Hello

I am new here sorry if I posted in the wrong section but really wasn't sure where to put it. I have a 1999 Trans am and I am thinking about getting a 3rd gen Trans am gta or Iroc z. Should I keep my 4th gen or get one of those? I am more into the classic look I love both generations just cant decide any suggestions would be appreciated.

Thank you

 

Find a nice 3G body and transplant the engine,trans,and rear from the 4th gen into the 3rd Gen. Best of both worlds!

 

I wish I could do that but I don't have the money to do that right now sadly.

 

Since you're asking in the "detailing and appearance" section of the forum, it implies the cars' appearance is a key factor. That's really personal preference. I prefer the look of the 3rdgens, but that's just me.
I like the look of the Firebirds up until 1990 when the nose changed. From 1990 onward, including into the 4th gens, I preferred the Camaro.


I've always been impressed with 4th gens. I thought they were an amazing performance bargain and it was a shame when people didn't buy them. I used to dream of owning one when I was younger. If I was shopping for a car, I still wouldn't mind looking at one.
But my main draw to the 3rd gens is that they're much more mechanic friendly. That makes a car more fun to own in my opinion. As fast as the 4th gens are, the idea of working on one just fills me with dread. But working on a 3rd gen is something I'd look forward to. That tells me where I belong.

 

Thank you for replying. I think I like the classic look more. I will try to find a nice third gen and if I can afford an engine put an ls1 one in it like the one comment above suggested to do.

 

Search Coparts.com. You can find whole donor cars for the cost of just a drop out engine.

Don't over look 4.8 and 5.3 LS engines either, they can make great power and come WAY under a LS1, plus, down the road, when you want more power and your budgets get fatter, all the acc and such will bolt onto a bigger LSX. Good luck.

 

Why would you suggest putting a 4th gen rear in? It's no stronger. Some will say it's weaker than the 9 bolt (if it is it's not by much). It's definitely weaker than the dana 44. Only real difference between the 3rd and 4th gen 10 bolts is the width.

 

It'll make finding wheels easier. It'll give him better rear brakes if he chooses a LS 4th gen. He's already worried about budget, so what do you want me to suggest? A 3k dollar Strange S60?

 

its stronger than the 1990 and earlier rearends because the axle is thicker.imo the altimate camaro is a third gen with a lsi conversion.the only problem with the 5.3 conversion is it won't fit under the stock hood without camaro lsi parts.btw id trade mine in a minute for a 1969 convertible.

 

Can you put the new ls9 engine in? That's my goal is to save up for that

 

honestly, it depends. do you still like your 4th Gen, and is it in good condition? if you're still happy with it, it doenst make sense to bail on a good car only to re-invest with an older car that is FAR more likely to have mechanical problems. not to mention, it can be tough to get a third gen on par with your 4th Gen's LS1 performance. so if you like the 4th Gen body style, and you want something cool, it would make more sense to get a WS6 hood and a nice wheel & tire package for your '99 and do some bolt ons.

i had a 4th Gen (a '96 Z28) from 1999 to 2011. in my case, i was just completely sick of the 4th Gen's bulbous, plasticky body style, not to mention all the little check engine glitches. the LT1 isnt THAT much faster than an L98 (your LS1 is a considerable technology/performance advantage.) anyway once i got my 3rd Gen on the road with heads, cam, full-bolt-ons - a mild performance build, it at least felt faster than my full bolt on LT1, and i MUCH prefered the attitude and body lines. a few bodylines notwithstanding, a 3rd and 4th Gen arent that disimilar. keeping them both would have been too redundant of a statement. and, as i said, i wasnt really liking my 4th gen anymore so i sold it.

for you, i would say:

• if you like the looks of your 4th Gen, keep it and make good mods.
• if you want to sell it, and get a 3rd Gen, whether you plan on modding or not, get a NICE 3rd Gen to start with.
• depending on what you can get for your '99, you may be not too far from crossing over to an '89 TTA (Turbo Trans Am.) you would not lose much performance, if any, and you would have a very rare and special car. those can be had for 10-15K. low twenties for mint ones.
• alot of people get "Trans Am and GTA on the brain." truth be told, myself and alot of people find the 88-92 Formulas to be the sleekest and sexiest looking 3rd Gens.

can we see pics of your '99?

