1971 Cadillac Eldorado Convertible - Dreams Can Be Expensive

It's somewhat ironic I ran across this 1971 Cadillac Eldorado at the transmission shop next door to my office in perma-cloudy Youngstown, Ohio. 

My father's 1972 Cadillac Sedan deVille "dropped" its "Turbo-Hydramatic 400" transmission as did the 400 in his 1970 Buick Electra 225 he had prior to it. The transmission in my 1982 Buick Riviera blew up as well albeit that was a "Turbo 325L", a lighter duty, overdrive equipped version of the "Turbo 425" found in this big old Eldo. 

Back in the day before the earth cooled, it seemed a car needing its transmission replaced, rebuilt or repaired wasn't a matter of "if", but "when". I chuckle when I hear about how durable and bullet proof transmissions where years ago. Even the "Turbo 350" in my 1977 Corvette is not original to the car. 

The GM Turbo 425 was a part of General Motors famed Unified Power Package that made this car, the similar Oldsmobile Toronado and a gaggle of motor homes, most of them built by GMC, front-wheel-drivers. That transmission was based off GM's "Turbo 400". The legendary rear-engine Vector V-8 of 1989-1993 used it as well to pass torque to the rear wheels. 

A front-wheel-drive car is nothing out of the ordinary today but fifty years ago it most certainly was. In fact, our '71 here can trace its size-able DNA to the 1967 Eldorado that was the first front-wheel-drive Cadillac ever. 

The Unified Power Package, or "UPP", worked so well, err, when it was working, that most drivers had no idea their car was being pulled rather than pushed. 

The UPP first appeared in 1966 on the Oldsmobile Toronado. Cadillac got it starting in 1967 when they launched their new Eldorado. 

The only tell-tale was a flat floor since there was no space-robbing "hump" or tunnel running down the middle of the car for the driveshaft. That and perhaps some drivers noticed a far greater degree of foul-weather traction since nearly sixty percent of the vehicle's weight laid over the front tires. 

Surprised it wasn't more than that. Then again, there is an enormous amount of car behind the firewall as well. If my '82 Riviera did anything well, which isn't saying much, it's that it pulled like a tractor in bad weather. Especially snow. 

The "UPP" which allowed for a longitudinally mounted engine and diverted torque to the front-wheels via a transfer case of sorts, was a remarkable piece of engineering. My 2002 Monte Carlo in the background here is FWD too, but it has a "transverse mounted" engine and torque is routed directly to the front wheels. The steering wheel tugs a bit on hard acceleration, that's what they call "torque steer", but there was all but zero torque steer on cars equipped with the UPP. 

My question to GM product planners of the time would be why they didn't use the UPP on at least their mid-size cars let alone their compacts. And although expensive to manufacture and more complex than a standard front-engine, rear-wheel-drive car, why'd they only offer it on range topping personal luxury cars? Imagine a Corvair or F85 with a small V-8 and front-wheel-drive. Wow.

Imagine a fleet of gloriously roomy GM front-wheel-drive four-door sedans and wagons back then too; the packaging efficiencies of FWD (front-wheel-drive) allowing cavernous interiors relative to the size of the vehicle. No more big on the outside, tiny on the inside. Certainly, befitting the Autorama theme or aura of the 1950's and early 1960's don't you think? Those dreams that seemed to come to a grinding halt sometime in the mid to late Sixties. Dreams can be expensive. 

Legend has it the Oldsmobile Toronado was originally intended to be a front-driver based on GM's new for '64 intermediate A-body chassis that under-pinned the likes of the Oldsmobile F85, Buick Skylark, Pontiac Tempest and Chevrolet Chevelle. 

Bowing to the GM axiom of the day that the size of someone's car determined their lot in life, that plan was scuttled and the new for '66 full size Toronado and '67 Eldorado were literally christened. 

GM used the UPP through 1985, 1979's E-body reboot that also included the Buick Riviera used, again, a lighter duty version of it they dubbed the "THM (Turbo-Hyrdamatic) 325". Overdrive versions like my Riviera had where called "325L's". I'll never forget the sickening feeling I had when I noticed that car taking for ever to upshift out of first gear. Swapping out that clunker cost me $1,800. In 1989. Ouch. 

For 1971, GM rebooted the Toronado and Eldorado making the Toronado, which I thought ghastly looking through 1970, especially the 1966 and 1967 versions, look much like the 1967-1970 Eldorado. Meanwhile the Eldorado, which had been, remarkably, touted as luxury-sports-grand tourer, became a fluffy parade float. 

Another "who-cares" was that these cars had 8.2 LITRE, or 500-cubic inch V-8 engines which was, and, kids, this will be on the test, the largest V-8 engine ever offered in a passenger car. Although, frankly, it didn't offer significantly greater performance than somewhat smaller displacement engines offered by Oldsmobile, Buick and Pontiac. Chevrolet too. Cadillac offered the "500" across their entire line starting in 1975. Well, save for the Seville starting in 1975. 

I've had little to do with these cars for as long as I can remember although it might be fun to turn this into a sleeper. Saving grace on this car, on the '72's as well, in my opine is this luscious, whimsical fake cooling vent intake design thing hearkening the original Eldorado of 1953-1956. 

1973's don't have it making their flanks slab sided and lifeless. Again, my blog, my rules. There was minor updating for 1974. Same for the 1975 into 1976 and they have their fans. Especially the convertibles. 1976 was the last year for the factory-built drop-tops. 

Next time I'm out at the office, if I happen upon one of the owners of the shop I'll ask about this car. It's a family-owned business and they're wonderful people. I have no doubt they'll tell me the THM425 is shot, and the owner has given up on it. 

Quick check on NADA values pegs this car worth around $10,000 but that's got to be a fully functioning car.  A new THM425 will set someone back a cool three-grand. 

1977 Cadillac Eldorado - The Wife Hates Big Old Cars

Came across this 1977 Cadillac Eldorado on, where else? Facebook Marketplace recently. It's posted by the same guy who listed that '71 convertible the other day and he's asking $6,500 for it. I guess he collects these things which is cool. Weird too. It's appears to be in such great shape that it almost seems like a steal. According to Haggerty, 1977 Cadillac Eldorado's in "excellent" shape are valued at nearly $21,000; good condition around half that, "fair" about half of that which is about the asking price of this. NADA values are a different ball of axle grease seeing they list one of these on the high retail end at under $15,000, average retail is around $9,400 which is about right I think. Keep in mind Haggerty is primarily an insurnace carrier and they are very, very generous with their evalutations of classic vehicle worth. Trust me on this one, they make you feel all gooey and warm inside about the value of your classic because the more you insure it for, the higher your payments to them.  

These cars are unique because of what they are and what they aren't. What they are is the last of the gigantic, domestic, premium, personal luxury cars. GM started the great downsizing epoch in 1977 and while they shrunk all their other full-size wares, the front-wheel-drive Eldorado and similar Oldsmobile Toronado were spared the plasma cutter. At least for a couple of model years.

What they aren't was convertibles. Well, in fairness, the front-wheel-drive Eldorado was available as a coupe going back to 1971 as well but 1977 was the first year Eldorado was not offered as a convertible. That make a difference in the value of the fixed-roof models? Not really. More importantly, though, the 1977 Cadillac Eldorado got the "smaller", 425 cubic-inch Cadillac V-8 all the other Cadillac's got save for the Seville that made due with a fuel-injected Oldsmobile 350. 

