To buy or not to buy, 81 eldorado

[tremblay]

Some guy in my town is selling his 1981 cadillac eldorado and i always though the cars were pretty cool. The only thing is that i'm pretty sure the car has the infamous 8-6-4 engine but i also know that most guys that had the engines disconnected the fuel economy system so it would only run on the 8 cylinder. My question is a 8-6-4 engines is only running on 8, is it relatively reliable or should i stay away from this car??? It's for my winter car by the way, so i want something thats gonna start everyday for about 5-6 months....so if you could give me some advice i would appreciate....


thanks

[maxwedge]

First of all it is 25 years old, so it has the same issues that any car of this age would have regarding things that could be on the verge of failure. The 368 cu in engine was very strong, by passing to 8 cyl used to take me 5 minutes so that is not an issue. Risky buy no matter what, without a full work up.

[tremblay]

the car has always been store during the winter team, and has something like 60 000 miles....so im not too worried, the only thing im really asking is how reliable the 8-6-4 is when it is disengaged and it is always running on the 8? if it only runs on the 8 it should be fine , right?

[maxwedge]

Whether it runs in 8/6/4 or has been bypassed for 8 only, is just an electronic function of the ecm and the solenoids on the valves, either way the engine itself was very strong.