 

Yes will upload some this evening I actually did convert it to a ws6 but I am starting to like the 3rd gens more because my first car was a 91 Camaro rs and this is my 2nd car I saved it from the original owner. I am kind of getting bored with it

 

 

Sorry for some reason it doesn't come out straight. I took these pictures from my iphone and uploaded them through tinypic

 

IMG]http://i41.tinypic.com/2qkqmix.jpg[/IMG]

 

IMG]http://i41.tinypic.com/2qkqmix.jpg[/IMG]

 

A 3rd gen rear is adequate for a stock LS1 street car. If budget is a concern there's no need to replace it right out of the gate. A front brake swap would be a much better place to spend time and money IMO

Is the axle shaft thicker or the tube? Because it's deflection pulling the ring gear away from the pinion that causes them to break. Thicker axle tube will help that. Thicker axle shaft will not.

 

Why choose one over the other? Do what I did and have one of each.

 

Nice Trans ams you have. I might be one of those people who needs help lol just love muscle cars to much wish I could have one of each.

 

I would love to have one of each eventually that is my plan, but I personally would never be able to give one up for the other....

I say if you cant afford to have em both or just don't have space or whatever your situation may be I would suggest keeping your current car especially if it isn't giving you any trouble.

Most thirdgens on the market right now are going to be major projects (unless you pay over 5k) seeing as how they are all 20+ years old and most have been treated bad.

That is my

Oh and by the way nice looking car

 

the 4th Gen Trans Am that you have looks to be a nice car in very good condition. personally, I just am not into that body style anymore (I used to be) because I find those cars bulbous, and plasticky. however, if you do like that body style, then I don't recommend selling off that car and buying a 3rd Gen {if performance is a goal, getting a third gen to even match your '99 will be a project in and of itself, and performance aside, 3rd Gens almost invariably require more maintenance regardless of how well kept they are. } and if you just want to spice up the car you have, as Carlos's ride illustrates, the right wheel/tire combo can really do wonders, even if a car has a hit or miss body style.

if you no longer are getting any pleasure out of owning your 4th gen, then before you buy a 3rd Gen, you should ask yourself "what is the one car you wish you had" (don't say Ferrari or some crap) and look into buying that car - i'm thinking older muscle car. maybe it is a 3rd Gen and that's what you should get. but if its a 60's or 70's muscle car, you should get that - even if it means you will have a project that takes you years to build.

 

Thank you for the compliment I take good care of it .

 

I might wait until spring to see if there are any more cars up for sale that are nice most of the ones I have seen on craigslist are junk. If I cant find a good one I will probably keep mine or if someone wants to do a trade. I have found one that seems to be in good shape has 40,000 miles on it and wants to do a trade for mine. He's asking 7500 for it.

 

I agree with most everything you said. I hate the 85-90 ground fx TA's and GTA's... looks like someone put a big sheet of corrugated metal on the front of the car. The Formulas are way sleeker and look far better, just my opinion.

But that aside, I'd say you're almost decided, but maybe you're worried about reliability and performance concerns. The performance concerns are easily addressed, potentially at the expense of reliability, but more than that, I think if you've got a 4th gen THAT nice, you can easily get a 3rd gen that nice or nicer with the money you'll get from your 4th gen. The difference between a 3rd gen youll love and one you're going to hate is whether or not you try to cut corners or you grab a super nice one from the start. Get the nicest one you can get.

The only problem you may run into is you can easily find yourself al ow miles, mint 3rd gen performance model that's WAY slower than your 4th gen, and making performance updates to it is going to significantly decrease its long term value. So you may want to try to balance it a little so you get a car whose value wont be horrendously destroyed after something like an LS1 swap. It's not easy to get a TPI to 300hp, and it's not cheap to hit 350+hp with any Gen I sbc fuel injection system. It's easily done, it's just not cheap.

The TTA is a really interesting option. Those really are quite special. I would suggest getting a 91-92 Firebird or Camaro, they had a lot of the best parts on them, but the looks of both can be polarizing. I love the late birds and hte late Camaros... the 91-92 Z28 high rise wing gets a lot of hate, but it sure does turn heads and people always seem to love them when they see them. Note the 91-92 cars of both varieties are by far the most rare in the big picture. 1990 was a half production year, but when you consider there were roughly 60,000 Z28's per year for most of the first several years, and through the IROC years they averaged around 20,000... and somehow by 92 they only made 5,000 Z28's, they are pretty special in their own rights. They made less z28's in 1992 than they made Pace Car edition Z28's in 82.

