Sometimes your plans just don’t turn out the way you initially envisioned. Circumstances change — especially time, money and desired effort level. The latter usually dictates how much of the former two is allocated to a specific endeavor.
With my Buick Park-amino project entering Year 3, and with it mostly sitting for Years 1 and 2, I knew that it was now or never, since my interest level was fading, and the ultra-massive mountain of work that it required still remained.
Welcome back to another SWG article my Autopian friends! It has been a couple weeks since I last checked in after the seemingly rustiest Genesis in North Carolina piqued my interest.
Well, with limited space, and very limited time, I knew that taking on another project with that Korean luxury sedan would push back all my other projects, and I’m currently overloaded at the moment with 17 cars in my stable. And yes, I realize that is a completely ridiculous and superfluous number of cars to own. Only Mercedes Streeter believes otherwise, which … bravo Mercedes!
First-In-First-Out, Or One-In-One-Out?
One fine day in early February of 2023, The Autopian’s Publisher Matt Hardigree bought himself a nice, new-to-him BMW 5-Series. You see, Matt’s been doing this car-culture/automotive journalist gig for a hot minute, so he’s wicked attuned to the various oddities of being a car enthusiast on the internet and the development of this space over the decades. Me, not so much.
So when he published his above hyperlinked piece, I copied his title and used the Buick purchase I had completed a day or so earlier as a counter to his German luxury purchase. I thought it was funny; I may be the only one. In fact, that was so long ago, our buddy Patrick George (now EIC of Inside EVs) edited the piece before it was published! He’s an awesome dude; we got a chance to finally meet in person at the LA Auto Show in 2023.
So why was I so excited about this seemingly nondescript, milquetoast GM front-wheel-drive, full-sized sedan? Well, because it’s none of the above descriptors once you look past the 2-tone green-over-champagne paint. This was the absolute top-of-the-line GM luxury offering (outside of Cadillac) in its time, and it had all the speed and comfort that GM could muster for the “Doctor’s Car” brand.
It’s supercharged 3800 put out 225 horsepower at 5000 RPM and 275 lb-ft of torque, which made it no slouch for its day. Today, with its Riviera stablemate, this is one of the few used cars you’re going to find for under $5K that have a stock blower under the hood. Comfort, power, an out-of-the-ordinary drivetrain, and a cheap price – what’s not to like? “Ultra,” well put, GM.
If you recall from that 2+yr-old piece (damn!) I got the tires aired up, purchased a new (used) battery, obtained a clean NC title, made a new GM-style set of keys, and was then hard-stopped with all forward progress when both the fuel pump and starter refused to work. I was not at all surprised that this was the case, though, since the car was parked in 1999. [Ed note: I guess that’s why they call it the Park Avenue, amirite? -DT].
No worries. I planned to have the car towed back to my Evil Wrenching Lair for a smooth hundo. I figured this project was going to be fun and not take very long, since it was a GM FWD car of which there are literally millions! I figured wrong.
Let’s Do A Quick Recap Of Why Many Americans Left GM During This Era
If you recall from my last piece on this car, I found that this top-of-the-line Buick (which was a retirement purchase for an elderly couple) needed the below dealer repairs in its 68,000 miles traveled (total) on this Earth:
- Crank sensor $276
- Trans solenoid $414
- Purge canister & solenoid $193
- Supercharger failure/replacement $1,394
- Rear wheel cylinders leaking $185
- Harmonic balancer $248
- Failed PCM $355
- Failed Traction Control Module (EBTCM) $881
That’s right, the elderly couple spent $3,946 on repairs in the first 68,000 miles. Which is $8,323.50 in 2025 dollars. That’s insane. Any brand or parent company that burns a customer that hard, that fast, probably isn’t getting them back, ever. The General does not deserve a salute for this tactical customer retention battlefield failure. Field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig was better at his job at The Battle of the Somme than The General of Motors was doing during this era.
OK, Enough GM Dumbassery. Back To The Park Avenue Ultra.
Initially, the entire Autopian Writing Team was behind it, well, mostly. Being totally honest, some of them are into Ferraris, some are into Porsches, some are into Jeeps and some are into Citroen 2CVs, so my idea of bringing back a moldy GM full sizer from ‘94 wasn’t that cool to many, which is OK and definitely expected! Except for one, lone colleague. A man who doesn’t play by the rules. An outlaw that draws his own lines…
The Bishop! The man has an eye for art, and eye for design, and he strangely even was familiar with the designer who penned the ‘94 Park Avenue! Because of course he was; Bishop is incredible. After a quick DM in Slack, he popped out this absolute stunner of a concept and had it written up and published in short order. Again, the dude is superhuman.
And holy shit was his idea wicked badass! I mean, I was instantly transfixed by it, and the wheels started turning in my mind about paths to take to bring it to fruition. First though, I had to get it running!
