Buy This 1981 Cadillac Eldorado 4×4 on a K5 Blazer Frame So I Don’t
All the comfort of a Caddy cruiser with the guts of a K5 Blazer. What more do you want?
Body swaps aren’t for the faint-hearted. What starts as a simple idea—putting a shell on top of a different frame—is fraught with tight fits, difficult wiring, and a whole lot of fabrication. Sometimes, they can be done well; other times ... you get the picture. What we’re looking at here is apparently a turnkey body swap of a 1981 Cadillac Eldorado Biarritz coupe grafted onto the running gear of a 1982 Chevy K5 Blazer. The seller, listing the car from Lindenhurst, New York, near Brooklyn, says the coupe runs and drives and lists the extensive work done to this mashup.
The car reportedly has a new Edelbrock carburetor on a rebuilt Chevy 350, paired with a Turbo TH400 transmission that’s popular among off-roaders. The frame has a 6-inch Skyjacker lift and sits on 35s wrapped around new American Racing wheels. Down the pipeline are Flowmaster mufflers that probably wake the next county on cold starts with dual chrome tips at the rear. The whole, free-breathing package may make upward of 200 horsepower, but outright speed isn’t really this coupe’s jam anyway.
The seller reports that the interior is in good shape, which checks out with the handful of interior shots provided, aside from a headliner that’s either not there or, at the very least, sagging quite a bit. (It’s possible that these headliners sagged when leaving the factory anyway, so no big deal there.) The rear drum brakes are supported by disc brakes up front, and there are more than a few shots of an aftermarket stereo with trunk mats and an amp—in case the car itself isn’t loud enough for you.
The seller is asking nearly $12,000 for this one, which is steep for a car that undoubtedly could use some more help during its life on the road. Perhaps before asking, “Why?” the first question for any prospective buyer should be, “Why not?” I’m struggling to answer that myself.
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