Yep, that's how the car looked until someone at the dealership added the derby tops to the poverty caps before delivery to try to make them look like the rallys the owner ordered and was expecting when he got there to pick up his new car.

Maybe someone will come up with documentation at some point stating to substitute the XT with trim ring and COPO type cap until 14x7 YJ Rally's are produced.

So, you’re thinking the error at the factory was that the correct argent wheels for rally’s were installed, but they mistakenly included poverty caps, rather than derbys and trim rings? Wonder why the dealer didn’t order the correct derby’s and trim rings?
And if the other speculation is correct that the car arrives at the dealer with the correct rally’s, and a salesman ‘borrowed” them for another car, why weren’t replacements ordered?

A derby will not attach to a XT wheel. These are not Rally Wheels.

No, I believe the factory didn't yet have 14x7 rally wheels available when this car was produced, so they substituted the standard 14x7 steel wheels with trim rings. When trim rings were ordered on standard steel wheels, the wheels were painted silver at the factory. (as these are) The factory shipped it with the silver wheels/trim rings with standard dog dish caps, and the dealer got the brainstorm to add the derby tops to the hubcaps to try to make the wheels look like the rally wheels the customer ordered but did not get. i don't believe any wheels were swapped from anything, the wheels it has are what it was built with, and derby tops were screwed to the base hubcaps at the dealership prior to delivery.

Trim rings would not change the color of the wheel. They would still be body-colored.

That is correct if it left factory with wheels configured with P06/trim rings. These wheels are painted argent silver like a rally wheel. The fact remains after discussing this there are two opinions:

One opinion is it couldn't have left the factory with XT wheels painted argent silver with trim rings as a substitution due to YJ rallys unavailable that early. 20 years have passed and YJ rallys dated for the build date of this car have not been found.

or

XT wheel substitution was made at the factory due to availability, and the wheels were configured to somewhat replicate a rally.

To me(opinion) the bottom line is these are the wheels that it came from the factory. They were painted argent silver with trim rings.

All of us would love to solve this anomaly.

Time to hitch a ride with Marty mcfly

Or simply ask one of the "Doc Browns" who were there and managed the factory.:biggthumpup:

i am going to assume that camaro and firebird kinda followed the same build, so i have owned numerous 69 trans ams over the years and a few (3 or 4) still had the original plain steel wheels with their dog dish hubcaps on them. everyone of them also had trim rings on them. a couple of them i bought from the original owners and i asked about the trim rings and they said they were on them when they bought the car off the dealer lot. so my question is did the dealers throw the rings on them to make them look better or did they actually come from the factory with them????

I think they came that way from the factory. If they had not I think the rims would have been blue body color.

if you had a buildsheet would it show the trim rings or would that be just a default build when it showed the XT rims? im really curious as i have a couple of 69 ta's that came with the regular wheels and poverty caps.

A 69 SS without optional Rally Wheels would just have XT rims painted body color and the center cap only. No trim rings.

Very cool thread I hadn’t read until now. I love weird, “incorrect” things the factories did on these old cars. Just reiterates that imperfect cars were being made by imperfect people who were just working for a living, not making 1000 point cars to be judged.

I think I’d probably have to put the “weird” wheel setup on the car, be that the goofy caps or the dog dishes. That’s what makes a killer survivor car the special car that it is, but that’s just me. Charley, thanks for sharing.

Trim rings were available on any 69 Camaro without hubcaps as RPO P06.
I don't know if they were included or optional on Firebirds.
http://www.camaros.org/options.shtml#wcovers

Hey Charley could you please check the underside of your console lid is either flocked or not flocked?


http://www.camaros.org/forum/index.p...=19715.new#new

It’s flocked

Cleaning up nicely.

----That blue deluxe gut is so cool, Charley!!! They repop blue floor mats. Might look really good.....Bill S

I like the Sun Tach in console. Nice touch. Cool day2 ride

I love this Camaro!! :Can-I-Have-It:

:Can-I-Have-It:

Back to the wheel discussion. Can you roll one of the wheels that came on the car and sit it next to a Argent Silver rally to compare to see if its Cortez or Argent? Still don't recall whether or not this was confirmed.


And thank you for posting the console lid photo.

The green wires above the heater box are for the amp gauge. Goes from the small wire off the positive post of the battery,thru the gauge and then to the power block behind the battery.

Just noticed the routing of the windshield washer hose and had the chuckle. Steve said it was like that when he had it. I’ll just leave it for conversation.

Here is the original spare out of the 25k mile Ss and the orig spare out of the 24k mile Z28. Same Argent silver.

Whelp at least that answers that. Thank you



One more question. Do you or Steve know if the heater hoses are originals? First time I've seen GM logo on both. Very cool car. You suck.:beers:

Thanks Charley.....now I can finally get some sleep....

Paul

I think Steve put the top heater hose on 20 years ago.

That actually is RPO HW01, super-duper rarer than hens teeth Hot Washer option! :smirk:

Way cool car!

I purchased the car from Bob Cobb in 1999. He purchased from original owner Gerald Nelson in 1981. I made contact with Jerry and agreed to bring the car to a show at the Monmouth County Fair he was hosting as the Parks Commissioner the same year.

I took this picture and had him explain the hideous hub caps. I have a wave file of him telling the story of the hub caps(can't seem to get it to play). The other picture is with the dog dish caps with Uniroyal Tiger Paws which is my favorite look for the car.... The last picture is circa 1980.

I kinda like it.

It's about time. If you like the look, then enjoy it. They are part of the car's history.

I like the white on the front fender extension.

1st design D90 lasted until early November '68.

My 11B Van Nuys also has the extended stripe. Thats car is looking really sharp Charlie no matter what wheels are on it!!

In the vein of this thread, I have never seen a '69 Camaro with this style of wheel cover pictured here. They look like full-size Chevrolet car items.

Here’s another example of trim rings on what appear to be XT wheels. Pretty sure I recall the Lemans Blue ‘69 RS ZL1 Camaro wearing the same wheels in old photos.

.