The H-body Buick LeSabre, no matter which one of its three generations, was a very nondescript, fly under the radar car. But “plain” has never stopped anyone from trying to jazz up their wheels with little customizations here and there. Despite the missing grille due to front-end damage, there’s the glaringly obvious addition of hood scoops — something laughably unfitting, but to each and their own.
Moving around the sides, it looks like another visit to JCWhitney was made, with window air deflectors and chromed wheel arch flares. Of course there’s also the clunky-looking canvas top with electroluminescent coach lamp tacked on, which was possibly a dealer-installed add-on. Lastly, despite missing original hubcaps, we have the replacement of the rear one with an period Oldsmobile wheel cover. I guess some attention to an older car is better than no attention.
Photographed: Chestnut Hill Avenue – Brighton, MA – March 2017
Oh the humanity!
Hit one too few times with an ugly stick. Needs one more walloping.
Splendid in all its wretched excess…..great find.
Say what you like, the Double Ram Air 3.8 was a heckuva engine.
If you don’t have functioning AC, those window deflectors come in handy on a rainy summer day….
It’s possible that the AC is nonfunctioning and irrelevant, winter beaters are a thing and this could be one.
Ugly Eastern Ruster/Clunker.
Front end damage done by excessive “ram air”.
I didn’t know we were in the business of making fun of poor people.
Ridiculing this car is shameful like mocking the homeless. No one would choose such a beast if they had a choice. The owner is one of us, a car enthusiast but probably has few resources and is doing the best he or she can, for personal expression with zero budget. The results are unorthodox but I respect the motivation.
Mike, by no means am I mocking the owner of this car and I’m sorry if I offended you in any way. I see aftermarket modifications done in poor taste to all cars on a daily basis, from beaters to $100,000 BMWs. This car just happens to be one of them, and it’s a unique looking car I thought I’d share. In no way, shape, or form am I targeting the owner of this car.
So right – see examples every day. Here’s an Avalon “Premier Edition” with canvas top and powder coated wheels. Just found on the street, not mocking the owner. If it’s well loved, I’m okay with it.
I can find plenty of examples of horribly executed rich boy toys, just watch an episode of west coast customs. Taste isn’t a byproduct of wealth.
Absolutely! I’ve seen very tasteful houses and cars that belonged to “economically challenged” folk and horrifically tacky homes and cars of the wealthy. In fact if you have money and no taste, the tacky quotient goes of the chart! Being rich or Poor has no bearing on taste.
Actually, neither you nor I nor anyone else knows the first thing about this owner. And for anyone to assume that they do is full of it. And to accuse anyone of “making fun of poor people” is just as bad as what you’re accusing us of doing.
It’s a car parked on the street. We know nothing about its owner. It’s owner may have made these modifications, but they may well not. Who knows?
FWIW, I see cars like this driven by hipsterish kids in Eugene, for ironic reasons.
Enough of the judgmentalism. We shoot what we find on the streets. Love it or leave it. But let’s drop any assumptions about the owner or our intentions.
We have the right to show any car parked on the street, as well as the right to comment on it. That’s what we do here, as long as the comments don’t disparage an actual person. And we haven’t.
To follow up on what Paul said, when I was 16-18 I made all kinds of tacky additions and addons to my my first ride. A 1987 F-150. And at the time I thought they were great! As we age, our tastes change and what I once found cool, I now think look tacky. But I also was given a 1984 Buick Lesaber for my Bachelor party (car was a cream puff and I now hate myself for what I did to it) and free range to a golf course that was going to be turned into a neighborhood. After a day of beating the thing to death, jumping it, running into trees and boulders, it still ran fine! So I actually took it home, spray painted it flat black and put all sorts of tacky scoops and flairs on it and drove it to work for a week. Because why not!
Sorry to burst your balloon there, pal, but lack of taste knows no monetary bounds. On a nearly daily basis I see Lincolns driven into our service dept. with all kinds of tacky add-ons much like this Buick. Mock tops and wide w/o moldings seems to be the most popular offenses among Lincoln owners. And I assure you not one of these people bringing their Lincolns into our shop are poor.
This “making fun of poor people” comment is just asinine, as many others have already pointed out. Brendan has no reason to apologize for your butthurt.
I don’t much care for this generation of car but they aren’t bad and fairly comfortable. But hood scoops? Ick. One hopes they ended up there ironically.
I had a gold ’87 for about 10 years with the old school stainless ventshades that I bought on discount on Broadway in Marble Hill just across the bridge from Harlem. Always wanted a Buick cruiser with fake wire wheels and ventshades. Goodrich whitewalls. Mine was the “Limited” top of the line with a beige interior that faded and was hard to keep clean. Actually, a pretty good car although it was one of those that suffered from intermittent ignition. Sometimes it would cut out at about 30 MPH. Not good for city driving! That car, a ’91 Riviera and a 2001 Olds all suffered from similar problems. Didn’t last too long after my girlfriend started driving it though. The first thing she broke was the plastic J.C. Whitney fog lights that I had mounted under the bumper. Later on the timing chain broke. On these cars with the transverse setup, you need to pull the engine to change the timing sprockets.
