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Compelling Buick Riviera Concept Showcased at 2008 NAIAS

The Buick Riviera, a stunning concept car designed to showcase Buick's new global design direction, makes its North American debut at the Buick stand during the North American International Auto Show (NAIAS).

Buick Riviera Concept

Unveiled at China’s Auto Shanghai 2007, the gull-wing, front-wheel-drive Riviera concept coupe was developed with global design input by the Pan Asia Technical Automotive Center (PATAC), a design and engineering joint venture between General Motors and Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation (SAIC). PATAC is headquartered in Shanghai.

“We said last year the Riviera concept made us realize how small the world was – it’s not East; it’s not West. It’s Buick,” said Ed Welburn, vice president, GM Global Design. “The reaction to the car around the globe proved that to be very much the case.”

Engineered to accommodate a new hybrid system that will go into production this year at Shanghai GM (SGM), GM's flagship joint venture with SAIC, the Riviera features several technological and manufacturing advances. They represent the latest achievements of GM and its partners in the promotion and development of alternative propulsion technologies in China.

"The Riviera concept underscores the diversity, strength and depth of the GM global design and engineering network,” said Welburn. “It also reflects PATAC's growing role within the GM Design family and China's significance as the world's largest Buick market.”

The Riviera marks the return of a renowned Buick nameplate after an eight-year hiatus. Between 1963 and 1999, GM sold more than 1.1 million Rivieras in the United States.

“The Riviera concept, with its tightly stretched carbon fiber body panels, combination of positive and negative curves, strong front and rear identities and gull-wing doors, captures the essence of Buick classics, while presenting a thoroughly 21st century design,” said Welburn. "It certainly lives up to the nameplate's reputation for bold design. The Riviera communicates the global design vocabulary of the Buick brand and sets the stage for General Motors' design, engineering and manufacturing centers to work together on the next generation of Buick midsize luxury cars."

Riviera's enticing curves and “earth and water” interior tones are drawn from diverse inspirations including classic Buicks, ancient Chinese artifacts and modern electronic icons. To PATAC designers, the car, inside and out, communicates universal beauty – a look that transcends cultural or national boundaries.

A sense of existence

To establish their design direction, PATAC designers looked, in part, to Buick icons such as the original Y-Job concept of 1938, the 1960s LeSabre, Electra 225, and the Riviera coupes, of the 1960s and '70s.

The Riviera design is structured around the Buick tri-shield logo, sitting proudly on a trihedral waterfall grille that is formed by three intersecting planes. This takes the traditional Buick treatment to a new level of sophisticated boldness.

The Buick logo leads into a reflective strip through the hood, a mark of respect to the distinctive mid-hood crease prevalent in classic Buicks. Elongated LED headlamps flow up the hood sides to three-section, top-mounted chrome portholes as a single piece of jewelry.

The logo, hood strip, headlamps, side mirrors and rocker covers all have “icy green” backlighting available at night, matched by backlit logo and exhausts at the rear. Designers incorporated several other design signatures from the original Riviera generation, including the "double-sweep spear" line along the body side and a flared tail design.

In this theme, the Shell Blue exterior color was chosen to elicit the right level of attention. The color is metallic silver with light blue accents that highlight the coupe's exterior curves. The gull-wing doors, selected for their exotic appeal, achieve an expansive entrance to the 2+2 seating configuration. Measuring 1,938 mm at their widest point, the doors add to the coupe's sleek sideline. At night, the fully opened doors gently cast the "Buick" name on the ground.

The use of carbon fiber in all body panels allowed designers greater flexibility through reduced mass and added strength. This made the gull-wing engineering demands easier to realize and sharp, tight radius curves possible across the body surface. The side mirrors are sweeping yet unobtrusive, taking a cue from Formula One racecars, and the Riviera sits on 21-inch, 10-spoke forged aluminum wheels that combine polished and satin finishes with low-profile tires.