I said previously about this car, “Out of 118 cars I’ve had, this is the only one that I’ve found that is both green and supercharged.” This is still true, even though my grand tally is now up to 153 cars, 2-plus years later. I cannot think of any green, supercharged cars that you can buy today that are under $100K, can you?
Regardless, in my mind, it was officially Wicked Unique, which is a classification that only the best rescue examples receive as they pass through my Evil Wenching Lair. This Buick, despite its extremely poor condition, was killer cool, and I was determined to make it even more so.
The Extraction
A few nights after having the keys made and airing up the tires, I called a local tow service and threw ‘em a $100 to pull it out of its wet backyard prison of 24 years. The tow guy was a bit hesitant upon first seeing the situation, but after reassuring him that:
- we had the keys at hand
- the tires rolled (this statement was pure optimism)
- it could be shifted into Neutral
- the Parking Brake was not stuck in the “On” position
- it would not have to be dragged up the roll-back
…he then agreed to the extraction.
Seeing the car in motion (even if it was just being slowly winched) for the first time this millennium brought a huge smile to my face, as I absolutely love resurrecting and re-purposing anything that has been passed over — both from an environmental and from a general usage standpoint.
A short few moments after the winch hook was attached to the frame, the green Park Avenue slid right up the roll-back and was secured in place for its short five-minute drive across two neighborhoods to be awakened. Honestly, convincing the whiny tow guy that it wasn’t going to be that difficult at all was the hardest part of the entire tow experience!
That night, I went to bed with visions of Ultra, Supercharged Buicks dancing in my head.
Let’s Wrench! Part 1: “No Phone” -Cake
Let’s remember that this hoss has only 68K on it. When that low mileage (for its age) is applied to the condition-carnage that follows here in this section, it really shows just how heavy the hand of time is.
Once the car was safely delivered, I awoke the next day and started on the lowest-hanging fruit: the cell phone! I’m old, but I’ve hung out at enough hipster bars in East Nashville to know that there is good fake-nostalgia fashion money to be made from those folks in items like that phone (which hipsters usually weren’t alive to use back in the day). Hipsters, man, always trapped in their own irony.
A few screws going into the floorboard in front of the front-middle seat, a few wires going to the cellular module and antenna in the trunk, and it was ready for eBay!
Fun, After-Sales Note: That phone sold immediately after being posted, and the buyer reached out to me to express how absolutely stoked he was. If I recall, it sold for around $75. I don’t get it at all.
Let’s Wrench!: Mold
I wasn’t going to get in the car to do anything until I made it safe(er) to breathe in there. Ripping out that petri dish of a headliner was Priority One. It was beyond gross, but it only took a few moments and very minimal effort.
Let’s Wrench!: Fuel
The next order of business was to deal with the biggest “known-knowns” of the situation: the rotten fuel system. Luckily for me, a “shade tree” mechanic had tried to assess the no-start condition the car had sometime between 1999 and the present. His attempt at diagnostics was to cut open the floor under the rear seat for direct fuel pump access instead of dropping the tank. I actually wrote about this exact move last year – check it out for a fun read! Lazy, yes. Dangerous, yes. Efficient … yes.
This was great since now I had a straight shot right at the seemingly OEM pump (from 1994)! Upon removing the pump, I was confronted with the nastiest, brown, stank-ass, corn-gas, rust water turpentine you’ve ever witnessed, but I was honestly expecting that. What I wasn’t expecting was this:
The rusty old pump actually worked! I’m not a bettin’ man, but I would have definitely lost money had I bet on that pump actually working. Now, after my initial amazement, my thoughts turned to how I can maximize this fortuitous turn of events. I decided to do the following, which I’m pretty proud of!
I then shop-vac’d the sediment out of the bottom of the tank, popped in a cheap $65 new pump assembly, used compressed air to blow out the fuel lines, replaced the fuel filter, and added a few gallons of fresh gas. Fuel system: revitalized!
Lets Wrench!: Tail Lights
I had noticed that the tail lights seemed to have a bit of water in them, which seems to be a known issue for these cars — all the examples I’ve come across in my local yard exhibit the same unit seal failures. I looked for months at multiple examples; the flooded taillights were something that I could not fix, outside of slathering on bathroom silicone, so I decided to re-approach this repair after I got the car running.
Let’s Wrench!: Engine
Ok, enough messing around with tail lights and phones; let’s get to the real heart of the beast — the supercharged 3800 engine. Now that we had a fresh, properly-pressurized fuel supply, we needed to get that engine spinning and hopefully light that fresh fuel up! The only issue was that the starter was not engaging when the key was turned. Not a problem, as I called in my buddy Corey for backup, and we set about hot-wiring the starter.
With the fresh 12V source of juice that the car now had (in the form of that new (used) battery I picked up from my local Pick ‘n Pull for $45), we were getting 12V at the starter, so bridging the hot connector to the signal wire on the starter was as simple as laying a flathead screwdriver between the two points. I actually pulled this exact same, old-school trick on The Autopian cab last Fall…and it worked to get that beast started for the first time in who knows how long!
