What is the best route to go, to do research on how many of my particular Oldsmobile exist?? Both my 1964 Starfire convertible and the 98 2rd coupe are pretty rare. Only 1200 ragtops made to begin with.

JT

 

We can start with this: There is no way possible to find out how many still exist. Do you mean including in junk yards too? Just gauging your scope. But even if you mean licensed (which may not include them all), there is no way to find them all, conclusively. There are lots of way to "research" to find some, but no way to find them all.
This is one question that is asked about all the collector cars, and only a few of the very rare ones have the answer to that question.

 

... Not even them, really.

They still pull heretofore-unknown Ferraris, Dusenbergs, and this Ford GT40 racer out of barns and garages.

NOBODY knows how many of ANY car are still out there, except, perhaps, for some, where they made one or two, and they know where both of them are.

- Eric

 

OK. I'm not totally without knowledge on various avenues to explore. Just wondered if there was an Oldsmobile registry, or something like that.
One friend, was able to contact GM Heritage society for his Cadillac Eldorado.

And the 1960 Super 88, that I did allot of work on, it's owner was able to get a "ballpark" idea, on how many were still around/registered.
He came up with approx. 55 1960 Oldsmobile Super 88 scenic coupes.

Thought of starting/establishing my own Starfire registery. (1961-1965)

JT

 

Please don't omit the '66's.

Henry

In the Corvair world the 1969's(last yr of production of around 5,000) have a lot of research in regards to accounting what has become of them.

 

That's just what I said. "only a few of the very rare ones". Not positive, but I believe the number of '70 & '71 Hemi Cudas are known, for example.

 

If you'd like to start a registry, there is a place to do that at Wild About Cars. And it won't go away when you do. (No offense, but that is a reality eventually, whether we face it or not.)

 

The rule of thumb in this industry is approximately 2% of any car over 40 years old and 1% on anything over 50 years are still on the road but even I can find exceptions to that rule. So much depends on how popular a particular car was when new and how long it kept its uniqueness. There are probably more 32 fords on the road today than were ever built by Ford....Tedd

 

This is just an educated guess based, at best, on original production and scrappage rates. There is no other way to determine a "ballpark" figure or any other degree-of-uncertainty figure for all of the reasons mentioned above.