I still think it cuts a handsome profile. Mine was also Bronze Dust Mist in colour, and almost never looked really dirty.
After the nightmare that was my 1993 Saab 900, I was ready for something that wouldn’t give me any maintenance headaches – or at least fewer than that Swedish nightmare.
The car I ended up choosing was a 2004 Pontiac Bonneville. Being a car fan from an early age, I’d always noticed how well reviewed the Bonneville seemed to be by the car books I’d been reading for years (Consumer’s Guide, The Lemon-Aid Used Car Guide, and even Consumer’s Reports). However, I’d noticed that the most recent incaration of the model didn’t seem to be as popular with car buyers.
Many reviewers tend to blame the styling. While the first and second generation front-drive Bonnevilles seemed to have the looks that buyers looking for a full-sized sedan wanted, the third generation seemed a bit…wonky. it was almost as though the GM stylists had taken the 1992-1999 version and both stretched and ironed it.
Also, the base price of the Bonneville had swollen to more than 40 g in Canada – almost Cadillac territory!
Regardless, I liked the shape, particularly the fact that the stylists had maintained the little bulge for the c-pillar and rear window, which linked the car to its predecessor.
On the road, the Bonneville was initially pretty great. The ride was comfortable, the seats were comfortable (at least for short drives, longer ones tended to give me a sore butt and I always took my wallet out of my back pocket if driving for a long time) and it had a lot of nice features that my earlier cars didn’t. Features like functional air conditioning, power windows, mirrors and door locks. As Pontiac’s top dog of the time, it also had a few things that i’d never experienced on any car, including redundant steering controls for the radio and a rearview mirror that dimmed if a driver had their high beams on while following me.
Gotta love that ‘high-tech’ dashboard!
This car had GMs proven 3.8 liter V-6 which found use in many higher-end GM products of the time, and the four-speed auto which was pretty ubitiquous in the automaker’s mid-to-full size lineup of the late 90’s-early 2000s.
It was definitely the quickest car i’d owned up to that point, good for 205hp. While not an absolute rocket, the engine easily went from a dead stop and made merging onto any highway an easy task. Also, while driving at 120-130, the transmission allowed the car to loaf along at less than 2000 rpm – a lot different experience from the small-displacement, high revving engines I’d been used to driving up to that point. Probably because of this, fuel economy was also surprisingly good, about the same as my Saab 900.
Over the next five years, the Bonneville proved to be a reliable (if not trouble-free) partner in crime. One weak spot I discovered was the brakes; I did a full brake job at about 170000 kms , another at 230000kms and replaced the front brakes again about 270000 ams. However, the good thing about the car was that anyone could fix it, and the cost of parts was pocket change compared to the Japanese or European vehicles i’d owned before it.
Friends and family alike got to really like the Bonneville as a long-distance cruiser, and even as the odometer got close to 300,000 kms I still thought I’d have at least a few more good years with it.
Except for one huge maintenance oversight on my part which led to me getting rid of the car much sooner than i’d planned. When I bought the car, I’d assumed the transmission had had its necessary maintenance done at 150000km which included a fluid replacement and filter change. However, when I was having some routine maintenance done at about 200000 kms my garage checked the transmission fluid for me. My mechanic actually brought the dipstick out to me, and asked me to smell it. It smelled like burnt varnish. The transmission had never been serviced since the car was new.
They did the essential service 50000 kms after it was due, and did one again at 250000 ams. At that time my mechanic Roy warned me that it would be lucky to get to 300000kms without a new one.
Not long after hitting 302000kms the car started to feel different. Usually it was fine but sometimes there was a shudder or hesitation if I tried to accelerate quickly or while going up a hill. The transmission was clearly on its last legs.
In the interim I’d gotten a higher-paying and less stressful job as a communications person for a local employment agency. After my year contract was renewed for a second time, I reasoned it was the time to think about getting something else.
I took the car for a pre-safety at a local garage. Irrespective of the worsening transmission issues, they told me the car needed suspension and brake work that would cost about $1,200. The writing was on the wall. I listed the car on a local sale site for $1000, and a man bought it the same day, actually quicker than I expected.
Within six months, I drove by that mans house and saw the car for sale again. “I guess the transmission finally went,” I said to myself.
However, someone else bought it, and I still see the vehicle from time to time driving around my home town. I guess someone must think that it’s not still totally used up!
I feel that for the time, the Bonneville was probably one of the best full-sized cars made by any of the North American manufacturers. Comfortable, well sized, reasonably peppy and fuel efficient. It was certainly the first car of mine i ever considered taking a cross-country trip in, even though i never actually ended up doing that. It also ushered in a more sensible period in my life, when something large and safe was more important than small or sporty or exotic.
