My wife constantly accuses me of losing things. I often correct her to say that my things are not lost, just misplaced. Lost implies that they are gone forever, which they are not. I may not know where a particular item is at this exact second, but I also know it will eventually turn up, and is therefore technically not “lost.” She is not amused when I try to make this distinction.
Alas, forgetfulness appears to be one of the common affectations of aging. We’ve all had those moments of insight when we see something that we had otherwise totally forgotten existed, like candy cigarettes (how were those ever a thing?). I had this happen at a recent car show when I stumbled upon several cars, the memory of their previous existence I had somehow managed to “misplace” in my mind.
Let’s see how many of these forgotten treasures you remember.
1976 Buick LeSabre Landau Coupe.
Yes, of course I remember the Buick LeSabre, but I kind of forgot about this odd-looking fast roof coupe model sold from 1974 to 1976, clearly created in an attempt to imbue the full-sizers with a bit of Colonnade style. This example hails from the final 1976 model year of this body style.
1976 Buick LeSabre Landau Coupe.
My absentmindedness of these big coupes is even more striking when you consider that this roof stamping was also shared with contemporary Pontiac and Oldsmobile full-size coupes. (The Chevrolet Impala also offered a similar style coupe, but its greenhouse was slightly different, lacking the rear quarter window and therefore not being a true hardtop). Still, these are rare enough to make this the first 1974-76 LeSabre coupe to be featured on CC.
The look has not aged well – none of the lines really seem to line up. The beltline kick-up and narrowing of the roof give the impression that the top was cribbed from a smaller car. The Collonade look doesn’t work as well with a hardtop, as it appears that there are too many side windows.
1976 Buick LeSabre Landau Coupe.
Part of the reason for my lapse in memory is that full-size coupes like this 1976 LeSabre were well on their way out by 1976. While big coupes were not quite extinct yet, the asteroid impact of the Arab Oil Embargo had effectively bifurcated the coupe market into upper and lower ends, leaving mid-tier full-sizers like the LeSabre on the verge of extinction. Customers looking for less expensive and more fuel-efficient Buick coupes in 1976 flocked to the Regal and Century, whose combined 217,982 coupe sales far eclipsed the 49,530 LeSabre coupes sold in 1976.
The upper end of the big coupe market was, for the time, still hanging in – after all Meat Loaf was still pining for a Coupe DeVille in 1977’s Bat Out of Hell album. Cadillac would face their reckoning in the 1980s at the hands of Mercedes and BMW, but in 1976 Cadillac buyers were still happily shrugging off the higher interest rates and gas prices and snapped up 114,482 Coupe DeVilles, with the CDV outselling the SDV almost 2:1 that year.
1990 Buick Reatta Convertible.
Staying on the Buick theme, here we see this 1990 Buick Reatta Convertible. While I of course remember this odd two-seater Buick (and I even remember its way ahead of its time CRT touch screen), it totally slipped my mind (and perhaps yours too) that for about five minutes there was also a convertible version. While the Reatta was sold between 1988 to 1991, the ASC convertible was only sold for only the last two model years, and only sold 2,437 examples. No wonder I forgot about it!
1990 Buick Reatta Convertible.
I didn’t realize it at the time, but this is the first Reatta roadster to be photographed in the metal by a CC contributor. Had I known, I might have snapped a few more pictures. Oh well, next time I see one…
As an aside, one of GM’s many head-scratching decisions of the 1980s was their insistence on giving almost every division a two-seater, with the Buick Reatta, Cadillac Allante, and Pontiac Fiero joining the long-running Chevrolet Corvette. Two-seaters are, by definition, niche products, so they were never going to drive huge gains in profits or market share. And yet all these new two-seat entrants were done so half-assedly that they couldn’t really serve as proper halo vehicles either. So why did GM even bother?
Infiniti M30 Convertible.
The last car was another convertible that I must confess I had completely forgotten about: The 1991-1992 Infiniti M30 convertible (coincidentally also made with assistance from ASC). With only 2,500 or so examples sold over two model years, you better commit this one to memory – who knows when we will see another one. I thought I might have pulled off another Curbside coupe coup, but our own Jim Klein beat me to it, finding an M30 convertible in a junkyard back in 2019.
