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BY GEORGE ELLIS AND BARRY BRAZIER 

   Last issue, you'll recall we drove one of the wildest Pontiac concept cars 
ever: the tricked-out "Firefox" Trans Am [FROM THE EDITOR, October '89]. 
Having sampled this car and another by the same automotive specialties shop -- 
the 20th Anniversary Indy Pace Car -- we just had to visit the Farmington 
Hills, Michigan, facilities of PAS Inc. 

Jeff Beitzel, president of PAS, has his hands full of Firebirds these days, 
including a car that's set up for top-speed runs as high as 230 mph, plus a 
couple of unique Pace Cars: a convertible and an all-out engineering exercise 
dubbed the 3.8 HO. All the cars belong to Pontiac except for the ragtop, 
which is Jeff's personal ride and one of only two topless Pace Cars made. We 
watched PAS's drivers put these cars down the strip and around a road course 
so we could see just what magic has been wrought with these F-platforms. 

------snip of 3.8 HO details----- 

Now, there's truly a wolf in this pack, and it's the red-and-black twin-turbo 
racer. It meets IMSA safety specs and gobbles the road faster than most 
anything else road-legal (or sane) we've ever ridden in. 

The heart of this car is a fully tweaked 5.7-liter that makes 605 dyno 
horsepower at 5000 rpm and puts out a massive 700 lbs.-ft. of torque at 3200. 
Warp speed, Mr. Scott! Fitted to the mill are 16 fuel injectors, three Buick 
GNX fuel pumps, two siamesed GNX intercooler cores, two air meters (only one 
of which reads, as mapping both to the chip would be a nightmare), and a long 
intake runner with short plenum runners that add to the tremendous low-end 
torque. A factory water pump and a Modine one-off racing radiator keep things 
cool. 

Inside the block you'll find Carillo steel rods, forged pistons, three-stage 
rings, and the piece de resistance: a pair of Brodix high-port aluminum heads 
with stainless steel valves and dual springs. The compression is a modest 
8:1, but don't try to feed this hairy mill any octane less than 100. 

The black Firefox GTA we drove at the Pontiac 1990 model introduction is very 
much like the red-and-black car, only without the turbos. It's still our 
favorite setup for the street. 

Like the HO, the twin-turbo and Firefox are both equipped with the 6-speed ZF, 
which delivers buttery-smooth shifting. The twin-turbo is currently running 
3.73 gears in its Dana 44, and at the strip it turns in 12.80s at 122 mph. 
The turbos don't kick in hard, so PAS doesn't brag about O-to-60 times. But 
they do brag about top speed and handling. 

On their last outing at TRC, they brought home a 184-mph timeslip. Taking all 
the parameters of the engine and gearing, together with the airflow 
capabilities of the stock body, Jeff Beitzel projects the top speed of the 
car to be 226 mph. Watch for this one to try for some speed records. 

Like the HO, safety is paramount aboard the twin-turbo. It's built to meet 
all IMSA specs, including a fuel cell, chassis-mounted rollcage, harnesses, 
on-board fire extinguishing system, rear-mounted battery, and racing disc 
brakes and suspension. 

So what does the future hold for cars like this? We asked Jeff and Scott, as 
well as Pontiac's product engineering manager George Collins and public 
relations rep Randy Fox, who showed up for our test session: Will we see 
these drivetrains and suspensions in production? 

The Pace Car is history. Fifteen hundred were made, and that's that. Two were 
convertibles, but because the convertible components belong to Chevrolet, 
those will probably be the only two. Some owners of the Pace Cars are 
stretching for the limits, adding aftermarket goodies in their search for 
additional performance. And there will not be a PAS-built 5.0-liter or 
5.7-liter twin-turbo GTA -- 'not now, not ever!" emphasize Beitzel and 
Collins in chorus. The reasons are simple: They can't warranty such a car; 
they don't know what its life span would be; and they just don't want or 
need to put such an animal on the road. 

Pontiac stresses that the PAS cars are factory upgrades built for the 
purpose of testing the strength and durability of various suspension 
components. Until the next generation, Pontiac will make the best of the 
solid rear axle and A-arm front suspension system, making refinements as 
they go along. In 1993 or '94 we'll see a whole new Firebird package, quite 
probably with an independent rear and a bevy of other tech tricks. And GM is 
testing various derivatives of 3.1- to 4.5-liter engines, many with multiple 
valves per cylinder. These could play a big part in both normally aspirated 
and turbocharged versions. With the various turbo cars coming from Chrysler 
Corp. and the Japanese over the next year, the Firebird will be pressed to 
answer the challenge with equal performance and durability. 

What we may see soon is a production version of the Firefox -- just the one 
we want to see on the dealer floor. A 350-cubic-inch, 330-hp V8, the 6-speed 
ZF, and Dana differentials are readily available from off-the-shelf pieces. 
The car is beautifully balanced and seems to be well worked out. The 
prototype we tested gets to 60 mph in 5.6 seconds, which is what it takes to 
compete with the new crop of Japanese and German supercars now arriving. Our 
drag-strip tests posted a best run of 13.38 seconds at 103.5 mph. 

"Out of all the specialty cars we've done for Pontiac, this [the 5.7-liter 
TPI car] is my favorite," says Gregg Palm, development engineer and director 
of operations at PAS. "It's a real-world car; you could use it every day. 
It's not temperamental, and you won't have to go to the airport for gas. And 
with the 6-speed and the 4.10 rear end, you can run the stoplight grand prix 
and then shift into sixth to drive cross-country, and you'll get reasonably 
good fuel economy. 

The black Firefox also gets around the corners with style. The Goodyear 255 
shaved S-compound tires get the car well above Ig on the skidpad, and Gregg 
believes an experienced driver could get 1.2 to 1.3g, since the car is set 
up much like a showroom stocker. 

Brakes are Brembo racing discs and stopped the car from 60 mph in 137 feet. 
More work in this area is expected to get the deceleration figure down to 
1.5g from its current level of 1.02. 

It's feasible that this dream Pontiac could become more than just an 
engineering exercise -- and if it does, the line begins right here. The 
black Firefox embodies all that Pontiac has stood for since 1964, and as the 
reins are given to a new generation in '93, it would be appropriate to leave 
an indelible impression of the great F-3 on the automotive world. Indeed, as 
new emissions and economy regulations loom on the not-too-distant horizon, 
the Firefox could possibly be the last of the purebred musclecars.  Don't 
forget that.