However, that sensible period didn’t last long, as my next COALs will illustrate.
My best friend’s Mother had a pearl white Bonnie of this generation she absolutely loved. In my mind it was very much her; sinister in appearance and attitude, but very comforting within. It got totaled in an accident that wasn’t her fault, and she literally cried when she found out it was going to be scrapped. To this day, it’s not uncommon for her to bring this up (and she is not a car person).
I’m on my second auto box for my W124. First one I wrecked getting out of a ditch so a thousand dollar job with a wrecker’s yard replacement got me back on the road. About 30,000 Km later, the box started to lose it. Phoned the garage to inquire of my mechanic if he had changed the oil and fluid when the new box was installed. He couldn’t remember so the answer was a big NO. Changed the oil and filter and karma was restored. Happened again recently, two years on, the auto box thumping between gears in an alarming way. Back to the garage for another oil change and new filter….karma restored. Ignore all the service recommendations and change your auto box filter and oil no later than 30,000Km. Works for me!
I agree. After owning many ancient cars, I’ve found that poor auto transmission function can be fixed with a fluid and filter change, about two-thirds of the time. The rest of the time, something else is wrong.
Every car project I get receives such a service. I can tell when a ‘professional’ mechanic has been in there, because they always throw the pan-magnet away, instead of cleaning it. Maybe they think doing so encourages future failure and repeat business.
Oh yes ! First trans fluid change on The Onion was at 50,000 miles, plugs at 10 years and 60,000, all belts, hoses, plug boots out at 10 years replaced with new, even the heater and AC hoses.
Pre-emptive maintenance I call it.
Heat, age and lack of use come under “severe duty” for me. 12 years and 65,000 miles currently on the ION. The potential for being stranded by the side of the road greatly diminished.
The auto on my Crown Vic has been acting a little oddly lately, so I think I’m going to try a fluid change before anything more drastic. I had a drain/fill done somewhere around 95k miles and it’s not quite at 120k now, but it’s been 3+ years on an elderly transmission so it’s worth a shot. Doesn’t look or smell burnt, but for the cost of fluid/filter and a little time to do the job, there’s not much to lose by trying.
I could be an outlier on this, but I always thought the exterior of these looked decent, it’s the interior (particularly the dashboard and radio/HVAC controls) that looked hideous, and orange backlit stuff (particularly that shade) just looks cheap to me. Worked on a few of these, they weren’t bad cars, but yeah, like a lot of heavier FWD cars they go through brake pads/rotors as well as struts
Not only Heavier FWD cars. My 99 Cavalier liked them every 25,000 miles, the Calais, the same.
I imagine the Citation I had would have done it too, but didn’t have it long enough to find out.
The ION just got new fronts at 65,000, so it wasn’t my driving.
The ‘orange backlit stuff’ looked cool before everybody started doing it. Then fashion moved on, and the cars still using it just looked dated. Kinda like body cladding…..
Orange/red dashglow was precisely why I couldn’t stomach Pontiacs for their last 20 years. It just looked cheap and cheezy. The Playskool dash knobs and buttons didn’t help either.
To the contrary, we had a rental Bonnie for a week in Miami about 10 years ago and it was a great car.
For me it wasn’t the lighting color, it was the shape of things. The weird rounded edges, “eyeball” vents, and huge buttons just ruined the look for me. It somehow came off better on the 90’s cars but had sort of gone off the rails by this point.
Pity, because the exterior is fine (if more anonymous than the previous gen) and these were generally well-sorted cars with proven mechanicals.
Kismet. I just posted last evening about my (unrequited) love affair with these last gen Bonnevilles. I wrote about one I rented, I needed to get back to Cleveland in a hurry (due to family issues) and I couldn’t trust my crappy Topaz to get me there. That car drove “smaller” than it was, meaning it handled like a compact or mid-sized car. I was thoroughly impressed with it. It was the same color as the car in the picture.
When I was working in downtown Grand Rapids, my office was next to a law firm’s office. One of the owners of the building would occasionally stop by, he had a fully-loaded pearl white SSEi that I was in love with. Eventually, he replaced that with a pearl white GXP Bonnie, which was even better! Oddly, the whole time I worked there (10+ years), I only ever met the guy in passing. We hardly exchanged 20 words a year.
WRT transmission service: On my new cars, I follow the owner’s manual. On my 2009 G6, I do the service every 50K miles as recommended. Here we are, eight years later and 115K miles and the trans shifts just fine.
Nice ride. I like the styling of the Bonneville, and having driven other period GM products, the 3800/4 speed auto was a good combination of power and fuel economy. COAL is always a favorite read of mine on CC, and I’m looking forward to the next instalment of your series.
