It is heartbreaking to see a bona fide classic left to rot. This Fleetwood Brougham isn’t a total wreck yet but it doesn’t look like it has moved for a while. I firmly believe a car like this deserves to be driven or showed off or both. This is why I could even tolerate a disused vehicle like this to be made over with a candy red paintjob and 24-inch chrome wheels. It beats seeing this poor Caddy slowly erode and corrode with time.
I recently saw the Oscar-nominated and Golden Globe-winning film Moonlight, which follows the life of a young, gay, black boy growing up in one of the United States’ poorest neighborhoods. Early on in the story, he inadvertently befriends a drug dealer – played by Mahershala Ali – whose car is a ’71-76 Chevrolet Impala that has been given the donk treatment. At first, I reacted in disgust. After all, that Impala had been butchered, right? But as I watched scenes of Ali cruising around in it, listening to that intoxicating V8 rumble, I realized that donk enthusiasts love big, RWD, American cars for the same reasons enthusiasts like us do. And while some enthusiasts will disgrace their cars with Continental kits or obnoxious exhausts or tasteless paint jobs or gigantic rear spoilers, what’s really important is that car is being driven and appreciated. Tacky modifications can be removed. A completely rusted out or crushed car cannot be restored.
I would prefer the owner of the featured Fleetwood restore it to stock condition, of course, like the photo above. Or, at the very least, pump up those tires and drive the sucker. I think these final Fleetwoods are stunning, more so than its more popular (around these parts) Brougham predecessor.
My biggest criticism? The interior. All the chrome and brightwork was stripped away, leaving a rather charmless, plasticky cabin. This was especially egregious considering the Fleetwood’s showroom company: the ’92 Eldorado and Seville and ’94 DeVille, which all had remarkably elegant and modern cabins. That gripe aside, that Fleetwood in Pittsburgh deserves to stay alive. Let’s hope it does.
Photographed by Brandon Gloster in Pittsburgh, PA.
Related Reading:
Curbside Classic: 1992 Cadillac Brougham – The Only Way To Travel Is Cadillac Style
Sadly I seriously doubt there is much hope for this one.
I must say that is one depressing picture on many levels.
Sorry William, but that one in your lead picture *is* a total wreck. That is the car you buy for $300 and hope it makes it for two months before something worth more than $50 immobilizes it.
I have only a passing interest in these, so perhaps someone more in love with them sees more here than I do. I would have to think hard before buying a nice one.
Resurrection is all about the rust. Mechanical bits can be fixed. Paint can be applied. But severe rust and/or accident damage put it beyond the skills of the typical hobbyist who might want to save that beast.
And for ’93-’96 Fleetwood, with the big chrome wrapping all around and bumper filler behind, when it shows rust anywhere obviously, it’s very rusted already.
From the looks of that location I would say that even if the owner lives in that building or close to it, a car is the least of their troubles. I’m be more concerned about the individuals ability to find gainful employment, obtain affordable health insurance, and live in a decent area.
As much as all of us here want to take the Indiana Jones mentality of “that belongs in a museum!” to older cars, I’m more inclined to adhere to Spock’s mantra of “the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.” Cars are by and large disposable items meant to transport people from one location to another. More importantly, the people come first, even if that means relegating some cars to the junkyard.
This isn’t a direct criticism of this post or you personally as I fully understand the tragedy of seeing a car in its death throes. I’ve just found that enthusiasts tend to overstate the significance of cars in the lives of everyday people.
What did you think of Moonlight? I can vouch for Mahershala Ali as he played a very good villain in Netflix’s Luke Cage.
You’re spot on about the owner. He/she has more pressing issues.
I still haven’t finished Luke Cage! From what I’ve seen of it though, it’s very good.
Moonlight was very, very good. It’s really more a soul-crushing look at the cycle of poverty so I didn’t connect with it as much as I thought it would. But it is definitely worth seeing!
I’m always saddened when I see a former luxury car reduced to a neglected carcass. Once someones pride and joy, admired by most everybody it passed, now looking like it lost it’s last friend.
