Nearing end of ground up restoration of 68 LeMans basket case project. I'm now in beginning prefit stages before paint, I'm getting the normal surprises of missing pieces...wrong pieces...etc! Wish car would have been left alone as LeMans but....previous owner must have wanted a GTO! This rig has an Endura bumper which poses the question....did LeMans have an endura bumper option? Also, anyone have pics of the back side of a 68 vintage LeMans or GTO with correct headlight backing plates and fitment. The car "basket" had grills for a 68 LeMans and also two grills for a 68 GTO with no bezels. Kinda heading for bringing it back to the original LeMans but need to determine which direction to head with the parts I have and those I would need to find. Seems like I kinda bought into the proverbial Johnny Cash special of a "one piece at a time" rig! Hindsight is great on what you think you're buying. Any insights from folks out there a lot wiser than me would be appreciated. Really need to get this front end put together and complete.
I think you'd be ahead by going with the LeMans bumper. Easier to mount and line up. And good 68 GTO headlight bezels are hard to find and lots of $$ when you do find them. Not reproduced either.
Sell the Endura and use the proceeds for your missing parts.
Plus side is that the bumper brackets are the same between the LeMans and the non-hidden headlight Endura. I think the headlight backing plates are the same too.
Judging by the interest lately it seems like even 68 GTO owners are looking at using the chrome bumper lol.
If your endura grill/bumper is a genuine Pontiac piece and not a repro, you definitely can get a buyer and a decent price for it. So many LeMans's have been cloned to "GTO"s that surely there are decent LeMans bumpers to be had. If you can't find one near to you, you could try our "last resort", Frank's. Here's his info:
Yup....endura and grills are the real McCoy and very nice...bumper ready for paint too. Used Frank's a few times but there's got to be a closer source. Thx a million for the info and clarification of endura/Lemans correlation.
The parts in my basket case car are the Lemans backing plates....ha...mixed with the endura bumper, I'm again humming ol' Johnny Cash's song of " one piece at a time"!!
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