With the Cutlass gone, it was time to turn my attention to a new car search. I had no wheels and had my first real job that I had get to. I had a patchwork of rides to get me to work a few days, but I needed a car and soon. I wanted something sporty and wanted to stay in the GM family. Making barely $10 an hour, options were limited as far as what I could afford. A used car would have been smarter, but there was no stopping me on the new car idea.
So, it was one of two flavors of J-cars: the Cavalier, or the Sunbird. Hands down the Sunbird appealed to me more. There was the SE version, which had the pop-up headlamps and rally wheels. It had been refreshed a year earlier and got a new single overhead cam 2.0 liter sourced from GM- Brazil. A friend of a friend knew the owner’s daughter at a local Pontiac dealer, so I had a connection of sorts. She was running the place for her folks and was rather nice. They had a nice metallic burgundy SE manual tranny on the lot, with AC, cruise and a cassette deck. Everything I needed, nothing I didn’t.
I believe it was stickered at $11,300, but with first time buyer discount, rebates and my brothers GM employee discount, it came in just under $10,000, and a $200 monthly payment. I could swing it and the deal was done, or so I thought. On the pick-up day, I was worked over by an over-aggressive F&I agent, who as it turns out was the little sister of my connection. She wouldn’t take no for an answer in selling rustproofing, extended warranty and number of other things I couldn’t afford nor really needed, which left a bad taste in my mouth. I held my ground and she backed off when she saw I was getting visibly angry. Oh, and I got a nice little payment coupon book as well, payments due on the first of the next 48 months. It would be regular car payments for me from that point almost continuously well into my 40s.
GM produced the J-body from 1981 to 2005, and it underpinned models globally and in various iterations outside North America for Opel, Isuzu, Holden, Vauxhall and Daewoo. Suffice to say, when this platform finally was retired with the introduction of the Chevrolet Cobalt in 2005, it was a more than bit long in the tooth. Performance tests of the day that I researched stated 0-60 MPH came in about 11 seconds. Slow, but competitive for the class and for the time. On the highway it would get about 30 MPG. It looked far sportier than it was, but it had a pleasing sound and with the manual, I thought it fun to drive.
Many people dogged the J bodies. You’ll find people who had horrible luck with them and people who drove them for 10 years. I had a friend who had a Honda Civic from the same period. Certainly, the Civic was a well built and holistically better car than the little Pontiac. But it was also at least $2K more to purchase. I cannot recall the last time I’ve seen any J-cars, much less a Sunbird, in these parts.
The Sunbird was a very good and reliable first new car for me, and it took me a lot of places. Back to see my old college friends in the Grand Rapids area, to countless out of town weddings, camping…and miles piled on quickly. At 60,000 miles, the water pump was replaced in what was a cheap repair. Other than that, it was brakes, tires and oil changes which I usually did myself.
One morning in the autumn of 1992 I went outside to leave for work and noticed the Sunbird was gone. There was an almost perfectly clean rectangle in the bare cement surrounded by fallen leaves where the Pontiac was parked. She had been stolen! Wait..what? Who the hell would want to steal a Sunbird? Police reports were filed, and as far as I was concerned, it was likely that the full weight of all area law enforcement agencies would soon be mobilized to find my car. Later that day, the Madison Heights police (the next town over) had called and it had been found in a drug store parking lot barely three miles away. I went to see it…it was smoked in, and the steering column sleeve was torn away.
Aha! It seemed that miscreants had left a clue: a tape in the cassette deck. It was “Master P and the Royal Posse”, or something like that. I deftly removed it and headed straight back to the police department, holding the edges. Surely, they wanted it as evidence and to dust for prints to move the investigation forward. I would be called to review a police lineup. An inside job perhaps? Someone right under my nose, from the neighborhood? The desk officer said it likely was kids stealing it randomly to go joy riding, or stealing it to steal another car, or criminals stealing it to commit another crime. There would be no investigation, I could keep the tape, and the officer told me I was lucky I got the car back in once piece. In other words, “run along junior”, and he went back to his paperwork. She was fixed within days and it was back to smooth sailing, and by the spring of 1994, after not quite 5 years of ownership, 107,000 miles were on the odometer.