Agreed. I try to imagine the day the first owner brought it home and proudly showed it off to friends and family.
I have to agree, I still remember seeing a 67 Cadillac Eldorado for the first time in a hotel parking lot. And when I took a closer look, it was a neglected rust covered wreck. I visualized what that car might’ve looked like in its prime, and it just made me depressed.
I would more hope that no homicide was associated with the car. The surroundings seriously look like the worse part of Detroit or Saginaw.
Some parts of Pittsburgh (and her older industrial suburbs) look like the bad parts of Detroit, (and for the exact same reasons..)
The building in question looks (based on brickwork around window openings, (A fairly accurate pointer in Pittsburgh.) was likely put up in the 1900-1910 era, placing it (if in the City limits) somewhere in the East End. if just out side the City borders, It may be somewhere the near “Mon” (Monongahela) Valley. (Braddock, Duquesne, McKeesport)
These parts were the “place to be” at the height of Pittsburgh’s steel era. and when that left, everything went to hell quick.
The “better” parts of town are either “gentrified” East End neighborhoods or the suburbs that were never industrial. (Shadyside/Mt. Lebanon, etc)
OTOH, Even Braddock, That most industrial of suburbs, (home to the first Bessemer steel plant in the US) is making efforts to “come back”, Just as parts of Detroit are.
Pittsburgh is largely better off than Detroit mainly because it never got that big, so we had a shorter fall to take.
This is the cycle of life, however cold-hearted that may sound.
There is an upshot; like one who has their organs harvested to help many others upon their untimely death, this Cadillac has an abundance of parts that will help keep others going. It’s just a matter of time at this point. There are wheels, trim, glass, and likely a host of usable interior and drivetrain parts. While it won’t likely be restored as is, many pieces of it are quite likely to live a very long time.
Here’s a picture in that vein. It’s just an Impala SS convertible, no big deal, is it? But it helped others live that much longer.
May I offer a dose of reality: we curbivores like old cars. We in particular like old cars that wear their patina gracefully while they add their style to the traffic of the daily grind. But here is the reality: at some point most cars must be crushed if only to make the survivors more valued in our eyes.
I wish they made a toy version of that car crusher for Matchbox cars. I’d buy it for my grandsons and probably play with it as much as them.
I used to use my Dad’s bench vice to crush matchbox cars, good times! 🙂
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=SwpjpGCcPJ4
I like it just like it is, and much more so than when it was new. A fitting ending.
LOL!!!
Restoring the old abandoned Fleetwood would cost big bucks, first step would require a Hazmat team to remove all ruminants left inside. LOL
I think I’d rather see someone Boss Hog-ify it with a white paint job and horns.
Is it weird that I like seeing old cars decay? Some of my favorite pictures on Pinterest are of old cars sitting in a field or behind a barn. I always thought it’d be cool (if I ever had a lot of land) to snatch up interesting and dirt cheap cars on CL and start a “collection” at the back of my property line. I’d be like the corpse farm, only for cars.
There’s a house I always pass by on my way to work that has a derelict late 80’s-early 90’s Jag XJ6 rotting out in the driveway. I’ve occasionally thought about offering a couple hundred dollars for the thing just so I can push it behind my house and watch it fall apart back there, but the wife (and neighbors) would most definitely kill me. I swear I’m not a hoarder.
I’m sort of the same way. While I’d like to see viable cars get repaired and stay on the road, once a car is truly used up and way beyond economic feasibility, there’s something poetic about a rusty old vehicle returning to the landscape.
My wife’s family lives in rural eastern North Carolina, and when we’d go to visit, I was always interested to see the wide variety of old cars and trucks that could often be found sitting “retired” along a fence line or at the back of a property, or sometimes right next to the house, slowly returning to the earth. Then about 2 years ago the county made it illegal to have an unregistered vehicle within view of a public road, and just about all of them disappeared. Some people probably saw it as a big improvement, but to me, it was kind of sad–the most interesting part of the scenery had been taken away.