And I agree these cars are incredibly easy to work on. GM does some stupid bonehead things here and there, but at least you can get to things.


Check the classifieds here. We are a picky bunch and we all are pretty harsh on what these cars are worth. You can get some great deals here. Be careful for the 80's cars, as they only had 5 digit odometers. That 40,000 could easily be 140,000. So just be aware of that. And remember these are getting old, you HAVE to check for rust. If you see ANY rust, you need to split. For the money you'll have you dont need to put up with rust. A real 40k mile car is going to be worth enough money that you may not want to daily drive it. You'll lose a lot of the value of the car in dailying it every day. You definitely wouldnt want to make any serious performance mods if trying to maintain the value of it is important to you. Cars always make for terrible investments, but especially these older cars. You can easily spend twice what the average 3rd gen is worth for a nice one, drive it a few years, and it be worth the same as every other 3rd gen out there. Do some awful carbed truck 350 swap and it's suddenly worth less than the average 3rd gen.

$5k-$7k should net you a really nice example. $10k+ should net you something REALLY special if you wanted to go that route.

 

cool. if you are new to Third Gens, TGO (Thirdgen.org) is a great place to get opinions on whether or not trading a perfectly good LS1 Trans Am is a good deal for a 3rd Gen or what a fair asking price for the car in question is.

 

I'll tell you right now, It is relatively safe to say that no two thirdgens are alike, therefore test drive MANY thirdgens before you buy.

Negatives

Be prepared to spend hours:

-tracing down and pin pointing the spots where water leaks into the car.

-Adjusting windows to eliminate leaks, and wind noise.

- Tracing and then fixing interior and even exterior rattles.

-Heavy a** doors is another. They can be pretty hard to shut at times.

-Most importantly be prepared to realize that you might eliminate many of the leaks, rattles, and noises, however it might not ever be up to par with an average "modern" car.

Those are the biggest nuisances of owning a thirdgen in my opinion. I have been able to eliminate almost all the leaks, squeals and rattles, but am still working on it. All of the negatives I listed might not seem like a big deal to others, but to me it truly took away from enjoying the car, especially on road trips.

Also, TTOPS are great and all, especially on summer evenings, however I would have probably gone with a hard top if I had to do it over again. Hard tops tend to have less squeaks, rattles and leaks.

All in all, I love my car and will continue building it. Thirdgens are becoming unique, you don't see many of them. That's probably my favorite part of owning one.

Would I go from your T/A to an average nice thirdgen? No.However I would definitely drive a LSX thirdgen all day before I bought your LS1 T/A though.

 

I think you'll find that you're right, most of your gripes are typical T-Top car issues. I dont have any water leaks in my car. When i wash it if I spray water just right I can get a little in my passenger side window, but it's never been enough to drip to the window sill regardless of what I do, just a few small drops at the corner. My car has a few small rattles here and there, but most of those are inside the doors and I dont care enough to do anything about them. Pretty easy fix with foam if you take the door panels off but rattles dont bother me.

The other thing is, I imagine (hope) the late 4th gens were better, but the early 4th gens I've been in were WAAAAY worse about pretty much EVERYTHING than my third gen is as far as noises and rattles and terrible interior flimsiness. The heavy doors should be about the same as the 4th gen cars too, but I think that's not a big deal even if you have fresh hinge pin bushings. Most of the things you mention are 4th gen issues too I think. But the main thing is unlike the 4th gens, the 3rd gen T-Top seals are on average 10 years old and 10 years more likely to leak. It may be better to stick with a hardtop car... Depending on what he wants.

Also, your car was recently repainted before you got it. Do you know if they re-used the old weather stripping? Did they buy new GM weather stripping? Or did they use new aftermarket reproduction weather stripping? That could make a pretty big difference.

 

No mods?

4th gen > 3rd Gen.

Why? Because drivetrain.

I prefer 3rd gen styling, but I will not deny that I LOVE a RA WS6. Specially in black.

 

That is why I love 3rd gens to I think they look more like 60's and 70's muscle cars and that's really want I want but I cant afford them but 3rd gens I can and sadly I do not have the tools and money to build one that is my dream though. I actually would rather build one then buy one that's complete

 

Thank you everyone for replying will wait till a nice one comes along and sell my car. Little off topic but does anyone have or know where I can find the 1991 Camaro rs sales video? The Camaro was an rs and it was red. Someone put it on YouTube awhile ago but it was removed.