The end came one weekday in early May of 1994 as I was making a left had turn on a yellow barely a half-mile from home. A large late 70s Olds Regency was trying to make in on the amber. I shouldn’t have went…knew I shouldn’t have went…and BLAM! She hit me in the right rear and spun me around, hard. She was going at least 35. The cops came and 10 minutes later, a motorist came back to say she saw the whole thing and said the lady in the Oldsmobile ran the red light. She was ticketed. The cars rear axle was bent and the rear passenger quarter panel was caved it. The Sunbird wasn’t drivable and was sitting facing the wrong way on the other side of the road, looking pretty sad. Good grief!
It capped off a very bad 8 month stretch for Carlsberg66 on the personal side dating back to the previous summer. Up until February of ‘94, I had a serious girlfriend for 3 years. We were engaged and wedding plans were made. She was having second thoughts and it was an emotional roller coaster for me. We ended up calling the wedding off at Christmas of 1993, and a short time later, broke it off for good. We would never see nor speak to each other ever again. Logically, I knew it was for the best. But I was really struggling: down and out, heartbroken, and in a major funk. I was in grad school at that time. My head just wasn’t into it that semester and I got a C in my class, a failing grade. It meant academic probation and additional drama I didn’t need. There was just not a lot to look forward to at that point for me.
The car was towed to a collision shop where it was deemed very fixable. I didn’t realize it, but I could simply decline the fix and get the money (net any liens) and the car would be turned over to the insurance company who would auction for salvage. Hmmm. The owner of my company had a car he was looking to get rid of that I was very interested in, but the timing wasn’t right. I had a big life change with the breakup and had made plans to finally move out of my parent’s house in early July. I’d had the Pontiac for almost 5 years, and for 3 of those years my fiancé had a lot of seat time in that car. Maybe I needed a vehicular change as well to help me move on? “Well, how much would I get?”, I asked the adjuster. “$3,100.00”. And in an instant, I knew I would be getting another ride very soon, and I was happy. Things were looking up.
Nice post. I spent a lot of time in rental Cavaliers so I’m no fan of J-cars but always thought the Sunbird was the best looking.
I always liked the refreshed aero rear of these and the Cavaliers. Your post illudes that your car didn’t have many options. In actuality, it was about as decked out as you could get an SE; cruise meant it had group 1SC, and that alone added nearly all the comfort and convenience options. “Turbo” wheels meant adding the WS6 performance suspension. The only missing big ticket items would have been power windows and locks. Ironically enough, the Medium Red Metallic / WS6 option combo on the SE was detailed in the 1988 brochure:
Actually, I would’ve really liked a sunbird GT turbo and that’s the first thing the salesman tried to sell me. My bosses son, who was a couple of years younger than me had an older Sunbird “fastback” turbo GT. It was a fun little car , fast for the era…but the GM turbo “grenaded” under the 16 year olds abuse. The service issues with GM earlier turbos were well-known, plus the insurance was prohibitively expensive so I didn’t / couldn’t consider it.
I owned an 82 J2000 and sold it to get the down payment on an 89 Civic. My Civic didn’t have cruise control and was a 4 door but it did cost $10,000. I am not sure if an LX 4 door was “at least $2,000 more” but I kind of doubt it.
My J2000 wasn’t too bad, I guess, but did have a fair number of smallish faults that were annoying like the speedometer cable that rattled at speeds above 40 mph. And the exhaust manifold that suddenly split into 2 large parts. And of course all cars back then had OEM tires in difficult to source sizes.
And yeah, mine was almost stolen, too. When the police came out to write up the report I asked why someone would try to steal this car and not the bigger/more powerful Mercury Zephyr I had parked next to it (my father’s car on temporary loan). The officer said GM cars had notoriously weak ignition lock systems. The damage to the steering column ran nearly $800.
From what I remember years ago from what a friend told me:
The Saginaw column—you know, the standard steeling column with the ignition switch that was used in every GM car and truck for, like, 127 years—is super easy to break. The bottom plastic panel is super brittle and flimsy and cracks right off. Then you cut 3 wires, tie two of them to get the car into the ACC or ON position, then touch a third to engage the starter.
I don’t know if this is 100% true, but I do know the Saginaws are notriously easy to steal, and the plastic is even worse than what you might expect from GM at the time.
