If you read the editorials in Old Cars Weekly, you know I'm now the proud owner of a slightly used 1994 Buick Roadmaster LT-1 station wagon.
I bought the car after eating lunch with retired car owner extraordinaire Kenny Buttolph. Over lunch, I made the mistake of telling Kenny I needed a winter beater as a back-up to my 210,000-mile 1989 Caprice V-6 sedan, and he said he had just spotted a "nice" Buick woodie for sale in a driveway. Now, there are two things you should know: I'll never sell my rusty and trusty Caprice. It's ugly and rust is making it fall apart, but the extremely low amount of repairs and reliability I've experienced in the last five years and 110,000 miles will shame any proud Honda owner, and it gets 23 mpg, sometimes better.
Secondly, anyone who knows Kenny has heard him use the word "nice" to describe a car in his trademarked high-pitched voice kind of way. But they also know that Kenny uses the word "nice" to describe cars in a wide variety of conditions. Basically, if he would buy a car, it's "nice." That car may be a solid, intact No. 4 project car, or a well-restored No. 1 or 2 car, as long as it was solid and intact before restoration. Original options and unusually ordered cars may positively or negatively affect a car's ability to be considered "nice."
I wasn't really looking for a Roadmaster (or "Roadmonster," as I like to call them), but I always liked them. And after a drive that Kenny called "short" short (the car was more than an hour away), we found the wagon below.
I've had my version of the "Family Truckster" since December and am enjoying it. I only use it when the weather is nice, and when I go to the Twin Cities to visit family and friends. And I'm looking forward to hauling some Cadillac parts to the body shop with the rig, thanks to its spacious rear compartment. I'll be able to make it to the shop quick, too, thanks to its high-perf engine.
However, at the fault of the car's LT-1, I find my right foot is getting heavier as time goes by. Even though it's engine is based on the 'Vette powerplant, it doesn't quite feel like a Corvette. I do keep the second and third seat in the "down" position, so I do drive one of the postwar era's largest two seaters. And, as Kenny says, "when you're in the driver's seat, you can't tell how many doors your car has." I'll tell ya, when it comes to doors, and with all of this wagon's glass, I'm able to see how many doors I've blown off the cars behind me!

With this 1994 Buick Roadmaster, I join the Old Cars Weekly LT-1 fraternity. Technical Editor Ron Kowalke also has an LT-1-powered Roadmaster wagon, and retired OCW staffer Ken Buttolph has three big 1990s GM wagons...and counting.

This Sunday, Online Editor Matt Gergeni and I hit the highway and drove down to Chicago to visit the world-famous Fran Roxas in his natural habitat – his Chicago-area restoration shop. Our mission? To photograph George Albright’s Duesenberg sedan, which has appeared in more movies than any other Duesenbergs. Any Duesenberg fan will tell that Duesenbergs have appeared in a lot of movies, so this is quite a statement. Albright’s sedan has quite a story behind its resurrection in Fran Roxas’ hands not once, but twice, and I am very excited to write the story for a future issue of Old Cars Weekly.

Roxas is probably a familiar name to most car hobbyists, especially those who like prewar cars. Many Pebble Beach-winning cars have been restored under Roxas’ care. What’s more impressive is this collector is, literally, a coachbuilder, and has built many bodies for Classic car chassis from scratch in the old-world way. Think Duesenberg torpedo phaeton bodies and coachwork originally drawn by the Fleetwood studio but never ordered by a customer for a Cadillac chassis. Google his name and you’ll see some of his work. I also pictured two of the 1934 V-16 Cadillacs sporting the Fleetwood coachwork he created in my Cadillac book, "Cadillac: 100 Years of Innovation."

Roxas doesn’t just restore Classics – he also works on postwar metal. Or, in the case of Roxas customer Joe Bortz, postwar fiberglass. The trip to photograph Albright’s Duesenberg was especially good since we were able to meet up with Joe Bortz, a famous car collector in the Chicago area who collects concept cars. Bortz met up with me and Matt while we were at Roxas’s shop to show us the progress on his 1955 Biscayne concept car. Bortz pulled this and several other GM concept cars out of Warhoops salvage yard in the 1980s and 1990s, but the Biscayne was probably in the worst shape of them all. The car was, literally, stacked in pieces, and he had to excavate many of its pieces out of the dirt. Bortz never thought the car would be put back together, but it’s in Roxas shop and it’s a three-dimensional car once again, thanks to Roxas.

