Alrighty y'all, got a good one for you. this car went up for sale and it's a rather nice looking car.
it's claimed to be a 71 W30 car and it looks the part but the engine was swapped some point in it's life.
the car does have an original window sticker that shows it has the W-30 option package and the vin on the sticker
matches the tags on the car. the thing though that caught my eye was the G heads and the engine number does not match.
same goes with the transmission. OW tag but the tag looks a touch too clean for an original car. so do y'all think it's a car
with a heart transplant or an elaborate fake?

 

The number on the transmission suggests that it is the original.
I am interested in hearing what others are thinking with regards to the front fender on the passenger side.

Where is this car listed for sale?
Is there a photo that shows the entire water tower?

 

the car is for sale at American Steel Classic Cars in Celeste Texas. here is the link to the ad https://www.americansteelclassiccars...oldsmobile-442

 

It looks like what I would expect after 55 years...

Agreed.

One of the previous sales ads say there is also a copy of the original broadcast card.

 

Thanks for the sale information. The photos are interesting.

The Rear Axle is problematic.
The rear sway bar appears to have been removed.
The rear control arm reinforcement links are present.
The frame rails are a mess.

 

Internet currently says its off the grid. This company above must be off the beaten path....

 

It is being offered and sold on a yearly basis of late, not sure how that plays into the equation.

Here is 2024


And here is 2025

 

Celeste, Texas. Look for the water tower.

 

Hum, interesting. the ad has a video of the car and the video is a year old. so the person who bought it at the mecum auction sold it to this dealer in Texas only a year later? seems a bit odd but i guess
people swap cars all the time. i do like the fact that it's a very clean car.

 

Good eye HydraMatic. I was wondering what you meant by complete pic of water tower. But left it alone to make my point. (did look at the under the hood pic incase I missed something first though... )

 

I think the guys that want a taste for what these models were about do this... Guys here seem to keep there cars forever for the most part. Maybe that 71 has not come into the hands of a true Olds guy that has the room and will cherish and keep. Otherwise playing hot potato with a car is a bad sign ...

 

Nothing wrong w/the P side fender. Kudos to them for the BAT influence on the pics...they didn't skimp on the number of pics.

 

that's what i was thinking. when someone dumps a car that fast either they found something they liked a lot better, needed cash fast or somethings really wrong with it.
it looks the part but the fact that the engine was replaced definitely pulls the value way down from what it could be. although i like it i'm a bit suspicious of why the last person ditched it so quick.

 

I think he was asking about the 70 style flat ridge vs. the 71-72 style on the driver side. I think I have heard that the left over 70 fenders were used until they ran out as long as the car was built before January 1971. Is this correct?

 

Not completely correct - not uncommon for '71's to have one or both flat ridge fenders...even those built into 1971.

 

Good to know.
Thanks

 

A '71 W30 I have long term knowledge of in the original owner's family had both flat ridge fenders.....and it was a March or April '71 build date.

 

Yes, the different style fenders raised my curiosity.
Thanks for helping us recognize the details.

 

I’m pretty sure this car is somone on the site as he offered it to me about a year ago he wanted 58k. I forget who it was.
maybe he will chine in.
he told me it was his friends car he inherited and was doing a few last things on it before he fully advertised it.
I think the trans is correct not sure why the sway bar would be missing. It does look like the rear was out and paibted or exchanged out.
The only problem about buying a car like this is you will get no history most of the times from a dealer and you have to start from scratch.
Is it a real W 30 in my eyes I’m no expert but I believe so and the engine does hold back the full value plus you gotta love bittersweet inside and out. I do like the color with a white interior would be nice and white stripes.
I was almost thinking about throwing an offer in on it as I am always looking for that next 442
I don’t see what’s wrong with the frame just looks original? Someone said it was a mess? And the passenger fender I think it looks out of shape from the pic maybe not. Other than the 215 wrong size tires looks like a nice car for 40 maybe 45 but with the dealer there are fees and tax.

 

some one removed the correct rear axle
THAT is the "buick corporate" letter A 8.5 with different rear cover "scallops" not used at Lansing as far as i know..
and the anti sway bar

 

Yeah, I was wondering why there was no sway bar. I did notice it was not an Oldsmobile rear just did not mention it. Like why wouldn’t you put the sway bar back in???

