as good as any competitive “sport sedan”. The more important thing is that Wangers and the Pontiac team gave buyers a real, cohesive car; like the original GTO, it felt like a unified package inside, outside, and under the hood, rather than just a few stuck-on gewgaws. Honestly, other than the T/A motor, that was essentially what it was. But it worked. Perception is everything.
The interior is as seventies as a polyester suit, but admittedly has a nice set of round gauges, a cool-looking steering wheel, and typically a floor shift on the center console. It could have been much worse.
There’s a full set of gauges, though not everyone opted for the large tach to replace the massive clock on the left. Actually, the entire dashboard was taken from a Pontiac Grand Prix, something that would ultimately be a point of contention. You see, the Can Am was star-crossed from the very outset.
Unlike the Trans Am, the LeMans body offered a decent trunk and plenty of room for three-across seating in back.
Pontiac top brass still wasn’t feeling this idea of a hot LeMans, but Muir overruled them and approved a run of 5000 cars. Ever the promoter, Wangers didn’t hesitate to push the whole “latter-day GTO” narrative; he wasn’t that far from the truth. Wanger’s premonition about a demand for a modern-day muscle car proved true; it’s safe to say that the Can Am was initially a smash hit. Reportedly, anywhere from 6,000 to 10,000 orders were on the books for Can Ams with Wanger’s Motortown facility briskly converting around 30 to 40 cars a day. What could go wrong?
Everything, that’s what could go wrong. Just as Can Am number 1,133 was leaving the facility, disaster struck. The mold used for making the unique rear spoiler broke, and in those pre-CNC and 3D printer days, it was estimated that at least 90 days would be needed to repair or replace the tool. Pontiac had a few choices; they could have held up production or shipped cars without spoilers before having them installed at the dealership once they appeared. Pontiac executives who didn’t want the Can Am to begin with used this as the perfect excuse to instead simply scrap the whole Can Am program.
There are a variety of reasons cited for this. One is that Pontiac thought the Can Am was cannibalizing sales from the Grand Prix, but I’m not sure that I buy that line of thinking. More likely was the fact that the 1977 “Colonnade” bodystyle LeMans would be out of production in only a few months to be replaced by the new-for-1978 downsized model, for which that spoiler wouldn’t fit anyway. Besides, Pontiac was to relaunch an all-new LeMans-based, enthusiast-aimed Grand Am for ’78 as well, leaving no space for the Can Am.
Shut Down, But Not By A Hemi
You can’t fault Wangers for trying. Somehow, the bad luck of the malaise era was enough to snuff out even the best attempts at performance cars.
With a powerplant nearly identical to the one used as a starting point in the Macho T/A we covered a few weeks back, one wonders how similar performance mods to this big LeMans (including a manual ‘box, rear discs, and even that crazy turbocharger) might have created the ultimate anti-BMW family coupe. We’ll never know.
Looking at the prices of Can Ams recently sold, I was actually rather surprised. On one hand, the $25,000 to $40,000 that reasonable examples command seems steep for a malaise-era car with malaise-era performance. But considering that barely over a thousand units were built fifty years ago, there can’t be that many left today. With Mr. GTO behind the concept, there’s an innate street cred to the Can Am despite its rather tepid performance.
It’s not the fastest Pontiac by a long shot, but in terms of rarity and fun disco-era appearance, the Can Am will certainly turn heads and generate smiles wherever you take it. If Burt Reynolds’ Bandit needed to get eastbound and down with two or three more passengers, it might have been a great choice.
Pontiac Points: 78/100
Verdict: This ultra-rare near-miss with some provenance is way more show than go, but what a show!
Didn’t realize how rare these were. Assuming it was a real example, the only time I’ve ever seen one of these was when I was walking past a car show in Melbourne, Australia.
