V8 Coupes With Aftermarket Wheels: 1961 Buick LeSabre vs 1983 Mercury Cougar

Good morning! I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do for this week, so I just grabbed a bunch of car ads that caught my eye and started pairing them up by whatever criteria I could think of. Today’s cars both have two doors, eight cylinders, and different wheels than they originally came with. I guess that’s enough to tie them together.

Friday’s choices had about as much in common; they were both freshly-painted cars from the 70s that needed some mechanical work. And it was no contest; the AMC Hornet not only won on its charm and price, but it also pushed the nostalgia button for a lot of you. We forget, as rare as they are now, but AMC’s cars were actually pretty popular in the 70s, so nearly everyone who was alive then remembers one or two.

And I learned something about each of the cars from the comments, which is always fun – a lot more fun than when I get something completely wrong and you all jump down my throat over it. The Dodge Magnum’s clear headlight covers were retractable because DOT required it, so they’re probably not missing on that car, just stuck open. And the US Forest Service once used a fleet of AMC Hornet sedans, painted in my beloved Forest Service Green. Now that would be a cool project to find.

Non-car people don’t often get this, but a car’s wheels can absolutely make or break its appearance. Since the wheels are one of the easiest things to change on a car, a huge aftermarket exists offering just about any style of wheel to fit just about any car you can imagine. The right set of wheels can make a car look the way it was always meant to look, but the wrong set can destroy the whole effect. Luckily, if you find a car that’s otherwise appealing but has the wrong wheels, you can change them easily. These two have some questionable wheel choices, but they’re both interesting enough cars to warrant a look.

1961 Buick LeSabre – $3,000

Engine/drivetrain: 364 cubic inch overhead valve V8, two-speed automatic, RWD

Location: Auburn, WA

Odometer reading: unknown

Operational status: “Runs, drives, stops”

Here we have a prime example of why I have stopped trusting sellers. This car is listed as a 1963 Buick LeSabre, but it didn’t quite look right. I thought I remembered the ’63 GM full-size cars being boxier than this. This style of hardtop coupe, with its slender pillars and huge windows, is commonly known as a “bubbletop,” and it was only produced for one year: 1961.

The ’61 LeSabre is powered by a 364 cubic inch version of Buick’s “Nailhead” overhead-valve V8, along with a two-speed “Dynaflow” automatic. If you’ve never driven a car with this transmission, it’s wild – it almost acts like a CVT. The torque converter does most of the work; in fact, the Dynaflow normally operates only in high gear. If you want low gear, for acceleration or climbing hills, you have to downshift it yourself. If you’re thinking that sounds horribly inefficient, you’d be right. This is not an economy car. It runs and drives, but that’s all the seller has to say.

It has been customized a bit inside; someone has covered the seats and door panels with some sort of fuzzy purple material. I don’t know the condition of the seats under it, but I have a feeling it’s not good. If you’re OK with looking like you skinned Grimace for your car interior, it might be best to just leave it.

Outside, it has some rust, but it’s probably ignorable unless you plan to really go deep and fully restore it. The seller does say that the trunk floor is rusted out, though, so if you want to put anything back there, you should probably weld a new pan in. The wheels are unfortunate, but they can be changed, and you could probably sell these to fund something more suitable – I’m thinking steelies with baby moon hubcaps.

1983 Mercury Cougar LS – $3,500

Engine/drivetrain: 302 cubic inch overhead valve V8, four-speed automatic, RWD

Location: Las Vegas, NV

Odometer reading: 128,000 miles

Operational status: Runs and drives well

The Mercury Cougar was always a car with an identity crisis. It started out as a fancy version of the Ford Mustang, then later became Mercury’s version of the Ford Torino and Elite, and then joined forces with the Thunderbird. The generation before this was virtually indistinguishable from the Thunderbird, so for this 1983 redesign, Mercury made sure the Cougar stood out. Whether or not that’s a good thing depends on how you feel about its odd bolt-upright rear window.

The standard Cougar engine was Ford’s Essex 3.8-liter V6, but this one has the optional V8, which Ford calls a 5.0-liter, but only if you round up. It’s really 4.942 liters, but that doesn’t look as good on a badge. In the Cougar, this engine is fed by throttle-body fuel injection and makes a tire-chirping 130 horsepower. The transmission is Ford’s AOD four-speed automatic. The seller says it’s dependable and was recently “serviced,” whatever that means to them.

Ford did a slightly better job with interiors in the 80s than GM or Chrysler did, but there’s still an awful lot of creaky plastic in here. It has bucket seats and a center console, but for some reason the shifter is still on the column; maybe Mercury thought a floor shifter was just too racy for its customer base. It’s in reasonably good shape, but I can’t tell if the upholstery is dirty, or worn, or just badly photographed.

It’s clean outside, and as rust-free as you’d expect a desert car to be. I’m guessing this car originally came with steel wheels and fake wire wheel hubcaps. I guess the American Racing five-spoke wheels are an improvement. At least it has all four center caps, unlike so many cars from the ’80s and ’90s that wear these wheels.

These two are basically the same idea, just a couple of decades apart, so I guess the question is whether you prefer late Jet Age styling, or the early aero efforts of the Reagan years. You’ve got a good-running V8 either way. So what’ll it be?