Jerry O’Connell’s 1979 Cadillac Seville Got Stolen. Here’s the Story | Jay Leno's Garage
Jay Leno's Garage ·
Description
Hollywood actors drive Ferraris. Jerry O'Connell drives a 1979 Cadillac Seville he bought on Craigslist for $12,000. It's his daily driver, and it's already been stolen once.
Jay has known Jerry since he was the kid in Stand By Me. Jerry has a system for buying cars: Craigslist only, within 50 or 60 miles of home, model years 1960 to 1991, and his wife comes along as a witness. His wife's theory is that he only buys "cars that rich people owned when I was a child." The seller wanted $16,000 and Jerry got it for $12,000 from an older gentleman. The last car Jerry showed Jay, a Delta 88 with a 455, came from a man who was about to go to prison.
In 1979 the Seville was Cadillac's most expensive car, aside from its factory limousines. It had an Oldsmobile 350 V8, fuel injection, cruise control, a rear defogger and fender-top turn signal indicators, which Jerry says make him "feel like an astronaut." Jay has a few notes: this is "the dustiest engine compartment I've ever seen," the brakes are mushy (change your brake fluid every two years), and Jerry has been closing his hood wrong all along.
Then there's the theft. Jerry left the keys in the center console, and someone drove the Seville out of his driveway and down PCH at close to 90 mph. Lost Hills Sheriff's deputies pulled the car over in Malibu. Jerry paid for three days of impound, and the impound lot's chalk marks are still on the back window. Jerry says the theft was on him: "I've been driving aggressively ever since."
Along the way, Jerry tells the story of learning to drive in his immigrant father's 1974 DeVille, explaining parking validation to his teenagers, and getting slapped as a kid for touching a new Cadillac in Hoboken: "Don't ever touch another man's car."
What You'll Learn
- How Jerry O'Connell buys classic cars on Craigslist, and the rules he follows
- Why the 1979 Cadillac Seville was Cadillac's flagship and most expensive car
- Why GM put an Oldsmobile 350 V8 in a Cadillac
- Why spongy brakes on a classic car usually mean old brake fluid
- What freeze plugs do and why a cast iron block needs them
- Jay's case for a transmission flush instead of a new transmission
- Why Jerry's 1979 Cadillac had to pass smog and what Leno's Law would change
Shop car care and detailing supplies from Jay Leno’s Garage: https://www.lenosgarage.com/shine
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A new video every Monday! Visit Jay Leno's Garage, the Emmy-winning series where Jay Leno gives car reviews, motorcycle reviews, compares cars, and shares his passion and expertise on anything that rolls, explodes, and makes noise. Classic cars, restomods, super cars like the McLaren P1, sports cars like Porsche 918 Spyder and Camaro Z28, cafe racers, vintage cars, and much, much more.
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