With the opening of baseball season, a car like this 1982 Chevrolet Citation X-11 is either a swing and a miss, a strikeout, or a homerun. Or, something in-between? This one is on eBay with an unmet opening bid of $1,500 and it’s located in Saint Joseph, Michigan. Let’s PLAY BALL!
With several million X-body GM cars sold between 1980 and 1985 hopefully they weren’t a total strikeout. Although, they did have their problems with recalls and safety issues to fix. As you can see, this particular example has a little issue with the LF fender. The seller talks about the damage being “very minor. I have the headlight bezel, but the plastic headlight mount and side lamp are broken. I removed what was left of the small flat panel behind the bumper so the original mounting hardware wouldn’t be lost. The panel itself can be easily be fabricated.”
There isn’t “much rust, just a cracked windshield and a well worn paint job (especially the black trim areas). Fortunately the original X-11 cowl induction hood, and front/rear spoilers are all in good shape.” The X-11 was available in this hatchback version or a notchback. They weren’t red hot performance cars, but the X-11 wasn’t just a graphics package car, they did include a few performance upgrades. One of a couple of odd things related to this car is that the VIN decodes as being a Pontiac “model unknown” because the 5th character is an “M” which isn’t listed from what I could find. One site lists it as a 1984 Pontiac Fiero. Anyone? Help!
This car has a few needs which you already know and in looking at the interior you can see a few more. This “car was rescued from a 15 year old boy who inherited it, then tore the dashboard apart trying to install a modern radio and speakers. I have the original vertical-bar AM/FM radio (see picture 20), but he did something that disabled the dash lights, gas gauge, and horn. It’s probably minor stuff, but I’m no electrician. The wipers, and all exterior lights and signals still work properly.”
The engine should be GM’s 2.8L V6 with 135 hp, shouldn’t it be? I don’t know that the 2.5L iron-duke four-cylinder was available in the X-11 after 1980. I’m not quite sure what’s going on there, if this is a “tribute” X-11 or maybe a 1980 instead of a 1982? Whatever it is, it “sometimes struggles to maintain idle, especially when cold, but otherwise runs and drives normally. All fluids are fresh and clean. Clutch and trans feel good, and the shifter is smooth and precise. Brakes and power steering also feel good. If you plan on driving the car a long distance home, I highly recommend new tires, the ones on it are very old.” So, using a baseball analogy, how would you grade the Citation X-11 and this one in particular? I’d give the model overall a solid double, I’m not sure how to rate this one. A balk?
I’m not usually so negative but, IMO, the opening bid is 1K more than a fair sales price.
I had a 1981 Citation with the 2.5L and it got 32-35 mpg on the highway…it’s worth the price it this get even close to that.
Several examples of the X-11 have passed thru these pages. I personally like the looks of ’em, quality issues be dammed.
With that being said, IF I had the space I would have to pass on this one.
BASEBALL, hot dogs, apple pie, and Chevrolet!
Not an X-11 This is an X-11
I’d have to agree. decodethis.com says this is the plain janer. No x-11 nothing to see here, move along….
Great pic. I had one that looked exactly like this one. What a great little car.
This car looks like a clone to me……………and why anyone would want to clone one of these is beyond me.
This is definitely not an X11. Having had 2 in the family, all 81 to 84 X11s had the HO 660 (6 cylinder, 60 degree Vee) which carried an eighth digit “Z” vin code. 85s had a fuel injected V6 and were all automatics. Also missing on this car are the x11 specific wheels and the correct B pillar trim. It may be possible that someone ordered this car with the hood and spoiler, but it ain’t an X11.
Right, and the wheels in the original pic are not X-11 wheels….my aunt had a blue one many many moons ago……..
Way too many problems for a low-performance, non-original car with higher-performance appliques. Forget it.
X-11 should have cold air intake and some of the best looking rims of the era. This replicant has neither.
G-M parallels!
these citations look like a oversized chevy chevette
Bunt.
You’re right, Scotty, there’s no such thing as a 4-cylinder 1982 X-11. This is a base car with X-11 body parts.
not stopping the guy from advertising it as a “rare X11”. I say BALK…
This is bunting on the shift.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvoKZB4tgFY
IRON DUKE! Loved that in my ’87 Celebrity Eurosport sedan. Well except for the oil filter location between the engine and firewall, super easy to change spark plugs though.
The Iron Duke was a little lacking in refinement, but it most certainly made up for that by being durable and reliable.
From an era when most American/Canadian built cars were shot by 130K miles, the Iron Duke-equipped GM cars routinely made it past 200K. To me, that’s quite a milestone in USA/Canada car manufacture.
If this was a Phoenix hatchback, and in a little better shape, I’d be all over it.
