Not my car; with 1,029 of them, all in the same color scheme, it doesn’t matter.
Working and Waiting
As winter ‘89 turned to spring, I worked my temporary job and searched for permanent employment as we tried to stabilize our household finances. For me, working second shift was like a box of laced Lucky Charms cereal: toxically delicious. A natural night owl, at 21 I had deluded myself into believing that I could goof off all night after work with friends and co-workers, get an abundance of sleep, and still hold down a “full-time” job.
I worked in the press room of The Lawyers Cooperative Publishing Company, or LCP, book manufacturing facility in Webster, NY. Founded in Rochester in 1882, LCP was the second largest law book publisher in the country. Coincidentally, in mid-1989 my mother also secured a temporary position in LCP’s Human Resources Department in Rochester, and was hired there later that year. LCP was very old-school in the sense that most support workers were hired into entry-level positions; the company was committed to promoting from within.
LCP’s Rochester offices, 1980s. Judging by the cars out front, this picture was likely taken around the time I was hired.
The Regal was still clipping along, but at the 100,000-mile point. In July ‘89 I landed an entry-level full-time editorial position in LCP’s Rochester office. Here, I received my first exposure to a corporate work environment, the finer points of work commuting, and paying for downtown parking. My new job also meant the end of my freewheeling, second-shift “playboy” lifestyle.
Mr. Second-shifter looks a little tired on his second day downtown. From the LCP company newsletter.
Rochester office work hours were from 8:15 am to 4:45 pm. There was no “flexing” of one’s work time to account for appointments, etc. You took an hour for lunch (and you liked it!). When overtime work arrived, you worked Saturday mornings from 8:00 am to 12 noon. Like I said, a very old-school company. My, how things have changed.
The Fleet is Out of Commission
Naturally, not long after I joined editorial, all three of our cars were kaput for various reasons. The Regal had completed one of its “magical disappearing front brakes” acts, the crummy ‘83 Crown Victoria began leaking coolant from the water pump, and I don’t even remember what the problem was with the third car, another pseudo-crummy ‘78 LeSabre.
But, rescue was on the horizon! With my grandmother’s “retirement” from driving, my Uncle John and Aunt Patty presented us with her 1980 Fairmont sedan. Nothing sexy, but it ran and had low mileage. My uncle noted to us that the fuel pump was likely on its way out (as the car would occasionally stall at cruising speed) and that we should get it replaced. We nursed the Crown Victoria to Ithaca to meet them, got the Fairmont, and headed home.
‘80 Fairmont. Remove the vinyl top and side molding, and it’s a match for my grandmother’s car. / ClassicCars.com
That “rescue” lasted about two days. On the afternoon of the second day, the Fairmont’s fuel pump conked out on 490 East in the middle of evening rush hour. My dad tried to get the car onto the left shoulder, but a bit of its tail stuck out. Next thing we knew, (wait for it) Ska-Booom!! A Cavalier wagon cut the curve a little too tight and torpedoed the Fairmont’s back end. Alas, poor Fairmont! Totaled before we knew ye. We hadn’t even switched the insurance and registration over. So much for our “rescue.”
The Search Begins
We fixed our existing motley vehicle fleet (likely with insurance proceeds from Grandma’s Fairmont), plugged along through the fall and early winter of ‘89, and kept our eyes open for something newer. As a “working professional” with a better, but still limited budget, I stumbled across an ‘86 Century Gran Sport in February of 1990.
A good photographer and quality lighting can make anyone look dreamy. Case in point.
I recalled once seeing a new one at our incompetent local Buick dealer. While attractive, I compared its MSRP to the turbo Regals and there was no question which one I would have chosen: Not the Century GS.
However, four years later (early 1990), the Century GS was the most “interesting” and cheapest late model, low-mileage car I found. So, for $6,000 (and a swell $1,500 loan rollover for the crummy Crown Victoria) I got a four year-old car with 24,000 miles.