That interior picture demonstrates everything wrong with prebankruptcy GM. Cheap, plasticity, and 50 shades of gray. This is not an economical, but their top of the line model, and not a hint of wood or metal anywhere.
Well…you still had the Olds Aurora and Buick LeSabre above this in the lineup. Both of those had woodgrain plastic.
All second-gen Auroras had real walnut -all 4 door positions, and the center console and center stack surround.
In their defense, 2004 was when the industry as a whole was just beginning to reembrace metal and wood trim in interiors. Nobody but Mercedes and Lexus used wood or metal in the 90s without getting labeled dated. GM was behind the trend no less but the air of cheapness is not the fault of being plastic heavy so much as it was the kinds of plastics used and the physical designs of them.
Not to mention that all the large-radius ‘corners’ around the stereo and heat/AC controls looks a bit Fisher-Price.
I am driving a 2005 GXP. Since I just had the Northstar block studded I will be driving it for awhile….would never be able to find as nice a car for what the repair cost – and selling it with blown heads was not going to get me much.
It is my thirdi had a ’94 SSE, a ’99 SSEj, and now this one. It goes like hell….but I miss the fuel economy of the 3800 V6.
The styling grew on me but think I still prefer the prior generation as I guess the car buying public did as well. The plastic fantastic cladding was toned down on the GXP which I think helps. I collect LOTS of comments on the instrument panel. “Space ship”
A very comfortable ride and it does handle well, it does not feel as big as it is. The GXP also has different springs and struts than the regular Bonneville. I just don’t want to buy tires for it again. It does seem to like eating brakes but they are ridiculously easy to do on this car. Takes longer to jack up the car and take the wheels off than actually doing the brakes.
I got to drive a ’94 SSE back when the car was just a couple years old. Quite comfortable and competent. Enjoyable on twisty roads.
Wouldn’t matter how good it was I would not buy one simply because of that wretched red dash lighting. My Dad’s 1984 Pontiac 6000 wagon had that red lighting too and it really fatigued my eyes during night driving.
No thanks.
I hear that comment about Pontiacs often, but I’ve never heard it about the older BMWs and Mercurys that also had the red instrument panel lights.
My first car with red IP lights was my 1985 Mercury Capri RS 5.0L. It was a bit unusual at first, but after a while I really grew to like them. Even now, when I go from my minivan to my G6, I find the red IP lights much easier to read.
Different strokes I guess…
Audi used red in the 80’s also. I kind of liked it when driving Dad’s ’86 5000S. However, IIRC that was actually a bulb casting red light on non-backlit gauges; the effect was a bit different than Pontiac’s use of red/orange backlighting.
When you mention driving at 120-130, is that in km/h?
Yes – 120-130km/h
I have always kind of liked these, and have wondered if Pontiac’s sporting bias would make the car feel any different from the 06 Lacrosse that I just couldn’t warm up to.
I know what you mean about that color. My 96 Odyssey was a similar shade and hardly ever looked dirty. I think I washed that car less than anything else I ever owned.
The ride tuning is similar in the base SE to a first-gen LaCrosse CX or CXL. The G platform by this point had aluminum control arms at all 4 corners and the rear was a big semi-trailing arm with lateral links, unlike the spindly trailing arm/toe link setup of the W-Body, so much better wheel control and lower unsprung weight. The tuning of the sportier Bonnevilles and the Aurora struck what I thought was a very good balance between stiff enough to feel controlled and soft enough for everyday comfort.
In fact, after having been in a number of then-newish W and G/H/K platform cars, the older second gen Aurora, final gen Bonneville, CXS-grade LaCrosse and base Grand Prix were the picks of the litter for overall balance. The base LaCrosse, Impala and Lucerne were pillowy, the Grand Prix GTP and GXP were brittle. The biggest letdown was the whiz-bang new magnetorheological suspension in the Lucerne CXS. All that press and development, not to mention cost, and it rode as brittle as a GP GXP while wallowing about like a base Impala. I suppose that was Version 1.1, and the newer models have solved it. Certainly took some beta testing. The conventional G platform suspension in mid-tune guise (Aurora and Bonneville) was tough to beat all around.
Not a fan of the red instrument lighting, but love the ignition switch in the dash, and not on the steering column.
These cars had a few advanced and nice features for the time that some competitors lacked. There was a rear seat pass-thru for long objects, the front seats had the seat belts built in for great comfort, there were std rear air vents and dual seat back map pockets, the instrument cluster had an oil pressure, battery, temp, dual trip odometers and of course a tach, even on the most basic SE trim level and bucket seats were std far with split bench an option for 6 passenger seating.
Also of note was the Canbus electrical system which debuted as far back as 1997 on the Park Ave, a std auto leveling rear suspension and as you stated it had the sporty for the time red instrument lighting which made it look like you were in an aircraft cockpit.