I remember seeing both at different times as a kid in the 70s. I thought they looked great, being 10 or so at the time, actually performance was not a factor. One of my Dad’s friends had the Can Am, and later traded for a Camaro Berlinetta in the early 80s
Those were crazy times, I’m so glad I got to experience them first hand or I wouldn’t have believed them. On the lot next to the Can Am could very well have been a Luxury Grand Lemons with the same body style, complete with fender skirts, lower body dripping in chrome, a landau vinyl roof, and a dinner sized medallion hood ornament! The fancier Pontiacs of this era always had fantastic dash panels. This was the era you could go to the Ford dealer and see a Mustang ll Ghia wearing navy blue paint and an orange (Chamois in Ford speak) landau top complete with the opera windows sitting next to a white Mustang ll Cobra ll with load orange decals and a fake hood scoop. Gawd I miss the variety of that bygone era!
It’s pictured with my favorite muscle car tires – the Cooper Cobra G/T. However, it seems like the Can Am is a slightly smaller Grand Prix, 4″ shorter wheelbase because it uses the coupe wheelbase and not the 116″ wagon/4door/GP wheelbase. I still prefer the Monte Carlo of this gen (I had a 75 MC as my first car) except the 77 MC had the goofy double headlights while my 75 had the single rounds up front.
They were and still are sometimes available for not nearly as much as they probably should be considering rarity, but My cousin had one, he swapped in a 455 and it was still pretty sluggish. They were pretty cool and rare to see in the wild though and it was no worse than any other midsize “sport” sedan of the era. probably a bit better in most ways I would say.
When I was looking for my first car, these were the types of options that could be picked up all over the place with less than 100k miles on them for under $2000. They were all complete garbage in every conceivable way. These packages were all so sad in that they were impotent and poorly designed appearance packages used to hide the terrible engineering and build quality of the product. The CanAm could be the poster child for why the American car industry deserved fail.
I’ve read many times and many places that Pontiac slipped a 421 into the 1964 GTO for the infamous Car and Driver test. The Colonnade style had a terrible rear end so the spoiler did wonders for the looks.
So this was basically a parts bin special with a giant, but neutered, V8 because 70s and GM. Got it.
Man, I love these things. The world needs more sticker and stripe cars! Really a shame that the spoiler mold broke so early in production, but it was a one-year model anyway. Probably my favorite GM Colonnade car of them all, save for the 1-of-1 test mule Pontiac Grand Am Wagon that one of the Pontiac staffers saved from the crusher.
Stickers, stripes, hood scoops, and white letter tires.
Can we get an Amen!
It was that signature Shaker hood scoop that doomed the Can Am. Shakers are famously celibate, a choice not conducive to survival of a culture. It wasn’t long before there weren’t enough Shakers left to produce more Can Am hood scoops. So, it had to die.
Pthanks for walk down memory lane.
I vaguely remember my crazy uncle having one of these in the mid 80s. Apparently he had a gto he wrapped around a tree one night and got a can am as replacement. My dad still can’t stop laughing while telling the story.
From the ad: “Trans-Am type ‘Shaker’ hood scoop – that really shakes!”
Great way to turn NVH and poor build quality into a feature.
They learned that from Harley Davidson.
You mean Harley “always a really rough idle” Davidson.
Yet another car I would add to my malaise era “performance” car collection if I had Jay Leno money.
Again, look at the Macho T/A with the same mill. Open the hood scoop, and headers and reject the carb and you’ll add 50 horse.
A high school teacher of mine had one of these (early ’90s).
“The ’77 nose was more aggressive and visually worked far better than the “beak” on the earlier cars.”
Lemme just stop you right there.
No.
The earlier cars looked better with the beak, rather than that flat, boxy front end.
Just my opinion, of course.
Agreed. The front end viewed directly head on looks damn similar to Chevy Caprices of the era. And it’s not a good look. Although it is still better than the grills on modern Chevrolets.
What it really needed was a variant of the “NASCAR nose” on the stablemate Chevy Laguna S-3. But that wouldn’t make sense for a low-production car.
It looks better and more well-integrated than the other divisions’ attempts to put the trendy new square headlights on the rounded Colonnades.
That All American interior looks like a bowling alley. From the colors to the shape of the console, it makes me want to type in ‘ASS’ as my player name, dry my hands on the air vent, and go throw some gutter balls with AC/DC on the sound system.
You Shook Me All Night Long on a constant loop.
I can smell the cigarette smoke and the scent of “shoe deodorizer” spray.
