Buick NightHawk & Free Spirit Factory Drawings

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Buick NightHawk & Free Spirit Factory Drawings

Postby stage169 » Sun Jan 25, 2009 4:44 pm

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Re: Buick NightHawk & Free Spirit Factory Drawings

Postby spyderman1977 » Mon Jan 26, 2009 2:34 am

Brian for what it is worth the 77 and up Regal and Century Free Spirit cars were either solid black or white with oposing colored decals. I bet that would explain the black or white decal color listed for the 77 car. The think that gets me is the fact that they show the long Skyhawk varied color decal. The big brother cars only had "Free Spirit" decals with a small Skyhawk usually under the script near the top of the fender close to the door. Some of the Century pic's I found had the script decal close to the front side marker light with the Hawk decal in the same general location as that of the Regal. I am also thinking that after 76 the wheels we body color with the exception being the Regal after 78 which I think got the regular 5 spoke style mag found on most Regal's in that time. The Century I think had body colored hubcaps over plain steel wheels. Im not 100% on the Century though as its been a while since last looked over those pics.

I think the only true way to actually find a 77 Free Spirit Skyhawk would be to find a 77 only Buick Parts manual. I have a 75-76 only Parts manual that shows the physical car for illustration purposes. The 70-81 Parts book I have doesn't give any diagram locations but does give part numbers. There are also NO pics of any Buick cars anywhere in the book. There is a page listed near the front with what I would consider "Most" RPO codes for Buick's built from 70-81 including the big Buicks with the Astro roof. I think there are a couple of different listings instead of just C06 for the Astro roof.

I wonder if a 77-78 model book was ever made? That may be our only hope. In some ways I hope that there is a 77 or later Free Spirit Hawk but then again that would mean I would have to add another car to the collection lol. I still need to locate a Nighthawk if at all possible.

Wonderful info Brian.

By the way if you want I can send you the VIN numbers to both of my 76 Skyhawk's. Both numbers fall within the listing you sent me from Sloan. Remember that both cars were built within a week mid model run. Also both cars share the same cowl plate trim break down. It did take me and Doyle about 2 years to chase down another Pewter Gray 76 Skyhawk. As far as the New Car Purchase form that Sloan was listing I doubt that it would have a box for the Free Spirit option. I am thinking that on the 75 New Car purchase form's that there was a box on the back near the bottom for special order options where the dealer could pen in different options not listed. I will have to see if I can find the scan of the 75 form I have. At the time the guy I bought mine from didn't have the 76 forms so I only ended up with the 75.


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Re: Buick NightHawk & Free Spirit Factory Drawings

Postby stage169 » Mon Jan 26, 2009 9:44 am

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Re: Buick NightHawk & Free Spirit Factory Drawings

Postby v6buick » Mon Jan 26, 2009 10:36 am

spyderman1977 wrote: I still need to locate a Nighthawk if at all possible.



There was one that someone on V8monza had found and the guy didn't want to sell it.

There was a alot of pictures of it on there, does anybody remember that??



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Re: Buick NightHawk & Free Spirit Factory Drawings

Postby stage169 » Mon Jan 26, 2009 11:13 am

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Re: Buick NightHawk & Free Spirit Factory Drawings

Postby v6buick » Mon Jan 26, 2009 11:43 am

No, it was a NighHawk. I was thinking it was in California.

It was in great shape too, something like 50 or 60,000 miles.

I think it was the guys Grandmas car or something along those lines.

There was one on ebay too, but it was in bad shape. I think it was wrecked on one front sideor needed a front fender.

I have alot of pictures saved on 4 zip drive disc, but the computer that as that drive needs a hard drive to run. Maybe I can get a zip drive that uses the usb port in the next week and see what I have saved.


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Re: Buick NightHawk & Free Spirit Factory Drawings

Postby stage169 » Mon Jan 26, 2009 1:31 pm

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Re: Buick NightHawk & Free Spirit Factory Drawings

Postby v6buick » Mon Jan 26, 2009 5:18 pm

Thats one.

There was one around here about 20 years ago. Then it was gone. Then I saw the door from it one that was in the junkyard, it was rusted bad, dented too. Car was junk. That was about 10 years ago. It was the only one I ever saw. I really like to know how many NightHawks were made. I would bet it was a really low number.