Sadly, we weren’t getting fuel to the Buick’s engine since the Security module was activated, which shuts down both fuel and the starter. But a can of ether in hand and a flathead screwdriver held by Corey, and ….
The Supercharged Buick fired for the first time since the 90s! Hell yes!
Cold, Wet Storage
Corey and I had a few celebratory beers that night. He’s a great mech, a great dude, and a great friend. Shout-out to all the good wrenching buddies out there; you folks are golden.
But why was the Security system activated? The correct VATS key resistance was checked (that’s the little black chip on all GM keys during this era), so the only other explanation was a fault in the Security system.
After purchasing the factory electrical manual off eBay (shout-out eBay for really stepping up their game), I dug into it to hopefully find some answers. Only, I wasn’t the best with reading highly detailed electrical diagrams, nor do I have much of a background in electrical diagnostics with my backyard shitbox rescue history.
I couldn’t figure out what was causing the Security system to activate (honestly there is a ridiculous number of inputs that activate it, such as the lock cylinders on the deck lid and doors, the ignition switch, the hood, etc), so I parked the Buick and vowed to study up, increase my skillset and understanding of the issue, and then to return to it with triumph in mind.
We published the first article on the Ultra on February 10, 2023, and in the conclusion, I stated that I had owned 118 cars up to that point. Well, between then and now, 20 additional cars came my way, so I definitely had my hands full! But I never forgot about the Supercharged Buick; it was always lurking in the background, reminding me that I needed to finish what I had started.
Let’s Wrench, Take 2!
You can only postpone something for so long before guilt starts to get at you. Well, after about 18 months, I decided that it was time to crack open that electrical shop manual and try again. I stared and stared at diagram after diagram, I went online and scoured the forums, I moved from Security section to the Fuel Delivery/Injection section to the Fuel Pump/Relay Center section to the Starter section (they are all intertwined, electrically) until one wire on one post popped right off of the page and smacked me in the face: The Fuel Enable Circuit!
Eureka! I think I finally cracked the code and solved the mystery! When you look at the location of the Security Module in the dashboard, it was right next to the A-pillar moonroof drain! GM, in all of its wisdom, placed a bunch of computerized electronics next to a cheap plastic drain hose and just hoped for the best. The hose leaked (eventually, it disintegrated) and it was literally raining on the Security Module!
When you piece together the rest of the puzzle, the big Live Oak tree that the car was parked underneath clogged the moonroof drains with debris and shorted out the Security system decades ago. That was why the shade tree mech cut open the floor, since he believed it was a fuel delivery issue (which it was, but the Security Module was purposely cutting fuel). Nobody could figure the root cause out, so the car was doomed to sit for a quarter century.
Puzzle solved! Time for a Stanley Tucci Negroni to celebrate!
The Chains Of Immobility Have Been Broken.
I immediately ordered a $20 Security bypass off of Amazon, which arrived the day before last Thanksgiving and was popped into the Security Module harness plug as quickly as I could get it out of the box. Fingers crossed, the bypass would fool the computer into believing the Security Module is present and disabled. About 20 seconds later, I was greeted by this:
I was about as happy as I have ever been in my wrenching career. This one felt so, so good. Solving a puzzle is fun – solving a 25-year mystery is wicked fun! I immediately went and got plates for the car before the DMV closed for Thanksgiving.
The next day, I woke up to a city with minimal traffic and a fully registered, inspected, and insured car. I was driving a machine that few thought would move under its own power ever again, let alone at speeds up to 50mph. For the first time since the Clinton presidency, the Park Avenue Ultra was Ultra-ing once more.
I was about as happy as an Autopian could be. The Buick was running, and I was completely unaware that a big yellow toaster would be dropped off in my driveway a few hours later.
Time Waits For No Man Or Buick … And There’s Never Enough Of It
I returned home after that trumphant first drive and moved immediately onto the disaster that was The Autopian Cab a few hours later. The Park Avenue was parked again.
After the Cab left a couple of weeks later, I was gifted a $50 stick-shift Volvo. A two-door 2002 Explorer Sport fell into my lap right after the Volvo left. The Buick continued to sit. More cars showed up, were rescued and rehabbed, and moved onto new owners. Still, the Buick sat.
As the months went on, there just always seemed to be something more pressing and important than my green Park Avenue Ultra. The list of items that were needed to take it from operational to actually-decent condition remained static and daunting.
Literally nothing electrical in the interior worked – seat motors, window switches, HVAC unit, radio, etc., all non-functional. But not just those; serious safety items such as the turn signals, brake lights, headlights, AC, heat, power brakes, and more were inoperable. Did the car go forward, backward, turn left and right, and stop well enough on its own? Yes, but that was about it. I had to accept the Park Avenue was just too far gone.