I’ve been told it is only necessary to connect 2 wires…
My 1987 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme was stolen Thanksgiving weekend 2001 in a very similar fashion from the apartment where I lived.
Found stripped for parts.
JC Whitney once sold a steel collar for those steering columns to shield the affected area.
Thanks for this COAL article. It’s well written and the personal experiences you are sharing bring the story to life. Hitting bottom, when everything appears to go wrong, makes for a defining period in life. I am looking forward to see how you pulled through.
Our J-body experience was with an ’86 Cavalier station wagon. It was underwhelming and bordering to horrible. We bought it for my wife because it was inexpensive and had electronic throttle body fuel injection which ensured reliable starting. In general it was reliable. However, the seats were just awful, providing no support, lumbar and otherwise. And when big rusty areas appeared on the doors and made it look like a blueish Holstein cow we donated it to charity. I still feel shame for that.
I had an ’83 Pontiac 2000 coupe, and later purchased a ’87 Cavalier Z24 coupe. Both bought brand new, and were good cars. I especially liked the Z, all black with a functional fiberglass ram induction hood. The Z was comfortable and looked sharp.
My first new car with payments was a Pontiac, too.
Mine was a 1990 Grand Am sedan, black with a light gray cloth.
It stickered at $15,000 and my payments were $188 for 48 months.
It had the Quad 4 engine. Nothing but electrical gremlins to ruin it. It would die completely and wouldn’t start after sitting for an extended period of time. After 4 trips to the Pontiac garage, and an arbitration meeting with a BBB representative, they finally fixed it.
“I was really struggling: down and out, heartbroken, and in a major funk …”
Being down… really down as you described … can be a defining period that allows one to reset expectations and start work on – well – the rest of one’s life. As you describe, the down period is not usually one moment, but more of a turning point where a series of moments make one realize that if you don’t fix this, no one else is going to do it for you.
Not that the future will be all good and strewn with rose petals; it rarely is.
This is an interesting story where the time of your youth, represented by the red Sunbird, is over. Literally and figuratively.
Looking forward to seeing how this works out for you.
A good read. It seems like your personal 1989-94 kind of paralleled GM’s. Thinks went from getting by to looking kind of bleak. I hope your paths diverged after that.
These Sunbirds did a good job of differentiating themselves from the more common Cavalier.
Nice article. My 88 Bonneville was stolen when it was a well used 15 year old car. It was specifically selected from a large group of more valuable cars. It’s well known how to defeat the ubiquitous GM steering column that was used for many years so the bad guys boosted my wheels for quick transportation.
Fortunately they were caught in mid-criminal act. I got my car back from the cops covered in finger print dust and with all the burglary tools still inside. The window and column were broken, and my jack was missing. Turns out the cars trunk was full of stolen merchandise when found and the cops seized it. They removed ALL the trunks contents as evidence, including my jack!
For these GM columns, a simple metal reinforcement collar can be wrapped around the column, which defeats the thieves’ techniques
I had a 1991 Sunbird as my first car with payments. Still love that car to this day, she was one of my many Pontiacs. My mom and I bought her in 95 with 4k miles. The older lady that had her only drive her to church and the grocery store on Sundays. I never had any issues with that car and I loved the dark red color. In fact my Chrysler 200 I just traded was about the same color, I picked it for that reason.
Funny thing is when we were buying her I was outside drooling over a 1995 Trans Am…. Just this summer I bought a mint 95 Trans Am it hit me on the way home that it was the same model I was drooling over when I bought my Sunbird :).
Great post! The travails of a young man, when love pulls the rug from right out under you. Looking forward to reading about the recovery and the new wheels.
Excellent article which covers so many interesting points.
The later the j cars got, the better the quality was. The cars fell further behind the competition in many ways, but they were fairly competitive in that for the same price point, you got a lot more car and many times a lot better treatment at a domestic dealer than at toyonda. Up until around the mid 2000s here in Atlanta, toyonda dealers had a take it or leave it with all the goop and additional dealer markup and $400 pin stripes and $250 wheel locks we can pack on. There’s a waiting list for our cars. $10k would have gotten a much more Spartan Civic or Corolla and certainly duller looking. This also illustrates why gm did so much badge engineering; people did appreciate the subtle differences between the El cheapo below Walmart brand cavalier and the sportier sunbird. The dealer experiences could also be very different so if you wanted a midsized sedan, you had a lot of choices and could pick which car was best optioned at the best price with the best dealer experience.
