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History / OriginalityGot a question about 1982-1992 Camaro or Firebird history? Have a question about original parts, options, RPO codes, when something was available, or how to document your car? Those questions, answers, and much more!
I have a 1989 camaro badges around the car say rs but I did a vin look up and it’s coming back as a iroc has lo3 engine and a t5 transmission the door handles say limited edition what’s just wondering what you guys thought vin on rpo sheet matches vin on title and vin plate
I have a 1989 camaro badges around the car say rs but I did a vin look up and it’s coming back as a iroc has lo3 engine and a t5 transmission the door handles say limited edition what’s just wondering what you guys thought vin on rpo sheet matches vin on title and vin plate
The reason why the VIN decoder doesn't know the difference between an RS and Z28 is because the VIN prefix that identifies a Camaro is the same between the RS and Z28. The tool would need to verify the VIN against GM's records to determine what RPO codes the car has. Your basic VIN decoder will not do this.
This is the same reason why people get confused with the Pontiac Firebird and Formula. Both share the same 1G2FS VIN prefix and so the basic VIN decoder will not know the difference between a Firebird and a Formula. To do so, the VIN would need to be checked against Pontiac's records to find the W66 RPO code for the Formula.
Not sure what you mean when you say "says z28 and comes back as iroc". If the RPO sticker VIN matches the windshield VIN and the label says Z28, then the car is an IROC-Z. The car appears to have been either repainted and badged as an RS, with the fog lights removed. All IROC-Zs had fog lights, black painted headlight pockets and non-RS badges. Does the steering wheel have a round horn or square horn? The car looks like an RS, but if the SPID says Z28, then it's an IROC-Z.
The door handle stickerzzz were a very popular Autozone / JC Whitney type of "customization" back in the day.
Looks like a RS with the infamous "triangle of death" GARBAGE sir "cleaner" on top of it. What a steaming bucket of monkey plop. Get that thing off of there before it expectedly catches fire or merely melts into a blob of goop and drips down into your carb. I say "expectedly" because it's ANYTHING BUT unexpected, that's just what happens to those.
The air cleaner was just laying around from a parts box I bought just set it on the to keep **** from going into carb when it wasn’t running and also I was saying the Rpo sheet says z28 and I looked up the codes on there they come back as iroc I no it had a paint job my guess is all the ground effect were cracked up and he found these off a rs but this is also my first Camaro so I’m not familiar with these cars at all
At some point, all Z28s became IROCs, for acoupla years. They all had the one RPO, either Z28 or B4Z, can't recall which was kept and which was dropped. There were basically only 2 "levels" of Camaro at that time, the RS and the ... other.
GM's contract with the International Race Of Champions for the use of their name began sometime in 1984, for 85 production year cars, and ran out at midnight on New Years Eve of 1990. For that reason there are relatively fewer 90 IROCs than previous years. For most, maybe all, of those years they ran the car in their series. Here's a few shots you might enjoy from the first year.
I'm guessing you might recognize a few of those folks? IROC itself was a strictly promotional sort of thing, invited the top drivers from NASCAR, Indy, F1, SCCA, and once in awhile some other series (I seem to recall somebody from the NHRA but I can't remember who), to compete in identically prepared cars mostly on the big oval tracks like Daytona and Talladega but sometimes on others (like the old Cleveland airport in that one pic). It had run Porsches previously if memory serves, then the Dodge "Daytona" POS for a few years, then nobody wanted to license the name anymore after about 92 or 3 so they ran Firebirds without a licensing contract for the last few years before the series went belly-up. Which was a shame I thought. The races were mostly a snore except that the drivers showed ALOT more finesse, especially the NASCAR guys, than they did on Sunday afternoons. The F1 and Indy guys didn't stand a chance except for pure dumb luck and the few of them like AJ that ran both Indy and NASCAR and so knew what to expect. They were fun to watch anyway.
There wasn't a whole lot of difference between the IROC and other Camaros in most of those years toward the end of the run. For the 1st few, they all came with a 305 either the TPI which was only available with an automatic or the LG4 (yuck). In 87 they began putting 350s in some of them, never with 5-speeds though. In 88 they downgraded the base model of it to TBI. At that point, about all IROC was, was stiffer springs and sway bars, and of course, ginormous STICKERZZZZZZ!!! Sad, I thought at the time. Not that I was a fan of TPI in the slightest, but at least, it had been "state of the art" for acoupla years. TBI as far as I was concerned belonged only on tractor motors.
Last edited by sofakingdom; 03-22-2021 at 06:40 PM.
From 85 to 87 you could get a Z-28 with or without the Iroc package. The Z-28 was RPO Z28 of course, and the Iroc package was RPO B4Z. ....Starting in 88, and for 89 and 90, you couldn't get a Z-28 without the Iroc package. RPO Z28 got all the Z-28 stuff from 85-87 as well as all the stuff from the Iroc package, just no seperate B4Z RPO.
So then, it was the B4Z RPO that got discontinued, and Z28 simply included the various formerly IROC features, such as the monochrome paint scheme... I found it hard to keep straight then, and as old-timer's disease sets in, no doubt it will get worse...
Looks great and I'm sure a solid car. I'd paint the headlight buckets black and enjoy it. 5speeds are a lot of fun I've been kinda looking for one for a while now for a daily driver.
There is no specific location for the build sheet and it may not even be in the car. The build sheet contains all the RPO codes, which you already have from the SPID, as well as dealer ship/bill info. So while the build sheet contains more info, as you have the SPID and the VIN matches you're not going to get any more answers on your question about the RS or Z28.
So what I'm hearing is you do have an IROC-Z that a previous owner replaced the ground effects from an RS. The ground effects for a 1987-1990 RS are the same as on a Z28/IROC-Z from 1985-1990. The space for the RS emblem can easily be replaced with the IROC-Z emblem for your year.
As was mentioned, the Z28 never went away. The IROC-Z "package" did. In 1985-1987, you could get a Z28 or you could get a Z28 with the IROC-Z package (RPO B4Z). In 1988, GM started reducing models and options and downsized the Camaro lineup to 2 models, the Sport Coupe and the Z28. The Z28 now came standard with the IROC-Z appearance package and suspension upgrades. There was an RS model available in limited markets in 1987 and 1988. The RS wore a monochromatic paint scheme, while the Sport Coupe had colored ground effects like the earlier year Z28s.
The IROC-Z appearance upgrades were dropped after December 1989 due to GM losing the rights to the name IROC, and the Z28 moniker returned on all 1991 and 1992 Z28 models. These two years had a different ground effects than previous years.
03-22-2021, 10:45 AM
