So ok, the newest Car & Driver magazine (with Vipers on the cover) has an article about a "beater" endurance race. The object was to purchase a car with an upper price limit of $500 and race it, beat it and bang it into the junkyard, just for fun, on a dirt track. The guys at C&D found a first-gen Aurora with 174k miles on it and body damage as their entry. While they make some positive comments ("...testing the old maxim that GM cars can run bad longer than some cars run at all"), some of the photos are horrifying.

This article has some parallels to the "old diesel road trip" article from a few months back, in which a 5.7 Olds won.

Check it out, Olds fans.

Edited December 31, 200618 yr by ocnblu

I did.. I read it last night. It is just interesting they like everyone else keep on talking about Oldsmobile and driving older Oldsmobiles. There were other Oldsmobiles in that race too. They had an Achieva, 77 Cutlass Supreme and 84 Cutlass Supreme and that Aurora. It was nice to see that too. I noticed they even gave it high praise and talked about how after it was beat up, it started right up. Even after Oldsmobile is gone, they are still talking about it and writing articles about it. They also said they are looking for another Oldsmobile in that article too.

Where were these people when Oldsmobile was in production and needed that press??

Where were these people when Oldsmobile was in production and needed that press??

Bashing Oldsmobile.

I'd say so.

But I read the article, and I liked it. I enjoyed the diesel race cross country even better.

Of course the photos were terrible, the Aurora hadn't been taken care of, had body damage, and this was a race of beaters, so further damage was inevitable. I thought it was a neat article.

Where were these people when Oldsmobile was in production and needed that press??

You mean ass-bandits like Christian Wardlow who spent two paragraphs bitching about the cupholders opening up when he slammed the center console lid down? Yeah.

Anyhow, someone on ACNA recently gave up his Aurora (heater core and transmission problems, I think) after 308,000 miles. And, yes, it was a 1995 model. First year for a brand-new platform with a brand-new engine. 308,000 miles.

With a high-mileage General Motors car, you know two things are going to happen - the paint is going to delaminate and you'll have sixteen squeeks and rattles you'll never get rid of. Maybe a power window will die. But it'll keep running. And running. And running.

I saw that article too. I was going to mention it to Fly, but forgot.

I'll have to read that article, sounds entertaining.