2008 Buick Enclave Awd.no Reserve.4x4/leather/onstar/heated/bose/chromes.rebuilt on 2040-cars

Auto blog

The Chinese experiment | 2017 Buick Envision First Drive

The 2017 Buick Envision is a very good five-passenger crossover. The "but" you should anticipate will come in good time. First it's worth understanding why it exists at all. Out of the ashes of GM's bankruptcy a few flowers blossomed and the carmaker is doing exceptionally well, certainly far better than Chrysler has done in the wake of its free fall into Chapter 11. But of all the surprises at GM's turnaround, Buick surely ranks highest, without question the least likely player to thrive if you only study the North American market. Look farther than our shores, to China, however, and you won't be shocked. Note that the Envision, which has been on sale in China for a year and a half, will reach about 200,000 units this year; the entire Buick portfolio in the US only totaled 223,000 cars in 2015. Not only is China Buick's primary market, but what it makes there, like the Envision, is intended for a different sort of buyer. Here, we'd call it a compact crossover. In China the Envision is a relatively large car, and the buyer there is far more likely to use it as a tall limo, or at the very least, as a big-time status statement. That buyer is also very likely to be in his or her mid-30s – the average Buick buyer in the US is getting younger, but, at 58, is hardly a millennial. Still, Americans who buy the Envision will benefit from all of this China focus. Huge effort went into its development since the target competitor in China is the Audi Q5, according to Rick Spina, Executive Chief Engineer for the Envision. Spina explained that Buick went to the trouble and expense of isolating the entire chassis from engine, suspension, and driveline vibration and sound penetration. "If you look at non-luxury models like Ford Escape, Honda CR-V, nothing's isolated, everything is hard-bolted to the body, and so all that vibration goes into the frame." Spina says that even though you'd guess the China-built Envision shares the general parts bin of the Chevy Cruze and Equinox, it's almost entirely unique. "It's kind of an orphan," he says, because GM couldn't afford to invest in the ride tuning Buick had to have to compete with Audi in China for a volume Chevy product, so nothing from Chevy (for now) is on this platform. And although it would have made sense to have Cadillac or GMC share it, Cadillac's XT5 and GMC's Acadia were already on a different development cycle. Besides, he's pretty proud that the Envision was developed strictly for Buick.

GM recalls 51k Enclave, Traverse, Acadia crossovers over fuel gauge inaccuracy

With all eyes fixed on General Motors in the wake of the ignition recall debacle, the auto giant has been carefully calling in a wide array of vehicles to fix anything and everything that could prove problematic. Just the other day it issued two separate recalls - one concerning the Cadillac SRX and another its heavy-duty pickups - and now it is issuing another.
This time the vehicles in question are the Buick Enclave, Chevy Traverse and GMC Acadia, three fullsize crossovers based on GM's Lambda platform. In an estimated 51,640 units manufactured between March 26 and August 15, 2013, the engine control module has been found to incorrectly display the level of fuel in the tank.
As a result, owners are being notified to bring their vehicles in to their local dealers to have the ECU reflashed to fix the problem. View the full details in the announcement below from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

Movie Review: Black Air: The Buick Grand National Documentary

As Buick currently claws and scratches its way back into relevance to compete against luxury brands like Lexus and Acura, it's hard to believe that not too long ago, the brand had a car that was mentioned in the same breath as Corvette, Lamborghini and Ferrari. That car? None other than the Buick Grand National. All black with a turbocharged V6 and some of the quickest acceleration of its time, the Grand National, in today's standards, is along the lines of a 2013 Shelby GT500 with both cars essentially being a working man's supercar.
The last Grand National rolled off the assembly line in Flint, MI on December 11, 1987, and to mark the silver anniversary of that somber occasion, Black Air is a documentary of the Grand National from the perspective of the enthusiast, the collector, the media and even from those at General Motors responsible for creating such a sinister legend. Like the car itself, Andrew Filippone Jr. shoots the documentary in a raw fashion, and it definitely helps to show why a low-volume muscle car from the 1980s is still the object of obsession for many automotive enthusiasts to this day.