If you have one of these and the A/C clutch freezes up (it probably will) you can by-pass it by simply using the serpentine belt from an early non A/C model. Pops right in on the ’87 and the Riviera too. BTW , The Broadway Bridge connects Marble Hill directly to Inwood.
I that roof “treatment” was dealer installed, I would avoid that dealer.
I watched Mecum last weekend and saw these exact scoops installed on a 1971 T-37 half assedly turned into a GTO Judge clone. “close enough!” Gotta love universal JC Whitney accessories, they look universally bad on every car on the road.
If I had to guess at this car’s history, I’d say it’s a three owner car at least. The first owner was possibly a mature driver for whom a quiet ride and a measure of luxury were priorities rather than performance. Basically the target demographic for this car.
Then at some point a young driver inherited it (perhaps it was his grandfather’s car) and since he wanted a sports car instead but couldn’t afford one, he tried to accessorize it in a way that reflected his vision. Unfortunately the two looks just don’t mesh very well. To be fair, I was that guy once too, and I admit I’m guilty of occasionally putting something on a car that only looked good to me. One of many lessons learned the hard way on one’s automotive journey.
At some point the young driver scraped together the money to get himself something else (maybe a Honda Civic if we’re being totally stereotypical here) and the LeSabre languished for a number of years before being bought for a song by someone desperately short of money and desperately needing wheels. The way the car looks now suggests to me that the current owner can’t afford to maintain it properly, so it will serve until something fails that costs more to fix than replacing it with another $500 car.
Of course, this is all pure speculation on my part. But it’s kind of interesting to imagine what might be.
“Gilding the Lilly” has been a personalization technique since the day of the horse drawn carriage. I have seen historical pictures of early cars dolled up with extra horns, spotlights, skirts, mud flaps, hood ornaments, Continental kits etc. A lot of these things are passing fads like foxtails on the antenna. Some of these additions were once functioning and essential parts of the car. Rear and side mounted spare tires were common on antique and later European cars. Canvas and landau tops were just the common construction techniques. Extra driving lights, spotlights, horns, bumper over riders, luggage racks, mudflaps were added to early basic cars like the early Model Ts as accessories. Personal taste is personal taste and like everyone else I’ve seen cars that have made me cringe. At least the owner is expressing their individuality instead of settling on a plain vanilla conveyance. And we are free to express our reactions to these vehicles when we see them in public. But I would never insult anyone’s car in public. Not only rude, but it could be hazardous to your health!
Mixed feelings, yeah that’s pretty terrible but it’s only an 89 Buick. I have stronger feelings about stuff like the Pro Street fad in the 80’s and the currently fashionable rat rod butchery.
And don’t get me started on over accessorizing VW beetles!
Those 87-91 LeSabres were one GM car that lasted and lasted, some still are chugging along, like the example above.
May have done many “Deadly Sins” in the 80’s, but some ended up OK. Just that Buick styling only appealed to older buyers.
I’m too shocked to see people consider H-body LeSabre as nondescript?
As an owner with two “H” body Buick Lesabres in my personal fleet. I wish to defend the beast. Particular the 86-91 model years. One is an 87 Lesabre T-Type and still loks quite handsomr in a nearly 31 year old survivior way. Sounds good, lloks well enough to garner attention at shows (they are rare) and handles better than expected. lat of the “Big Buick” sport models that goes back to the Incicta of 1961, maybe even the Specials of yet earlier days. Dont’t forget Wildacts and Centurions of the y60s and 70s respectively. and the LeSabre Sport coupe of the late 70s. All fine cars in a Buick fashion. The other I have is a 91 Lesabre Custom 4 door. An honest car that is still in good mechanical shape. It was my fathers last car. purchased new in Nov of 90. Physically a little worn, but 18 years in Missouri weather extremes followed by 8 years in Az. (sheltered by u still hot and dry) I believe the “H’; body to be underappreciated and it motive power, the venerable 3800 V-6 to be one of the better engines the General has offered. Now I must admit some folks might have questionable taste in aftermarket accessories, regardless of income….I say Have at it. If it makes you happy…And frankly, I have seen much worse..There is an early 80s Oldsmobile here in Phoenix I swear was slathered in gorilla glue and driven through the J.C. whitney warehouse.
