Featuring: Jack B. and Bark M.
Here’s my left field post for today. What is this, Klockau? No Electra? No Town Coupe, no Mark, no Cutlass Supreme? Nope. Today we have here a rare birdie, a Japanese personal luxury car, the Mazda Cosmo.
It’s like an alternate reality, where the domestic US cars kept making Plymouth Cranbrooks, Ford Customs and Chevrolet Del Rays thru the 1970s, while Japan went full zoot Broughamance with opera windows, velour, and 8-track Quadrasonic stereos. With CB.
Another week, another vintage domestic land yacht. I spotted this one last week on Marketplace, for the very reasonable ask of five grand.
I’m sure it’s no secret I love these 1977-79 GM C-bodies, from Brougham d’Elegance to Ninety-Eight LS to this Electra Park Avenue. It seems like 90% of these, no matter the make or model, had the optional wire wheel covers, but I really love the standard wheel discs on this one.
Perhaps it’s because they debuted right around the time I started noticing specific model years of cars. Perhaps it’s because I grew up with Volvo 240s and these cars seemed exotic and so different. Hidden headlights! Sleek lines! American made! Or maybe because I have a soft spot for cars that stumbled in the marketplace. I love Studebakers too.
Today I spotted this front wheel drive ’80s Cadillac on Baltimore Craigslist. Painted in most excellent Sapphire Blue Firemist with matching coach roof and blue velour interior, it cuts a formal look only improved by the new for ’88 4.5 liter V8, which ended the HT4100’s reign of slowness.
It was a much more robust engine, too, with none of the reliability shenanigans the early 4.1s liked to pull. With 155 hp and 240 lb-ft of torque and weighing in at around 3,450 lbs at the curb, it was good power for the time, too.
Yep, another land yacht that sucks gas and has approximately 32 lbs. of chrome, not including the bumpers. I spotted this one today, and immediately latched onto the listing.
Yes, that’s right, another Cadillac post. You know the drill! I am nothing if not predictable. So let’s check out this week’s Klockau Lust Object. The 1967 Eldorado, though made possible through the production of the remarkable 1966 Oldsmobile Toronado, was a sharp car-literally and figuratively.
I first became aware of these via ads in old National Geographics back in middle school. Though the cars were only about twenty years old then, they blew my mind. Nothing like the Mini Me Eldorados then in production (circa 1987-89). Slightly later on I was given some old “Spectraflame” Hot Wheels my Uncle Dave had as a kid. One of those was a deep blue Custom Eldorado – which I still have.
This week the old car that drew my attention on the Finding Future Classic Cars group was this silver over red 1986 Cimarron available in Middletown, CT for a mere three grand. Yep. A Cimarron. And I like them. So buckle up.
Here’s an oldie but a goodie. I probably took these pictures about ten years ago (Update: it was almost nine-April 15, 2012). I was just driving through Moline, spotted this sitting in front of a repair shop, and mentally noted its location, as it was a cold, clammy rainy day. This one was among the last of the Nova line: A 1979, last call for Novas. Unless you count the Mini-Me Corolla clone version from the mid to late ’80s.
On Tuesday, I spied this early Seville online. I zeroed right in, as my Cadillac radar began going awooga, awooga! This one looked amazing, in Claret Metallic with an Antique Light Buckskin interior. I always liked these, they give off an American Judge Smails-era Silver Shadow vibe, to me at least. The K-body Seville was the first Cadillac in years that wasn’t parade-float sized, and it looked good.
Anyway, this one is on offer on Marketplace for five dollars shy of eleven grand. As the seller related, “I am RELUCTANTLY offering my 1976 Cadillac Seville for sale. I am a long-time member of the Cadillac-LaSalle Club and an avid Cadillac collector. I have owned this car since 2011. Prior to my ownership, my former employer owned the car since 1985.”
The 1971-76 GM full-size station wagons were the largest wagons the company ever made. Each division had their own fancy version, usually with vinyl wood appliques on the sides – the Chevrolet Caprice Estate, Pontiac Grand Safari, Olds Custom Cruiser and Buick Estate Wagon. The Buick was the fairest of them all, an Electra wagon for all intents and purposes.
Buick had only just resumed the production of full-size wagons. Starting in 1965, the Sport Wagon, a long wheelbase version of the Skylark wagon (a body shared with its more famous sibling, the vaunted Oldsmobile Vista Cruiser) with windows over the second row seat, became the top Buick hauler-last year for the fully full-size Estate Wagon was 1964. This remained the case until 1970, when a new full-size Estate Wagon debuted on the LeSabre chassis, which itself had been redesigned for the 1969 model year.