Pontiac Firebird 400

Firebird 400 at a glance

A pony car with the GTO engine

Pontiac launched the Firebird on 23 February 1967, five months after Chevrolet had introduced the Camaro on the same F-body. To keep costs down, Pontiac engineers had to use the Camaro's front wings and doors, so the Firebird's identity came from its split grille, its tail lamps and its engines. The 400 sat at the top of a range that started with an overhead-cam six; the four-barrel Sprint version of that six was rated at 215 hp.

The big V8 came straight from the GTO, Pontiac's intermediate muscle car, and the Firebird 400 was rated 242 kW (325 hp) at 4,800 rpm in 1967. Enthusiasts have long claimed that a small tab on the Quadrajet linkage stopped the secondary barrels from opening fully on 1967-1968 Firebird 400s, to keep the smaller car below the GTO under GM's rule of 10 lb of car per advertised horsepower. The First Generation Firebird club treats the story as unsettled: Firebird and GTO carburettors often share a part number, and inspections of original parts have produced mixed results.

The 400 package and the Ram Air option

Ordering the 400 brought more than the engine. On 1968 cars the package also included twin non-functional bonnet scoops, heavy-duty springs, red-line wide-oval tyres, a chrome air cleaner, dual exhausts, a declutching fan, a heavy-duty battery, starter and radiator, and chrome rocker covers. The standard gearbox was a heavy-duty three-speed manual with ratios of 2.41, 1.59 and 1.00.

The Ram Air option, US$263 in 1967 on top of the 400, made the two scoops work: they were opened and ducted straight into the air cleaner. Pontiac paired them with a camshaft of longer duration and more overlap, a valvetrain built for 6,000 rpm, exhaust manifolds of the 428 type and a recalibrated Quadrajet. The official rating stayed at 242 kW (325 hp), only reached at 5,200 rpm instead of 4,800. Ram Air cars usually had 3.90:1 or 4.33:1 axles, against the 3.36:1 standard ratio.

400 engines by year, 1967-1969

Each year brought a new top engine, and the ratings rose by small steps that hid larger changes inside.

The 1968 400 HO, a US$76.88 step up from the regular 400, added premium-fuel tuning and stiffer suspension. Ram Air II replaced the first Ram Air in mid-1968 with revised round-port heads, forged pistons and crankshaft and a higher-lift camshaft. Sources give different start dates: Wikipedia cites 1 March 1968, while the club records the first Ram Air II as built on 20 May 1968.

Period road tests

Motor Trend tested four Firebird 400s for its May 1967 issue, and the results show how little the gearbox choice mattered with this much torque.

The wide-ratio four-speed (2.52, 1.88, 1.47, 1.00) cost US$184.31 in 1967 and the Turbo Hydra-Matic US$226.44, available only with the big engine. Car Life, testing a four-speed car in August 1967, wrote that with the flexibility of Pontiac engines a three-speed was "more than adequate and costs less". For scale, Car Life's 1969 test of a Camaro SS396 with the 375 hp L78 and a four-speed gave 6.8 s to 60 mph and 14.77 s over the quarter mile.

1969, Ram Air IV and the first Trans Am

The 1969 Firebird received a new front end and a revised instrument panel, with the ignition switch moved to the steering column. The regular 400 and the 400 HO continued with little change, and the "Ram Air III" name that collectors use for the 1969 HO with Ram Air was never a Pontiac designation. In the middle of the year Pontiac added the Ram Air IV, rated 257 kW (345 hp) at 5,000 rpm and 583 Nm (430 lb-ft) at 3,400 rpm, with 1.65:1 rocker arms against 1.5:1 on the lesser engine.

In March 1969 the 400 also became the base of the Trans Am, the WS4 package priced at US$1,083, with the 400 HO as standard. Pontiac built 689 Trans Am hardtops and eight convertibles; Hagerty counts 55 of them with the Ram Air IV, 46 with a four-speed. The full story of that car sits in our Firebird Trans Am hub. Pontiac rated the same Ram Air IV at 370 hp in the GTO, and Hagerty notes that both figures were probably on the low side. Because the second-generation Firebird was late, 1969 cars were built into early 1970.

Firebird 400 today: what to check

The 400 name was a package, so the engine, its code and the paperwork carry the value. On 1968 cars, the club lists separate engine codes for each version: WZ and YT for the 400 with manual and automatic gearboxes, WQ and YW for the 400 HO, WI and XN for the first Ram Air and WU and XT for Ram Air II. Body codes 22337 (coupé) and 22367 (convertible) apply to every first-generation Firebird and say nothing about the engine.

• Ram Air cars are the rarest: 65 in 1967, roughly 413 Ram Air and 110 Ram Air II cars in 1968.
• The club says its 1968 totals are mostly estimates; firm figures need Pontiac's original billing records, which Pontiac Historic Services uses for its documentation.
• A 1967-1968 400 with non-functional scoops is a regular 400; working scoops ducted to the air cleaner should come with the Ram Air camshaft and manifolds.
• The car shares body panels with the Camaro, so rust repairs and parts supply follow the first-generation Camaro.

The whole Firebird line from 1967 to 2002 is covered in our Pontiac Firebird guide, the engine's original home in the Pontiac GTO story, and the other Pontiacs in the Pontiac catalogue and the American muscle car guide.