It’s very odd to me which cars get stolen. I was laughing when I bought a 4;cylinder 2006 Dodge caravan and the salesman told me, it has an immobilizer! Who’s going to steal a four cylinder caravan, I said.
Two or three times someone broke into it and tried to steal it and the immobilizer did its job. I remember a coworker had a 7 year old Sundance stolen as well.
You definitely made the right decision to not have the car fixed. Too much baggage and if it’s badly damaged like that, probably not going to be ever right again plus it was aging. I hope the next chapter is better!
Right. Last year, someone stole my dad’s 2007 Hyundai Sonata SE V6 with, like, 200K miles on the odometer, and I just wondered why they wanted it…
Thanks for sharing your story, oftentimes it is the tough things in life that make us stronger. I had to laugh when you commented about making barely $10.00 an hour at your job. My first job, bus boy at a Howard Johnson’s, paid all of 75 cents/hour; this was in 1968, but still. My first “real” job, after I withdrew from college in 1973 paid all of $500 a month.
My only experience driving a GM J-car was as a loaner. Back in the early oughts I had a Pontiac Grand Prix that snacked on power steering pumps on a regular basis; it needed a new one every six months or so. The repair process was always the same, the PS pump would start squealing, I would take the car to the Pontiac dealer and the service writer would tell me it needed a new pump. For some reason the dealer never had a PS pump in stock and had to order one from the warehouse. This would mean the car wouldn’t be fixed until the next day and they would give me a loaner to drive. Invariably the loaner would be a bottom feeder “Sunkist” that had been a daily loaner for too long. It would reek of smoke and the interior would have unidentifiable stains on the seats and floor mats. I usually only drove the loaner to work and back but I was not favorably impressed; not the car’s fault I’m sure but I could never see myself buying one. I am fairly certain that these loaner Sunbirds were the last cars I’ve been in that came with crank up windows.
I’ll never understand the loaner mentality of some dealers giving out dirty, crappy cars that are worse than what you brought in. Give someone something nicer than what they are currently driving, then perhaps when they pick up their own car again they will have been favorably impressed and perhaps want to trade up.
When I had my old Mini in for service years ago, the dealer did something I thought to be pretty ingenious— my loaner was a Fiat 500. “Here, try our direct competitor. We don’t think you’ll be impressed.” (I really wasn’t. It was a low end model, though.)
Interesting tactic!
Well, karma finally got this dealer. When GM killed off Pontiac they also transferred the Cadillac and GMC franchises from this dealer to another here in town. They stayed in business for a couple of years selling used cars but finally gave up.
The one time the local Toyota dealer had to keep our Highlander overnight they gave my wife a Lexus to drive. It didn’t convince to buy a Lexus but we did go back to the dealer when we traded the Highlander in on a new RAV4.
It just occurred to me, I’ve only had two loaners in my life! And both were Oldsmobiles. The first was a rear wheel drive A/G Cutlass, from a Honda dealer in 1981; and then an Achieva 2 door as an insurance loaner when our Corolla was rear-ended around 1996 or 97. Oh, and my first new car was also a Pontiac.
Always liked the flip lights on these, there’s a blue one around here that’s pretty beat up with bad rust repair and the headlights stuck open.
Great COAL! Like others have said, you did a good job putting a personal touch on the story by connecting the car to your life and experiences at the time. To me that’s what makes this website so fun – those connections between cars and humans. Some writers here are better at this than others, and you’ve done it well here.
I haven’t seen a Sunbird in the flesh for a long time. In the past, I disliked the face of this car, but time and distance have caused me to see it as an Integra doppelgänger of sorts. I never thought about that resemblance until today when looking at the featured picture at the top of the article.
Some years ago a friend had her car stolen with some cassettes in it. The thief recorded heavy metal over whatever had been on the cassettes. It struck me as adding insult to injury.
I went through a rough period with a romantic relationship in college, and my grades suffered. I had yet to get my first car at the time, so no car for bad memories to get attached to.
These were the best looking of all the J-cars.
One of the most important things about life is when to know when to move on, be it from a relationship with a car or with a partner. Your COAL shows how you did both. Thanks for that.
