1991 Buick Reatta on 2040-cars

Auto blog

Junkyard Gem: 1983 Buick LeSabre Estate Station Wagon, Rocky Mountain High Edition

If you live in Colorado and want an affordable chariot to haul you and your snowboarding droogs to the slopes, you could get one of the obvious cheapskate choices, e.g., a Tercel 4WD, a Corolla All-Trac, or an 80s 4WD Subaru wagon. However, if you want to channel the spiritual forefathers of early-1980s punk rock (and you do), you'll need a big, battered, Detroit bomb. This '83 LeSabre, spotted in a Denver self-service wrecking yard, is such a car. As you can see in 1984's Suburbia, you're pretty much halfway to being a member of The Vandals when you drive a couple of tons of once-luxurious Detroit Iron. 1983 was the final year of the Malaise Era, and so you didn't get much power from the V8s back then. The standard engine for the LeSabre that year was an Olds 307 generating a mere 140 horsepower. The only way to get a burnout out of this setup was to pour a case of Lucky Lager over the right rear tire, then neutral-drop the transmission while floating the valves. Chrysler and Nissan dominated the Whorehouse Red car interiors during the 1980s, but GM made a respectable showing with this scratchy, velour-influenced stuff. When you know you're a car's last owner, nothing holds you back from decorating it to suit your tastes. Ron Paul, the Snowboarders + Skiers For Christ, and many other icons of Buick-driving snow enthusiasts are represented upon the ample flanks of this wagon. How many miles are on it? With a five-digit odometer, there's no telling. The Colorado sun is rough on interiors, but this car may have spent its first couple of decades parking in a garage, or maybe it came from cloudy Oregon. Advertising for this generation of LeSabre emphasized fuel economy, which may have been a less-than-convincing approach. Related Video:

GM applies to trademark Buick's Electra name in Canada

At Auto China 2020 in Beijing, Buick revealed an Electra concept with a design language called Potential Energy created by one of GM's Shanghai-based design studios. A press release about the concept said the "all-electric crossover offers a sneak peek at Buick’s vision for a new intelligent electric future." It's possible that the "intelligent electric future" could include the Electra name, as the Rivian Owners Forum discovered Buick applied to trademark that model name in Canada on December 20. Buick isn't new to the name, having put it on a luxury sedan it produced from 1959 to 1990. What better way to resurrect history with electricity using the name Electra and a design language called Potential Energy? As the Rivian forum also noted, Buick snuck a concept car into General Motors' promotional video for the Ultifi software platform that will connect owners' digital lives across vehicles and locations. For less than two seconds at the end of the vid, a seriously chic fastback sedan speeds through a digital landscape, a Buick tri-shield logo set into what looks like an active rear spoiler. We don't see Buick building this car, but we'd love it if Buick did. What we imagine more likely is a more production-possible evolution of the Electra concept shown in Beijing last year that had Ultium batteries powering two electric motors that shared a combined 583 horsepower among both axles. The sprint to 60 miles per hour was said to take 4.3 seconds, range estimated at about 410 miles. The dihedral doors enclosed a buttonless cockpit with a rectangular, retracting steering wheel, huge curved screen, eConnect software, and an AI-powered assistant for feature control. There was also a skateboard tucked into the rear bumper for last-mile travel to the destination or the half-pipe. We expect Buick to launch at least one crossover in 2024, and another in 2025. One of them will likely compete with the Ford Mustang Mach-E and the production version of the Chrysler Airflow concept. Related video:

GM throttles back Chevy Malibu, Buick LaCrosse production over swollen inventories

As inventory of the Chevrolet Malibu and Buick LaCrosse continues to pile up, General Motors will be idling its Fairfax Assembly Plant for two weeks, according to Automotive News. This move comes about a month after the plant was shut down for three weeks in late December and early January for the same reason. As of January 31, the GM had a 94-day supply of Malibu stock while the LaCrosse was a little worse with a 117-day supply.
Just last week, GM announced that it would be investing $600 million in upgrading this plant, but it's unclear what future plans the company has in store for Fairfax considering slow sales of both the plant's models. We do expect a refreshed and more luxurious LaCrosse shortly and an early design update for the Malibu to be announced at some point this year, although we have had no official word as to when either will happen.