Not a very desirable car but should deserve some points for surviving this long. 1980 Pontiac Grand LeMans - 76,000 Miles! - cars & trucks - by... (craigslist.org)
Makes sense that it apparently sat in a museum. That car wouldn’t have looked that good for 42 years in Ohio driving. Man the 1980 Big Pontiacs and Buicks, etc all looked so great with their redo, and these had stationary back windows. Still can’t get my head around that. Oh well. Roger Smith needed fresh Lobster flown in, so you gotta cut corners somewhere.
Wait, what? You couldn't roll down the rear windows in these??? Overall, that looks like a decent car though. Too bad about the bumper rash and the funny paint refinishing on the passenger side. For that price it would have been better if it had the 305 in it, but I guess that's whatcha' get in today's market. I'm sure it'll scratch someone's nostalgic itch and make them happy to own it though.
Look at the back door panels. It's a crank window car. There's no crank or hole. The windows are fixed, you can't roll them down. They added a tiny vent window that would open but ultimately, this is a car body style and generation I will never own for that particular reason.
My dad had a 1981 Malibu company car. I couldn’t ride in the back seat. Lol seriously I always thought what are they really saving for such a crapola design. At least the vents moved. This one doesn’t even have that. You’re stuck in that back seat. Could you imagine 2 smokers in the front seat.
On the 'early' Pontiac design of these, like this one, the movable vent windows were part of the quarter pillar design, not in the door itself.... That little quarter window opens. You could even have it electric, if you ordered power windows. They changed the roof design for the 1981 model year to that of the Olds Cutlass and Buick Century....
Ah. I didn’t see the lever in the inside picture, but do see it on a closer look at the outside picture. Yeah the ‘81 Malibu as I remember had it on the door part itself when they squared up the roof line. Thanks. I would have hoped you could get some sort of ventilation back there. Still probably wouldn’t own one.
It's weird how they offered a power vent window, but they wouldn't offer a manual crank rear window on these. That's an odd and almost backward peculiarity. That kind of penny pinching was just a sign of the times, I guess. Although, there is still the odd entry level car being made today where if you order power windows, you get them in the front, but the rear doors have cranks.
Oddly enough WTD having splits between power and crank windows is nothing new. Lol In 1967 the rear window on the Cadillac Eldorado was a “vent” window that cranked into the sail panel of the car even though the front windows were power. I too don’t have an issue with crank windows. I agree with Krash on the convenience of them, but the cheap Scotsman in me hates shelling out $2-400 bucks for new regulators. Lol especially on two door coupes.
Heh. Well, I didn't want to say it either, but that's also the cheap side of me speaking too. Unless something is seriously messed up inside, there really isn't much to go wrong with crank windows and any issues they do develop can (usually) be remedied pretty easily. You can't really argue with the convenience of power windows, but I just loves me some crankin' on the door panel to make the glass move. lol
