What is it about GM and the names they give their cars?  What does the name Lucerne conjure up?  Aside from the city in Switzerland, I get an impression of something soft, fluffy, comfortable.  While comfort is nice, if I were to buy a car, I’d also want performance.  So I was a bit surprised to learn this morning that they are now offering a Northstar V8 (on the CXS model).  That got me to actually take a look at the features on the car, which I normally wouldn’t have done, since I normally tend to dismiss Buick as an “old people” car line.

This thing actually has some interesting features on it, like the Northstar V8, stability control, and magnetic ride control (uses a magnetic coil to change the viscosity of the fluid in the damper).  I was a bit surprised to find these on a Buick until I learned that it’s built on the Cadillac DTS platform.

Buick has always had a bit of a schizo personality.  My first car was a hand-me-down 1966 Buick Wildcat (scroll down to 1965, which is almost identical to mine, except that it was maroon instead of the lighter red).  It had a 401 cu.in. V-8 with a 4-barrel carb.  The Wildcat line was eventually killed because it was considered too “wild” for their core market.  The Wildcat and LeSabre were built on the same platform and the LeSabre continued on (as its name seemed to “fit” their customer base better). 

I wonder how well the Lucerne will ultimately do, given that many people, like me, don’t usually give much consideration to Buick?

Update:  I just played around with their “Build Your Buick” feature and added all the cool options to the CXS model (sunroof, deluxe leather seats, XM, 6-disc CD, theft package, backup assist, etc) and it came out at $37,435 MSRP.