 

It was me that said that the frame rails were a mess. Perhaps my criticism was overly harsh.
Have another look and let us know what you think.

Seller's link:
https://www.americansteelclassiccars...oldsmobile-442

 

For those that are interested, here is a brief history of this car. It changed hands about 3 or 4 times since 2017 including Mecum auctions. It was first listed here on ClassicOlds TWICE before the flippers took ownership of it. Of-course, every time it changed hands it got cleaned up and detailed some more and the price kept going up.
.

 

I am of the opinion that the value is hurt by the engine being off by more than the VIN. If it were just NOM, I would be more ok with it than also having to source missing H heads.

I am of the opinion you don't buy a 69 H/O without that intake and the D heads, and you don't buy a 71 W30 without the intake and the H heads.

 

Here are pictures of the SAME car back in 2017:
.

 

The window sticker has the blotches, wrinkles, rips, and folds that are typical of the modern fakes that have been "aged".

To remove an original, you had to spray it with water, allow the water to penetrate the paper, wait for the glue to soften, and peel carefully from the glass. Many of the real window stickers from that era still had some discolored traces of the glue that held them on the window.

Yes, some would have continued to soak them in water to eliminate the glue. So the absence of glue residue is merely suspect, it isn't an automatic indication of a bogus sticker.

But the most obvious indicator of most fakes is that if someone had taken the time to follow those procedures back in the day, they would not have crumpled the wet sticker into ball and then tried to flatten it out. They would have dried it flat and put it in a file folder with the rest of their car documents.

An additional indicator of fakes is that the ink from the IBM 1403 line printer that the factory used to create the window sticker would have faded differently from the remainder of the printed label. In this label, both have the same intensity.

 

Without the H heads and intake, hard pass at the asking price.

 

See this link to an old thread from 2017. Same car was also discussed a year later at a separate thread when the 2nd buyer listed it on eBay in 2018, eventually sold in the low 30's

https://classicoldsmobile.com/forums...0-sale-117352/

Tagging: @70Post @11971four4two @69CSHC @HydraMatic @Jetfire62 @JOHNNYOLDS442 @Koda @Loaded68W34 @VC455

 

Yeah, I am seeing a car without the W-30 drivetrain, so in my mind it is just a Cutlass. What made a W-30 different from a Cutlass? Does this vehicle have those parts that made it different?

 

Beautiful car, regardless of pedigree. Based on the equipment seen, it appears it may very well be a W-30 based on the transmission partial VIN. My own 71 442 was originally bittersweet with white vinyl top/stripes and black/white interior. Anyway, like was mentioned, the things that made it a W-30 really was the drivetrain. Sure, it's likely still got its tin can uninsulated trunklid, and a few other W-30 pieces, but it's essentially a modified 442 at this point as Fun71 mentioned (442 was still a separate model in 71). Pretty clean and fairly nice, though.

That "original" window sticker is a re-pop at best. I can tell by the lettering. It was done with a computer-generated font. When the IBM printers literally hammered out the letters, they utilized black ink ribbons similar to the typewriters with spinning reels of letters/numbers, just bigger, meaner, and faster. Harder hits made darker letters, and vice-versa. The lettering sometimes started fading at the end of a ribbon's life, along with the hammers not being perfectly aligned causing some variations of height, spacing, and darkness intensity. But in the example shown, note the "N", "E" and "A" in particular. Every single one of them has the same fading and spacing and alignment from the typeset. They're clones across the page. Almost too perfect. And those IBM printers were far from that. I'm not poo-poo'ing the attempt, but to try and pass it off as an original is rather irksome. Just call it a repro and stop the gaslighting attempt.

I blew it up a little and lightened it to highlight the glaring similarities of the individual lettering. You can see this is a repro. No two ways about it as far as I'm concerned.

Original magnified:




Lightened to highlight the letter fades:



Speaking of built-in letter fading, here's a sample I did just for fun a while back. Note that every alike letter/number looks like a clone of each other. Same as in that "original" window sticker. Looks pretty good at first glance, but a closer look reveals the details...

 

Thank you again for the amazing details you constantly share with us.