Collectible autos: the Buick Regal Grand National

In the heady days before the Japanese automakers got a solid foothold in the American car market, General Motors let its individual marques operate like little carmaking city-states. They all swapped designs and bodies and engines, but at the end of the day, they all had their own sets of engineers. A Pontiac engine was different from a Chevrolet engine which was different from an Oldsmobile engine—even though they were all roughly the same displacement and were all derived from the same block.

The 1980s took care of that, and now GM is one giant boring-car factory and each of its individual brands is responsible for manufacturing little more than their own nameplates and advertisements. Pick any Pontiac (for example) made from 1990 through 2000 and you can be damned sure that it was almost completely identical to at least one other GM car—and this was the way the General wanted it.

But right around the time when the manufacturers were getting smooshed together in an unholy orgy of ungainly panel gaps and ghastly hard plastics, there was one holdout: Buick.

In 1982 Buick took their otherwise completely boring Regal coupé and ... painted it silver and black. And gave it an anemic 125hp engine. We'll ignore this model, although here's a picture, anyway.

Buick cancelled this model after only 215 were made.

But in 1984, Buick actually got things right: it took the regular Regal, upgraded the interior, painted it black, and threw an upgraded version of the turbocharged V6 in the front. This is the car that you see at the top of this article, and the engine is why we're talking about it. It's a single-point fuel-injected and turbocharged 3.8L plant that made 200hp and 300lb-ft of torque for the 1984 model year. That's a stump-puller of an engine, and it's entirely responsible for the cred that comes with this car.

Now, Buick left the car largely intact for 1985 but in 1986 they upped the power to 235hp and 330lb-ft and then a year later to 245hp and 355lb-ft. And all that torque is available at just 2000 rpm, which is absolutely remarkable. Amazing powerplant.

Lastly, I should mention the Buick Regal GNX, a special version of the GN produced only in 1987 but which had a ton of go-fast, turn-fast, and stop-fast goodies. This car made 276hp and 360lb-ft out the door, which made it really damned quick.

When Buick sold the GN and the GNX, both were quicker than the Corvette—which is one of the big reasons why the car was discontinued. It's somewhat against policy to build cars that can outperform the feather in GM's quirky American hat.

But enough of that. Down to business.

Collectability: Well above average. Buy one if you're enough of a badass.

(+) Sean Penn had one. The sound that Buick GN owners heard on April 8, 2003, was "cha-ching!" Sean Penn's 1987 GN was stolen and instantly brought a fair amount of interest to the car. Apart from the De Lorean DMC-12, I can't think of a car whose value has benefitted so much from the film industry.

(+) It's Custer's Last Stand for the American muscle car. Even though Buick has made supercharged Regals since the GN, they're not rear-drive and don't have the flair of the GN. The Grand National is an idiotically overpowered car that can't stop or turn very well (even in GNX trim) and it's the last holdout of GM's old guard before they got overrun by the beancounters and the engineers so in love with FWD.

(+) It's available in any color, as long as it's black. The turbocharged Grand Nationals (i.e., those made after the failed 1982 run) all come in black. When a car is cool enough to sell on its own without having to deal with something as trite as color selection—well, that's cool.

(+) It makes no bones about being a badass car. There's absolutely no pretention here, and absolutely no sophistication. The GN is a car designed to go really quickly in a straight line, and very little else. While I don't respect this very much in cars made at a time when going quickly in a straight line was popular, I do respect the GN for it because Buick made it when the imports had a solid foothold in the US and you had to be outright daft to buy a drag car. This car has balls, and I think that's a very rare thing.

(-) They all have automatics. Much like the Subaru SVX on which I commented earlier this week, the GN and GNX were only ever available with slushboxes. In fact, none of the Regals built in that body style were ever sold with a manual transmission.

To be honest, this isn't as much of a problem as it is with most cars—the GN/GNX don't make the statement that they're refined driving apparati, ready to bind your soul to the road in the quickest way possible. No, they're big brash drag cars, and they're designed so that you put your right foot as far down as possible and then use those hands to just hold on to the damned wheel.

(-) Forget turning. Even NASCAR involves too many right turns for these cars. The Regal is a big willowy chassis and the GN sashays more than it turns.

(-) Oh, the interior. For those of you who delight in finely crafted dashboards, well-placed gauges and switches, and supportive seats: look elsewhere. The GN interior is upgraded from the stock Regal—but it's still a disaster. Take a look.

Expect to pay: $10,000 for a solid GN and $30,000+ for a GNX.

What to look for:

• Engine mods are kosher—especially those to make it more drag-car-like.
  
• Exterior modifications are strictly verboten.
  
• Buy a clean car with a blown motor instead of the other way around. Yes, the motor is legendary, but it's also extremely rebuildable, too. These are fairly solid engines and parts are cheap.