Little known “Royal Bobcat” 1969 Pontiac GTO

[Lakota]

Here’s the little known “Royal Bobcat” 1969 GTO produced by Royal Pontiac in Royal Oaks, Michigan. The Royal Pontiac dealership was considered the Yenko equivalent of the day & they had a few versions you could order through them. They also sold speed parts through the mail.
Since GM still had a corporate ban on engines over 400ci outside of full-size cars, these cars were ordered as rolling bodies from Pontiac & shipped to Royal Oaks minus engine & transmission. The factory DID however, build the Ram Air V engines specifically for Royal Pontiac & shipped them in crates separately to get around the ban.
A prototype car with the 428/390 hp(underrated) Ram Air V engine was clocked at 11.5 seconds at 123mph in the quarter mile with a 0 to 60 time of 5.2 seconds! The Royal Bobcat GTO package also got you a Crystal Turquoise paint job with white stripes & badges. Very few were built & very few remain today.

[6spdC6]

Ah the Bobcat. We had at least one Bobcat in Albany in the mid 60s. Albany at that time was a hotbed of illegal street racing. I most definitely had first hand knowledge of that!

It was built to to appear to be a 389 tripower car. It was rather quick for a GTO of that era. The owner wanted some work done on the car at my buddies speed shop and we found out why it went so well. It was not a 389 it was a 421 poising as a 389. Car was quick and we made it a bit faster.

[GTOguy]

Ah yes....the Crystal Turquoise Car. Thanks for posting!

[ricks327]

Bought a 66 GTO in the 1990's and it had the Royal Bobcat stickers on the front fender. It didn't come from Royal Pontiac, per the PHS document but then a lot of folks put those stickers on their GTO.

[TheHammer]

Hmmm, never heard of them.

[Onebadcad]

Dood I knew in middle school had a bro who had a Goat, nice car for its day.
ICNOO!!

[WydGlydJim]

Hmmm.............didn't know about those........very nice looking car. Sounds like it went like stink! thanks for posting

[AUTOHOLIC]

In 1977 my good H.S. friend an I were buying a lot of old muscle cars and reselling them for extra money. There was a guy in our small town that always had nice used muscle cars that only kept them a year or so. We bought this car from him. It was a 1970 GTO JUDGE CONVERTIBLE RAM AIR IV 4 SPEED that we bought for $1400.00. It was a nice rust free car in good condition. Now at the time we had no idea what we had. We lived in a small rural town in the NW corner of Illinois about 150 miles from Chicago. I ran a for sale ad in the Chicago paper for $4400. and a guy and his son came out from one of the suburbs to look at the car. I started selling cars right out of H.S. so I naturally started to “qualify” the guy asking him what he did for a living and he said he was in the car business. After probing further I found he was a Pontiac dealer. Now this guy was all over the car and I had no idea what HE was really looking for but I knew he was check the authenticity of the car. He made a lowball offer on the car and I said “I know you certainly know more about these cars than I do but I do know they couldn’t have made very many like this so if you want it the price is $4400.” He shut up and bought the car. In 2004 there was one at the BJ auction in Scottsdale. I was looking at the info sheet on the car and it said “1 of 17 GTO JUDGE CONVERTIBLES MADE. Then later I found out that there was no record of how many RAM AIR IV were made in this configuration. That car sold that day for $450,000. Since then they have sold for over $850,000.

[Don Rickles]

Snapped this picture a couple weeks ago. Could it be a real GTO? And what year…..? Possibly available


Not to high jack …..

[GTOguy]

Originally Posted by ricks327

Bought a 66 GTO in the 1990's and it had the Royal Bobcat stickers on the front fender. It didn't come from Royal Pontiac, per the PHS document but then a lot of folks put those stickers on their GTO.
Attachment 97629

Royal Pontiac sold their Bobcat kit through the dealer and magazines. It was under $100. Anybody could install it on any Pontiac anywhere. Came with special thin head gaskets, ignition and carb parts, etc. Good for a half second or more over a stock car. So your car COULD have been bobcatted.

[GTOguy]

Originally Posted by Don Rickles

Snapped this picture a couple weeks ago. Could it be a real GTO? And what year…..? Possibly available


Not to high jack …..

That is a '68 GTO. The VIN on the firewall will start with '242'. To verify.

But it looks like an honest old '68 Goat to me. Be advised you can spend 60k to restore a car like this and end up with a car that is worth about 40k. Condition is everything.

[OnPoint]

Cool rig.

[ricks327]

Good friend has a 69 GTO convertible in excellent shape and he went with us on our 2018 Hot Rod Power Tour, Long Haulers.

[GTOguy]

Originally Posted by ricks327

Good friend has a 69 GTO convertible in excellent shape and he went with us on our 2018 Hot Rod Power Tour, Long Haulers.

Attachment 97653

That is a 1968 GTO in your photo.

[Aerovette]

[GTOguy]

Balding guy with the bouffant 'rock star' hair band doo for the win!

[roadpilot]

My first new car. 1969 Pontiac GTO coupe built strictly to street race.
No power anything ,4 speed. Cost under $2900. I remember puting
Corvette rims on the back because they were wider and AR's in the
front. Fast car.

[StudleyJames]

Originally Posted by roadpilot

My first new car. 1969 Pontiac GTO coupe built strictly to street race.
No power anything ,4 speed. Cost under $2900. I remember puting
Corvette rims on the back because they were wider and AR's in the
front. Fast car.

Your car must have looked alot like this one.

We are finishing up a frame off restoration on this one (for the original owner) He came back fron NAM and ordered this one, Ram Air III, 4 speed with posi rear end. no power anything, doesn't even have any gauges except for the hood mounted tach and fuel gauge. He orded it for strickly racing, today it has only 61,000 miles on it.

[roadpilot]

Originally Posted by StudleyJames

Your car must have looked alot like this one.

We are finishing up a frame off restoration on this one (for the original owner) He came back fron NAM and ordered this one, Ram Air III, 4 speed with posi rear end. no power anything, doesn't even have any gauges except for the hood mounted tach and fuel gauge. He orded it for strickly racing, today it has only 61,000 miles on it.

Nice car. I got rid of the red lines tires. I have never liked them . When
I bought the 66 vette , they had red lines and I gave them away.

[Torqaholic]

Never owned a GTO. Guess they were all taken when I was car shopping.