It is always a treat to review an American muscle car in Hong Kong; just the rarity alone makes it worth it. Today, we are reviewing a 1968 Pontiac Firebird. Many, especially if you’re not American, may be more familiar with the later Firebirds, like the one with the huge ghastly firebird sticker on the front ‘hood’. This, however, is the much rarer, and in my eyes much more beautiful first generation Firebird produced between 1967 to 1969.
Part of the ‘pony car’ genre of American muscle cars, where cars were made to be compact, look sporty, and have good performance (best example being the Ford Mustang), Pontiac did not originally intended for the Firebird to be like that. Legend has it that Pontiac wanted to do a smaller two seater sports car, but parent company GM at the time rejected that as they did not want the Firebird to rival to almighty Corvette. As such, the Firebird was made as a pony car instead.
Original base cars came with an inline six engine, but as always there were a variety of V8 engines to choose from, ranging from 5.3L to 6.6L and producing between 250HP to 330HP. Later cars even had the option of the ‘Ram Air’ engine which pushed power to 350HP.
The car today was originally manufactured in GM’s Ohio factory. It was then sold to Connecticut where it spent most of its life until it slowly withered away into a basket case project. In the early 2000’s, someone picked up this project and did a full frame-off restoration that took more than two years to complete. Its original inline six engine was replaced with a later model’s, the Firebird 400’s, engine, which is a 6.3L V8 producing 330HP. Further modifications were made to it, including a camshaft from the Ram Air III engine, so the car is likely making 330HP+ in today’s form.
After the restoration, the car went on and won many awards in different American muscle car shows before it found itself in a second hand dealer in Florida. An Englishman then bought it sight unseen and shipped it to the UK, where he enjoyed it a few years before putting it up for sale again, which is when the current owner bought it and shipped it to Hong Kong. Needless to say, this car has travelled a bit around the globe in its lifetime.
We took the car to Shek O as we normally do, which was perhaps not the best road for this purebred American muscle car. In the beginning it took some getting used to, since the car is a LHD (Hong Kong is a RHD jurisdiction). With a three speed automatic gearbox, there no clutch work to worry about. The story about the car being fully restored not long ago proves to be true, as the car is very solid and the engine runs smoothly and healthily. Power is plentiful and there are no unnecessary pops and bangs or delays in power delivery. The brakes are particularly impressive, giving a very modern feel with ample stopping power.
Other than that, the car has a lot to be desired on tight twisty roads like Shek O. It is extremely wobbly, while steering feel and accuracy is nonexistent. The unmistakable American V8 exhaust note, however, makes up for all of that. After all, this is not a car made to attack narrow mountain roads, but long and straight American highways. Therefore, it would be unfair to judge the car by trying to go fast in such roads. Instead, one should put down the windows, enjoy the breeze, and the potent American V8 note, which was exactly what I did and it was wonderful. It is no wonder that there is a small but strong following of American muscle cars in Hong Kong, a city that would otherwise never be seen as the right place for them.
As always, we thank the owner for the generosity of not only lending us his new pride and joy, but also filming and editing our video, seen below! Also huge thanks to the team for helping out:
Dave (Email: david@lemonadeandgiggles.com)
Alex C. (IG: @nofishshark)
See our review video here: