Sudden want for a 63-65 Buick Riviera

[samoht]

Classic Cars featured a white '63 Riviera in their current issue, and it just looks so cool to my eyes.




I love the front, both the original with huge sidelights, and the '65 with the concealed headlights. The interior looks really fun in a way you just don't see nowadays. Plus, it's under two tonnes with a 6.6L V8 - what's not to like?

It feels like it's quite a special car which is currently available for quite reasonable prices (~$20k).

Now, I'm not about to rush out and buy one anytime soon (or probably ever) - I'd need to buy a house with a double garage (as the FD isn't going anywhere). But if anyone has any first-hand experience of these cars, I'd love to hear it!

[Taimar]

Well that's an offbeat choice for you!

They are very reasonable considering what they are - more than one Brit mag has compared them favorably to the Bentley S3 Continental, and you could have three of these for what one of those costs.

They are abundant here still - probably because they are still so stylish and they held up well. It was very popular as a used car and held it's value well - mainly because it spawned plenty of imitators and was in exactly the right market as it aged. In the 1970s, Americans were obsessed with big luxury coupes (Monte Carlo, Regal, Cordoba, Thunderbird, Cougar) the way they would later be obsessed with SUVs. So many have survived. They're also fast for the era and most of the mechanical pieces are simple and rugged. There are more electronic things on a Riv to go wrong than on many of it's contemporaries, but it's simple compared to the wiring nightmare of a 1960s or 1970s Lincoln. Lincoln's belated answer, the 1968 MKIII, is notorious for electrical gremlins.

The only drawback is that they aren't quite modern enough to feel like a modern drive. If you drive a 1970s Riviera, it feels old but familiar (and really, really big). This car is older and it definitely feels it. It was a good handler for a big sixties car back in the day, but you would feel very weird going from say, a BRZ to one of these if you had not driven cars like this before. Steering is finger light - but better than many other sixties American cars in that it actually does have good feedback and you can actually get a sense for it after awhile, although it takes getting used to. Some American cars from that era have virtually no feedback at all, and you feel like the steering wheel is more of a tiller. They all have huge torquey V8s, so no problem when you hit the gas- but it takes forever to stop by modern standards - drum brakes all around. Really big, nice drums, but not the same experience as discs in front, which is what most drivers our age are familiar with.

My tastes for Rivieras skew a bit newer - 1968 to 1973 - but those cars feel larger, heavier, and more modern (still old, but early cars from the "safety era").

[speedpimp]

You can't beat a "boat tail" Riv.

[samoht]

Thanks for the info, good to hear more about them. I can see how, having started a trend, the Riviera has always been valued and thus many have survived in good condition.

I can imagine that despite modern levels of power, the rest of the driving experience must feel quite different. I was definitely thinking of it as being a contrast to a sports car, something more relaxed and cruisey.

The boat-tail does look cool, I admit - like a more modern Stingray Vette, which can only be a good thing. However I guess the interior isn't as exciting, and it's even bigger and heavier than the original, which is already pretty huge.

[thesameguy]

If you're as old as I am and drove anything big and American from the '80s, you'll feel reasonably at home in anything from the '60s or '70s. Improvements between '65 and '85 were incremental at best.

[KillerB]

Oddly, I've driven a 63 Riviera. Only thing that feels very "antique" is the Buick Dynaflow automatic. It's really close in operation to a modern CVT. It's one big torque converter backed up by a two-speed transmission. In most modes of operation, the torque converter acts like a slushy CVT. Drum brakes are no big deal as long as you only make one hard stop. It's fade that kills drums.

My personal tastes run to the 61-62 Cadillac, but a 64 Riviera (I want the hidden headlights) with a modern 6-spd auto out of a Camaro and fuel injection on the Buick nailhead V8 would be perfect, IMO. But what I really would like is a 61 Cadillac bubbletop coupe with a later 500ci Cadillac V8 with fuel injection and the 6L80 out of a Suburban.