Thematically, the picture is very interesting and coherent: the building in disrepair; the dilapidated cars; the cracking street and sidewalk; the overcast sky; trees with no leaves. Nice shot, if a bit depressing.
Sic Transit Gloria Mundi
That’s what I was thinking.
For a piece of transit, that Caddy looks very sic.
My moneys on a dead Opti-Spark, possibly caused by a leaking water pump.
At about 80k miles I always put in a new water pump on any LT1 or L99 engine that I owned. My best friend and his neighbor did the same on the Roadmasters and Caprices from this era and never had the Opti-spark issues. It was great insurance to avoid future problems with these cars.
I guess I’ll jump in and be the LT1 fanboy.
The whole opti-spark thing is blown way out of proportion. I’ve been driving and maintaining LT1’s since 2003, first my dear departed Caprice 9C1 followed by the Fleetwood that’s been my daily driver for about ten years. In that time I replaced the opti on the Caprice once (because it was starting to cause misfiring) and on the Fleetwood once (because I was doing the water pump and it had hit 100k miles). They are nothing more than a simplified distributor that’s tricky to get to. You’re well advised to change the “cap and rotor” every 100k or so, nothing unusual about that. They very rarely fail suddenly or catastrophically. Like anything, if you ignore warning signs you’re going to have trouble.
The design may be somewhat flawed, but only in that they are vital and hard to get to….and that’s only in relation to how easily everything else is reached in the generously sized engine bays on these cars. Replacing one is about an hour job and most of that will be refilling the coolant. If you simply replace it when the water pump needs replacing you’ll probably never have any issues.
Be that as it may, opti-spark was still a lousy dead end ignition system. GM should have just outfitted coilpacks like the rest of the world, like they inevitably did.
Everything is built to a price. Was it as good as it could possibly be? Obviously not. The original SBC didn’t have an oil filter. The LS1 has that cheesy plastic intake manifold. Corners are cut.
Now, one could argue that while such corner cutting is appropriate for a Chevy, Cadillac should be better than that…and I’d agree.
Easy fix now…MSD has a drop-in replacement that will last forever. Bonus: it is half the price of a stock replacement.
I recently went junkyarding to find a few things for my ’94 Fleetwood. Unfortunately they are getting a little harder to find. However there was one trim panel I was able to use from this dead soldier. It looked to have been cherry until it was wrecked in the front. The headlight wiring shorted out and the engine compartment burned.
Well, there goes another Cadillac, slowly decaying before everyone’s eyes.
While I can understand your logic behind rather seeing it turned into a donk than rusting away, I don’t necessarily buy it. It’s a running example sure, but often times, the amount of money needed to turn that car into what it ended up as, will be roughly the same money needed to turn it stock again, provided the owner sells it at any point. It’s not just the wheels, it’s also removing the lift kit, fixing the suspension, removing whatever garish paintwork adorns the body. And if the owner decided to fit stuff like scissor doors or a tacky custom interior, good luck.
Trust me on this, I’ve been looking at Fleetwoods for sale on auto websites and craigslist, and the only ones around are either high mileage beaters, or converted into Low Riders were the owner is asking about 15K for the car, never mind that I’m going to spend half that money turning the car back to it’s stock form, because there’s not a chance in hell that I’m going to be seen in a low-rider or a donk.
Well, that was my rant. So, yeah, I really like these Fleetwoods, but it seems they’re getting more expensive and more valuable, even ones with 100k on the odometer are going for nearly 10 grand on some websites. I just hope to get one as a daily driver before the price gets jacked up further, if not, I’ll settle for a Roadmaster.
If you think a nice Fleetwood is hard to find, try looking for a nice Caprice. In the same way that today one might think all 1960’s intermediates were two door hard tops with big block engines (because the six banger sedans have died off) the once ubiquitous Caprice is now rarer than the Fleetwoods and Roadmasters. I still see good numbers of those but spotting a nice Caprice is a special occasion.
I noticed nice Caprice is pretty rare these days. It’s uncommon for people to garage it all the time, compared to Roadmaster and Fleetwood. But I won’t really say they are that hard to find, at least it’s easier to find than Lincoln Mark series.