PATAC designed the Buick Riviera to accommodate the new hybrid system, which will be introduced in China in 2008 this year prior to the Beijing Olympics. The new hybrid system fits naturally with the Riviera's “earth and water” design theme.

All about relaxation

The Riviera’s interior can be summed up with one word: sanctuary. The use of rich blue and subtle creams, representing water and earth, is conveyed in the high-quality leather bucket seats, plush carpet and a luxurious, padded steering wheel. Completing the organic feel, the roof comprises two shaded glass windows offering increased headroom and a celestial connection for occupants.

Designers aimed to have the driver feel relaxed and tranquil inside the car. Earth and water tones were used, and hard, aggressive edges were studiously avoided.

The interior has no discernable start and finish point for the front and sides, creating a comfortable lounge feel. It is immediately futuristic yet somehow familiar. A three-dimensional speedometer, inspired by past classics but utterly modern in design, compliments the touchpad styled central console loosely modeled on a computer mouse. An LCD display screen crowns the central console.

Riviera’s interior designers were encouraged to consider people's personal belongings to enhance their feeling of familiarity and comfort in the vehicle. Continuing the theme of calm simplicity, electronic shifter pads replace the traditional transmission shifter and controls are kept to a minimum to deter driver distraction.

Ambient light strips are applied across the console and inserted on the door liner, stretching to the front seats. Deliberately imitating precious Chinese jade stone, the lights are tinted a subtle icy green, which also offers tribute to a favored color of historical Buicks of days gone by.

Interior trim treatments befitting the Buick prestige abound: miniature aluminum tri-shields in the front seat headrests; a wooden floor mat in the rear; and a rear central armrest which can move sideways left and right to accommodate passengers of different sizes.

Royal blue Alcantara, a plush, suede-like covering, was chosen for the door, console and roof, while sandy white leather covers the lower door, lower console and seats.

Ancient influences in modern design

The design team set out to create a modern global design. At the same time, they sought to draw from their heritage outside the automotive industry from classic shapes, concepts and artifacts. They wanted to include a subtle Chinese essence and influence if one looked deeply enough.

A strong influence was the yuanbao, a small curvaceous gold or silver ingot used in ancient China as currency and popular today as a symbol of ancient Chinese prosperity.

PATAC designers intended the design convey East and West coexisting in harmony. The design brief was global, taking a portion of Buick’s DNA and creating something for the world. The North American debut of the Buick Riviera concept highlighted the achievement of that goal.

Celebrity Era Ends at Buick as Tiger Is Reassigned to OnStar

Saying that it no longer wants "a celebrity at the core of any brand," General Motors on Thursday said golf great Tiger Woods would now be used as a pitchman in companywide ads for products like OnStar instead of serving as the face of Buick.

Mark R. LaNeve, GM's vice president of North American sales, service and marketing, said the automaker will continue to use Woods in corporate-level marketing. "Tiger's a great asset," LaNeve said. "We can use him in lots of ways. Why shouldn't we use him in ways other than Buick?"

Woods, 31, has been a prominent part of Buick advertising since 1999. He reportedly has a five-year contract with the automaker worth $40 million that runs through 2009. But there has been widespread media criticism that the Woods/Buick association lacked credibility, especially since most Buick buyers are well into their 60s.

LaNeve said the new Buick strategy would be to sell the cars based on their own merits, not on their ties to celebrities such as Woods.

In addition to taking delivery of a new Buick Enclave CXL recently, Woods also drives a Buick Lucerne and several other GM vehicles.

First Drive—2008 Buick Enclave

Here's a better Buick you can own right now

AT A GLANCE:
2008 BUICK ENCLAVE
ON SALE: Now
BASE PRICE: $32,790
DRIVETRAIN: 3.6-liter, 275-hp, 251-lb-ft V6; fwd, six-speed automatic
CURB WEIGHT: 4780 lb
0 TO 60 MPH: 8.1 seconds
FUEL MILEAGE (EPA COMBINED): 19 mpg

Even though the all-new 2008 Buick Enclave is on sale (with $1000 incentive) and in customers' hands, General Motors hoped the media would wait until the end of May to report on it. That's when it will have the official media drives at which point it would hand out the official media information.

