You don’t have to travel to the Galapagos Islands to find extinct birds. You can go to Billings, Montana to look at this 1980 Pontiac Yellow Bird. The Yellow Bird was part of a run of models of the Firebird by Pontiac between 1977 and 1981 along with the Red Bird and Sky Bird. This car is listed here on eBay with a starting bid of $6,450. With five days remaining in the auction, the car has not received any bids yet. The car looks well used and unrestored.
In the late 1970’s and earlier 190’s, Pontiac produced the Red Bird, Sky Bird and Yellow Bird package based on the Firebird Esprit. The Red Bird was produced in 1978-1979 and, of course, was all red. The Sky Bird was made in 1977-1978 and was painted in a light baby blue. The Yellow Bird was option code W73 and was built in 1980 and 1981. Unlike their more powerful brethren with W72 400 cubic inch V8 engines or turbocharged 301 cubic inch V8 engines, these cars were targeted more toward comfort and style rather than performance.
The Yellow Bird was painted with a two-tone Yellow scheme with matching color coded snowflake aluminum wheels. We believe most cars came with a camel interior. This example has the deluxe hobnail interior which is showing some where on the seats. The dash is also cracked from exposure to the sun. The car is equipped with the 155 horsepower 301 cubic inch V8 engine which had just enough power to get the car to move along and cruise nicely down the highway. While this car does not have the gauge package that was included on the Trans Am, it does have air conditioning and an automatic transmission.
A distinctive feature on the Yellow Bird that most people miss is the tail-light treatment. The lenses were blacked-out and featured Yellow horizontal lines. This car has the 1981 bird emblem added to the rear fuel door that only came on 1981 Firebirds. Overall, this car looks well used and worn out. The car has over 100,000 miles on it and is said to have minimal rust. Prices of these cars in excellent condition are around $10,000 so I doubt the starting bid is achievable for the seller.
Back in 1980-1, I was about 7-8 years old and obsessed with cars. On a family trip to Florida to visit grandparents, I BEGGED my stepfather to get a cool rental car, and it turned out to be a Firebird Yellow Bird. I loved that thing, and wound up washing it in my grandparents’ driveway nearly every day, just because it was the closest a young gearhead could get to taking ownership.
My tastes have changed—a lot!—since those days, but I appreciate the memory…especially since so many of the people in it have since passed on.
The song ‘Pull up to my bumper’ by Grace Joans comes to mind. That’s a sweet looking rear end.
I have managed to see examples of each of these special editions but in my opinion they walk that line between unusual and ” rare does not always equal valuable “.
This one ? I would buy it, if the price was low enough, and then transplant a much more powerful engine. The blue and red editions ? I wouldn’t bother with as they are very unattractive in my opinion….but then, I like yellow cars.
These “color” birds were very popular in the late 70s. I remember seeing them everywhere in suburban Chicago. They seem very peculiar now but they fit perfectly into their time.
If I had to guess the order of popularity it would be blue, red, and then yellow. I didn’t Google that, that is just on memory.
I would’ve ordered a ’78 Blue Bird with a 400 T/A drivetrain, a 4-speed, WS6, and the lowest special-order ratio I could get w/ a Safe-T-Track diff. That would’ve been the baddest Blue Bird ever and would be worth a fortune today.
It also had t tops.
Not sure if any old cars ever got a yellow interior, but that would be something – on this car.
Gus, the 400’s were in short supply already in ’78 & were reserved only for select formulas & t/a’s – & for for bluebirds, much less yellowbirds.
oops typo above – & NOT for bluebirds
I have seen all of these special color Firebirds, liked the red & yellow versions, but did not care for the Blue Bird, just the incorrect color of blue. Have nor seen any of these special Firebirds for quite awhile.
The Yellowbird has a camel tan with raised hobnail seats interior,very nice.
These cars were popular with the ladies.
Just amazing to me to remember that so many cars did NOT come standard with gauges – a Pontiac Firebird with no tach – Camaros were the same. These days my son’s Hyundai Accent – the cheapest Hyundai – comes with full gauges!
It was a way to be able afford a performance car, say a stripper formula(with power nothing!) for less money – sometimes cheaper aftmkt gages were later fitted by the owner – same with radios.
I have not looked at recent cars, but i have never seen an analog voltmeter or oil pressure gage on most imports of the 70’s-90’s, except for high end cars like supra, nsx, etc.
& the usual import temp gage hardly ever had numbers on
it, unlike, for ex., the t/a’s temp gage over the years.
Does the above Hyundai have analog oil pressure & voltmeter gages? I don’t even see one on the modern Challenger.
Oddly, the 2nd gen camaro(even z28) i believe was never avail with an oil pressure gage, but you could get a clock – dumb.
Also odd that for the 1st gen camaro, if you got a 6 cyl & a console, you still could not get tach or aux gages! lol
You had to get a v8.