Ben
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Re: Buick NightHawk & Free Spirit Factory Drawings

Postby stage169 » Tue Jan 27, 2009 9:03 pm

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Re: Buick NightHawk & Free Spirit Factory Drawings

Postby fyrftr50 » Thu Jan 29, 2009 11:32 am

Dam, this is some good information. It is possible that this is the RPO Code for the Nighthawk, the striping codes could have been an alternate for something, or maybe a delete? Regardless, the W's and Y's were usually for the special edition packages and it seems likely that they would have 1 code for the nighthawk decals, and not use a stripe code for the entire package. I'll have to sit down and look thru all my info, and stuff posted and see what I have going. I've never taken the time to really seperate all the Buick info I have into models (except the Road Hawk, because I have one) and checked it out in detail.
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Re: Buick NightHawk & Free Spirit Factory Drawings

Postby stage169 » Sat Jan 31, 2009 9:48 pm

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Re: Buick NightHawk & Free Spirit Factory Drawings

Postby fyrftr50 » Sun Feb 01, 2009 10:45 am

I guess you can't send the pics to me for my ownpersonal collection of pics eh???
Bryan
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Re: Buick NightHawk & Free Spirit Factory Drawings

Postby spyderman1977 » Sun Feb 01, 2009 3:00 pm

Brian it was possible to get a Free Spirit Decal option on the Century and not get the varied colored graphics. The 78^ cars never to my knowledge got the varied colored decals. It was only the black on white or white on black decals. The Free Spirit option was offered on the Regal's and Century's cars after 78. The 77 model I don't know for sure as I never found any pics of a 77 car period. Also I was in contact with a guy in the Mich. area with a 76 Pace Replica Century that had a set of decals made for his car. He lost the color code info for the varied color decals and the place where he had the decals made also didn't keep the info either. He told me that he got the info from the Sloan Mus. but was having a difficult time trying to reach them. This was back when I first pick up my Free Spirit and I think the at that time the mus. was changing hands.

Also as far as I can remember there was atleast 500 Pace Repilca's that HAD to be built in order for it to meet the Pace car requirements for INDY. I think the Pace Car replica's didn't have to have the T-tops as there are pics of them without that option. The only thing I think that you had to get in 76 was the Pewter Gray body color and custom red wheels.

I think on the window stick the option list a couple things as part of the Free Spirit group. I know that on the 75 New Car Purchase form ( or Whole Sale Order ) that there was an area or box left blank for special ordering. Also there was recommendations as far as body color and interior colors but none that HAD to be with one color or the other. Basically you could order any interior color with any exterior body color. Buick made recommendations but didn't force a customer to HAVE a color combo. I haven't been able to get a 76 New Car Purchase form yet but I think that Sloan is now offering them with the package you can now get for the early 76 cars.

Brian why do you think there was a prototype Free Spirit? There are no suspension mods for any of the cars except for maybe the Pace cars. The only real changes to the actual Pace cars was the turbo v6 option. Buick already had the v6 in the Century that year so all they had to do was make it fit under the hood. As far as I was able to find out was that Smokey did a lot of work with Buick to get the v6 motor up to where Indy was needing it to be. I don't know exactly how much work Smokey did with the turbo setup but I am sure he had something to do with it. It appears that Smokey did a lot of work on the Buick v6 afterward's in the late 70's.
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Re: Buick NightHawk & Free Spirit Factory Drawings

Postby stage169 » Mon Feb 02, 2009 8:59 pm

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Re: Buick NightHawk & Free Spirit Factory Drawings

Postby spyderman1977 » Tue Feb 03, 2009 1:23 am

The varied colored decals refer to the different colors related to the door and partial quarter panel decals as well as the small decal located on the side rear view mirrors. Why there was a varied colored decal on the mirrors is beyond me. The 75 Century cars were mainly red,white, and blue. There were also some that were solid blue with white decals but those were the NON Pace car replica's. The 76 Pace Century had a special one off custom T-type top that was not carried over to the replica cars. The 78^ pics that I found took a ton of digging and I think they were saved on my old computer that crashed. I was also in contact with a guy from the Buick.org board that had a restored Replica Pace car. That is where I learned that Sloan had the color code info for all the colors used on the door decals. The door decals on my car are faded especially in the red and purple color areas. The red colors are going to be the hardest to match with out those codes.

On a side note the comment made about not having a very good pic of a show quality Skyhawk has kind of got me bent out of shape a bit. Maybe he would rather use the photo's of the car that Ben found many many years ago in Indiana that looked in far worse shape then mine. I guess I could send him a pic of how the car actually looked when I brought it home with all the surface rust. I did cover all the surface rust with primer to keep it from getting any worse or causing any more damage. Also it was nice of him to post the pic I sent to Bryan about the factory pic of a Free Spirit.

Here is a link to some early pics of my Free Spirit.
http://www.geocities.com/spyderman1977/Skyhawk.html
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