Hey everyone, my name is Dan and I'm from Phoenixville, Pa to be exact. I've just recently become obsessed with trying to find a station wagon for our family. I grew up with a Pinto, Subaru, and Taurus wagon, but never a B Body. I did get to ride in one a couple of times when our family went on trips with another family who had a long roof, but I was too young to pay attention to the make and model. I would like for our family and especially my 2 yr old nephew to have the experience and pleasure of riding in one of these behemoths with his Poppy behind the wheel. So far, I have test driven a 78 Caprice Classic, a 96 Buick Roadmaster, and a 91 Mercury Colony Park. I posted about the colony park in the for sale section. I'm not deciding between these three simply because the Caprice needed a ton of cosmetic work inside and out and the Roadmaster needed too many things done to it. Plus it would need one of the biggest cleanings Ive ever had to do in my life. Any thoughts, suggestions, or guidance would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.
Welcome aboard! For a good driver it is hard to beat the '91 to '96 GM wagons. Look enough and you can still find reasonably priced low mileage ones. I would consider one with under 100,000 miles and up to $3,500 a decent deal. Of course I am kind of partial to the B bodies!
Welcome. Yes, there are some nice clean low mileage wagons still out there. If you are not concerned with one special make and model it should be easy to find a good driving wagon reasonable. I agree it is hard to beat the '91 to '96 GM wagons. But those Fords are nice too.
Welcome to the Nuthouse we call Home. You will fit right in. Any of those wagon is going to give years of pleasure. There are good points and bad to all of them. My personal preference is for the full sized Ford and Mercury wagon, but that is a personal thing. I will say, from my brother's experience with both an 86 Colony Park and an 86 Parisians Safari, the Mercury was by far easier to get parts for and the parts were considerably less money.
Thanks for the welcome and input so far! I wanted to bring my brother to check out the 91 colony park today, but we got some snow/ice here this afternoon and that foiled our plans. Does anyone have any strong feelings about makes/models and certain years to stay away from? Like when I was on the hunt for Geo Metro I found out that inferior material was used on the 95 Metro dash causing it to flake/disintegrate in sun. I really liked test driving a 96 Buick Roadmaster wagon the other day even though it needed an alignment. It's just a shame there are so many cosmetic problems with the Roadmasters. Was there any year that the cosmetics held up better?
Hi and welcome. I imagine you should be able to get a nice 1977-1990 G.M. or 1979-1991 Mercury or Ford for a decent price, I got a 1990 Mercury Colony Park Grand Marquis (Someone please tell me why it says all that on the car) for $2,500 last year and it had never been driven in the winter slush and apparently the previous (and original) owner had it repainted fairly recently before I bought it.
Mercury Colony Park Grand Marquis They had lots of extra letters left over from previous years and didn't want them to go to waste. Loryboy keep looking. the hunt is part of the fun.
Heh. It says "Colony Park" on the rear quarter panels, but "Grand Marquis" most everywhere else including on the rear door. I'm not sure if you're being serious or silly here. :banana:
