Do Grand Nationals get too much credit for the greatness of the G-Body?

[Clone TIE Pilot]

Never knew about the body and frame, makes no sense but GM doesn't always. I personally like non adjustable rocker arms, they work great with stock base circle cams. The crappy factory fuel pump is a well known issue. My BIL took a used 86 GN for a test drive at our local GM dealer. He blew the doors of a 5L HO Mustang, the water mark for 90's performance and left 2 long black streaks on the highway, part of the GN legend.

The idea was to give them a soft ride as Buick cars must ride soft. All Regals except GNX have 4 to 6 missing lower body bushings, missing the number 5 mounts, no rear seat brace, and no front frame bracing.

Even with TRs, only the last two years are considered good. The GN guys rank on the early carb turbo and hotair TRs.

 

[thunderball]

The idea was to give them a soft ride as Buick cars must ride soft. All Regals except GNX have 4 to 6 missing lower body bushings, missing the number 5 mounts, no rear seat brace, and no front frame bracing.

Even with TRs, only the last two years are considered good. The GN guys rank on the early carb turbo and hotair TRs.

Wow I never knew that. Even GN's, that is ridiculous.

Adds another layer to the bizarre distribution of performance options with gbodys amongst GM's different subcompanies.

Pontiac, Chevy get aerodynamic window option
Buick has turbo engines
Olds and buick get 8.5" rear
all except GNX buicks missing bushings and mounts

 

[pagrunt]

all except GNX buicks missing bushings and mounts

my '81 Monte had all 14.

 

[thunderball]

my '81 Monte had all 14.

I may have that phrased that in a confusing way but i was saying other GM companies had all the mounts and bushings but Regals were missing them

 

[oldmansmonte]

I may have that phrased that in a confusing way but i was saying other GM companies had all the mounts and bushings but Regals were missing them

What was the purpose? To transfer less of the road feel to the passengers and driver?

 

[oldmansmonte]

They were fast for their time and responded very well to modifications (a few hundred $ would take a stock low 14 second car into the mid 12s). These cars had an incredible amount of potential relative to other cars available in the mid 80's.

I think people forget how ridiculously slow the average car was in the 1980's. Take a super common Buick Century with the 2.5, it's 1 barrel throttle body and 3 speed transmission. Holy hell was that slow, and that was common. In today's traffic that car would get you killed for not being able to get out of everyone's way.

 

[Clone TIE Pilot]

What was the purpose? To transfer less of the road feel to the passengers and driver?

That is correct. With G bodies they rely on the body to help stiffen the frame and vice versa. Because of this, you can tune the ride feel by deleting bushings and bracing. My base Regal was missing 4 of the lower bushings and the number 5 location bushings, six bushings in total.

 

[oldmansmonte]

They were fast for their time and responded very well to modifications (a few hundred $ would take a stock low 14 second car into the mid 12s). These cars had an incredible amount of potential relative to other cars available in the mid 80's.

I think people forget how ridiculously slow the average car was in the 1980's. Take a super common Buick Century with the 2.5, it's 1 barrel throttle body and 3 speed transmission. Holy hell was that slow, and that was common. In today's traffic that car would get you killed for not being able to get out of everyone's way.

That is correct. With G bodies they rely on the body to help stiffen the frame and vice versa. Because of this, you can tune the ride feel by deleting bushings and bracing. My base Regal was missing 4 of the lower bushings and the number 5 location bushings, six bushings in total.

How much did changing that affect the ride?

 

[motorheadmike]

I wonder how the F41 vs. FE3 suspensions stacked up with respect to body bushings (count, placement, durometer, etc)?

 

[Clone TIE Pilot]

Installing the missing bushings did increase NVH some.

Speed is relative. 30 years from now, they will consider the average current day cars as slow too. The price of progress is that everything must become outdated and die. Heck, some of the GN guys consider bone stock intercooled TRs as slow cars.