I am beginning to restore my 68 442. I discovered the inner wheel wells have 2 4 inch round holes cut very roughly in them. My 68 cutlass does not .this is not a W 30 car. My question is should the 442 have the holes and what are they for / Thanks for the insight.

 

Sounds like someone was trying to install W30 scoops. Regular 442's do not have holes cut in them.

 

I assume these are black inner fenders.

As noted, it was not uncommon back then to order the O.A.I. hardware from the parts counter and retrofit the system. This was shown in may car magazines back then. Alternately, it's possible the front end was swapped after an accident. Contrary to today, back then these were just used cars. Again, it was not uncommon to see W-cars in wrecking yards in the early 1970s. I certainly saw more than one.

 

Pretty much every one of them passed thru a wrecking yard, probably.

Black plastic fender liners only had a 4" OAI hole if originally used on W31/RamRod cars, right?

So you have either red plastic W30 pieces [my car had one, painted black...]
or W31 black ones, or
Std issue black ones that some PO modified.

What makes you assert that the car is not a W30? Got AC or power brakes?

All the factory OAI holes I have seen were very rough finish, they did not even deburr the holes at the factory.

 

Also 1969 W-32 cars.

 

This car was wrecked in 1973. With out a doubt the replacements came out of a junk yard and from a wrecked w30 car. The inner wells are not painted red nor is the car a ram rod. I am very grateful for all the help I have received from you.

 

They can't be from a W30 or they would be red

I assert that maybe your car is/was a W30, and needed the holes for scoops. Therefore the holes were put into replacement black liners.

What proof do you have that the car is not a W30? Such evidence might include...
VIN stamped Auto Trans that is not OW code
Protecto Plate with contrary information
power brakes
Air Conditioning
etc.

 

the '68 does not have power brakes or AC it does have an auto trans at this moment I am away from the VIN to see the #

 

I am hearing
-real 442
-no PB
-no AC
-OAI holes for air scoops

which all adds up to "W30 can't be ruled out"

It would be exceedingly rare for a real '68 442 to have manual brakes unless it is a W30.

I suggest you look into this very closely, maybe when you have more info at your disposal.

Start with the Trans. Find the tag midway in the RH side, clean gently and read the info stamped in. Then find its VIN stamp in the LH side of the case, in the as-cast flat area just above the pan gasket. See what info that offers.

Or, maybe you get lucky and the Protecto-Plate is in the glovebox... or the broadcast sheet is under the rear seat.

 

But...

You are also hearing "black inner fenders".

Sorry, but it's MUCH more likely to find a 68 442 with manual brakes than an undiscovered W-30.

 

The inner fenders I assert are whatever replacements were handy when the W30 front end got replaced. Needed holes, so got 'em.

A regular non-W30 442 would have had power brakes.

Prove me wrong, OP. That's what I am here for, to learn.

 

Not unless RPO J50 or J52 was selected. The base 442 came with manual drum brakes, as did all A-body cars in the 1968 model year. Were power brakes a commonly-installed option? Of course, but by no means were then installed on all 68s.

Sorry, Chris, but there are too many people out there who think their car is something it isn't. My cynical side maintains that if the OP doesn't know the car is a W-30, it probably isn't.

 

Just throwing this out for conversational purposes, as Chris said, we're here to learn. On my 69 W31 it had a red PS inner fender liner & a black DS (both pierced in the same haphazard fashion). When I restored it, was stripped to bare metal I saw no evidence of any metalwork on the frame, or fender areas...never figured out why it had mismatched liners....but it did.
...There are more things under Heaven and Earth Horatio....etc...etc

.o2c

Brett

 

I agree with Joe (what else is new?). I've seen enough regular 4-4-2s with manual drums to make me believe that it's much more likely that that's how the car was born than that it's an undiscovered W-30.

 

I heard from another guy today that he has seen manual-brake 442's of the era. In light of these experiences, I am inclined to believe that it is more common than my experience has been. Then again, I worked with mostly common Cutlasses and the like. Not 442's, but family cars.

So, we are still at "maybe it is and maybe it isn't a W30"
Trans stamping and ID tag info would help.


"My cynical side maintains that if the OP doesn't know the car is a W-30, it probably isn't."
=================
Cynicize all you want, Joe... I had my car for years before I even knew what a W30 was, and more years before I found out how to prove it and then found the proof. This Original Poster here sounds like about my level of knowledge when I started... entry level.

Just on the probability and statistics, I agree that "a" 442 is unlikely to be a W30... but the thing to do is investigate, if the owner cares enough to.

 

Yeah, but you and I grew up in that prehistorical time before Al Gore invented the interwebs. Heck, in the late 1970s these were just used cars. There weren't BJ auctions on cable, nor numerous books on restorations, nor any of the multitude of resources available today. Keep in mind that Classic Sixties Magazine (the predecessor to Muscle Car Review) didn't start publishing until Jan 1983.