Remarkably Unremarkable
The Century GS was a perfectly adequate car: comfortable to travel in, got good highway mileage, easy to drive, and reliable. But, its Darth Vader livery wrote checks that the powertrain and chassis couldn’t cash.
Century GS-specific 15-inch alloys we’re a nice touch, but lended themselves to easy curb damage. Thoughtfully, mine were already “pre-curbed” by the previous owner.
Also, like some of the Grand Nationals I saw around town, the Century suffered from a typical lousy mid-‘80s GM paint job. It presented as if it had been washed regularly with a Brillo pad and dried with paper towels.
Not terribly subtle, and not a particularly good “sport” either.
But, compared to our other cars, it seemed so modern. It maintained its novelty to me for quite a while after purchase.
Notable pros included:
1. Sequential port fuel injection! Without a doubt, my favorite feature of this car. No pedal pumping; no flooding, no stubborn hot starts. I just turned the key and it started almost immediately. It was like magic.
2. The audio system. Sound quality with the GM/Delco stereo was easily two levels beyond what I’d experienced in the Regal or our ‘76 LeSabre. And, (finally) a cassette player. (I had a lot of cassettes.)
3. The steering wheel. Thick and leather-wrapped, it was similar to the one used in the turbo Regals. (And that was where the similarities between the two vehicles abruptly ended.)
4. Panoramic visibility. The Century’s upright roofline and generous greenhouse was like being in a ball turret on a B-17, minus the enemy gunfire obviously. Good visibility became an increasingly valuable attribute to me.
Visibility was excellent and the interior was comfortable enough. Hard to escape the Grand National interior.
Notable cons included:
1. Annoying, overly-sensitive throttle tip-in. I assumed it was purposely calibrated to make the car feel more powerful, but the car lunged forward, or “jumped,” from idle if the accelerator pedal was pushed a smidge too hard. When my father drove it, there was usually at least one muttered “goddammit . . .” as the throttle response caught him off guard.
2. Stoplight snoozer. When new, one magazine estimated a 0-60 mph time of around 8.5 seconds, which seemed reasonable. In real life experience, it was slower than that. While at a stop light on Ridge Road one day, a V6 Dodge Dynasty (!) pulled up in the lane next to mine. We both took off on the green, and . . . the Dynasty left me for dead.
Dusted . . . by a Dynasty. Oh, the shame!
I mean, he was gone — as I closed on maybe 45 mph, he was multiple car lengths in front of me and disappearing. I was perplexed. Was it that:
- Mopar built a single high-performance “Q-ship” Dodge Dynasty for street use . . . and brought it to Rochester, NY?
- The Dynasty’s V6 horsepower was underrated?
- The Century GS was not in top form?
3. Talked the talk, but didn’t walk the walk. Related to number 2 above, the GS made a very convincing case for itself on exterior appearance alone. But it didn’t have the Wheaties to back it up. A few random people asked me if it was turbocharged. My “Nope” response usually killed any residual interest.
Two-color badge = Turbo 6. / MikesMontes.com.
Single-color badge = “Power 6.” / BeforeBlack.net
Years later, I pondered what the GS would been like with a 205 hp, naturally aspirated 3800 V6. After careful consideration, I finally landed on, “hot mess, torque-steering handful.”
4. Lazy instrument cluster execution. Buick mailed it in on the GS’s instrument panel, as they had on the turbo Regal with its lame strip speedometer and LED “tachometer.” Even Oldsmobile’s Cutlass Ciera had an optional full gauge cluster. I assume the same unit wouldn’t fit in the Buick’s dash.
The Ciera had this available instrument cluster . . . in 1985. However, the steering wheel is a bit of a whiff here. / BringATrailer.com
We elite 1986 Buick Century GS owners got this cluster. Steering wheel is on point, though. / TopClassicCarsForSale.com
It’s not any better close up. Ugh. / TopClassicCarsForSale.com
Dull, Dependable, Deteriorating
Over three years, I put about 45,000 miles on the GS. Front-wheel drive made winter travel easier, although the Regal with winter tires was nearly as capable. Did the usual oil changes, brakes, tires, and of course, an exhaust system. A new Mass Airflow Sensor (MAF) fixed an intermittent surging-then-stumbling-low idle. That was about it.