Belated congratulations on your COAL series! So far, very relatable to my own personal and vehicular experiences. Your mostly happy ownership experience coupled with the Sunbird’s inglorious end, timed with your breakup with your girlfriend brought up some difficult memories.
That Sunbird was a looker! I had forgotten how much sportier these looked than their Cavalier cousins. Haven’t seen a Sunbird of this vintage in a very long time here in central Ohio.
In the spring of 1993, my older brother’s ’80 Pinto was on its last legs, so he ended up with a red ’90 Cavalier. This awakened the new car bug in me, so I traded in my trusty ’84 Chevette on a red ’89 Beretta. Both of our new-to-us vehicles stayed around for about 10 years, but I would’ve been better off with the Cavalier.
The Beretta was a fun car, but somewhat of a parts queen. Among other things, the THM125 automatic transaxle wasn’t enough to harness the 120 or so blazing ponies of the 2.8 MPFI V6. One rebuilt transmission about 5 years in and the weakened condition of said rebuild by 2003 ended the Beretta’s career. In between were two ignition modules, an engine computer, an alternator or two, a driver’s seat-back frame that collapsed. This was in addition to normal brake and tire replacements.
IIRC, my brother’s Cavalier needed no unusual repairs. Over the years, he bought at least one more Cavalier and then a Sunbird. I believe that Sunbird is still in near daily service with his youngest daughter’s family.
We had 2 Corsicas in the family…sort of. My now 33-year-old nephew had 2 during his college years up until late 2007. They were neither good (nor bad) as sub $2k cheap transportation, but got him through his last three years of college. A high school friend who was doing much better than I was at the time had a 1990 Beretta GT, quad 4, 5 speed, burgundy and it was peppy and fun. I remembered I quite liked it though many have horror stories about the quad four head gasket issues.
The local Holden version wasnt quite that cheap, my old man bought one a june 83 JB Camira for 14k basic 1600cc four door he bought the june car in december after the prices had gone up at the original invoice price and drove it on dealer plates untill mid January and registered it as a new 84 model no build plates on NZ assembly cars, two years later he clean swapped it for a rebadged Isuzu Aska that were sold in NZ as Holden Camiras with a 2.0L engine his is the one on Wiki, he totalled it in a major way end for end over a 60ft bank and got 20k insurance payout and immediately ordered a new VL Commodore no more J cars, he’d had enough
My Mom had a 1994 Pontiac Sunbird SE, the last model year for the Sunbird. It was a 2 door coupe, dark purple, 3.1 liter V6, sunroof, CD & cassette player in addition to all the usual power options. That car was pretty quick and the V6 had a nice rumble to the exhaust. She kept that car until 2007 with no issues other than normal maintenance items and a water leak into the interior. I remember when she brought it home the neighbors came over and said it looked much sportier than the 1987 Grand Am SE she traded in for it. I cannot remember the last time I have seen a Sunbird of this vintage or any Sunbird at all for that matter. The Sunbird was always the nicest looking of all the J cars in my opinion.
From the title and the mention of the 4cyl from Brazil I thought for sure it would be round cam lobes that finished the love affair with the car at least. There was an 88 in our family fleet that did this twice. First at 155K km and then again a short time later after transfer to the next owner. Cam and followers were quiet expensive at the time and on back order to boot. I was just glad to see it gone after the first instance. I got to ride in another Sunbird a while later and after about five minutes or so I asked the owner if he had the cam replaced. He was quite surprised and asked how I knew. Well 240K km on the 4cyl and it popped along pretty good.
There were a couple of 89 Cavaliers in the family fleet as well and each one has it’s own story too.
As for the break up and the tragic end to the Sunbird. Good on you for walking away from both. I had a similar experience. My truck was totalled and a week later the gf called me on the phone and broke it off. I met with her one more time for a face to face explanation and realised how effed up it really was. She called me up a while later to ask how I was doing and to apologise for the break up. Nothing worse than that. I put a stop to that pretty quick and never heard from her again.
I shudder to think how my life would’ve turned out had I been successful in convincing her that if we just got married ….things would of been alright and all of our ‘structural problems” would’ve melted away. Sounds tcliché to say,but everything does happen for a reason (most of the time).
