The Swiss Cheese cars are fully documented, thanks to my good friend from Pontiac, Fred Simmonds.

Rode hard and put up wet was the typical fate, save for the very lightly used Catalina sent to Mickey Thompson, who left Pontiac the moment they walked away from official racing sponsorship.

The frames buckled in the plant, as they were processed on the same assembly line as the regular Pontiacs. At the time, when the perimeter frames were delivered from the vendor, they went down the line on their backside so workers could attach axles, brake pipes, etc. and a large machine would "flip the mattress" upon completion of the tasks. For the stout standard frame, this was no problem, but the first Swiss Cheesed frames buckled and stopped the line (the gravest of sins at GM.) Enterprising plant engineers and hourlys quickly found that the open frame C-channel could be stuffed with lengths of 2X4" lumber to survive this operation and continue the journey through Plant 8.

These special Catalinas were also painted in non standard Cadillac Firemist Firefrost Silver, trimmed with the basic blue cloth and vinyl interior, albeit with no radio, heater, defroster, sealer, sound deadener or 'dum-dum' . They were also coded for the 389 2V economy engine and standard 3-speed transmission, which is a subject of some debate. My own guess - the standard engine would let the SC units glide through all the inspections, roll test and other quality checks, compared to a full house race engine which could easily be grenaded at any point from first fire up to loading on the transporter. I would need to recheck with my sources, but I'm recalling many of the teams kept the T-85 3 speed, and geared accordingly, compared to the fragile T-10 4-speed.

While they transferred weight like crazy - all the exotic preparation just pulled them even in weight with the more compact ChryCo B-Bodies, which also had the advantage of the outstanding Torqueflite transmission, allowing them to traverse both stick and automatic classes.

The killer app as we would call it today was the 421 Tempest AFX, an even more exotic machine, likely the first factory-built homologation special race car to run 11's off the trailer with only light preparation. Both programs would come to a screeching halt with the GM racing ban, but for a brief moment or two, they were the combination to beat.