I posted the car for sale for $900, which was about how much I had into it, given the $400 purchase price, $100 title, $100 tow, $65 fuel pump, a 68,000-mile supercharged donor engine, and other odds and ends. The buyer would get a running, well-documented drivetrain and be able to scrap the body for $250, so they’d be out the door around $650 for a Supercharged 3800 – fair money for what they’d be getting, I figured.
It’s a bittersweet moment when you realize that your project car is just not going to reach the state of completion you hoped for in your lifetime. You’re giving up on something that you had previously financially, emotionally, and physically committed yourself to. On one hand, putting the Buick up for sale felt like a defeat; but on the other, there was a pile of cash out there waiting, and the weight of having to complete the long list of repairs the car needed was lifted off my shoulders.
The Supercharged Heart Keeps Beating
Recently, an aeronautical engineer who worked for the FAA contacted me. He told me that he has the same Fiero that he bought new in high school in ‘88, and its original engine had just blown. I knew immediately this guy was (A) one of us and (B) the perfect buyer.
Bob The Buyer came down from Wake Forest to The Cape Fear, and it took about 30 seconds before he PayPal’d me the cash and asked if I could deliver it to Wake Forest. Luckily for him, I was bringing Jason Torhinsky his new 2CV that same weekend, so I already had a trailer lined up behind The World’s Greatest $400 Durango!
Bob has been working on and massaging his high school Fiero into a gorgeous masterpiece over the past 37-plus years, and the man has exquisite taste and talent. Check this out:
Bob also recently posted a YouTube video that documents his custom build. Click that link, you’ll be glad you did. Putting a Supercharged Buick Park Avenue Ultra 3800 engine in a Fiero is wicked, wicked cool.
I put together a fun little social media Reel on how to get a car like my Buick running, sent it off to The Autopian Video Crew (a crew composed of one Griffin Riley) and rolled my green Ultra onto the U-Haul car transporter to leave its coastal NC home for the last time.
That Buick was heavy! I don’t think I’ve towed anything with that weight at that speed for that long, but my Durango saw it through with an impressive 15MPG at 75MPH! The U-Haul car transport weighs in at 2,210 lbs, and the Buick rings in at 3,533lbs for a total of 5,743 reasons why you’re sleeping on how badass the Gen 2 Durango is.
Saying Goodbye To A Dream
Silly dreams are still dreams, and it’s never easy to let a dream go. To me, that green Ultra had a set of traits (green & supercharged) that I don’t think I’ll ever find again for the rest of my life, even as a guy who has waaay too many cars coming and going all the time. Green is my favorite color. This was my first supercharged car – they’re not exactly commonplace.
The easiest aspect of letting this dream go was knowing that the car has become an organ donor and that it will donate its powerful supercharged heart to a worthy recipient. Literally, the best possible outcome here. I get a feeling of pride thinking that my old supercharged engine will be impressing a new generation of car enthusiasts in the Wake Forest area in a gorgeous custom Fiero body.
The hardest aspect of letting it go is realizing that life is moving way faster than I think I was consciously aware of. I don’t have the time that I thought I did for silly, fun projects like this one anymore. The clock is always ticking, and there are always going to be other options out there – and there will always be less time to finish them.
Everything in life is a choice.
Looking back, I’m so glad that I saved this car’s engine from the crusher. I was also able to get the immense satisfaction of solving a 25-year mystery and taught myself basic electrical diagram analysis! The truth is, the car was way too far gone when I found it, and attempting to bring it back to glory was a fool’s errand.
It’s still such an undercover, low-key, wicked-unique and killer-cool car in my mind, and it always will be. Even after it’s crushed into a cube.
My hope is that we each have the wisdom and awareness to know how to best spend the finite days and dollars we each have, while we have them, and how to make the best of our circumstances and situations.
88mph, into the future.
- How I Bought A Broken Version Of My Dream Car For $300, Then Nursed It Back To Glory And Let It Free
This is going to be a long one, and it’s time for me to eat a little crow.
I was one of the ones critical of SWG spending any effort whatsoever on this vehicle. Yes, the SC 3800 is cool but other than that it’s a typical 90s GM car with a boring slushbox, jello suspension, questionable build quality, and there’s also still a ton of these around with relatively low miles so it just didn’t seem like the juice was worth the squeeze. Removing the engine and shoving it into a fiero is the absolute best possible use for this vehicle, so huge congrats on finding the perfect buyer!
Since that article, my dad got sick and passed (which is bullshit) and he left me multiple vehicles in various states of disrepair, one of them being a 1995 Buick Riviera with the SC3800. If I remember correctly, he bought this car in 1996 from a dealer buddy who took him to a car auction and he picked it up only a year old for around $17k which was extremely cheap at the time. He had a beater, he had a project car, he had a tow vehicle, but this was to be the long distance, high speed roadtrip car.