I enjoyed reading your 2nd COAL installment as well as the first one. What an ignoble end to a decent car. Seems the (excrement) hit the fan in close proximity. First you break up then your car gets busted up. Ouch. Just as well you and your ex- never saw each other again. Nothing to be gained by it.
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Like you, I was in a car accident in 1994. March 2, to be precise. My only ticket to date came that day for ‘careless driving’ when I hit the back of a taxi doing 34 mph on a wet road. I took the ₧ and paid the fine. I had no desire to go to traffic school.
I saw not one but two Sunbirds in one block recently, driving, not far from my home. One convertible. Both looked clean and straight, not junkers at all like most of the (few) J Bodies I see now.
This isn’t about a J-car but about a car theft. My twice-rear-ended, butter yellow Datsun 510 (with the tailgate held shut with a bungee cord) and the potato vine I’d painted on it for prom was stolen one morning. I was shocked. It was SUCH a piece of junk. The radio didn’t work so I had a tape recorder with a New Order tape and maybe another GOGOs cassette on the seat. Fortunately, they’d found my car right around the corner but… everything in it had been taken yet I GAINED:
– one ENORMOUS bra
– one soap on a rope
– three female singer folk tapes- Ferron, Joan Armitrading and I think Holly Near.
I felt pretty lucky. Not for the bra, the soap on a rope but that my Datsun, aside from having the wiper arms stolen, still ran … and I scored some good new music. Sometimes good things come from the pits.
Happy rolling, peeps.
That is a strange story. With the contents left behind and what was taken makes me wonder what kind of party they had in your car…
Later that day, the Madison Heights police (the next town over) had called and it had been found in a drug store parking lot barely three miles away.
This is funny, but not unexpected. A friend lived in MH and had his Dodge Avenger stolen a few years ago. Whoever stole it called him and offered it back to him for $600. So, my friend called the Madison Heights PD and asked for their help. OK, they said, set up a time and we’ll be there. He did, but they didn’t bother to show. He decided to take the insurance money and let the thief keep the car.
About a week later, the Madison Heights folks were bragging on local TV about being part of an aggressive consortium of local PDs to combat auto theft. Right.
Just my observation, but see more 2000-05 Cavaliers still running, than Cobalts. I’m thinking the ignition recall scared off buyers/BHPH dealers, and got junked sooner than usual.
My story also has a serious girlfriend of 3 years at that same time and an 89 GM car (Cutlass Supreme, bought in 92) in this case. We married a week before Christmas 93 and are about to celebrate our silver anniversary.
We kept the Cutlass up until the time our oldest son arrived in the summer of 1997, and upgraded to an Impala SS. I eventually had a J-car of my own for awhile (98 Cavalier, bought in 03). I managed to ditch the monthly payment cycle at age 38, thankfully.
I always like the Pontiac dashboards of the era, and the Sunbird was no exception. The driving experience was OK, but admittedly not a standout. The Cutlass ended up being a better fit for us at the time.
Hope your personal story has a happy ending!
Wow.. This is surprisingly kind.
The internet is not kind to the J cars at all.
My ex FIL bought a new Cavalier every 2 years from 1982 all the way to the end. He really didn’t like the Cobalt (so similar..) and actually moved on to Toyota eventually.
I hold that the J cars don’t deserve it. They were great machines depending on options.
When my daughter turned 16, my wife’s boss offered us such a good deal on her ’89 Sunbird convertible that we couldn’t refuse. I think it had around 80,000 miles on it when we bought it.
2 weeks later, the head gasket fried (typical GM 4-cylinder). The boss offered to buy it back, but we’d pad so little for it that replacing the gasket was worth it.
Eventually, it became mine to drive. It’s still the only convertible I’ve ever owned.
We ended up selling it to a family member who drove it for about a year util the engine blew.
My dad got a call at 4am from the police. “Are you the owner of a 78 Seville license blah blah blah?” They’d recovered his car before he ever knew it was stolen from Maaco for a repaint. Recognized the driver and said “that ain’t his car.”
If you made this car a GT convertible and one year older, you’d have my first new-ish car (and payment book). My father’s friend was a Chevy dealer and got it for me at the GM dealer auction. I was the first owner of the car around November ‘88 but it had 4300 miles on it. That was fine by me, because I only paid $15,000 for a $21,000 car.