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Buick has best sales year ever, delivers over 1M cars globally

If there are any lingering doubts why General Motors held onto Buick while killing Pontiac, Hummer and Saturn, one only has to look at the sales numbers from 2013 for the real answer. Thanks largely to strong sales in China, Buick set a global sales record last year by selling more than one million vehicles.
The lion's share of Buick sales came from China, which sold more than 809,000 units - about four times more Buicks than were sold in North America as a whole. In the US, the Buick Encore accounted for almost half of all US sales with 97,311 units as Buick spent the summer trying to keep up with demand of the subcompact crossover. Likewise, China-only models like the GL8 minivan and Excelle sedan (same as the US-spec Verano) were strong sellers in that market.
For good measure, Buick more than doubled its sales in Mexico with 2,319 units. Scroll down for the full press release.

Buick Electra-X EV caught testing on U.S. roads in new spy photos

Spies captured what they say are the first shots of the production-bound Buick Electra-X electric crossover. Bound exclusively for China (last we heard, anyway), the Electra-X is underpinned by GM's new Ultium EV platform, meaning it's fundamentally related to all of the American automaker's next-gen electric models even if we won't get one exactly like this.  If you're a fan of GM's swoopy utility concept, we've got great news for you: it appears as though Buick's designers are bringing its design to production pretty much as we saw it originally. Our spies weren't able to get close enough to snag any shots of the interior, where we expect things to be a bit more toned down relative to the futuristic renderings offered of the concept, but we're prepared to be pleasantly surprised.  We've already seen some evidence of Buick layering elements of this new look (as inspired by the Wildcat EV concept) onto its existing models. Earlier in December, the Encore GX was spotted in the wild wearing the new front-end look. Both the Wildcat and the original Electra concept were stunners, so we're excited to see what Buick's designers can do with this language going forward. Sadly, we've yet to see anything as low-slung and sexy as those original concepts, but we can always hope.  Related Video 

Junkyard Gem: 1986 Buick Riviera

The Buick Riviera personal luxury coupe attained monstrous proportions by the middle 1970s, scaling in at well over 4,500 pounds by 1976. After spending 1977 and 1978 as sibling to the Chevy Caprice, the Riviera then moved to the front-wheel-drive platform used by the Cadillac Eldorado and Oldsmobile Toronado, staying there through the 1985 model year. The Riviera world became a lot more interesting for the 1986 model year, when a smaller and more sophisticated generation hit showrooms with curvier lines and electronic gadgetry straight out of science fiction. Today's Junkyard Gem is one of those cars, found in a self-service boneyard in Phoenix, Arizona. What makes this car such a fascinating bit of automotive history is this dash-mounted touchscreen interface, known as the Graphic Control Center. The 1986 Riviera was the first GM vehicle to get the GCC, which means it was the first production car in history with a factory-installed touchscreen display. This system became available in the Buick Reatta and the Oldsmobile Toronado a few years later.  The GCC used a cathode-ray tube screen sourced from an ATM manufacturer, which ran on 120VAC power and required an inverter and dangerous high-voltage wiring inside the dash. It was used to operate the HVAC, the radio and the trip computer, as well as to display operating and diagnostic information. The system used numerous bulky components in addition to the dash screen; I've extracted a couple of complete sets of GCC components over the years and plan to build them into a junkyard-parts boombox. As it turned out, the senior-citizen-heavy demographic of Buick shoppers didn't feel great enthusiasm for the GCC and there wasn't a huge sales payoff for this revolutionary technology. That didn't stop GM from introducing the first mass-produced cars with head-up displays a couple of years later. The running gear wasn't quite as sophisticated as the GCC. The 1986-1993 Rivieras got old-fashioned 3.8-liter Buick V6s under their hoods; the one in this car was rated at 140 horsepower and 200 pound-feet. If you wanted a manual transmission in your '86 Rivvie, you were out of luck. A four-speed automatic was mandatory equipment. Note the unusual face-loading cassette deck in front of the shifter; the AM/FM radio was a remote-controlled unit living inside the center console. The MSRP for this car was $19,831, or about $55,691 in 2023 dollars.