Still, the Cadillac 425, all but indistinguishable from the Cadillac 500 it was allegedly based on (sorry, no under-hood pictures in the listing) was the largest engine General Motor's put in a passenger car that year, for 1978 as well before Eldorado met the shrink ray for '79. This is of course back in the day when GM's myriad divisions were still manufacturing their own engines. For the most part. That edict was slowly changing in the mid to late '70's and through the '80's as each division came to use the same engines. It's actually only in the last ten years or so that GM hasn't at least made some sort of proprietary engine for Cadillac. 

The 425 may have helped improve mileage on the deVille and Fleetwood, that and their losing a good half-ton of curb weight, but it did little to help the Eldorado at the pump. Rough EPA estimates, which were as generous back then as Haggerty is on evaluating classics today, pegged highway mileage at 9.4 miles-per-gallon. Performance wasn't affected that much which, much like the Cadillac 500 it replaced and the 472 before the 500, is a testament to the engine's monstrous and flat torque curve that peaked at a diesel like 2,000 rpm's. 

So, if you wanted a big car in 1977 but it had to be a GM, this was your only choice. This '77 Eldorado a meaty ten-inches longer than a still gargantuan mid-size "colonnade" Buick Regal, Olds Cutlass, Pontiac Grand Prix or Chevrolet Monte Carlo. That of course changed as GM mid-sized cars became upsized compacts for 1978. The Ford Motor Company didn't start downsizing until 1979 and for a couple of years they wisely attempted to market that fact aggressively; but if you're a GM loyal like yours truly, nothing else will do. And the "little" Coupe deVille couldn't row my boat either. 

The Cadillac Eldorado moniker had been around since 1953 when Cadillac introduced a special two-door convertible model to help commemorate Cadillac's 50th anniversary. Eldorado was a front-engine, rear-wheel-drive model, as all domestic models were back then until the introduction of the rear-engine Chevrolet Corvair for 1960. For 1967, Eldorado became a front-wheel-drive automobile sharing it's power-train configuration with Oldsmobile's Toronado (that debuted in 1966). Starting in 1966 through 1976, the Buick Riviera shared the frame and body-shell of the Eldorado\Toronado but eschewed it's front-wheel-drive. If you've ever thought those Rivera's actually looked like front-wheel-driver's but they weren't, that was why. 

Unlike almost all front-wheel-drive cars manufactured today where the engine is transversely mounted, the Toronado\Eldorado engine was longitudinal, like most cars of the day were, but the gearbox was mounted next to the transmission driven by a heavy-duty chain. The gearbox output shaft pointed forward sending power to a slim planetary differential and then via CV-jointed half shafts to the front wheels. The arrangement was remarkably compact and was referred to as the "Unitized Power Package", or "UPP". In my opinion, it was one of the more remarkable engineering accomplishments for General Motors in the 1960's. Engineering that, unfortunately, was applied to the wrong car at the wrong time. Did Eldorado buyers care that their dreamboat had front-wheel-drive? For sure some did but by and large do you think they did? 

When GM downsized the Eldorado for 1979 they used a similar setup to drive the front wheels. The packaging of the power-train entirely in front of the firewall allowing for a spacious "hump-free" interior same as it did on the previous model but it technically made more sense seeing those cars were for all intents and purposes "intermediate" sized automobiles. The "UPP" going into the GM engineering dumpster come 1986 when they, dare I say, "fatally downsized" the Eldorado complete with a transverse mounted V-8 that in itself was an interesting if not solid effort but was nothing like the UPP.

 

If this guy wasn't so far away, Toledo is a solid ninety-minutes west of where I live, I'd be all over this guy test-driving his Eldorado's and asking him all sorts of questions about why he's got at least two of them. And why each is going so cheap. If you look hard at these photos you'll see that this oh-so-'70's brownish-orange Eldorado is not perfect but it appears to be in real good shape. 

The wife hates big old cars like this so it's not worth my time and aggravation to take the trip to kick the tires. You're reading this for a reason - you're interested in these cars and are tickled by this one, comment below and I'll do my best to hook you guys up. Just swing on by my triple-wide so I can take a big old front-wheel drive in it.