By 1993, the car was also three years older, and it showed. The bottoms of the doors were getting scaly. The paint was hazier. I’d had some paint work done, which simply magnified the decline of areas not repainted.
The “BUICK” billboard door decals were unobtainum even then; I didn’t want to paint the doors and lose the decals.
Imposter Syndrome
One day, as I returned empty-handed (again) from the parts counter of our incompetent local Buick dealer, a couple of salesmen were outside arguing about the GS’s (ahem) “provenance.”
Salesman 1: “I’m tellin’ ya, dat caw don’t exist! Someone made dat caw up.”
Salesman 2: “Someone made dem badges and dee-cals demselves? C’mahhn!”
Salesman 1: ”Lissen ta me, Jerry. Dat caw don’t exist. I nevva seen one, so it don’t exist.”
When I rounded the corner and headed for the car, they suddenly clammed up and stared, riveted, at the tops of their shoes.
And yes, most of their salesmen, when speaking, sounded like extras in “Goodfellas.”
The Handoff
I’d left the editorial department in Rochester in 1991 and returned to LCP’s manufacturing center in Webster, NY to work on second-shift in the page composition department. My associate’s degree was insufficient to advance in editorial, a situation I wouldn’t abide. On the plus side, my work commute became easier, and I once again convinced myself that I could goof off all night, get a lot of sleep, and still hold a full-time job.
The car had about 69,000 miles on it when I sold it to a friend and co-worker in June 1993. He was dying to buy it; I was dying to sell it, but not necessarily to him. I don’t think one should mix friends and used cars. Well, I was right — he put about 11,000 miles on it before the engine blew up on Thanksgiving Day as he and his wife traveled past Binghamton, NY, of all places.
The sequential port fuel injected, distributor-less, 150 hp 3.8L V6 was a substantial improvement over the asthmatic carbureted 3.8L, but still had a few deficiencies (oiling issues) to overcome.
He wrote off the incident as “just one of those things,” and left the car at the garage where it had been towed. I, however, was both embarrassed and annoyed. I took good care of that engine and expected it would go on long after the rest of the car had disintegrated.
But, by June 1993, I had a plan, and to execute it, I needed to sell the Century. As plans often do, it involved a girl, a car, and my departure from this podunk town (Rochester, NY, in my case). For I had laid eyes on California, the place Chuck Berry called “The Promised Land.” Like countless others, I’d seen my destiny. . . and it didn’t include a scaly Buick Century GS with a lousy paint job.
What kind of car does one procure for a trip to such a place? We’ll find out in the next installment, but I’ll give you a hint: it was a crazy choice . . . crazy like a fox.
Related CC reading:
Curbside Classic: 1986-96 Buick Century & Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera – Sheer Frustration
Curbside Classic: 1986 Buick Century Limited Two-Door Sedan – Even If Buick Insists It’s A Coupe
Curbside Classic: 1991 Buick Century Coupe – If We Make It Forever It Will Be Good
Curbside Outtake: The Dwindling A-Body Buick Century – Four Sealed Headlamp Version At That
Never driven a 3800 V6 FWD, in RWD in Holdens they went fairly well plenty of torque at low rpm they get away from a traffic light ok, I would guess the Buick original would go at least that well,
I kinda like it as far as looking at it goes, but hose cars dont exist here.
Buick struck out on all their attempts to sell sporty cars in the ’80s except those based on the Regal. It would be easy to attribute this to its RWD, but others around this time were selling FWD cars with good, even sporty driving characteristics.
Agreed. I felt this was an inexpensive cosmetic experiment on GM’s part, and failed attempt to shine a little of the Grand National halo on other models in Buick’s line.
I was unable to find the price when new, but it was a much more appealing daily driver for $6,000 as a used car..
