Hi! Section 1-4 p 156 in the 72 assembly manual reads that the bodyside stripe for a W30 was cancelled in March? July? of 1971. I'm still looking for pages 80, 81 in the 72 Olds Product Selling Information Book (covers striping), but everything else I've found says that W30 included a special hood stripe/scheme (because of the OAI hood?) and the W29. package. So why is the wide stripe still used? Why not the side/deck striping shown for a W29 sec 1-4 p152 &154? Does anyone have the Olds documentation that justifies using the wide side stripe despite its' cancellation? Thanks in advance for your time!

 

The W30 striping is the same for 70, 71 and 72. The cancellation notice is not accurate. Maybe they were planning to not offer the W30 in 72 then later decided to offer it. Remember a lot of last minute decisions were being made since the 73 Colonnade body style was originally supposed to be available in 72 but labor strikes caused the 2nd gen body style to be extended an extra year.

 

I think the statement saying the W30 package 'includes the W-25 hood and W-29 option' was just noting those two items were required with the W-30.

I was also surprised to see the cancellation notice for the '72 W-30, not just the stripes, in 1971. Maybe management had originally cancelled the '72 W-30 since banned for sale in California, but then reconsidered for the other 49-states? Would think another notice was issued cancelling the cancellation, which luckily they did.

Wonder why they cancelled the A/C option on the W-30 for 1972? Especially since made an option on the Hurst/Olds that year.

 

Air conditioning and boogety rough-idling cams do not mix well. Plus A/C added weight which in those days was not ordinarily something a peformance enthusiast would spring for.

 

Thanks to all for the input! I agree that there must have been chaos playing catch up after the strike in '70. I can't speak to the Colonnade... still babystepping through the '72 Cutlass S. And I had no idea that the entire option had been canceled! Any idea where I might find it? Is it dated? I'm on a quest for anything not mainstream, and you guys are the ones for that! Again, thanks! And then, when I look at the '71 AM cooling sections there are quite a few revisions. So maybe allowing AC in '72 W30 with a cooling system that was already stressed (implied by all of the changes) and a boogety cam was just too much trouble?

 

All W30 cars were built at Lansing MI, and all 72 Xcode cars included the W29 package in their overall build. The wide body stripe and hood paint for the W25 hood was part of the package, as was the dual exhaust and cutout bumpers. Here are the missing 2 pages you asked for: Below that is the 72 SPECS for W30 which could be ordered on Cutlass, Cutlass S and Cutlass Supreme (convertible only)

 

 

Thanks! But I think the "special paint scheme" refers to the OAI hood (not the sides) as described in W25. The spec book for '72 W29/30 is different (from above) for the S and Supreme; they read "Force-Air Fiberglass Hood with Special Paint Scheme" as though the special part were limited to the hood....

 

You're not reading the text properly. It says W25 hood AND special paint scheme. It's well known that the 72 X body cars retained the wide stripe throughout 72 model production. The SPECS book is not
different from what I posted. That is directly taken from the 1972 SPECS booklet, just cropped.

 

1972 SPECS




And if you read the CS specs for W29 and W30, it is only available for convertibles. Learning to read these documents is a learning curve that takes time.

 

May I gently suggest that you read my previous post, read the W30 descriptions for the models mentioned and then respond?

 

You're correct that the SPECS does say with instead of and with the S and CS models. I can only presume they were typos. Regardless of the cancellation notice on P156 of the AM, the W30 cars of 72 continued to roll out of Lansing with hoods and body sides festooned as described prior to the cancellation notice. I suspect the reason for the cancellation was they expected the 72 model year to be issued as Colonnade coupes and sedans. That didn't happen so they obviously reverted back to 71 production paint stripes. I did go look up the SPECS for 1971 442 (when it was its own model) and the W30 option does specify both the hood and 'wide body stripes'.

I cannot logically offer anything in rebuttal to your comments, just speculation and observation of what actually was produced in 72 as W30's.

 

Again, thank you for your help. We can only speculate as to why they did what when,.especially without documentation. But it's clear that they left the barn with a wide stripe! So there's something that reissued it... maybe it will surface one day. Meanwhile, some of the cancellation pages have a reference to a release document. Any idea if these are available?

 

No speculation. Your answer lies in post #2. The Colonnade body style that arrived in 1973 was supposed to have been introduced in 1972, but due to a long strike, they were not able to launch the new body style until 1973. They quickly made minor changes to the 1971 Cutlass lineup and made them the 1972 model year F85/Cutlass S/Cutlass Supreme, therefore those paint schemes carried over as well.

 

From what I understand, the 66-69 w-30s had a serious cam. The 69 W-32 had a milder cam. The 70-72 w-30s had two different cams, the manual trans had the wild cam, the automatic had the same cam as the 442, and this option could have AC. The 72 HO, being automatic, also had this and could have AC. No AC on manual shift w-30s because of wilder cam. I may be wrong on some of this, but this is why some years, some config, w-30s could have air and others could not.

Edit: in response to

 

 

Cool. Or, not cool, as it may be. Do you know why that is?

I also confused H/O 455 with w-30 engines, my mistake, like you pointed out. Why was AC permitted on automatic W-30s earlier and not in 72?

 

Scuse me Dave, but W29 cars could get AC. I'm not sure what you're getting at with that statement as W29 didn't require the L77. All X code cars had a base requirement to have W29 which gave the grills, deletes on rocker stainless, FE2 suspension etc. I agree that none of the W30 cars didn't have AC, neitjer did the other HO's as you specified.

 

 

Nice explanation! About the 2 cams that were mentioned: does the more radical have one long chamfer?

 

Dave, we both agree that no 1972 W30's were AC equipped. We both know that W30 included the W29 option, so let's not beat on that.
Now about the W29 statement - you DID leave that pretty much wide open to interpret that it meant ALL W29 cars in 72.That was all I was responding to.

Please address this comment. The 28 X code W46 cars that ended up at Demmer Engineering for conversion to the HO. You know that to get HO, the order had to include W30, which also included W29 as a subset of W30. So now how is your comment that no HO cars could be W29 optioned valid. Let's say for the sake of discussion that the Olds production office knew which cars were being shipped to Demmer. They could easily have bypassed certain features of the W29 option on the build, OR they could simply have left the conversion of the appearance (grills, decals, rocker stainless, blacked out taillights) to Demmer.

 

Mr. R, don't you mean that in order to get the X vin the order had to include W30? The AM sec W45-6 page 100 shows the " items that are applicable" for W45 and the L77 W46; Both got FE2. Listed under the " W46 only" is L77 engine package and then "exhaust system only" from the W30 option, So maybe the W46's weren't optioned W29... they just look like it!