Try to replace one and you might feel differently. I’ve never done one of these but that’s about the same position it was in my wife’s Alero and WOW that was a total PITA to replace.
Though it was overpriced and the interior styling is…well, just look at it, I have always had a soft spot for this Bonneville.
Does anyone else think the 2012-2014 Camry SE looks a bit like a Bonneville from the front?
I don’t get the overpriced thing. It was cheaper than the Buick LeSabre of the same period and right about in line with other full size cars like the ancient Panthers or certain iterations of the LH cars. We used to look at these when they were new and the SE versions were usually stickering in the 25-30K range and the SLE/SSE models were usually in the mid 30’s range sticker. Of course there was most always money off and discounts so a nicely equipped Bonneville usually sold for under 30K with lots of equipment.
Stunned to read an article that actually praises a GM vehicle of recent vintage. I hope that it’s politically correct to do so.
What do you mean by politically correct? It happens. Here’s another one from recently:
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/curbside-classics-american/gms-greatest-hit-15-1997-2003-pontiac-grand-prix-randys-here-for-dinner-and-he-brought-the-wild-turkey/
Another interesting subject relating to this car is how advanced its electrical architecture was for its time. GM’s past ownership of Hughes Electronics definitely showed in the complex computer network that operates these cars, called CANbus. If anyone has access to shop software (Mitchell, Identifix or Alldata), do some reading of schematics and diagnostic test prodecures for ABS/Stabilitrak systems on these cars. The list of self-diag trouble codes from the EBTCM is mind-blowing, considering it was developed during the Clinton administration (this platform debuted under the ’97 Park Ave) and can be obtained in a drastically depreciated old car for peanuts today.
There’s something about that dashboard that marrs an otherwise fine looking automobile. It looks technologically advanced (evoking a sense of luxury?) in a food buffet kind of way whereas an Audi (I suppose an A6) would have the same wizardry on its dashboard appearing like fine dining with multiple courses coming from all directions. I guess that’s what separates the two classes of cars: You can have climate control, or you can have climate control.
At any rate, I own a humble Ford loaded in a similar manner, but at least it’s designed with a fusion of international tastes (see what I did there?…). The Pontiac has boy racer written all over its interior. They cleaned up the outside with all the cladding, all they needed to do next was do the same for the interior and then it would be complete automobile imho.
Even in flashy SSEi trim, I genuinely love the exterior of these. It was even better-looking than its predecessor. But wow, that interior… The overall shape and layout is fine but the details are terrible. Bob Lutz was right: this was a GM interior that looked like molten lava.
Does the prior generation fall under the greatest hits category? I still see many of them on the road….most looking good except fitted around the fuel filler…WTF. GM?
Of course I still see lost of Aleros and Aztecs (yes, those) in north east Ohio.
I would consider the second generation FWD H body overall a success. There were paint problems, the mid-cycle switch to Dexcool, and the Olds Ninety Eight, plastic valve cover gaskets, and warping upper intake manifolds, but otherwise they were some of the best GM cars all around in the 1985-2005 period.
Ugly car inside and out.
Or about how 90% of the crap on the roads today looks. At least this car can be told apart from most other sedans of the time and had many distinct Pontiac cues.
My parents had a Silver 2001 SE up until 2013 with 129K miles on the clock that they loved. And this is in Upstate, NY the salt belt hell of NY where most cars, especially Asian makes, are disintegrated by 8 years of age! It still looked like almost new underneath and the only small spot of rust was under the gas door where many of these start.
There Bonny was also remarkable trouble free for the most part with no transmission issues, the original 3800 engine and plastic manifold. The upper gaskets were changed because it was starting to seep at 10 years of age but the valve covers were never touched. It never needed a water pump, alternator, serpentine belt or plug wires either during that period. The spark plugs were changed by me as was the battery under the rear seat at 8 years of age. Just try and go that long on any new Honda or Toyota battery. Not going to happen.
One rear wheel bearing got noisy at 100K, a rear sway bar link bit the dust during 2012. I changed that out myself for less than 30 bucks! Other than that it was just the usual oil changes, transmission fluid changes, filters, tires and brakes. That damn car never ever left them stranded, pulled off easy 30 highway MPG runs to Cape Cod and was avery pleasant substantial highway cruiser. I wish they still made something like this as does my mom. If it had the new GM LGX 3.6 and 8 speed automatic from the new LaCrosse but with Pontiac styling I would be first in line!
When dad was diagnosed with Dementia in 2013 mom saw the writing on the wall and had to sell the Bonny during the Winter of 2013. A younger girl bought it from a distant relative and still drives it to this day as far as I know.