The most obvious have been an extended, more-pointed hood and a more sharply Vee’d grille to match. A chief instance is the 1970 GSX, a bespoilered GS 455 hardtop with new “Stage I” engine tuning; it noticed only 678 copies; the GS 455 convertible was little greater at 1416. Both were again for ’71 (GSX as an option package) with daring black body stripes and hood paint, special grille, chrome wheels, and fat tires. Buick’s fundamental mechanical growth was an unlimited 455 V-8. These could be powered by every little thing from a 155-bhp 250-cid six to an enormous-block 429-cid V-eight with 360-370 horsepower. The previous supplied six and V-eight Tudor and Fordor, together with business and club coupes. Some say it stemmed from the game of Rounders that was performed in England and Wales during Tudor occasions. Bolstered by spiffy Luxus and Regal submodels (the latter made a separate series after ’74), the midsize Centurys offered nicely via 1977, offering an essential “security web” at occasions when inflation and rising fuel costs despatched would-be huge-automobile patrons scurrying for thriftier alternatives. The yr-outdated junior line displayed the anticipated minor trim shuffles; Gran Sports and Sportwagons remained separate sequence, as in ’68. Trim packages created a bevy of fashions: base, 350 and Custom Skylarks, plus Sportwagons and Gran Sports.

The last of the 1968-vintage Skylarks appeared for 1971-72. They remained strong, good-looking middleweights, though their engines were being emasculated by energy-sapping emission-management units, which meant Gran Sports weren’t so hot anymore. Never­the­less, full-size automobiles remained Buick’s bread-and-butter by way of 1975, accounting for over 40 p.c of complete division gross sales. Buick’s last true muscle cars had been also 1970-72 fashions. All were thirsty. The final 455-cid Electra, for instance, was good for less than 8.7 mpg within the Environmental Protection Agency’s metropolis-fuel-economic system ratings. The GS choice, a last vestige of sport, vanished after 1975, but Buick tried to maintain enthusiasts involved with a “Rallye” bundle providing reinforced front antiroll bar, a brand new rear bar, and heavy-duty springs and shocks. Oddball styling and outsize heft must have contributed to Riviera’s sagging fortunes in this interval; by 1975, sales have been lower than half of what they’d been 5 years before. All employed a brand new-era A-physique with so-known as “Colonnade” styling that did away with pillarless coupes and sedans.

Intermediates have been subsequent on the corporate slenderizing schedule, so a smaller Century bowed for 1978 along with a separate Regal collection of non-public-luxurious coupes, all constructed on a new 108.1-inch-wheelbase A-physique. This hot-promoting line continued into 1970, but with out Specials — the smaller workaday fashions have been now Skylarks — and with Estate wagons in a separate series. Estate wagons moved as much as its 127-inch wheelbase. The following 12 months introduced even fancier Electra Park Avenue models. This was claimed to provide even better trip and handling than the GS, and doubtless should have been standard to handle the scale and weight of those beasts. The new subcompact Vega introduced for 1971 took over that end of the powertrain spectrum for Chevrolet, so Nova moved to a extra responsive six-cylinder engine — 250-cubic-inch and 145 horsepower — as standard fare. Arriving for mid ‘seventy three because the Apollo, it was just a rebadged clone of the 111-inch-wheelbase X-physique Chevrolet Nova from 1968, with the same three physique kinds (two- and 4-door sedans and a hatchback two-door) plus, initially, the same 250-cid Chevy straight six as commonplace energy.

Rated at one hundred ten bhp, and also commonplace energy for the ’75 Skylark, Century, and Regal, this would be a big engine in years to return. Electras via 1979 relied on a regular Chevy-built 350 V-8; a brand new 403 with 185 bhp was elective, courtesy of Olds. The upmarket Electra remained a C-physique cousin to Olds Ninety-Eight and Cadillac de Ville. The latter remained big upper-class two- and three-seat haulers battling the likes of Chrysler’s Town & Country. Convertibles had been no more (killed after ’75), however two- and four-door sedans had been offered in LeSabre, LeSabre Custom, Electra 225, and 225 Limited sequence. LeSabre still rode a 123-inch wheelbase, however so did Wildcat for the primary time in 4 years. 389sports needed to be carryover, including the wheelbase, together with carryover front-finish sheet-steel, cowl, entrance and rear bumpers, door lowers, quarter-panel internal structure, and so forth. The Plymouth stylists could do something they wished so long as they held these hardpoints. All full-sizers acquired new grilles, bumpers, and taillights; intermediates received longer hoods, bulkier decrease-physique contours, and completely different grilles for each series. It was a definite asset throughout the large-car sales stoop touched off by the Middle East oil embargo late that yr, but intermediates would stay more important to Buick’s overall health.