Them station wagons are a rollin’, and continuing in that vein, I have another one for you, a real not-so-barn-indy example in the form of a 1991 Buick Century. This is definitely not the type of car we usually feature, but it has its own qualities and 110K buyers thought enough of the ’91 Century to take one home – not bad for a ten-year-old design. Sunning itself in Daytona Beach, Florida, this eight-passenger hauler is available, here on eBay for a BIN price of $4,999.
Back to statistics, Buick produced only 6,500 Century wagons in ’91 so this example isn’t rare but not common either. Five varieties were available, a Custom coupe, sedan and wagon (our subject car), and then the Limited sedan and wagon. The biggest difference between the Custom and Limited wagons is the contact paper-like fake wood veneer adorning the Limited’s flanks. This non-woody, which is probably better for its missing faux cellulose hull, appears to have lived well for the last 33 years, it’s clean and straight with no indication of damage or other mishaps. The listed offers virtually no detail, or back story, so a closer inspection would be warranted by prospective owners but it doesn’t seem like any demerits are warranted.
Powering this rig is a 160 net HP 3.3 liter V6 engine (not photographed) which is attached to a four-speed automatic transaxle. The seller laconically claims, “runs and drives” – not exactly a ringing endorsement. My late mother-in-law had the nearly identical 1989 version of this car and I recall that it rode and drove quite well. I was expecting road manners tantamount to a pig with a steering wheel attached to its head but it was much more than that and fairly refined. As for the 3.3-liter engine, the smaller brother of the famed 3.8-liter edition, it performed admirably – to the point of my surprise.
The interior is early ’90s GM all the way with its not-too-exciting ribbed cloth upholstery and cheap-looking instrument panel. And that instrument panel matter, with its silly-looking 85 MPH horizontal speedometer, has been one of my gripes for years. In a car of Buick’s stature, I would expect something more extensive and quality imbibed. I guess it’s a small matter as the arrangement is functional, and as far as this interior goes, it still shows well. I don’t know how long this Century has been a Florida resident but there’s no obvious interior sun damage and the car’s rather light 55K miles of experience has caused the upholstery no discernable wear.
Final thought? Seems like a good buy for $4,999. It’s hardly a classic, and probably never will be, but it is certainly a welcome departure from today’s endless sea of CUVs and SUVs, wouldn’t you agree?
Hate to say it but wrong century
I purchased my mom a 85 century not wagon with the 4cyl and only 40k miles on it at 48k miles the car needed the distributor replaced at 52k miles it blew A head gasket I had the dealer repair it and the car never ran right again I sold it and got her a 91 ford tempo with 20k miles on it she put over 100k trouble free miles on it.
It’s over 30 years old, I believe that would classify it as a classic, it’s just not a desirable one. For what it’s worth, I’d have no problem parking it in my garage, without being scared to drive it.
A nice set of wheels and tires would do wonders for that nursing home look.
Those GM (fake) wire wheel covers were abysmal.
Any family who owned one of these really neat the pizza outta these station wagons because they were reliable cars that made sense for camping and hauling large families around. You could even get the back part to have a door instead of a trunk window and I personally remember riding in the trunk of my grandfather’s station wagon and in the trunk of my mom’s Jimmy which you could never do today.
Reliable every day car, not something worth preserving, though.
Not sure, but I think the 3.3 was actually an Olds engine, GM sharing engines across divisions. No matter, I had a ’93 Cutlass Ciera with the same drivetrain and drove it into the ground. A few Centuries could be optioned with the Buick 3.8 too, which made the car quite spry!
Negative. It was a version of the Buick 90 deg V6 with a smaller bore and stroke. It did come in a lot of Cieras, though.
https://wbodytech.com/wiki/engines/buick-3800-v6/
Page down to the 3300/LG7 section. It’s a Buick engine, a low deck version of the 3800 and not an Oldsmobile motor. (I actually research these things before I write them.)
JO
Didn’t realize the deck was lower.
Huh?
JO
An engine can have a shorter stroke depending on the length of the rod and/or height of the wrist or crank journal. The deck doesn’t always have to be lower.