Sidebar: At this point in history, Mercury Racing was still a relatively new company and had been given a large budget to absolutely destroy the competition (Johnson, Suzuki, Yamaha) in boat racing leading to their sponsorships of races and prize money all over the country. My dad grew up racing hydroplanes/runabouts and many of his race buddies graduated to larger, faster boats with air entrapment hulls to reduce drag and go even faster. This was the golden age of tunnelhull boat racing, and my summers growing up were filled with roadtrips to boat races all over the country, in the Riviera.
Back to the present: The car started and drove, but as SWG so eloquently put it, the time of hand is heavy. The car was rarely used anymore, but the suspension was in need of complete replacement, it wouldn’t idle properly, and most obnoxiously, the car suffered from all sorts of electrical gremlins of the worst kind: intermittent. Multiple things were happening; the temperature of the HVAC would randomly crank it all the way to hot or all the way to cold, and the stereo would either fade out slowly so you’d think it was just the end of a song, or it would turn itself ALL THE WAY UP and try it’s best to either blow out your eardrums or the speakers themselves.
I want to give SWG a massive ego boost here, as I too have spent untold hours staring at these very same service manuals and studying the electrical schematics and brothers, it is not fun. I went down so many paths in each subsystem and eventually realized it might be the steering wheel controls or cable fritzing out and causing mayhem. It wasn’t; I unplugged it completely, it still did it. I kept disassembling, testing, probing, and the car was looking worse and worse.
And then I saw it. In 1995…. Canbus wasn’t a thing yet, but the car DID have a central nervous network where different modules communicated to each other… and the hub where a lot of things connected was the AC Delco Stereo itself. Going for a hail mary, I lobotomized the suspect sterio and I splurged on a 2 DIN Pioneer Carplay capable deck. VICTORY. No more electrical gremlins, no more blowing out my eardrums, the car could now be driven despite all the other issues it was having.
This is getting long, but since then, I have given the car a tuneup, fixed a few of the broken things in the suspension with many more to go, recharged the AC, and taken it on a few roadtrips just like my father and I did decades prior.
And now?
Now I get it. I’ve always hated 90s GM products; they didn’t build driver’s cars like Japanese/Germans of the same time period; in my opinion they were just going after a geriatric userbase that valued comfort over all other things, which made the cars extremely boring. And they are… in town. But on the freeway? They are FANTASTIC cars. Extremely quiet, incredibly comfortable, stable, capable of passing most other traffic with minimal effort… the miles just fly by and cruising at 80-90mph for hours on end just feels fantastic. I now realize that this wasn’t a boring car; it was Buick’s version of creating a GT coupe, an affordable domestic version of something like a Mercedes SL500. The goals are exactly the same; a large, heavy, powerful coupe meant for crushing multiple states per day while providing as much luxury as possible to the passengers.
That heavy hand of time keeps moving, and I’m overloaded with projects so I’m slowly selling off all the other vehicles that were left to me.
But I’m keeping the Buick.
Not your main point (which was a well-written tribute to your father), but enjoyed your sidebar too – for the past decade or so, I’ve gotten into power boat racing and really enjoy watching it. There’s something intoxicating about the juxtaposition of this ancient thing that many people would associate with graceful sailboats, and the brute force of modern(ish) engine power.
Offshore? Thing is, tunnel racing was even cooler. Everyone was close to it, right up near it, and the speeds and corners were insane. Tunnel racers sustain more lateral G forces than any other form of motorsports, up to 6G during corners.
I actually got a ride in one of only two, 2 seat F1 boats last year, and Tim Seebold (legend) was driving.
It’s absolutely bonkers how they stick in corners, and way more exciting to see in person than the offshore stuff, which is typically soooo far away.
I’ve seen both, and like the tunnel boats for their seemingly more real-to-my-experience scale!
The final 2000-2005 generation got right, as is typical of GM. While the 3800 had some minor issues with fortunately cheap fixes the overall car has fewer gremlins. Or 2003 LeSabre has 220,000 mile and outlived it’s first two owners and the worst issue has been a sticky valve resolved by replacing the cylinder head with a used one. The Ultra from this generation does well too, there are two daily drivers in my neighborhood.
I got a 2004 Impala Police Special 3.8L for free when my friend bought 3 of them at a govt auction. It was reportedly owned by the County Sheriff and only driven back and forth to work (had 70k miles in 2014), though it was outfitted with a partition cage and bars on the windows. My friend smacked up the front end doing a drunken J-turn right into a big oak tree but the damage was only cosmetic. I’m not sure why I even agreed to take the car, but I found a cheap parts car and fixed up the front end. 80k miles since then with no serious issues.
I never would have given this vintage GM a second look but I am begrudgingly impressed with how well put together that car is. It’s a great highway cruiser that’ll get 30+mpg and feels really solid. It’s not supercharged but it’s fast enough for me, whose hp chart looks only slightly better than Torch’s.
Sorry about your dad. My in-laws (both passed) had a ’90 Park Avenue which wasn’t a bad car to drive for what it was. It wasn’t an Ultra, but it was quiet, reliable and rode very nicely around So Cal freeways. And it was rust-free.
