I love the way my '89 GTA hood looks except it's old and has a few dings. I am looking at aftermarket fiber glass hoods, but most seem to be of the cowl induction form. I would really like a fiber glass glass that looks exactly the same (or very close) to my current hood. Does anybody know of anyone manufacturing these? As a last resort, even a simple hood (without the cowl induction part) will do. Any links/info are appreciated.

 

us body source has a stock fiberglass firebird hood but not the hood style with the vents on the front (like the one in the picture). hope this helps and good luck on your search.

 

Cool, thanks for the link. The Firebird stock hood they have looks nice and clean so I might go with that. The other benefit of the GTA hood is the extra cooling throught the hood openings. Seeing how Firebirds get all the cooling from underneath the car, some hood openings would've been nice to have.

 

mine is just a trans am but to solve the cooling problem i bought the ram air II hood from ram air hoods . i got my car in the paint shop right now. hopeing i can get it back for saturday. but i got the functional hood, not stock but it gives the car a new "pontiac" look with the nostrils but still retains the muscle car look, and serves its function to cool off under the hood and ram some air to my carb. it might not be what you're looking for but its not a boring cowl (no offense to cowl hood owners but i want something different). i'm sure you've seen it but pic...

 

Don't be fooled.. the 'gta hood' vents are just decorative... they don't do jack ____.
Same thing applies to the Trans AM fender vents.

 

Do you know average weight savings vs. a standard steel hood?

 

about 50lbs. or more. i know the steel camaro hoods weigh about 100lbs. my dad's harwood weighs in about 50lbs. so i would think that a stock firebird hood would be a little lighter and the fiberglass hoods even more so.

 

Sounds like a ram air hood is the way to go. I actually found one I like at americansportscardesigns. One last concern would be around the increased drag the hoods generate because of the two raised vents. I think I read somewhere the Firebird has a drag coefficient of .31. How much increased drag would this add to the chassis? I suppose only way to truly know is with a wind tunnel. Since I doubt aftermarket hood makers actually perform such tests, I'm wondering if anyone has done any measurements on their own. My main focus is not about looking good, but getting faster lap times at the track.

 

for aerodynamics than a fiberglass flat hood is the best, for cooling run a bigger radiator and dual fans.

 

Would the Ram Air hood do it's job to add a little more power by cramming a lot of air into the carb in the short distance traveled while drag racing? If it would I would suggest you get that one for the extra bit of power it adds.

 

Unless you plan on doing over 150mph the slight increase in drag will be nothing really. The only aero effect I would worry about is turbalance/vortec increase, the RA2 hoods are high enough that they could disrupt the flow over the top of the car, raising the air cusion layer above the rear spoiler, reducing any down force it has (although except for the stock camaro and the late 80's firebird aero wing most spoilers are netural wings generating no down force) And most aftermarket wings are not in the air cusion that is created at higher speeds so they do not generate much to any downforce. And although these cars are extreamly aerodynamic I doubt .31 is the coeffecent, some airplanes dont even have that good of numbers. Its been a while since I took a fluid dynamics class, but jets have numbers like .25 total drag coeffecent. Which is the amount of drag created divided by the lift generated (or on a car downforce), basically over simplified that is.

Oh yea and with the insert out of my power buldge hood my car runs 10-15 degrees cooler, I had it out for a while to get it re painted it started pealing.

 

I happened to come across an OEM glass hood from an 82 when I bought my 89 IROC-Z (previous owner somehow got one). I've heard they are rare to find but maybe check your local yards. I thought the hood had inserts, but when I removed them I was sad to see it was a gimmik (serves no purpose except for looks).

 

i just cut up an OEM fiberglass hood, only had a little damage...didnt think it was that rare and since im making a one off hood i needed some donor parts