1988 pacecar information

[Crazy K]

I have a question, if you know the origin of the photos of the 1988 pacecar in a museum, the ones where the car is behind a velvet barricade, and with an engine on display. Basically, where was this photo taken?????? who took it?


I visited (finally!) the Indianapolis Motor speedway...... and went to look at the photo archives for 1988.

so far..... here's what I learned:

1988 pace car replica convertibles were used as parade cars.
1988 coupes were also used as parade cars... and at least some of these had sunroofs!
calais coupes were also used as parade cars in 88, painted in the 88 pacecar scheme, and not the 86 paint.
JIM DAVIS rode in the 49 pace car.

In the prior pictures I have seen, I have isolated only two real pace cars.
1 with race lighting, with HUD, with removal rollbar, with leather interior, WITH HOOD VENTS! with Quad 4
1 withOUT race lighting, withOUT HUD, with removal rollbar, with leather interior, without Hood vents, with Quad 4.
almost ALL publicity shots are of the non-race ready vert.
in the publicity packet that comes with the 50 pacecars (maybe all 250, or ?) is a picture showing two verts under construction whose caption implies that they were the only two cars produced to be real pacecars.
so far the cars I have seen from the photo archives are consistent with these two, However, the archives guy said that typically they have 3 ready pacecars.


the archive guy showed me a picture of a prior year HURST OLDS pacecars.... with EVERY Hurst Olds pacecar (including parade replicas) in a formation on the track. If I dig... and go through a stack of proofs that would sit 6 feet tall... I am hoping to locate a similar 88 image.

[ManicMechanic]

I have a question, if you know the origin of the photos of the 1988 pacecar in a museum, the ones where the car is behind a velvet barricade, and with an engine on display. Basically, where was this photo taken?????? who took it?

Wasn't me, though I recall the scene when I was there in 1988. My mom should still have the pics we took if she can find them and if they weren't destroyed.

[SLAMDIT]

man, removable rollbar....i would love to see how they did that. I have an idea that will work, I just don't ever have time to work on either damn vert. Hell, my car is still in the house garage in the same place it sat for almost 2 months.....one of these days I need to pull something in my shop and attempt to mess with it.

Good info though, does the Indy museum have a cutlass pace car there? My buddie's Dad (Ken, you met Derrick) is huge into mustang pacecars and has a book that goes into detail for every year of the indy 500 about the pacecars....I'm gonna see if there is anything in that book we didn't already know. I doubt it but who knows....

Sean

[kendall221]

The Speedway still has at least one of the 1988 pacecars. I was up there within the last 5 years on Race Day, and they had it out on the track as part of the Pre-Race Festivities. I was actually able to get up next to it and took pictures. I'll see if I can find them and post.

David
'94 with 60,000 miles (recently purchased)

[Crazy K]

The Speedway still has at least one of the 1988 pacecars. I was up there within the last 5 years on Race Day, and they had it out on the track as part of the Pre-Race Festivities. I was actually able to get up next to it and took pictures. I'll see if I can find them and post.

David
'94 with 60,000 miles (recently purchased)

please do! I've been trying to catch it but have not seen it.

[1988PhantomFE3]

I hope you guys are still around!

When OLDS was awarded the pace car project, it couldn't take a car off the assembly line because the GM10 body wasn't yet in production. Instead, Olds delivered to C&C two all-but-obsolete hand built prototypes. Olds admitted the cars were in sorry shape from extensive test work, but "we really don't care about the condition because we're going to tear it apart anyways," said Ken Hart (C&C Vice President).
Three look-a-like show cars also are built, as well as a couple of "mules" for testing various components while work continues on the actual pace cars. *AUTOWEEK MAY 2,1988

The article above also included a photo of 1 car being converted by C&C with a time stamp burned into the photo, 7 29 '87

I have a photo (Counts, artist rendering) of the 1988 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme Public Relations released then received on NOV 27 1987. This rendering has a completely different rear spoiler with NO front airdam, and large yellow flags mounted on the back bumper. I know the actual pace car was build with strobe lights.


Therefore it's quite possible that a total of 7 ACTUALL PACE CARs are or were around. My list of total replicas(with VIN#s) from Oldsmobile given to the Speedway goes as high as 278. These are quite different figures than what most have come to believe, 2 actual pace cars, 50 convetible replicas & 200 Hardtop replicas. I have both front and rear 1988 Indianapolis 500 Official Pace Car license plates numbered 259.

I'll have these documents scanned if anyone is interested.

[1988PhantomFE3]

Here are photos of the car you mentioned(says Al's Olds Page in corner of pics). I even found one photo of a replica hardtop with a sunroof like you mentioned.

I have other pictures from the web, and I think there are at least 4 1988 pace cars (1 now gold) that I can guess about. I look at the suttle differences, like the red hood emblem, color of the rear decals, etc...