Thank you so much for sharing this amazing comment, ADDvanced and my deepest condolences for your loss.
I sent this to Mercedes for a COTD nomination.
Always good to have an SWG article, even if the ending is only semi-happy.
There is no shame in a project being too much for you. I would have posted the thing for sale after it sat for the first time. Life often interferes with life, no matter our intentions.
Edit: I have to add that Bob’s Fiero looks great. Not something I would take on (or do, given I am 6’3″) but it looks fantastic. I have to applaud the effort
There was a moment when I was pulling the door panels to test the window motors (the switch didn’t work for all 4 windows), and I was getting eaten alive my mosquitos after a long day at work with the moonroof dripping on my head (after Flex Sealing it twice) that I thought to myself: “What am I doing here?!”
Thanks for reading and for the kind words, Rollin Hand!
It’s a good day when a SWG article posts!
I like to think so!
Hey, thanks for reading and for the kind words, my dude!
I just love that Bob the Buyer showed up in full FAA work gear, looking like someone from central casting. FAA and a serious car nut. I like him already
…and he’s not too far from Bishop’s Bro HQ!
We need an update on that fiero project!
I sent this piece to Bob The Buyer and am awaiting his response at the moment! He’s probably knee-deep in FAA work or with the motor swap.
I’ll keep Autopia updated on it though, for sure.
Good read. The fact that you could get a tow for $100 is probably the most amazing part.
I respect your tenacity for diving into these projects. As a professional carpenter, mechanics like that scare me. With over 100 cars through your hands, if one isn’t worth the effort, so what? You can’t save every one. And really, that 3800 series two was likely the only thing worth saving anyway. That Fiero is awesome good for that guy. That’s a whole story in itself.
One time my Silverado wouldn’t start and I was LOW on dollars and had to get back to work. Like you, I had to familiarize myself with GMs electrical schematics quick and fast. I learned more by just getting into it that I ever thought I would. It turned out it was just the fuel pump. Which a qualified individual, like yourself, would’ve likely figured in a few minutes. Oh well. Good luck on your wrenching.
Only tow I ever got was $100 (+tip).
Called the guy and said 7 miles on a flat bed how much?
How much was your tow?
“I learned more by just getting into it that I ever thought I would.” –same here, Ariel!
And Note: I’m not that qualified and it probably would take more than a “few minutes”, but that was nice of you to say!
Glad to hear that you got your truck fixed and kept it rolling through your own intuition. Also, than you for the kind sentiment above and for reading!!
Great read dude !
Noone can win every time, it’s still cool to have saved that power train.
Try and find more time to share your tales with us!
Thank you kindly, Manuel!
I am really going to put some effort into making some time for more writing in the upcoming months so hopefully you’ll see some more of me around here.
Until then, my dude!
How I hate corn gas. Make Actual Gasoline Again.
Yay for another tale of wrenching adventures! Too bad this come didn’t pan put, but they can’t all work out.
Now… Any word on the Shrek Roadmaster? 😀
While it’s a shame The Bishop’s render will remain unrealized (for now), the moment I read the Buick was up for sale, I knew a Fiero guy was buying it.
Thank God you’re still alive. Long time, no see. Always enjoy your articles. You had me with your love of that rusty mercury Cougar you bought as a budding car freak. Have respected you ever since. I like that Buick El Camino. Save it. I haven’t commented on here for a while, Damm You depression and drink! What ever became of the k car new Yorker, maybe a Dynasty, you were working on? BTW your YouTube videos of your Sleath are legionary.
Im flattered that you remembered all of the above, Sofonda Wagons! Wow! Many of those pieces were written years ago, so the fact that you recall them means a lot to me. I’m glad that you’re back to posting.
Yes, that ’84 Cougar from Upstate NY was my first car and you can never fully get over your first love.
The New Yorker was sold last year, but I bought another Stealth! I hope to write about fixing it up and getting it back on the road soon.
Thanks again for reading and for the great memory!
Man, I love your articles and particularly this little project but…..
1) I’d be wearing gloves for most of that, but especially ripping down a moldy headliner that requires me to wear a respirator.
2) “The buick is driving on roads legally”. Uhhh, how? No turn signals, brake lights, headlights, etc. Where the F do you live that they allow something that dangerous to be certified for legal use on the roads?!?
My buddy had a 30 yo vehicle and if the horn or wipers didn’t work….. no pass. Lack of turn signals or (especially) brake lights would be an immediate fail.
In NC no inspection is needed for 30+ year old vehicles!
Ah! My only experience with your state was a week long vacation in the OBX region with my then-girlfriend (now wife). What an awesome time. Shout out to the Food Lion there, haha.
As a NYer, I apologize for how many of us came down to retire there. Sorry, we’re pretty awful.
Love your articles and I give you all the props for hooking up Torch with a (mostly) fixed 2CV!
Thanks for the kind words and for reading, my dude!
