The Bonneville was Pontiac’s largest and most luxurious automobile throughout the 1960s and 1970s. But lagging sales caused Pontiac to cancel its big cars in 1982, and the name was transferred to the smaller LeMans platform instead. This rear-wheel-drive survivor from 1985 looks outstanding and has had some recent work done. Having been in the same family since new, this low-mileage fancy sedan can be found in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and is available here on craigslist for $8,500 OBO. A thumbs up goes to Rocco B. for this stout tip!
Buyers who were used to the Bonneville being a big car didn’t necessarily take well to the downsizing. That led to declining sales, so much so that Pontiac resurrected the Parisienne in the middle of the 1980s as a reskinned Chevrolet Caprice, which that GM division had still been selling with some success. After 1986, the mid-size, RWD Bonneville became a thing of the past as the cars gained a new platform, going the front-wheel-drive route.
The 1985 Bonneville was only offered as a 4-door sedan. 34,400 copies of the “regular” model were built, plus another 8,400 as Broughams. The interior of the seller’s car looks luxurious enough to be a Brougham, but the seller makes no such reference. Somehow, this beauty has only accumulated 43,000 miles in the past 40+ years. It has a V8 engine, which could be a 305 cubic inch motor supplied by Chevrolet (common practice by the 1980s).
Within the past 100 miles, the seller has replaced one or more tires, flushed out the radiator, performed a tune-up, changed some fluids, rebuilt the water pump, and recharged the air conditioning. So, we assume everything else is as solid as a dollar. The body and paint look great, and the interior appears so plush that you could get lost in there. I might be in the minority, but I liked this generation of the Pontiac Bonneville, having owned its cousin, the Olds Cutlass Supreme.
Good eye Rocco. Loved these cars. Seville style looks, luxury inside, and smooth driving. 👌
Nice one, Russ and Rocco! I’m with Stan, I’ve always liked these smaller, somewhat unusual Bonnevilles. I washed and parked many of these cars after high school in my little garage attendant job at a medical building. The gentleman who owned the Medical Arts Building in Duluth, MN, Royal Alworth (a very big name in Duluth for decades), had a tan one, and he used to put four snow tires on it in the winter.
I don’t know if Pontiac canceled the Bonneville because of slow sales as much it was to increase CAFE standards at the time. Rumor was that Chevrolet at that time was going to drop the Caprice and Impala B bodies and replace them similarly with a G-Body Malibu. If you look at the 1982 Malibu, it had a new front end designed to mimic the Caprice and Impala.
GM’s original plan for 1982 was to replace all B-body cars with facelifted G-body cars. That’s why their G-body cars received facelifts for 1982 that made them look more like their full-sized relatives. In the end, only Pontiac proceeded with the plan. Customers complained and dealers revolted, so Pontiac brought the Parisienne in from Canada in mid-1983.
I had an ’85 Parisienne,I’m certain it was U.S. made.
My dad had an ’84 Bonneville back in the day. Not as nice as this one, though. Dark gunmetal blue. I loved driving it at night. It had the same headlight pattern that all the police cars had back then; and based on the way people would drive in close proximity to it, lots of them thought it was an unmarked cop car: slowing way down, changing lanes, quickly taking the next off-ramp, etc. It made for some good laughs, especially when I would sit somewhere with just the parking lights on. Funny times & even funnier memories!
Always a pleasure to see one of these. I had the 83 still called Grand LeMans in Canada. Purchased it in 97 from the typical elderly man with 65000 km’s. Kept it.until 2001 when the rear frame under the trunk gave out to severe rust. I travelled a lot in them days it was up to 180000 km’s. It was a very base model. 3.8 V-6 with only am/fm as an option. The 3.8 although slow was frugal on fuel giving me a consistant 29 mpg highway. Save for a busted rear brake cable it was quite reliable.
I like it too, even though by ’85, it was a gussied up Chevy, but it still had a shred of dignity a Chevy couldn’t possibly provide. My old man had a ’84 or ’85 2 door Bonneville, I should have bought from him. He didn’t like it because a 2 door, and too small but it was a nice car. It had the 305, but it got amazing gas mileage. I always thought there was something wrong with it. Very nice cars, the likes of which we’ll never see again.
There were no 2-door Bonnevilles from ’82-on; these only came as a 4-door. The previous generation was offered in a 2-door variant, but those were full-sized and could hardly be called “too small”.
nice needs some rally wheels. price is bit on the high side.
Nice downsized Bonneville. I don’t know….. I’d be worried about falling asleep on those seats!!! They look great, and really nice dark blue too. Seeing this one, makes me realize, I really miss having a choice of colors for interiors. It seems I remember seeing more Regal sedans and Cutlass sedans than these Pontiacs, but every bit as nice!!!
The worst thing about these GM G-body cars was that the rear windows were fixed in place and didn’t open. Peak lazy Malaise-Era “engineering”.
Due to the design there was no room in the door for the window to go down.
Yup, to maximize hip and elbow room in the rear, the armrests were scooped into the door trim, leaving no room in the door cavity for the window to roll down, so backseat passengers could only flip open a small vent window behind the main pane.
If I remember right, if you had power windows, wasn’t that little vent powered too?
I like the interior color. When did blue become unacceptable for interiors?
Luckily, I was able to order blue / gray trimmed seats for my blue Bronco in ’22.
You could also tell from the outside whether it had power windows or not. Non PW cars there was a little chrome button on the outside of that back door “vent” glass that the locking mechanism mounted to, on PW cars the glass was intact.
This is a Brougham model. The name is on the sail panel. Same place & same interior as the Grand Prix Brougham.
Nice car.