I’m not sure whether this M30 is a 1991 or 1992 model. Most of the convertibles were sold in the 1991 model year, so we’ll go with that unless one of our eagle-eyed readers can spot something that I missed.
Infiniti M30 Convertible.
Although my sample size is small, it seems like these were almost always sold in white. A quick internet image search shows a few other colors, but otherwise confirms that most of these models were indeed white. At least I remembered something correctly! Now if I could just remember where I put my wallet…
Related Reading
Ebay Find: 1990 Buick Reatta Select Sixty Edition
Junkyard Classic: 1992 Infiniti M30 Convertible – Hidden Under A Rock Behind A Tree
Curbside Classic: 1990-92 Infiniti M30 – To Infinity And Nowhere
Curbside Classic: 1990 Buick Reatta – A Pudding With No Theme
Comment Classic: I Grew Up With Two LeSabre V6s And Survived Their Slowness
That lesabre coupe is awkward looking. I don’t remember them although I may have thought it was a Riv back then. Yet they sold almost 50,000 not bad at all!
i would love to see a 1974 montecarlo that light green with a white top my first car
Wish granted:
Those big Buick LeSabres had satisfactory or maybe more than enough V-8 power when the ’71 version was introduced. It is possible that this coupe though had to struggle with just the 3.8 V-6. Yes, their time was over.
Oddly enough, the V6 versions had a V6 badge, to tell the world how very underpowered they were.
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/qotd/qotd-did-the-1976-buick-lesabre-v6-have-the-worst-power-to-weight-ratio-of-any-malaise-era-american-car/
BTW, the answer to that question was no. The 1976 Ford Granada six had the worst power-to-weight ratio
If you are even remotely like me, (and our wives, that is) your wallet will probably be in your pocket, your passport in the drawer where it should be, and you’ll have to overcome being frowned upon as a distracted, reckless old guy who doesn’t mind spending other people’s time….
Some cars are better left forgotten.
But do you remember this oddball?
The Toronado XS (with it’s ‘hot wire’ bent rear window) was my first thought, as well.
The only problem is the XS was introduced in 1977, so it followed the LeSabre, instead of the other way around.
Another problem was its name. Why on earth did Oldsmobile call its top-line Toronado something that’s pronounced “excess”?
One auto writer dubbed it “XS-ive”.
I was thinking more along the lines of another obscure low-selling GM variant that Tom probably doesn’t remember.
How about this forgotten biggie from ’76? The quite rare Oldsmobile Delta 88 Crown Royale Landau Coupe. A different and very distinctive approach to a coupe with enhanced closed-in privacy for rear seat riders and accented with a stainless steel band over the top… in all totally “over the top”! Very sought after by Olds collectors today.
Wow; I’ve long forgotten about this one. I can’t remember ever seeing one either.
Holy Blind-spot, Batman!
Always wanted, still do, one of those “Infiniti’s”.
The 1991-1992 Infiniti M30 convertible… seems like these were almost always sold in white.
White Quartz, Black Obsidian, and Burgundy Berry. Interiors, always leather, could be Beige, Graphite, or White.
Colors aside, the original Infiniti M was such a strange misstep; rework a Japanese market Nissan Leopard that dated back to 1986 by stripping content, forgo the available DOHC VG series V6 for a less powerful SOHC variant that resulted in a woefully underpowered car for its weight and aspirations, and pluck the LHD dashboard from the not-luxurious R31 Skyline series. The arrival of the otherworldly-by-comparison Lexus SC in early 1991 underscored what a half-assed attempt the M was, making it rather astonishing Nissan even bothered with the 1992 model year; it certainly did the Infiniti brand image no favors.
The Buick coupe felt like it was the car you were supposed to buy if you couldn’t quite swing the note on a Riviera.