No, it doesn’t but it is in this case of this smaller Buick engine.
JO
Exciting on its own, not really. Exciting in today’s jellybean traffic, heck yeah.
As a surfer from the east coast of Florida, I proclaim this will be snapped up and turned into a surf wagon by a teenager in a matter of days. If I was in the market, I would be on my way to Daytona right now. Inexpensive, reasonably reliable, has some cache, you can rack the boards up top. Need a new hubcap choice though.
I don’t think that you can get hubcaps for this car. The full sized wheel covers are it and look great!
They offered a cleaner standard wheel cover that look better IMHO. These wire wheel covers were an option that too many people checked the box for. They also had some attractive alloy rim options available in ’91. The 3300 is much preferred to the later 60 degree 3100 they started using later.
Not sure why you say it’s not the kind of car you usually feature. It should be. This appears to be a nice find in quite nice condition. Well worth saving. If cars like this aren’t preserved, future generations will think no on drove anything but Mustangs and GTOs! I bet it attracts a crowd at the car shows. Very reasonable price too.
Simple, look at what we usually cover, you won’t find many posts for a car like a ’91 FWD Buick Century station wagon.
As to whether or not our reading population wants to see more coverage of these types of cars, we’ll have to see. The last discussion that I had with our Managing Editor, admittedly over a year ago, led me to believe that this sort of car wasn’t a hot topic in terms of readership.
JO
My first instinct is that these types of cars tend to get a lot of reader responses.
This one is doing pretty well but that may be because of the way that I teed the matter of cars like this up (and that honestly wasn’t my intention). As I stated to another poster, if I can find them, I’ll write about them. Which makes me think…we have a tip line, if you come across such subjects, submit them.
JO
I can’t speak for others, but I find all the Camaros and Mustangs an utter bore. And the articles on nice cars that have had bigger engines installed make me sad. The only articles I ever read are the ones for cars you never see anymore. Doubt I will bother with the site if they drop goodies like this wagon.
I agree with you thoroughly on the Camaro/Mustang matter. It’s not a matter of “dropping” cars like this, it’s more a matter of finding them. If they turn up, I’ll write about them.
JO
Looks like a solid citizen to me. They may not have been inspiring but GM made a decent midsize wagon. Durable and reliable. Just the thing for that extra car to run errands. You can have dirt and mulch delivered. Lose those wheel covers.
Gotta keep the whitewalls and the stock hubcaps. They fit the era.
Umm, no.
The absolute best rural mail carrier car was these GM wagons! Plenty of room, reliable and efficient. Just add heavy duty brake pads. This is a nice piece and would make a great errand gopher.
Did they.make any right hand drive?
The heavy duty brake pad option on these was absolutely necessary. They were a 215 pad. The 183 was the light duty. We had a Rabbi come in all the time with an A body, and he would get about 8000 miles out of a set of light duty pads. He must have driven like a maniac. The outside pad new was half the thickness of the inside pad. Terrible design.
That interior is more early 80s GM than early 90s. This generation of Century was offered from 1982-1996, and the interior changed very little over that span.
I owned an ’88 Century Limited back in the early ’90s. At the time was the fanciest car I owned. Had all the bells & whistles available except for leather and a sunroof. Nice refined ride, and decent on gas even with the 3.8.
We had two of these (as sedans) and they were indestructible and very reliable. For folks like us who have vehicles for practical use and not for making a social statement or sheer enjoyment, these 3.3 A-bodies were unbeatable! Ours both rusted away, elderly and with very high miles.
The good news is that being a mid-size Buick, lots of Regal parts are a bolt-in or bolt-on option. I could see restomodding this thing to be something Buick never built: a GNX wagon!
I don’t remember, were these still body-on-frame, or had they been converted to unibody construction by 1991? The sixties versions were body-on-frame construction, but I think they got converted to unibody construction to save weight as part of the fuel economy improvements in the post-malaise eighties, but I am not sure. Could an expert confirm or deny my guess? Thank You!
Wrong car Robert. These are fwd.
Thanks for the update.I suspected that there was something I was missing, and you found it for me! Thanks again.