1) I’m also from NY and
2) Big props to “Food Daawg” (Food Lion)
Yeah, why would you inspect an “Antique Car” (sigh. A car I could have driven myself new is Antique)? I remember figuring as a kid that an “antique” car was some 1948 Ford. Only to realize that the Buick in the article is older now than that 48 Ford was then. Perhaps this is why when The Bishop and I were looking at retirement communities for our parents we realized that the music played in the lobby was… Steely Dan.
The reason to inspect a car, even if it’s very old, is because it coexists on the roads with everyone else.
Cars with non-functional horns, brake lights, headlamps, wipers, rusted brake lines, etc are much more likely to cause accidents than those with equipment that functions correctly. Anything that uses public roads (IMO) should be subject to a safety inspection.
Emissions is something else, and I can understand both sides of the argument there.
Don’t few US states have mechanical inspections? Some have smog only, most have none, right?
My experience titling a car, not in NC, but elsewhere, is that here, they only want to see a hunk of car-shaped metal with the right VIN, and paperwork in order.
For better or worse.
And it had damn well better not look like a KEI car, that would be dangerous!
I have no idea, I’ve only ever lived in places that inspected your car for both functionality and emissions.
Aging out of emissions is arguably fine IMO, but no vehicle should be immune from having to pass a safety check. At least, no vehicle intended to travel on public roads. Farm stuff is a different story.
It appears that only 14 states require recurring safety inspections for personal vehicles.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_inspection_in_the_United_States#Non-commercial_vehicles
EDIT: 30 states have some type of emissions testing, although most of those are only in select counties/urban areas.
That seems like a fairly stupid policy unless you don’t care about public safety or your driving population is incredibly spread out.
But states’ rights I guess.
I’m also not sure this list is actually correct, as NY ages out emissions tests when cars are 25+. They still require safety inspections but nothing else.
“That’s right, the elderly couple spent $3,946 on repairs in the first 68,000 miles. Which is $8,323.50 in 2025 dollars. That’s insane.”
You’ve never owned a German, British or Italian car, have you?
I spend a total of $1,950 in unscheduled repairs on my 2003 Jetta Wagon TDI over 10 years / 245K miles.
I think the shop scammed them. Most 3800 cars go for over 200k before stuff like that starts breaking.
Big respect for your ecologically correct mindset!
I’d never have looked at that Buick unless I already had a buyer.
One safety point worth noting, even though you used the pump to get all the 25yo. swamp gas out first, NEVER use a shop vac. on a gas tank!
Most likely in this example, the volatiles had mostly left, but general principle, gas vapors are heavier than air, vac. motors spark, you have everything needed for big BOOM!
^^^^^^^^
Glad I searched the comments, I was seriously concerned I was the only one who caught this.
The tank was left open for 2-days with the doors open and blown out with compressed air. There was no odor/fumes on the 3rd day and the bottom of the tank had completely dried out.
Thanks for sharing an important the safety tip regardless, as it just may have saved another Autopian’s project or life.
Thanks for reading also!
The Last time I saw one of these it was going down the road with a goat and at least 2 chickens in the back seat.
For me anyway, I’ve noticed that at a certain point, it’s not longer about the car itself, it’s about the engagement with it via your growing knowledge and abilities. So though she had to go (in perhaps the best way possible, but still…), the actual Buick wasn’t the most important part of the story.
Also, that needs to be the SWG Garage moto. I’d absolutely buy a shirt that says LET’S WRENCH on the back.
“…it’s about the engagement with it via your growing knowledge and abilities.“
You absolutely nailed it with that line, Jack. Thanks for always having an eloquent, insightful take on each of my pieces and for reading; it really means a lot.
Jaguar XJR – Supercharged and often (should have been only) in green. And it will supercharge the green out of your wallet. Often available for less than the Buick…
I was going to say that given how long it’s been and still no XK8 article, that maybe SWG was Jag’d out, but he lists four Jags on his profile, so maybe not.
First gen Mini Cooper S (R53?) would also fit the bill, and around here are abundant and cheap (and usually ragged).
Excellent call on the MINI Cooper! I totally forgot about that car.
Also, good eye on the profile car list! I now have 4 Jags and have cycled an additional 2 X-types through the garage in the past 5 years since my XK8 article was denied.
I think DT is coming around to it and it’s way too hot to be wrenching this week, so here’s hoping it shows up on the these pages sooner than later!
Thanks for reading and for being here in the comments with us, Maymar!
Bravo, AllCattleNoHat!
As the owner of 4 Jags at the moment, you’d think I would’ve thought of that.
Thanks for the on-point and humourous comment!
My Uncle had a supercharged Ultra like that back in the day. I think it was a company car or something. I got to drive it once (I was maybe 17), it was a sweet sweet ride !
One of the great 90s things about it is how the cupholders pop out – before the era of cockpits designed around them.
IIRC they swung out when you opened the armrest?
That car was the fastest BarcaLounger on 4 wheels!