Something of a shame to see that the stereo install was aborted. Having a stereo that’s worth more than the old car it’s installed in is so absolutely period-correct for the ’80s!
Not a real X-11, but could be a fun ol’ bomber for delivering pizzas or teaching your kid how to drive a stick. Fix the electrics, put the old radio back in, grab a seat cover and cheap tires from Wal*Mart, and off you go.
Lipstick on a pig.
junk !!
My folks only got 100K miles out of their ’80 Iron Duke Citation before it died in less than a decade of service. It was a well-designed, roomy car that was plagued by subpar assembly, mechanical recalls and GM’s 1980s cheapness and awfulness: plastic transmission parts, icky vinyl interiors, peeling paint, and that stupid vertical radio that almost no one made an aftermarket version of.
one of my friends who will remain unnamed and retired from Metro North Railroad still has his Citation on the road. Go figure. And when he worked for MNRR he could of bought a newer fancier car , but never did…
The seller apologized for the VIN error (saying it resulted from using eBay’s pre-load format), and added the actual VIN to the description. It shows an “X” as the 5th character if that tells us anything, but I say at $1500 who cares? Clone or not, the car looks cooler than you-know-what by today’s standards. I haven’t even seen a bench seat Citation with a power-slush since Reagan was in office!
I believe a “Z” code in the VIN would only denote a 2.8L V-6, not whether the car is an X-11. The VIN on this car has an “X” as the 5th character for whatever that’s worth. It makes little difference, because at this point, the car is a rarity either way. I haven’t seen another one on eBay in years.
Someone defiantly tried to make an X-11 clone. My first car was a 1982 X-11 (it looked exactly like the maroon one pictured earlier in this thread). The wheels are wrong, it should have the 2.8l HO motor, the center console and instrument cluster is incorrect and it should have a “Sport Suspension” text on the trim over the glove box.
You may be correct, but I still think there’s value here. Base model or clone, I like that the car has the 4-speed, and is apparently in drivable condition. Best of all it doesn’t appear super rusty. So what if it has Fiero wheels. X-11 instrument clusters pop up all the time, and upgrading a suspension is part of any good restoration. I think the car is weird enough to own.
You do have a point, that car is pretty clean for an 82 citation. If mine had been in this good of condition when I had gotten it back, I would have kept it. It was a great little car.
Yeah, they’re way under-rated. They can’t take abuse like a Nova, but if you treat them right, they reward you with things the Nova never can (like getting traction in snow, and great gas mileage). Every car that’s different gets scorned until Jay Leno buys one, and then everyone jumps on board. Like when he started buying Corvairs.
There’s a reason you don’t see them anymore. Quality was terrible in the eighties. I worked on many 3-5 yr old citations at a used car lot, The transmission lines going in to the radiator were rubber hoses with hose clamps that were guaranteed to leak. Torque struts on engine were always bad. No thanks, they were good looking cars especially the X11’s but not worth the trouble.
All of my decoders keep this coming back as an 84 Fiero Sports Coup. I even work in the industry, so I have plenty of tools to decode… Haven’t see one pop like this before. I do like the old Citations, especially the X-11s. Dad had a 4 spd. 81 Phoenix, which was essentially the same basic car. That thing was bulletproof. The only real strange thing was if you went over 67 mph, the speedo went crazy, boucing up and down while some alarm bell was dinging like crazy. Yeah, I drove it like I stole it, so I’m like Quasimodo – still hearing those durned bells!
Apparently, there are no real X-11’s on Craigslist right now, just one guy looking for any that might be out there:
https://skagit.craigslist.org/wan/d/wanted-to-buy-chevrolet/6510678557.html
You guys keep de-coding the Fiero VIN that the seller acknowledged was entered accidentally. He posted the correct VIN in the text, and even offered a free Carafx report. Since no one else bothered to ask him for it, I did. I’m not even interested in the car, but it’s gets old watching people spin Fiero wheels in mud. The Carfax is attached. Looks legit.
It was called Citation for a reason – it got more ” fix it tickets ” (recalls ) than just about any other car of the era.
When I told people I drove an X-11, I would say the X stood for eXperimental. And of course, 11 is one better than 10, so there you go.
Why that actually sounds like a compliment! :-)
All things that blaze a new trail get criticized.. the Citation has had more than its share. The more negatives I read, the more I want one.
At least the bumper looks nice…. :-D
It’s funny that the other ad archive for this car, is from the son’s auction and using his wording, I guess he was trying to sell it out from under dad.
https://topclassiccarsforsale.com/chevrolet/429458-rare-citation-x-11-with-4-speed.html
I actually seen this car on the road locally Sep. 9, 2018. I thought it was a real X-11 myself. If I would have known it was for sale for only $1,500 I would have gladly bought it.