Maxim Vintage Car Shopper: 1987 Buick Regal GNX
This black beauty is a beast.
The Year: 1987
The Model: Buick Regal GNX
The Drivetrain: A turbocharged, 3.8-liter V6 hooked to a trusty, 4-speed GM TurboHydromatic. In classic muscle-car fashion, the car is rear-wheel drive and perfect for boosted V6 burnouts.
Favorite Five Points:
1. The “high-low” hilarity of the Buick GNX—yes, it’s a two-door GM coupe from the eighties, but only 547 were made. (For comparison, in 1977 Porsche sold over 1492 rare 911 Turbos.)
2. The OEM steel and chrome basket-weave wheels: they look like a classic BBS design, but were made in house by a crafty design team.
3. The designed-with-a-slide-rule profile. All the hard angles will go great with the soft, feathered hair you’ll be sporting to celebrate your eighties icon.
4. The turbo power: though the claimed number is 276 horsepower, the GNX was notoriously underrated, and subsequent dynometer testing revealed most cars were making around 350 horsepower at the crank.
5. Two-tone velour seats and a numbered plate on the dashboard (406/547) make the interior a treat—pure eighties kitsch, special if not luxurious.
Quirks:
The front bumper housing on this car seems to be cracked pretty severely, and the seats are wrapped in plastic despite the car having been driven for thousands of miles—was it kept and put on for storage? The seller mentions neither oddity, so we’d be sure to inquire.
Good buy?
Low-mileage, great condition and some appreciated upgrades (a higher-performance turbo) would seem to put this car above average; the price, $75,000 reflects that. It might seem like a crazy amount of money for an old, Buick G-Body, but the GNX is special—a 1987 Darth Vader Turbo Buick is nothing to look down on. In fact, we might just call it the coolest American car of the eighties. If you can figure out the discrepancies between the photos and description, we’d give this Buick a solid endorsement. Find it here on Hemmings.
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