Bortz’ Biscayne has been featured in Old Cars Weekly several times, but watch for more progress updates on this gem in the future, as well as a full feature on the Duesey in an upcoming issue. In the meantime, enjoy these pics from our visit and be sure to check out Matt’s video from the day of our visit.

Duesey pics courtesy of Joe Bortz.

Pic below of me in Joe Bortz' Biscayne.

As promised, here are some recent prices of 1955 Cadillac prices, as well as the current prices, as noted in Old Cars Price Guide.


1955 Cadillacs:
Current OCPG values
Series 62 two-door hardtop: #1 40,000; #2 28,000; #3 18,000; #4 8,000
Series 62 Coupe deVille:      #1 41,000; #2 28,700; #3 18,450; #4 8,200
Series 62 convertible:           #1 85,000; #2 59,500; #3 38,250; #4 17,000
Eldorado convertible:           #1 92,500; #2 64,750; #3 41,630; #4 18,500

When it comes to Coupe deVilles from 1955, there are four records of No. 3 cars selling for $35,000 to $9,500 for an average of $20,625 in 2007 and 2006. This large span of prices is a good example to show how an auction venue can help or harm a seller’s price. (Bigger auctions that are well-promoted fetch realistic values while small auctions with little if any promotion can hide deals for bidders and heartbreak for sellers.) Looking at the Old Cars Price Guide estimates, the publication’s prices are in the ballpark.

The Series 62 coupe prices weren’t as conclusive as the 1955 Coupe deVille prices. Only three cars are contained in the database from 2007: a No. 2 Series 62 coupe sold for $19,500, and two No. 3 Series 62 coupes are listed as selling (one for $19,500 and a second for $25,500) for an average of $22,500.

I’m fortunate enough to have two 1955 Cadillacs in my family, a Coupe deVille and a Series 62 coupe. While the Coupe deVilles prices haven’t changed much, it appears that the No. 3 price for Series 62 coupes have gone up, indicating a need to raise the values in Old Cars Price Guide, perhaps to around the $22,000 mark in No. 3 condition. Compare that to the $20,000 recent market average (address above) for a No. 3 Coupe deVille – according to this information, a Series 62 coupe is worth more in today’s market than a Coupe deVille, and any Caddy fan will tell you that shouldn’t be the case. Series 62 coupes are not nearly as plush as Coupe deVilles, and most people are willing to pay the difference to have a Coupe deVille badge and a slightly plusher interior on their car over a (relatively) “plain Jane” Series 62 coupe, which has only Cadillac emblems here and there. Or is this ideology changing?

Another twist on prices comes from 1955 Cadillac convertibles. It appears that have been paying more for a Series 62 convertible than the usually coveted Eldorado convertibles! Eldorados are far more rare, came standard with dual four-barrels and Sabre wheels, and feature unique styling in the Cadillac line. Are more buyers stating they prefer the looks of the Series 62 line over the Eldorados? It’s possible. Throw in the fact that any 1955 Cadillac can be equipped with dual quads, and Sabres can be fitted to almost any model (Cadillac did not recommend fitting Sabres to Series 75 models), and the mechanical benefits of an Eldorado can be had in a Series 62.

Here are some pricing results:
Three Eldorado convertibles are listed as selling in 2007 auctions in No. 2 condition at $65,000, $71,500 and $88,000 (the last example had less than 16,000 original miles). That’s an average of $74,800, with the low-mileage car thrown in. Throwing it out, that’s an average of $68,250. Three No. 3 Eldorados are in the database selling for $52,000, $55,000 and $57,500 for an average of $54,000. The Old Cars Price Guide currently shows a No. 2 price around $64,750 and a No. 3 price at $41,630.
Eldorado prices remain strong and on-target with Old Cars Price Guide, but Series 62 convertibles, on the other hand, have been recording higher sales figures. In 2007, three Series 62 convertibles in No. 2 condition sold for $145,000, $87,000 and $74,000, all considerably more than Eldorados in comparable condition, and with a higher average at $102,000 in No. 2 condition. If we throw out the $145,000 figure and consider it an anomaly, the average price of Series 62 convertibles in No. 2 condition was $80,500, compared to $68,250 for Eldorados.  

Conclusion: Cadillac Series 62 coupes have been fetching more than Coupe deVilles in comparable condition, and Series 62 convertibles have been seeing higher prices than Eldorado convertibles in comparable condition. It will take more time to see if this is truly where the market is heading, but chances are, these are not trends. Rather, the less-expensive Series 62 coupes and Series 62 convertibles from 1955 are likely being sold at higher-profile and better-publicized auctions than more-expensive Eldorados and Coupe deVilles.