No need need to “defend” these to me!? I had a 1987 Electra, (My first FWD car.) I was thankful that I had the 3800 vs the craptastic engine Caddy was using then! There’s an ’88 LeSabre near me that is mint. If it ever comes up for sale, It would take a lot for me to not buy that puppy! On the T-Type (and performance full sized Buicks in general…) The best predecessor to the Invicta would have been the pre ’60s Century. (The Pre ’60s Special would be a regular LeSabre..) The Century from the late 30s to the mid 50s was THE hot Buick.
The funeral home I worked for in the late 80s and early 90s had about a half dozen of these for company cars. That reverse-hinged hood was slick, and the slot the rear license plate just dropped into without fasteners was cool too. Some clever details.
Not a fan of modifications like these but it’s his car, let the owner do what he wants with it. Even the “cabriolet” top would look decent if it was black…at least there isn’t a sunroof/moonroof cut into the pseudo-convertible top…talk about mixing your metaphors.
You really can’t judge someone by the car they drive. Nobody knows someone’s personal situation at any given time. And for the purpose of this site I don’t think anyone is trying to be mean or degrading. We are not making fun of anybody. The person that drives this Lesabre could be a multi-millionaire for all we know! I think Brendan simply found a car that is perfect for CC, a car on the side of the road that has a lot of add-ons and basically looks a little over-the-top, that’s all.
As far as the H-bodies are concerned, these cars were always a great follow-up to the huge rear drive sedans they were designed to replace. Think back to 1977 – the goal of GM was to downsize their large cars to a smaller package, have the same if not greater interior room as their predecessor, be comfortable, get improved fuel economy and look nice in the process. These cars did exactly what they were supposed to do. And these sold like crazy, too. If equipped with the 3.8 like the majority of them were they were fast and got great mileage. And they were DURABLE as well. These were well-accepted by the public and a hit for GM. I know many people that owned them and loved them. I often wonder why Chevrolet didn’t get their own Caprice/Impala version. They could have kept the large RWD in Brougham and police/taxi form and called it the Classic alongside the newer FWD models. Just a thought.
We had a company here in Cleveland called Roman’s Chariot that did all kinds of that tasteless crap to cars. They got their start in the disco years and would display them at the Autorama show. Even as a young lad I knew “tasteless” when I saw it.
Most of the mods on this car are awful, but I am actually kinda liking the aftermarket roof treatment – it makes the C-pillars thicker and adds more visual “weight” to the rear end of the car, something I always felt these things needed. Although the Frenching of the rear window is pretty extreme, it does lend the back end a more finished look.
I just saw a car one hour ago that was in similar condition. From a distance it looked like a Vega until I walked up to it as it was next to my car. The logo said Pontiac Astre!? A hatchback, with peeling clear all over, black spray bomb paint on some surfaces, and an interior that looked like it spent it’s life in Phoenix. I said to the early 60’s driver that is something one doesn’t see on the road ever. At least not me in 30 years and I had no camera. Got to learn to carry it with me.
Yep the Astre was the Pontiac version of the Vega. In an ironic twist the Vega/Astre platform was also “H”!
Anything done to a hideous have body poor excuse for a full sized Buick is a positive good. Should next get continental kit and a push bar for the front. Also side pipes and a spot light would be good. And some Cadillac emblems and cc style grill would help.
It’s funny that the Marble Hill bridge to Harlem was mentioned. I saw this at another web site just recently. I hope it’s OK to post other auto sites here…
http://jalopnik.com/youll-never-find-the-unofficial-oldest-bridge-in-new-1618691095
It’s also interesting to look at the before & after of Manhattan here:
http://story.maps.arcgis.com/apps/StorytellingSwipe/index.html?appid=97ae55e015774b7ea89fd0a52ca551c2&webmap=60a6d8d2ab754250918e7fc21d7ac999#
That then and now spyglass thing is pretty cool!
There are/were (that I know of) two buried bridges in Pittsburgh. 1 in Highland Park and 1 in Oakland.
I wonder if there are more buried bridges out there? I thought that particular oddity was a local thing!
Thanks for the interesting post. Although I live in Westchester, when I owned that Buick, I was a merchandiser covering a territory from Queens to Kingston in New York State including Manhattan and The Bronx. A&P number 1 (the 1st) was actually a store I often covered. The “The” in The Bronx was part of the official name and the whole borough was originally part of Westchester. Marble Hill was originally an individual island – politically part of Manhattan. Things like the telephone exchanges would indicate this. Where I live is very close to U. S. Route 9 which is an extension of Broadway. We still have the old milestones here – put up by Ben Franklin when he was postmaster. I think the store where I bought those stainless Ventshades was a Pep Boys at the time.They were having a big clearance, my Buick was already about a dozen years old and they were getting rid of the old outdated stock. . I just had to have those visors! Dreamed of having a car with visors like that since I fist saw them in Whitney’s when I was a kid. Such memories!