The Grand Prix 2+2 (aka Aerocoupe) was a limited production Pontiac that was intended to help race teams better compete in NASCAR. The cars needed aerodynamic help as Ford was cleaning their clocks on superspeedways. The results weren’t all that spectacular, and the effort lasted two years at best, with most of the 1,118 or 1,225 copies coming in 1986. The seller has a nice ’86 Aerocoupe that seems to be lacking for nothing but a new home. Located with a dealer in Gainesville, Georgia, this survivor is available here on eBay for $18,500 OBO.
Besides the Pontiac Aerocoupe, Chevrolet also had one for the Monte Carlo, and Dale Earnhardt found success, winning the Cup Championship in both ’86 and ’87 (but not all his wins were with the “Aero”). The Aerocoupes required a huge rear glass bubble window built into a new deck. A slippery plastic snoot was added to the front, but nothing like that of the 1970 Plymouth Superbird. Pontiac didn’t even put their fastest engine in the street cars, going with a 165 hp 305 cubic inch V8.
As a dealer is involved in the sale of this Grand Prix, the history lesson is short. The car has 61,000 miles and has been repainted once. With a few exceptions, they all left the factory in one color, silver. This one has a matching interior, but red was popular, too. It has a lot of its original paperwork and evidence of its time, going to car shows.
Sporting a new set of tires, this Poncho looks ready to roll. They don’t command the same interest as Buick’s Grand Nationals (same GM platform), but they don’t go as fast either. Is this one priced right for your Cars & Coffee adventures?
Dixon alot of these GP 2+2 and Monte SS are showing up lately on BF. Wonderful looking cars, and cheerful cruisers stock. Ideal models for a re-power if performance is sought after.🏁
A repower is the right decision, I owned a 86 Monte Carlo SS, great cruisers but lacking in the power department. If it were me, I’d get a crate motor with around 300 HP and I’d make it look exactly like it looks now. My buddy has an 83 Camaro Z and put a healthy 350 into it and it looks stock, just the way I’d do it
Imagine this car with a intercooled V6 from a Gran National. Healthy..
I knew a guy who spent thousands of dollars on a Monte Carlo trying to beat a Gran National. My stock T-Type whipped him bad and my GN was about 2 seconds faster. We tried to get him to trade for a GN.
This is one more example of GM killing the Pontiac nameplate. They put out a nice looking car with about the power of a nice lawnmower. This the same year Buick introduced the intercooled V6 Gran National hotrod.
I worked in a Pontiac dealership in the early 80s and the only thing we had anybody wanted was the Trans Am and they were as hard to get as an honest UC salesman.
Pontiac had world class cars in the 60s and then the bean counters and drunks at GM killed the division.
These (and the Monte Carlo Aerocoupes) solely existed to homologate the more aerodynamic nose and rear glass profile for NASCAR, and they required quite a bit of expensive hand-fabrication off the main production line, so GM wasn’t gonna spend one penny more than strictly necessary to make them and didn’t want to make or sell one more car than strictly necessary to meet that minimum production quota.
They knew they’d sell every single one of these limited-production “NASCAR specials” regardless of how they were equipped, so there was no incentive to equip them with higher performance engines or even offer that as an option, since it was just cheaper and easier to make them all identically equipped with their most basic V8.
And yet, for one year, they were sold in Mexico with a 350 and a 4 speed!!
Moparman, I infer you must mean the regular Grand Prix, rather than these 2+2 special editions.
Even the regular 5th-gen (’78-87) GP wasn’t ever offered with a 350 gasser in the US market, tho’ an Olds 350 diesel was briefly an option, and they did offer a Pontiac 301 with a 4-speed for ’79 only. Mexican-market cars may well differ, I’ll grant.
Oops! Got my wires crossed, I was thinking of the SS Monte Carlo!!
Sounds like you had 2 nice Turbo ↩️🏁 Buicks Archie 👍 love them. Got smoked in my stock 89LX 5.0 by a Grand National. Had him off the line…before I knew it, on my left side, and I’ll never forget, my window was down, it sounded like a jet going by. First time I heard a GN at full steam. 👋
cool!
What is the definition of “2+2”? I see it applied to a lot of different vehicles both domestic and foreign. I seem to remember it being applied to a lot to European sports cars in the 1960’s in Road and Track magazine.
Typically, 2+2 means 2 adult-sized front seats plus 2 child-sized back seats that might fit a smaller adult in a pinch for a short distance, nearly always applied to a small, sporty coupe.
For some reason, Pontiac decided to adopt that 2+2 nomenclature for their sporty/performance edition of the full-size ’64-67 Catalina, positioned as a sort of “big brother” to the mid-size GTO, despite the Catalina being anything but small, and its bucket seats in the back accommodating even large adults in comfort. I suppose at least technically it indicates the model was strictly a 4-seater despite the body large enough to seat 6 comfortably in its bench-seated variants.
That heritage may be what led Pontiac to dust off the 2+2 moniker for this NASCAR homologation special (whereas “Aerocoupe” was only used for its Monte Carlo counterpart).
Always thought it meant 2 in the front, 2 in the back Frank. 👍
Hurts me to say this about a dealer, lol, but this is a much much better deal than the over priced rust burger we saw a few days ago. Also a lot better location for most folks to either pick up at or ship from. But what goes a retired electrician know about such things. 🤷🏽♂️😉😉
@Stan Thanks. Here is what Wiki thinks:
Pages in category “2+2 coupés:
A
Alfa Romeo Montreal
Audi TT
B
BMW 8 Series (E31)
C
Chevrolet Camaro
Chevrolet Monza
F
Ferrari 330
Ferrari 365
Ford Mustang
G
Genesis Essentia
J
Jaguar E-Type
Jaguar XJS
Jaguar XK (X150)
L
Lexus LC
Lexus SC
Lotus Evora
M
Maserati Merak
N
Naran Naran
Nissan 300ZX
P
Pontiac 2+2
Porsche 911
Porsche 924
Porsche 928
T
Toyota 86
Toyota Soarer
TVR Cerbera
Frank I’m probably wrong then. Because at least one car for sure is a 2 seater only on that list. Audi TT…
Stan- You may not be wrong. No guaranty the Wiki info is 100% correct. I put it up here to see what other folks thought,
The Audi TT roadsters were 2-seaters, but the TT coupes (aside from the Quattro Sport edition) were 2+2s.
Thanks Sub. 👍