1966 Car Craft GeeTo Test Car (Ertl)

By Pat GTO

My friend Pat is the only diecast buddy I've met in person. Of course he is a Pontiac fan and especially a nut for GTOs. He has an old copy of Car Craft which features a 66 GTO test car very similar to the GeeTo Tigers we've all seen. Obviously a picture of the magazine cover is to the left. It's the December 1965 issue. Anyway, when Pat saw this picture he thought it would be nifty to try to tool up a 1:18 scale copy of this car. He saw my work via the Stage-1 boards so he contacted me to do the vinyl roof and the chrome. Keep in mind, all I did on the car in the pictures to follow is the vinyl and chrome, Pat did all the detailing and customizing. He really is dedicated to GTOs and does nice custom work. It's rather odd, but the article inside the magazine features a different car with different decals and no vinyl roof. We tried to copy the cover car.

Pat had the stickers made and he personally made the tiger tails. He used Hurst wheels from a TRU GTO, painted them gold and recreated the center emblems. He found a unique way to raise the rear of the car so the GMP slicks would clear the fenders. Pat is still working on the rear fender decals but the car will have them eventually.

Those tiger tails look pretty cool. Pat is working on a way to make tiger paw seat belts too. The original cars had tiger skin covers for the seat belts and the paws covered the buckles. I hope they were mock-tiger paws, otherwise it's rather sick! These GTOs do look good with a vinyl roof. Chroming around the vinyl is a royal pain in the rear though. This car certainly has the right stance with the slightly raised rear end.

The chrome work extended to the tail light louvers. I think Pat also plans to add "GRRRR!" license plates to this model. The cover car has them so this would look right. It will look great with the manufacturer decals on the rear quarters. I wonder if the Car Craft cars were prepared by Royal Pontiac like the GeeTo Tigers? The same name GeeTo appears on the door though the graphics are different.

Pat went to town here with plug wires, fuel lines, throttle linkage and appropriate paint to the master cylinder, radiator cap, hose clamps, battery and alternator. He also painted the engine a more correct shade of Pontiac blue. Anyone know why Pontiact changed the shade of blue they used on their engines? Early and mid 1960's cars had a bright sky blue color and later in the 1960's they shifted to a darker metalic-looking blue.