1970 Buick Riviera Base 7.5l on 2040-cars

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eBay Find Of The Day: 1946 Tucker Torpedo Prototype II hides a secret Riviera

The Tucker Torpedo is one of the great what-if stories of automotive history. Preston Tucker hoped to revolutionize the industry with a car unlike any other on the road at the time. However, due to a variety of problems, he only managed build 51 vehicles before closing shop. Over time, they have become highly sought-after; In 2012, one sold for $2.65 million at auction.
That brings us to this Tucker "replica" that you see above because it might be one of the ugliest monstrosities ever put together. However, we might extend some leniency to the creator, as the vehicle isn't actually trying to replicate the classic look of the 1948 Tucker Torpedo. Instead, it is attempting to reproduce an earlier prototype from 1946 that actually features that weird, trident nose. According to the seller, his uncle built the car as a labor of love and supposedly used actual plans from Tucker as inspiration.
Underneath all of the crazy changes is a 1971 Buick Riviera powered by a 455-cubic-inch (7.5-liter) Buick V8. Some of the replica's odder modifications include the front fenders that turn with the wheels and the fin running down the back. All three headlights work, but the one in the middle is only for the high beams. Oddly, the small hinged sections on the roof are meant to open to avoid hitting your head when getting in or out. Maybe the seller's uncle was a very tall guy?

GM laying off more than 4,000 workers Monday morning

According to reports from Automotive News, The Detroit News, and CNN, General Motors plans to begin laying off more than 4,000 salaried workers starting Monday morning. In a statement to AN, a spokesperson for the automaker said, "We are not confirming timing. Our employees are our priority. We will communicate with them first." We've been expecting layoffs at General Motors since November, 2018. At the time, the Detroit-based automaker announced it would seek to shed 8,100 salaried employees, shut down five assembly plants in North America, and kill off several slow-selling models. One month earlier, GM offered buyout packages to 18,000 workers and said it would seek to cut its global workforce by 25 percent. A spokesperson said at the time the moves were "proactive steps to get ahead of the curve by accelerating our efforts to address overall business performance." The cost-cutting moves are expected to save GM up to $2.5 billion in 2019 and as much as $6 billion by 2020. David Kudla, CEO and chief investment strategist of Mainstay Capital Management, referred to the impending culling as "Black Monday" and told The Detroit News that the layoffs would begin around 7:30 a.m. and continue in waves throughout the coming days and weeks. GM plans to deliver on its fourth-quarter and full-year 2018 earnings report on Wednesday. President Donald Trump plans to deliver the annual State of the Union address a day earlier on Tuesday. We expect to hear plenty more from both sides over the next several days.

Junkyard Gem: 1982 Buick Riviera Diesel Coupe

After appending the Riviera name to various cars during the 1950s, Buick finally made the Riviera a model in its own right for the 1963 model year. Seven more generations of Buick's rakish personal luxury coupe followed over the next 36 years, but only one ever had an oil-burning engine available from the factory. Today's Junkyard Gem is one of those cars, a vividly purple '82 Riviera with 105 horses of Oldsmobile diesel power under its hood, found in a Denver-area self-service boneyard recently. Starting in the 1966 model year, the Riviera had been living on the same platform as the Cadillac Eldorado and Oldsmobile Toronado, both of which featured radical front-wheel-drive powertrains that used longitudinal V8s powering the front wheels via sturdy chains. However, despite the common platform, the Riviera alone kept the then-traditional front-engine/rear-drive setup, making it something of a corporate oddball for the next 12 years. Then General Motors decided to downsize the Eldorado/Toronado platform for the 1979 model year, and the Riviera got those cars' front-wheel-drive rig at the same time. Sales of the smaller Rivvy were strong, no doubt due in large part to certain geopolitical events that sent gas prices skyward and caused fuel rationing and gas lines. Back in the late 1970s and early 1980s, diesel fuel was much cheaper than gasoline in the United States. Mercedes-Benz and Peugeot had done reasonably well selling diesel-engined cars here during the 1970s, and so General Motors developed a diesel-burning version of the Oldsmobile 350-cubic-inch (5.7-liter) V8 engine. As was typical of naturally-aspirated automotive diesels of the time (every modern car's diesel engine is turbocharged), horsepower was miserable but torque was strong; the engine in this car was rated at 105 horses and 205 pound-feet. The 5.7 diesel first showed up in the Riviera for the 1981 model year. The base engine was a 4.1-liter version of the Buick V6, while the oil-burning Olds cost an extra $924 (about $3,206 in 2023 dollars). A comfortable and smooth-riding Riviera with the cheap fill-up price and long range of diesel sounded great, even if you had to line up with Freightliners and Peterbilts to get to a pump, but there were problems. Oh, so many problems! Oldsmobile's 350 V8 had been around since 1968 and it had proven to be both reliable and powerful.