The ‘84-‘87 turbo Regals brought the goods (at least under the hood); these didn’t. There were rumors of an available Getrag 5-speed manual but I’ve never seen one (or even a picture of one).
Sometimes these low-production trim packages make me wonder what their intended market was. In this case because it fell between so many posts – not enough smaller or cheaper than a Regal, not harder-edged enough more than a 4-door Century T-Type or indeed a base Century – all I can think of is there wasn’t so much a target customer as a need to eke out a few more marginal sales to amortize the 2-door A-body costs with the market for midsize 2-doors shrinking even as GM was readying a revised roofline with fewer stampings common to the 4-door and the phenomenally expensive GM10s which would launch as coupes only without any 4-door variants available for at least 18 months.
These vehicles weren’t available in my country, so I can only judge based on the images.
In my opinion, this car doesn’t exude the quality I expect from a Buick.
The black paint scheme without contours looks clumsy, the oversized lettering on the sides seems half-baked. Even the alloy wheels seem unimaginative and cheap – somehow aftermarket. The steering wheel is stylistically uninspired, too The instrument layout looks twenty years behind its time. I hope, at least there were other colors for the interior available besides gray.
Definitely the eagle called GM in its descent…
The billboard-style “BUICK” decals were dealer-installed. Initially, I would have preferred it w/out the decals but got used to them over time.
And no, gray was the only interior color available, just like the Grand National.
! Only 1,029 made ? . this sounds like a serious flop for GM .
It doesn’t look bad per se, just un inspiring .
I didn’t know Rochester, New York was a podunk town, I lived there on and off until 1970 when I too headed Way Our West .
I wonder what my old house at 390 Wellington looks like these days .
-Nate
I don’t think they planned on making very many, Nate. But, it was not a very inspired idea, either. It reminded me of Olds calling nearly model a “Cutlass-whatever” to help juice sales.
Rochester isn’t really podunk town. But, any town one wants to leave gets classified as a podunk town.
Quite a unicorn – or in this case, a sleepy, slow unicorn. I do remember these cars, and thinking how odd the interior looked with the floor shifter. But you sum it up perfectly by noting that its appearance wrote checks that the powertrain and chassis couldn’t cash. This was a good looking car for its day, and not too bad as far as durability. But wow, what a snoozer in real life!
1. Annoying, overly-sensitive throttle tip-in. I assumed it was purposely calibrated to make the car feel more powerful, but the car lunged forward, or “jumped,” from idle if the accelerator pedal was pushed a smidge too hard.
This was seemingly universal with GM cars at the time, certainly the FWD platforms. Obviously intended to make them feel quicker than they actually were. Quite annoying.
I remember being with my dad when he test drove a 1986 Celebrity Eurosport wagon, in dark blue metallic. Gorgeous car. He was impressed how quickly the car took off from a stop. The tip-in, the looks, and that 2.8 MPFI engine’s distinctive raspy sound made up for its true lack of swiftness – it sure and sounded fast! SOLD.
I think this was a 3.8/3800 thing, maybe also the related 90 degree V6s. Too light of a throttle spring. My buddy had multiple Bonnevilles that were this way. I had a Trans Sport van that was the same way. Pretty much had to hold your foot up to keep from mashing the gas. I hated it with a passion. I seriously considered trying to rig up an additional spring on my van for more pedal resistance. I’ve had tons of GM 60 degree V6s, and some GM 4 cylinders, and none of those were that way.
Chris, I enjoy your articles and this one was not about the car but how you opened. Sounds like play hard, then work hard. A decade earlier this sounds like me but when I was in my late 20s – mid 30s, sleep came Saturday mornings. During the 1980s I was mostly in NYC, my career in design was progressing fast, friends in theater and arts kept my calendar full so little need or interest in autos at that time.
Interesting now to read about cars of the 80s as it is a decade of auto history I skipped.
Alfred, I’m glad you enjoy them. I wish I could say it was a voluntary “work hard / play hard” decision, but it was more of a matter of household survival. I worked at LCP as it was the option available to me. I hoped that if I learned enough about publishing overall, I’d be able to get a car magazine job someday.