Rather than wait until then to give you our take on the Enclave, we did what you could do and took a test drive courtesy of a local Buick dealer. The drive impressions you read here are based on that journey.

Chalk it up to enterprising journalism. And to getting you what you have come to expect from AutoWeek: Information first and information fast.

With all the commotion coming out of the Shanghai auto show, it would be easy to forget that U.S. citizens buy Buicks, too. While the rest of the world was out examining the Riviera concept, we checked out a new Enclave at dealerships across this country right now.

Enclave is the best looking Buick to hit the streets in years. From the delightfully tight and tidy panel gaps to available 19-inch chrome rims, the Enclave looks good—and dare we say surprisingly young. Best of all, there is no trace of wretched Rendezvous anywhere: This design is virtually unchanged from the concept that wowed show goers to its dealer-lot production trim.

Looks are nice, but Enclave shines when you get behind the wheel. From our brief test we found body roll to be well controlled with little or no dive under braking. Taut handling doesn’t come at the expense of ride quality; the ride is smooth, and this cross-over responds well to steering input through the turns. Our short drive revealed greater car-to-driver feedback than other Buicks, which bodes well for it on the consumer stage.

Of course, taut handling is a relative term with a 4,780 lb curb weight. The all-wheel drive system adds an extra 205 lb and the extra mass taxes the 3.6-liter V6, requiring the use of all 275 hp and 251 lb-ft when times comes to pass. Sluggish downshifts, likely engineered to maximize fuel economy, contribute to its somewhat lazy acceleration.

We found the best way to hustle through traffic is to manually select gears from the six-speed automatic via +/- buttons on the shifter. You still won’t get the spirited response of a Mazda CX-7 (and its 3929 lb curb weight), but you’ll have the option of bringing seven friends along, something you can’t do in the Mazda. At the concept’s introduction, Buick said it would have a V8 engine as option, but we haven’t heard much about it since.

Seating for eight doesn’t mean Enclave will need a trailer to haul luggage when all spots are filled (though you could tow a maximum of 4,500 lbs, if you were so inclined). With 18.9 cubic feet of cargo space available behind the third row, you can bring plenty of gear for the ride; folding all seats net 116.2 cubic feet of storage. Other crossovers in this segment top at around 85 cubic feet of storage, so this is a clear winner. Haul lots of people, piles of stuff, or some combination; you won’t leave much behind.

Of these handsome General Motors sport utes—Saturn Outlook/GMC Acadia/Buick Enclave (a Chevy is yet to come)—to hit lots, many will choose the Enclave as the best-looking model out there. Now that’s high praise… for any automaker, but especially Buick. Throw in a quiet interior and world-class ride should give those shopping Japanese crossovers a real reason to think Buick. Oh, and comparable Enclaves will run several thousand dollars less than the competition from Lexus.

It does not take long behind the wheel to realize the (last generation) Lexus RX was the Buick engineers’ target for interior noise levels. When cars blow past at highway speeds and only a whisper transmits to the cabin, you know they’ve done their job well. With the radio on, exterior noise virtually disappears. Check the Bose 5.1-channel audio upgrade box and prepare to experience music. Laminated window glass, triple seals around the doors and plenty of sound-deadening materials are some of the so-called QuietTuning features that isolate noise and vibration at speed.

Cloth seats in the CX model are of a higher quality than those found in a Saturn Outlook that we recently sampled. Leather seats come standard in CXL models. Rear-seat entertainment systems are available in all Enclaves and include wireless headphones. A rear-view camera is included with the navigation system upgrade.


By PHIL FLORADAY
autoweek