Josue Iglesias, 21, takes a peek inside the never-sold 1987 Buick Regal GNX that resides at Boulevard Buick in Signal Hill. (Mel Melcon, Los Angeles Times / October 13, 2010)
Posted on 12/13/2010 1:06:27 PM PST by Responsibility2nd
A pristine Buick that's sat in the showroom of a Signal Hill dealer for 23 years is the stuff of turbocharged automotive legend.
The sinister-looking black coupe sits in a corner of the showroom floor, oozing macho and muscle. Square headlights. Evil sneer for a grille. Six cylinders of turbocharged fury.
If Darth Vader drove a car, this is what you might find in his garage.
This new car is 23 years old. It's a Buick Regal GNX, and in 1987 car enthusiasts including celebrity collectors Reggie Jackson, Burt Reynolds and Sylvester Stallone snapped them up.
This menacing Buick — one of only about 500 — still sports its original $29,389 sticker on the window. Experts say it could sell at auction for north of $120,000, especially since most of its surviving siblings have many more miles of rough roads under their fenders.
Why this GNX still sits there in Signal Hill amounts to a miscalculation by the dealership, Boulevard Buick, which tried unsuccessfully to boost its profit by auctioning it to the highest bidder.
"This was a car that was meant to go fast and driven hard," said Steve Davis, president of Barrett-Jackson, the Scottsdale, Ariz., rare and classic auto auction house. "So when you find one in virgin condition sitting unsold at a dealer, that is bulletproof provenance. There is no question this car was born the way you are seeing it."
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
Josue Iglesias, 21, takes a peek inside the never-sold 1987 Buick Regal GNX that resides at Boulevard Buick in Signal Hill. (Mel Melcon, Los Angeles Times / October 13, 2010)
Fugly....
I never understood the attraction to this car.
6 cylinders? Turbocharged? How much HP could it be?
Maybe ... but also fufast.
I once owned a Regal, my son wrecked it, sadly.
I once owned a Regal, my son wrecked it, sadly.
I once owned a Regal, my son wrecked it, sadly.
I once owned a Regal, my son wrecked it, sadly.
O know a guy with a 69 Impala that has less than 2000 actual miles. He bought it right off the line when he worked for GM and immediately put it into storage as a future show car.
Since then its been driven in parades and cruise night type stuff.
GNX put out 276 @ 4400 rpm
You should stop fixing it again if he’s gonna keep wrecking it like that.
You can take a 3.8L Buick V6 ‘LD5’ and make 1300+ horsepower from it.
How many did you own and how many did your son wreck. With this many posts it had to be a bunch!
DRYROT....
I had a buddy with one, and by the time he was done addind and tweaking, it was up around 700. I refused to get in it.
Modern, fuel injected V6’s...even straight 6’s (BMW) put out more power than this.
Maybe he wrecked badly not sadly?
The area I grew up, drag racing was popular (street racing on the country roads as well as at the local track)
These cars were blowing the doors off of cars that had major investments as custom muscle cars.
Six-Cylinder Hondas have about 300hp these days....Most the the ‘baddest’ Muscle cars from back in the day can’t compare to most stock six-cylinder cars these days...It’s about more than HP in this car...And, I bet 120k will not touch it at Barrett-Jackson.
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