And Caprice is a regional thing, at least in Michigan it has higher than usual concentration in Warren and Saginaw ( both working-class community )
That’s certainly true. I didn’t mean to say a nice Caprice CAN’T be found, but hey are definitely getting thin on the ground.
A lot of 90’s Caprices went to taxi fleets and were worn to the ground. Until the ’08 recession and 5 dollar gas, then they switched to Toyotas.
To me, a donked out Fleetwood or any of these big old RWD boats is like seeing an old lady with one foot in the grave decked out in streetwalker clothes and makeup. Simply vile.
I’d rather see them crushed.
I don’t know where you are, but a quick search my Craigslist found a few good choices in the Gulf South:
https://mobile.craigslist.org/cto/6000754230.html
Slightly pricey but it looks pristine and has the very desirable towing package.
https://neworleans.craigslist.org/cto/5995115599.html
The year is obviously wrong (probably a ’93 built in ’92) but the price is right and it doesn’t have the padded top which is a plus to many.
San Diego California, for what its worth.
Ah, okay. Big American cars probably didn’t sell very well out there to start with. You might want to consider a road trip!
Does this mean you are giving up on the Eldorado?
Nope, well, I’ve given up on the Eldorado. But, considering the new engine and other stuff, my dad wants me to keep it. It’s his word against mine, so I’m stuck with the Eldorado for now. Unless I get a full time job and use my own money or end up totaling the car, it’s going to be my mode of transport for the foreseeable future.
With a new engine, which should have been upgraded to the final head bolt design, I think keeping it for now makes sense. I did look at your coal, but I am not sure if you were aware of the Northstar’s problems before you bought it or not.
I was very much aware of the Northstar’s infamy going in. In fact, I always tried to make a promise that if the engine had problems, I would not bother with them and just try and get my dad to scrap it or sell it to someone who could fix it. I just didn’t expect putting new stuff on the car that I couldn’t have anticipated that meant we got stuck in the rabbit hole as far as crossroads. In hindsight, I wish I had tried to find a stud kit for the headbolts and convinced my dad to get it, it probably could’ve saved both of us a big headache.
Ok, what would have been a good plan would have been to replace the head bolts while the engine is still good with the timesert, which should have prevented problems. Anyway I think these replacement kits put a coarser thread somewhat deeper into the block, which is usually done after a failure.
Most CC’ers here seem to think the FWD Northstar should be avoided. I think that if one finds a good one with the original engine, preemptive action would probably be the cheapest way to go. The best time to have owned these is when they were new, or while insurance was still available to cover breakdowns.
A good Fleetwood can still be found if you keep your eyes out. Last October, I found one at an auction up here in the Bay Area. For $2300, I got a ’94 Fleetwood Brougham with 81,000 miles on it. It had some minor stuff wrong with it: The A/C, the key fob, some oil leaks, and the radio weren’t quite right, but it was all pretty minor stuff. Under the hood, everything else was well maintained and stuff like the tires were brand new. It had been in few accidents judging by the repaired body damage, but it was still very presentable. It was even the rare Amythyst color too.
My plan was to flip the car for a profit since I already have a good ’96 Lincoln Town Car as a daily driver. (The other guy I was bidding against had wanted to get it for $1500 and make it into a lowrider). I took the car back to SoCal and left it with my parents and a funny thing happened. My dad really liked the car, so I ended up just giving it to him. My parents have always supported my interest in the car hobby, so it was the least I could do. I’ve slowly been fixing all the little issues on the old car and dad’s been daily driving the Fleetwood for the past couple months.
Nicely done!
The car is one thing–what bothers me is property owners who replace windows with ones that are clearly the wrong size! I guess these people don’t care how bad their buildings look.
Another step in the decline of Western civilization.
Also a pet peeve of mine. Replacing wood or metal frame windows with vinyl is bad enough, but vinyl in the wrong size is 100 times worse. Those big old windows were meant to let in the glorious light and let out the heat in summer; replacing them with whatever small units one can buy most cheaply is a sin in my book.
