Behold, The Gutlass. Its small-ish, its heavy, its powerless, it has no torque, no acceleration, it handles like a rowboat in a tropical storm, Its malaise era design at its finest.
The Engine well it has one. Ah, the 231 Buick V6. Designed in the 60’s, then dumped by GM onto AMC(as the 225 Dauntless), like that one fruitcake at Christmas, you know the one, doesn’t taste great, doesn’t look great, but you’re not going to use it so you might as well gift it to someone. And then come back in a few weeks asking to have it back. GM got the engine back in the 70’s when they realized that POWEERRRR was not the world’s concern anymore. They threw in this beast, gave it some “fanciness” like an electronically controlled carburetor(which is crap), and then sold it to the inevitably large numbers of old lady’s and college students that bought these cars.
Transmission 3-speed slushbox, what more do you want to know?
The only joy in this joyless car: it has bucket seats and a floor shifter, and the roof comes off(sort of)
Thanks for reading this self-and vehicle-deprecating rant about the slow mystery that is, “La boite de Merde”
…I feel weird saying this after reading your long deprecating description of it, but I love the styling of that car. I love the hubcaps, I love the boxy angles and proportions, I love the stupid square headlights … I dunno, I just like the way that car looks.
Do you have plans to make a recreation of it when the V6s are added?
Hey man you’ve still got a G-body, I’ve always liked the look of those. And while it may be totally gutless the 231 v6 and thm400 are about the most durable combination gm ever put out, so at least you can look forward to a long future of complaining about it.
Edit also for pretty cheap you can swap a few parts around and get a turbo setup from a regal or lasaber.
I do have plans of making a 231-esque engine once its added to the game. I don’t mind the styling, it could be worse cough Monte SS cough but its not the best looking thing ever. I don’t have anything against G-Body’s, in fact I love them, it’s just this one that I hate. Its constantly one problem after another, it was never well cared for, its just a big pile that was totally worth the $200 it cost to buy it. I was originally going to do a SBB swap, but now I don’t really care for the car anymore. I’ll probably just let it sit and maybe sell it to a friend or to another enthusiast who cares to fix it up.
…oh, I forgot the 231 was a 90-degree V6 - that’s a bit of an obstacle.
Where do you live? For $200 I will buy it.
I think these cars are totally bad-ass. I had a '78 Monte Carlo with the same engine/transmission (no ECU for the '78, unlike your '82). It might not have been fast, but it got great mpg (for its day) and was hella fun to drive!