As cjiguy says above, the M30 coupe and convertible were past their prime even before they became Infinitis. The last of the 1980s square-shouldered designs in an era of jellybeans. It felt to me like Nissan executives said, “Well, we can’t just offer ONE model at the new Infiniti dealerships, what can we throw together really quick to give the dealers a second model to put on the floor?”
“Coupe coup.” Hats off for that one, Tom.
Buick, Pontiac and Cadillac all had 2-seaters in the 1980’s. Also the corvette for Chevy. Why no 2-seater Oldsmobile?
The LeSabre would look much better without the landau vinyl roof; its bright surround molding make that area look much too busy, especially the way it doesn’t quite reach the roll-down rear window. Without the vinyl top the LeSabre coupe is a cleanly styled car.
That’s a big, bad, black Buick! I don’t recall ever seeing one in the wild. I wouldn’t have been surprised if many owners had a shop add a new vinyl “cap” that would have covered those huge quarter windows. Then it would look like that Olds. I remember how 75-76 Chevy Caprices were very sought after by some of the Low Rider guys that I knew.
The Reatta and the Allante were similar in concept, regular fwd drive trains stuck in a “special” body. I was aware of the Infiniti, and had considered getting one once they got older, as I was into Datsun Z cars at the time. One of my coworkers actually bought one.
when my kids were younger, they would make fun of me when I would “lose” something. I’d tell them it wasn’t lost, “Everything” is “Somewhere!”
Oh, I remember those big LeSabre coupes! I worked at a job in high school where another kid drove one owned by his parents. I also remember how a couple of us were in the back seat fighting over whether the window would be open or closed and we broke something in the window riser mechanism. So I will never, ever forget that these existed. FWIW, I will agree that I never liked the styling on these.
On the Infiniti, I remember back when I was first starting to photograph cars for CC there was a guy in my area who drove one as a daily. I always liked the styling on them (being the retro guy that I am) but I never saw but a handful of them.
My wife is the misplacer-in-chief at my house. My favorite thing is when I ask where something is, the reply is “It should be in the xxx”. I always fight the urge to reply “Of course that’s where it should be, because that’s where I looked and found out it wasn’t there.” Her favorite phrase is to put something down somewhere it does not go “for right now.” I have joked with her for years that this will be on her tombstone: “Here lies Marianne – for right now.”
I have a family member with not 1, but 2 of the Infiniti convertibles! (and there were 2 in a salvage yard near me until recently.) Not bad looking and not bad driving, but were overpriced when new, and the conversion job did not avoid ‘cowl shake’.
…”like candy cigarettes (how were those ever a thing?)” • wow…I don’t even know how to deal with such a comment…it’s pretty obvious – smoking looks cool, kids want to pretend they look as cool as Clint Eastwood chewing on a cigar when he blows away some unfortunate adversary…
I realize my. Reply, is giving away my age, but as a life long GM guy, who had a pretty nice collection, of their great cars, from mid 50’s to mid 70’s, I need to jump in, and comment on the full size Buick two door coupe/hardtop.
We need to both remember, to cut the designers some slack, because everything regarding the American automobile, was being heavily watched over by Congress, due to
safety demands, especially the always popular two door hardtop, and the convertible…plus the mandatory downsizing of full size automobiles, I was blessed to own a 1974, and a 1975 Buick Le Sabre convertibles, both fully optioned with the 455 V-8. in the 1980 thru mid 1990’s, both fantastic cars. Winding back to 1975, I attempted to find a 1974 two door hardtop, because I preferred the roll down rear windows, creating the two door hardtop look…They were very scarce, and I was told the 1975 models were difficult to order.
I liked the Coupe De Ville, I actually owned a 1973, but I preferred the Buick, for multiple reasons, including how they handled the mandatory redesign, of the two door hardtop.
I agree 100% with la673, that the designers, created a very stylish two door hardtop, even with the Government mandates, that also included safer bumpers, etc.
When I first saw this big, black bad ass Buick, I had two thoughts, hopes, that it had the bullet proof 455, along with all the amenities, and it was For Sale. I’ll keep looking.