This 1984 Cadillac Eldorado Biarritz caught my attention for all the wrong reasons. I used to make fun of cars like this and considered them to be pretentious posers. The mention of the 4.1-liter engine drew me in too as I have never read anything complimentary about it. Full disclosure, I have never owned or driven a 1984 Cadillac Eldorado so it’s time to be completely objective and review this downsized luxo-ride. Larry D discovered the listing for this car here on eBay where it’s available for a current bid of $8,100 with the reserve not yet met. Apparently it will play in Peoria because that’s where it’s located.

Today’s find is a member of the tenth-gen (’79-’85) Eldo, built on a GM E-body platform that was shared with the Buick Riviera and Oldsmobile Toronado.  It’s 204.5″ in length, riding on a 114″ wheelbase and clocking the scale at 3,700 lbs. So, compact compared to a prior gen Eldorado? You bet, and that was the intention. Looking it over, however, I see a big car in shrunken proportions which seems how GM approached a lot of its downsizing. It’s not an unpleasant bearing, entirely, but it doesn’t flow smoothly or seem properly proportioned, at least to my eyes. While stated that it’s far from my favorite, Jim, once again, is on the wrong side of the public’s preference as Cadillac sold about 77K Eldorados in ’84, an all-time high!

Our subject car dons the high-falutin’ Biarritz option which features, most notably, a brushed stainless-steel roof panel along with a padded landau top and special wire-wheel covers. Additionally, there is stainless trim that extends from the C-pillars to the leading edge of the fenders. The Biarritz name harkened back a good number of years, made its appearance as an Eldo option in ’76, and continued through 1991. Being sold by the son of the original owner, this Caddy has experienced 90K miles of use and clearly has been well cared for. Like it or not, it’s hard to find fault with its exterior – sound garaging must have been part of this car’s daily routine. The seller advises that upon ordering, his father requested every available option.

Now, the little matter of the engine. Introduced for model year 1982, the HT 4100, as it’s known, is a 135 net HP 4.1 liter V8 that is set longitudinally and drives the front wheels via a four-speed automatic transaxle. Research tells us that this is an aluminum block engine, wearing a pair of cast iron cylinder heads and connected via an aluminum intake manifold (sound familiar? Same composition as the ill-fated Vega 2.3 liter four). Besides the fact that 135 HP is a pretty measly output for a V8 engine, even by 1984 standards, once again the iron heads/aluminum block decided to not play nicely with each other. According to Motorbiscuit, “Weak block castings, one victim of the rush to production, resulted in head bolts pulling out, taking the threads with them. With aluminum in high-stress areas, and the cylinder sleeves doing their own thing, intake manifolds began failing. Camshaft bearings began eating themselves alive, and the aluminum oil pumps started failing as well. And this was all within the first month or two in the field“.  It also stated that silicone was used in places instead of gaskets and that cost saving idea just added to more failures. While eventually garnering a bit more power, the HT4100 lumbered along into 1988 when it was replaced by the vastly improved 4.5 liter V8. How’s this one run? No word, just the sounds of silence and a quick quip of “needs nothing“.

Inside is a tufted and buttoned red leather upholstery environment – standard on the Biarritz. The carpeting is “Tampico” whatever that means but it shows well with just the slightest amount of visible floor mat wear. No worries if you are of an environmentalist nature, the excessive amount of wood veneer is faux – though it probably used a lot of petrochemical input. It seems needlessly excessive – we get it, it’s a Cadillac.  As for the seller’s “needs nothing” claim, I’d agree, the interior is about as perfect as you’ll find on a 38-year-old automobile with 90K miles of experience under its cushy seats. The biggest drawback is potentially getting a DWS (drivin’ while snoozin’) citation – the entire environment could be considered soporific.

There you have it. In the scheme of things, 38 years isn’t that long a passage of time and it’s truly telling to see what passed for luxury back then as compared to today. And of course, there were other players in ’84 who had a completely different take on the definition of luxury too. The evolutionary change actually took less than 38 years but the endpoints of ’84 and ’22 just make the differences that much more obvious. No, I don’t feel any different about this Eldorado now than I did when I started out and had not yet researched this model. Regardless, what I think is of zero consequence because someone who really appreciates this type of car is going to snap it up and derive a lot of enjoyment from it. I just hope for their sake that there’s no hijinx left in that HT-4100 engine, right?