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Junkyard Gem: 1998 Cadillac Catera

Every so often, during the last few decades of the 20th century, the suits running each of the big Detroit automakers would eye their European subsidiaries and decide that some car from the other side of the Atlantic could be making dollars over here in addition to pounds or francs or Deutschmarks over there. Chrysler didn't do so well with Simca 1204s or Plymouth-badged Hillman Avengers in the American marketplace (though the Simca-based Omnirizon did very well). Ford USA moved quite a few Capris and Fiestas during the 1970s, then bombed with the Merkur Scorpio and XR4Ti. General Motors tried, over and over, to get Americans to buy Opels (some sold by Buick dealers, others actually badged as Buicks), and I still see the occasional Kadett, GT, or Manta in junkyards to this day. For the 1997 model year, still stinging from the not-so-great sales of the Turin-Hamtramck-built Cadillac Allante, GM took the Omel Omega B and applied Cadillac badges. The result was the Catera, and I found this silver '98 in a Denver self-service yard recently. The Catera had a lot going for it, with a rear-wheel-drive layout and a modern V6 engine that made more power than the BMW 528i's straight-six that year. It should have been able to compete with European luxury sedans in North America because it was a European luxury sedan. Unfortunately, you couldn't get a manual transmission in the Catera, "traditional" Cadillac shoppers thought the Catera lacked a sufficiently massive presence, and younger Cadillac buyers flocked straight to the Escalade starting in 1999. After 2001, the Catera was no more. I still find Cateras in junkyards, nearly 20 years after the last ones were sold, so they appear to have held together pretty well. This one was in nice shape until the end, with all the original manuals still in the glovebox. Even the Catera ballpoint pen remained with the car for its whole life. As we can see in the owner's manual, Cadillac marketed the Catera as "The Caddy That Zigs." The idea was that younger car shoppers would become as Cadillac-obsessed as their grandparents had been. Inspired by the ducks in the Cadillac logo, the Catera marketing team created Ziggy the Duck to pitch this car. Things didn't go so well. The Catera listed at $29,995 in 1998, about $47,600 in 2020 dollars. That made it an affordable alternative to the BMW 5-Series or Acura 3.2 TL, but total Catera sales came to fewer than 95,000 cars over five model years.

Combine a self-driving car with V2V, and here's what happens

Transportation engineers have started laying the groundwork for a traffic world in which cars communicate with other cars and infrastructure like bridges and traffic lights. How about an environment in which cars talk to pretty much everything and everyone? In a preview of its offerings at the upcoming Consumer Electronics Show, Delphi Automotive will deploy just such a concept. Engineers have designed a system that communicates with traffic signals, street signs, pedestrians, cyclists, even to fry pits and parking garages along a driver's route. To date, engineers and researchers across the auto industry have focused on the technical and safety-oriented foundation of future vehicle-to-vehicle communications, which could help cars share information about everything from traffic tie-ups to upcoming road hazards. Beyond those building blocks, many have projected that V2V could also include more consumer-focused features. Delphi's system, dubbed V2Everything, might be the first that combines those sorts of features in a tangible package. At CES in Las Vegas, scheduled to begin the first week of January, company officials say they'll demonstrate in real-world conditions how V2V technology can be used in an autonomous vehicle to provide a range of critical safety information and leisure and convenience options for riders. The first V2V technology installed on a production car is slated to appear on the 2017 Cadillac CTS. "We imagine a world with zero traffic accidents," said Jeff Owens, Delphi's chief technology officer. "To get there, we will need a convergence of active safety, sensor fusion, connectivity platforms and advanced software." Such software might allow a vehicle to start searching for and reserving parking spots at a programmed destination long before arriving. It could allow riders to place their McDonald's drive-through order from the road and have the food ready for pickup along the route. For the drive itself, the Delphi-equipped car can stay updated on the status of traffic lights around Las Vegas, and can anticipate yellow and red lights. Using smart-phone technology, the car can detect pedestrians and cyclists that may otherwise be hard to see. It can send messages to friends or family to notify them of a driver's location. Some of those features have been available on third-party apps or individually developed by automakers. But this system marries them together in a single system that is tailored for use in self-driving cars.

Cadillac CT6 will get high-res streaming video rearview mirror

Cadillac is preparing a big upgrade to the humble rearview mirror, adding a streaming video function that it claims will improve a driver's field of vision by 300 percent. The new system will debut on the 2016 CT6 flagship. The streaming system, which eliminates the visual obstructions caused by passengers, headrests and the rear pillars, relies on a 1280-by-240-pixel TFT display and a high-definition camera to reduce glare and improve visibility in low-light conditions. That camera even addresses one of the big annoyances of today's camera systems, by adding a hydrophobic coating to keep the camera lens clear. The system can easily be switched off at the press of a button, at which point the driver has a simple electrochromatic mirror at his disposal. "The closest comparison to this kind of rear vision would be driving a convertible with the top down," Travis Hester, the CT6's executive chief engineer said in a statement. "The streaming video is a significant enhancement for the luxury customer interested in purposeful technology." Scroll down for the press release from Cadillac. Cadillac Adds Streaming Video to Enhance Driver Vision and Safety Display eliminates visual obstructions, increases rearward vision by 300 percent 2014-12-18 DETROIT – Cadillac late next year will add high-resolution streaming video to the function of a traditional rearview mirror, removing obstructions of passengers, headrests and the vehicle's roof and rear pillars. The streaming video mirror improves field of vision by an estimated 300 percent, or roughly four times greater than a standard rearview mirror. "The closest comparison to this kind of rear vision would be driving a convertible with the top down," said Travis Hester, Cadillac CT6 executive chief engineer. "In addition to the increased field of view, the technology eliminates any rear seat, rear pillar or passenger obstructions, allowing the driver an unimpeded view of the lanes behind and traditional blind-spots," Hester said. Thanks to a high dynamic range, the camera's video feed reduces glare and allows a crisper image in low-light situations, versus a traditional glass electrochromatic, or auto-dimming, rearview mirror. The in-mirror display is an industry-leading 1280 by 240-pixel TFT-LCD display with 171 pixels per inch, combined with a HD camera designed specifically to enhance rear view lane width and maximize low-light situations.