In the meantime, I tried to improve my lot in my job at the time. Like others, I fell for the “meritocracy” fable that I’d rise through the ranks with hard work and ambition. I worked hard and had ambition, but never rose through the ranks.
But, my motivation to try more and different kinds of cars kept me striving.
We had a rental Century of this vintage and I thought it drove very well. The quality of Buicks in the 1980s was pretty good, certainly above average for an American car at that time.
If I correctly recall, the Buick Regal Grand National had the same puny horizontal speedometer and even punier auxiliary gauges.
You are correct. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.
Wow, that tiny horizontal strip tach! And an 80s GM car with a temp gauge? That merits a “wow” all on its own.
I certainly remember Lawyer’s Co-op books on law library shelves everywhere.
Yikes. That dash brings me back. Nothing looks as… cheap as those 1980’s GM gauges.
The Celebrity had the same “light bar” tach. Another thing the Buick shared with the Celebrity is the “full” gauge package did not include an oil pressure gauge.
I wouldn’t have any of that. Oil pressure is important. Using some junkyard parts from another Celebrity and a 6000, I crafted in a factory looking oil pressure gauge into the available spot at the far end. While I was at it, I crafted in an analog tach using more Celebrity and 6000 parts. That was in 2003 and both are working to this day. That oil gauge saved me when a sender blew its plug out and was pissing oil all over the highway.
I picked up one of these same Century “full” clusters from the junkyard. And had plans to craft a factory looking oil pressure gauge into the top right corner. But not got a round tuit. That was like 15-20 years ago. It’s still in my garage but no telling if it even works.
Nice job integrating the oil pressure gauge and updating the tach, Troy.
Thanks Chris. Thinking back, I remember there was one Celebrity that came with an oil pressure gauge. The police package. It was in a pod carved into the passenger dash pad, right about where my lower vent is. Looked really tacky. Pictures of this seem to have disappeared from the internet.
I’ve never seen a Century GS in the wild or at a show. One thing I find interesting is the special wheels just for these. Aside from the AWD 6000 and a handful of 6000 SEs, this is the only factory application of 15 inch wheels on the Abody.
About the performance, I would think it would have been pretty good for 1986. A buddy of mine had a Ciera GT with the same 3.8. That thing was insane fast, at least around town. It’s possible they used the 3.33 final drive, instead of the 2.84 or whatever they normally used with the 3.8. Even my 6000 with the 3.1 and 3.33 final drive would smoke the tires as long as I stayed on the gas. That was 30 years ago when I was 19. The car still ran without problems for another 9 years until Michigan road salt took its toll.
There is a MotorWeek test of the revised ‘89 Century coupe, w/ the 3.3L V6 (160 hp/185 lb-ft) on YouTube. It does 0-60 in 8.4 seconds, which is where I would have expected the ‘86 Century GS to be. But the “Dodge Dynasty incident” made me question that expectation.
I had an ’89 Century Custom with what I believe was called the ‘GT’ package which consisted of what I figured were leftover Century T-type/GS components. Sadly it didn’t include the bucket seats, console or accessory gauge strip in the instrument cluster. It did include the firm handling bits, big turbo fan wheels that looked exactly like the ones on the G-body Regal T-type, Goodyear Eagle GT+4 tires and the cool steering wheel along with a perky 3.3 V6. It was ‘garnet red’ metallic which had a maroon-purple-red fade which got plenty of compliments. The only complaints I had with it were that the Eagle GTs had rather poor grip in the rain and that power seemed to peter out at around 75 mph. That wasn’t a huge deal though with a federal 55 mph speed limit.
Looked up the ‘89Century coupe and watched an old MotorWeek test after reading your comment. I was surprised by the number of emphatic endorsements for the 3.3L. Folks who like that engine really, really like it. Don’t remember that level of enthusiasm at the time.
Knew someone who had a “Buick Somerset”. Interior looked muck like this. ((but blue))
Reasonably sure I’ve never seen on of these.