And stale beer. Like a Wisconsin Supper Club.
sounds like a great Friday night!
Is that also a whiff of societal decay and racism?
Mark it eight, dude!
I think the styling was neat for the period. It was odd that the GTO dropped down to the Nova body and then disappeared, but GM also dropped the Z28 after 1974 but it did return again in 1977.
I liked the CanAm and had hopes for it to succeed. I thought it had the Grand Am nose but apparently not. Pontiac must have had a lot of confidence in themselves to let 5000-9000 orders walk away. I don’t think the concept would have worked as well on the new Grand Am.
I’m sort of surprised they did it at all when you consider than in fall of 1977 the downsized (and much better driving) 1978 models would be coming out.
I think there was a customized Grand Am of that 78-80 era that was made, but I haven’t dug into the A/G Body Grand Am yet (but considering that I need to do this every week I certainly will at some point)
ALSO, 1977 was a strange year where the full-sized Bonnevilles and Catalinas had been downsized and were the same size as these mid-sized LeMans! The new big Pontiacs had more interior room and admittedly were likely better cars overall than the Collonades.
Ford did the same a year later, my ’78 LTDII matched the wheelbase of dad’s Panther platform Colony Park. Part of me still wonders how to body swap a ’77 T-Bird onto a late police spec Crown Vic frame.
Ford wisely downsized the mid-size cars first onto the Fox platform in ’78-’79. Then the full sizers onto Panther in ’79-’80. That way the full size car was not smaller than the intermediate on the same dealer floor.
Imagine going to an Olds dealer in ’77 and finding the Cutlass Supreme coupe dwarfed the Delta 98 Sedan.
I’m not sure if it dwarfed it, but is certainly wasn’t bigger. Well, on the outside; inside I know that downsized Delta had more space.
Ford downsized the compact/intermediate first. They sold the Fox body a year or so, then downsized the full-size cars to eliminate this conundrum.
Yeah, family had a 75 MC, and then got a 78 Caprice, and the Caprice had more room in the rear seat than the MC, at 6’5″ at the time when I had the seat all the way back there was like 2″ of room behind the front seat, when I loaded up the ladies in HS I had to slide it forward so they could fit back there!
Can someone with more business degrees than me expalain why this is bad? “Pontiac thought the Can Am was cannibalizing sales from the Grand Prix” is not a sale still a sale?
Also, Other than prog rock I hate everything about the 1970s having been 1-11 during that crap can decade of chain smoking pinocle playing polyester wearing unemployed steel working divorcees.
Grand Prix had higher profit margins.
And looked better.
Cannibalism was always a major concern for GM, since they sold the same damn car in so many slightly-different wrappers.
I guess the profit margin excuse made my the other poster kinda makes sense but there are so many companies that sell slightly different versions of cars that do not worry them BMW X#s, subaru forester/new outback/ accent ect. I can see worrying about losing a sale to a different company but if you have 3 cars for a niche and 2 are yours and one is a competitor then is that not good. Oh well I will probably not understand GM think.
GM was a lot more like a holding company for a bunch of autonomous divisions back then. That legacy is still sort of with us with the Chevy and Buick/GMC dealers being separate. The GM presidents realized that they were duplicating a lot of parts like engine development and wanted to wring cost savings from making the divisions less autonomous. Roger Smith took it a wee bit far…..
That was always one of their major flaws. Too many brands, and too many brand managers trying to walk on egg shells around the other brand managers.
Which makes me wonder why GMC still exists when Chevrolet also sells trucks and SUV’s. Many of the exact same product on the sales floors of both brands’ dealers. Sure, there’s a bit more to differentiate them compared to years past.
There’s also no good, sound and logical reason why more dealers don’t just offer the entire GM stable at a single location.
Because the BOP/Cadillac dealer didn’t want to sell Chevy trucks.
The reason GM still exists is quite simple: it’s extremely profitable. There is very little to differentiate it from a plain Chevy, yet they tend to sell at higher msrps because they are seen as “premium”.
And they are sold at different dealerships than Chevy, usually paired up with Buick. So it makes the dealers happy to have a pickup in their lineup.