I’m always a bit embarrassed that my 1946 vintage house has “efficient” vinyl replacement windows, but they were there when I bought it and I’ve not yet found any old photos to indicate what the originals looked like. At least they’re the correct size as the brickwork around the openings appears untouched.
Indeed. It depresses me seeing these as much as it does seeing the old windows bricked over.
I agree, however in the case of the Pittsburgh photo, the building was never a likely a candidate for “sympathetic restoration”. The owner likely got the cheapest windows needed to pass BBI (or city housing authority) inspection. In that, architectural integrity being secondary to lower gas bills in an economically challenged area…at least it looks occupied, thus providing it’s prime function. Plus, this is not the facade (admittedly, the facade MAY be as bad..).
Yea, that Camry does look tired, but I bet it still runs!
Had a ’93 with the L05, a much safer bet, if somewhat slower off the line, than the LT1. It was a very nice driver that consistently got 24-26 mpg on the highway, rode beautifully, and had comfortable seats and the most legroom fore and aft I’ve ever encountered. It did not rust like this one.
As I’ve posted before, the interiors were the big letdown on these…thinner carpets, more plasticky interior, flimsier switchgear, and iffier interior electronics than their predecessors. Had they had those interiors, these would have been most impressive old style Cadillacs.
As they were, they were the most efficient big car I’ve ever seen, but lacking in distinction otherwise. I think I’d prefer a 92 to own if I wanted another.
I think Cadillac wanted the FWDs to take over so they could end production of these. I suspect that Cadillac could not just do that as long as the BOF was still selling and the Caprice was also in production. GM’s cars in the 90’s were not what they had been though, I was disappointed with the interior of my 1995 Riviera.
The good sales of Lincoln Town Car kept the RWD Brougham going to 1996.
“Tacky modifications can be removed. A completely rusted out or crushed car cannot be restored.”
The more extreme examples will cut out wheelwells and even cut the exterior wheel openings to clear these oversized neck medallions passed off as wheels. Fixing that kind of butchery is just as labor intensive as fixing rust, which that “trimming” most certainly exacerbates. And since these cars aren’t all that desirable anyway they really are lost causes. I very often find 70s full sizers in the Chicago U-pull-it yards in the GM section, which normally cars that old are complete anomalies in self service yards, and when I look at them, indeed there’s clear evidence of Donkery. And I got a pretty good idea of the workmanship involved.
Ain’t happening. Not in Pittsburgh, anyway.
While we have nothing on DC or Chicago crime, the neighborhood depicted is still a dangerous place to be. You live in a place like this if…
A) you can’t possibly afford anything better,
B) you’re selling drugs.
Sorry for the bluntness. Lincoln-Lemington, Homewood, parts of the Hill District, this could be somewhere in the Mon Valley as well. IDK…there are just some places you avoid at all costs. I take no joy in sharing that assessment.
What I CAN tell you is that if you can afford to do anything with this Chevy Caddy, you can probably afford to hop I-79 South and in just a few hours, find a much better example. Even as rare as these are getting.
Of course there IS the matter of caring for an Optispark-equipped LT-1…’nother story entirely.
Again with the optispark pessimism….it’s really not that big of a deal. The first year of the engine in F-bodies were flawed but by 1994 (when the engine made its way into the B & D-bodies) they had added venting to solve the moisture problems.
I’ve put a good 120k miles on two LT1 powered cars over the last 14 years without any major incidents.
Or if you really are trepidatious regarding OptiSpark, get the 1993 model, which is otherwise identical except for the steering wheel and some interior lighting. It’s not a binary choice of LT1 vs no Fleetwood. I think the most ’93s were sold, too, so there ought to be more of them.
Can’t actually disagree. Pittsburgh is “famous” for a relatively low crime rate…….If you stay away from certain areas, (anyone with a scanner and a TV knows where…) New York City also has a low crime rate……..In most areas…… YMMV!?
PS I grew up in Mon Valley, FWIW…..
Seeing that…I wanna go down there with a repo truck and rescue that Fleetwood.