My Chevy Beretta had a similar setup – a fragile pullout on the passenger side of the dash b/c hey sporty coupe no real time for this but if you insist…
Of course, they were tiny by today’s standards, but I’m sure the brochure mentioned them.
The 3800 has got to be the most unkillable engine GM has ever made.
Putting a bit of important computer circuitry right next to a brittle water drain hose is a GM level of stupid. The engine is legendary, and the fuel pump was well made, but unfortunately, the quality of the rest of the car (see the stack of repair receipts) is legendarily bad.
That’s GM in a nutshell right there. Solid engine, crap car.
Well-said, my man.
You summarized it perfectly, Chris!
Thanks for reading and for the comment, my man.
I was loving every word of this story and then you said that the engine is going into a Fiero? Cargasm Saturday! Nothin but good vibes here. Also, having a moonroof is like owning a cobra. One way or another, it will find a way to bite you.
Yes. I hate sunroofs and moonroofs with a passion. Can’t see the logic of cutting a hole in the roof and not expecting it to leak over time. 3 of 4 that I’ve owned have and I’m sure the one in my wife’s Acura will given enough time.
Funny. I’m currently considering a used TLX. The only thing I don’t like is the moonroof. They all have it. Sigh.
Yes, it is getting hard to find a vehicle without a hole cut in the roof.
I think it is a symptom of the new car buyer. I read a study recently that said 2/3rd of new car buyers keep that car for 5 years or less. The overall average is only ~8 years and that is skewed by the small number of buyers that keep their cars until they go to the scrapyard.
So the typical new car buyer only sees the upside of a moonroof and not the downside. They also only own a car when it is under warranty so they don’t have to deal with a $4500 bill to fix a panoramic moonroof like a coworker had on his 2014 TDI Sportwagen. I had the exact same car, mine also failed but it was covered under the CPO warranty. The shop had the car for 4 days because the entire assembly had to come out to fix a failed seal.
Thank you for reading and for the kind words above, Dodsworth!
Agreed on the moonroof; I’not a fan. Excellent cobra simile!
That 3800 will do great in the Fiero, the rest of the car was fairly gone. It is a bit sad though, in my youths when I first started driving, the supercharged 3800 was really something.
If any consolation that green wasn’t really unique back then, teals and greens were big in the 90s! The Park Avenue’s sibling the Bonneville was famous for it.
Excellent call on referencing the greater number of greens and teals back then – especially the Bonneville! You’re right, I think almost everyone of those cars that I saw in the 90s was green, blue, white or gold.
Thanks for reading and for the above, Fuzzyweis!
I have a hard time feeling too sad about the Buick when I know just how good an L67 is in a Fiero. Throw on some ZZPerformance parts to really wake up that blown V6 and that Fiero will be fun enough to wrap around a tree in no time.
Hopefully Bob the Buyer is able to navigate safely away from the trees (and other solid objects of Fiero-demise), but I’m with you in not feeling too sad about it either after realizing its donor-fate.
“I know just how good an L67 is in a Fiero.” I’d love to hear more about this.
Thanks for reading and for the comment, Squirrelmaster!
It wasn’t my car, but around Y2K I had a friend who had two Fieros in sequential order: an ’85 GT and then an ’86 GT. The ’85 was a hoot, but the ’86 had been L67 swapped. Even though the L67 was bone stock, it was an absolute hoot to drive. Down the road my buddy started modding the engine with pulleys, injectors, and eventually a larger blower. I think he estimated that it was putting out about 350hp at the tires before he sold it before a deployment. The L67 didn’t seem to weigh much, if any, more than the factory 2.8L, as the balance was just as good as his ’85 GT but with far more power. He did a bunch of suspension work too, so it handled turns almost as well as it went in a straight line. I made fun of his Fieros a lot until I experienced that modded L67 and saw the light.
In the middle of a story about bringing back to life a rusty, moldy, crusher-bound ’94 Buick, about seeing the beauty and potential in a car that’s been sitting for 20+ years and that 99% of people would only see as inconveniently immobile scrap steel, you’re baffled that someone might want an old, outdated, non-functional, overlooked, now-incredibly-rare, almost always landfilled piece of once-amazing and important electronic gear? My man!
I mean shit, he might’ve wanted it to complete the look in his immaculately restored ’94 Park Avenue.
(Really loved the story as always, of course!)
Thank you for the above introspective, Stacks! You do make a solid point.
“…almost always landfilled piece of once-amazing and important electronic gear” -well said
I appreciate you reading it and the above kind words, my dude!
SWG, even in your defeats, you somehow find the silver lining. Where others fear to tread, you see opportunity. In your unrealized Buick dreams, someone else’s Fiero finds a new heart.
Another fantastic article! Cheers!
Thank you sincerely for the kind words and for reading; it means a lot!
There is no heart transplant story that is not bittersweet.
Well said.
Thank you for reading and for the above, Slower Louder.