Yeah, the 2 models had to sell better than just 1 model would have, and cover the production cost differences.
GM has always had that issue, even more so between brands. See Fiero vs C4 Corvette
I see bits of my old 77 Grand Prix in that front end. My favorite part of the story is cutting and reusing the decals.
Me too on the decals. I love that vein of car lore – like how GT 350 has absolutely nothing to do with the particular car and only the most tangential connection to cars in general.
White cars with bright maroon interiors just don’t work. One of my least favorite 1970s/80s car styling trends.
My mom had a red Grand Prix?? with white leather interior. no idea why with 4 kids and 2 dogs.
White on red is my favorite combination. You probably wouldn’t have been happy with the traditional British green on red either. Or the German silver on plaid. Anything but black or gray is my motto.
The Germans used to do silver with red interior, and it was glorious.
Look at the 450SL in the 1978 and ’79 Mercedes-Benz full-line brochures.
Glorious indeed.
Engleburt Humperdink had a 1979 450SL in White over Red.
It was not a completely unusual color combo.
I had a Charcoal Grey Audi Coupe GT (Commerative Edition) with a red leather interior and loved it.
I just bought a used ’13 Highlander, green on tan. Wonderful! The green is muted, but definitely green not grey. The saddle tan interior just pops.
My ’96 Tbird was cranberry over saddle tan.
I was looking at a similar Highlander, in a Hybrid Limited, and that combination is just so unique. The vehicle I ended up with is a Volvo XC90 with Bursting Blue Metallic over tan leather.
Very different feel then any other cave-like something-over-black.
Italians had a thing for blue with red for a while, on anything from a Fiat 500 to a Ferrari.
Right? That 1953 Corvette was a complete failure that lead nowhere.
One person’s opinion.
Dad had a White over Red Opel Kadett sport coupe – followed by a ’78 Ford Courier XLT…
…then I had a White over Red Honda Prelude XE when I lived in Japan…
…after co-driving cross-county in a friend’s Dodge Omni GLH in white over red.
I was also gifted a White over Red 1966 Mustang Fastback toy car for Xmas that year in white over red – like this one:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/226990626627
Perhaps the most famous White over Red car was the Leslie Special from “The Great Race”
https://www.stahlsauto.com/automobiles/1965-leslie-special-great-race-movie-car/
It’s among my favorite color combos.
My first car was a ’78 LTDII Brougham coupe, silver over maroon. Glorious.
Yes the landeu top was maroon.
I think they do. I like most of the 70s/80s interior color combinations over the tan, 2 shades of grey and black now offered.
These motors had “windowed” main bearing caps. They weren’t horrible, but seemed like an unnecessary place to lose weight/cost.
Yeah, the Olds 403 was a steaming turd of a motor, and that’s all we got in California. The 49-state version got the Poncho 400, which was a much better engine.
I know the Colonnade cars’ reputations are being rehabilitated of late, but Jesus Christ they’re all slow, fat, ungainly pigs with the “sporty” versions all being tape-stripe specials. I wonder how many of the people who write about them actually drove them – I know I have, and that’s what made me a fanatic about small, light cars with stiff suspensions and rev-happy engines.
This one’s about the best of a bad lot, along with the Chevy Laguna S3.
Yep, I spent my teen years in the late 80s diving 60-70 cars and I hated them all. My wrangler is a track car compared to those messes.
Had a ’78 Ford LTDII coupe in high school. That Ford platform was arguablely worse. Hoist the spinnaker, batten down the hatches, heave to port.
I actually think these are pretty cool. Sucks it is from an era of dog slow V8’s but something about a 6.6 with a shaker on a glorified Grand Prix is just cool.
Also side note keep it up with the Pontiac Pthursday I have no bias or anything for Pontiacs haha.
Need to spread the love. Yesterday was Mercury Wed. with the cold start.
No reason why you can’t toss a throttle body on there instead of the 4bbl, and then top it off with some compression breathing and you might have a decently fun time. Gotta imagine that some modern suspension upgrades might help with the handling too (although GM’s of that era handle about as well as a rolling couch with tiny casters).