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Cadillac's Blackwing V8 was the best engine at the worst time

It should be clear that GM knows how to innovate and engineer excellent products when it wants to. Cadillac's 4.2-liter twin-turbo Blackwing V8 is recent proof of that. Yet, as related in an extensive Road & Track piece, the Blackwing became victim to some of The General's bugbears, like the reticence to — for whatever reasons — unleash its excellence everywhere, fund that excellence, and be consistent with that excellence over the long term beyond the Corvette and full-sized pickups and SUVs. The R/T story relates tales told by "several people deeply involved with the Blackwing project" about how an engine 18 years in the making was deprived of its reasons for being in less than three. Starting around 2000, GM spent a dozen years building Cadillac up to the point where the American luxury brand could rationally flip to the chapter called, "Taking the Fight to the Germans, but for Real this Time." The first steps in the plan meant an exclusive platform and an exclusive engine. The platform was called Omega. You know the engine's name. They were going to be the aluminum-blocked fist and velvet glove enabling Cadillac to break on through to the other side of luxury — proper luxury to global standards, that is — with a range of beautiful and dynamic crossovers and sedans. An engineer involved in the project estimates GM poured $16 million into the Blackwing's clean-sheet development. Many more seven-figure sums went into creating the first sedan on the Omega platform, the CT6. The automaker dropped millions again poaching ex-Audi and Infiniti chief Johan de Nysschen, and moving Cadillac's headquarters to New York City in 2014. Further pallets of cash funded the development and debut of the Escala concept at Pebble Beach in 2016. In 2018, GM revealed its dramatically named DOHC twin-turbo V8. Considering what came before, the Blackwing clearly wasn't designed for cars. It was designed for world domination. However, against the backdrop of plummeting sedan sales, the CT6 didn't sell like GM had hoped. The automaker hesitated to marshal another fleet of Brinks trucks to fund entries into a cratering bodystyle. Removing sedans from the world domination equation created more difficult math for the crossovers and the Escala.

GM Super Cruise is evolving into Ultra Cruise, for hands-off city driving

GM has a "big team" working on an advanced version of its hands-free driving assistance system, Super Cruise, that will expand its capability beyond highways and apply it to city streets, the automaker's vice president of global product development Doug Parks said Tuesday. GM is also continuing to improve its existing Super Cruise product, Parks said during a webcasted interview at Citi’s 2020 Car of the Future Symposium. "As we continue to ratchet up Super Cruise, we continue to add capability and not just highway roads," Parks said, adding that a separate team is working on the hands-free city driving product known internally as "Ultra Cruise." "We're trying to take that same capability off the highway," he said. "Ultra cruise would be all of the Super Cruise plus the neighborhoods, city streets and subdivisions. So Ultra Cruise's domain would be  essentially all driving, all the time." Parks was quick to add that this would not be autonomous driving. Advanced driving assistance systems have become more capable, but they still require a human driver to take control and to be paying attention. "What we're not saying is that Ultra Cruise will be fully autonomous 100% of the time, although that could be one of the end games," Parks said. Parks didn't provide a timeline for when Ultra Cruise might be available. A GM spokesperson said in a statement after his interview that the company continues to expand its hands-free driver assistance system technology across its vehicle portfolio and has "teams looking at how we can expand the capabilities to more scenarios." GM said it "does not have a name or anything specific to announce today, but stay tuned." This new Ultra Cruise feature would put it in competition with Tesla's Autopilot advanced driving system, which is largely viewed as the most capable on the market today. Tesla's "full self-driving" package, a more capable version of Autopilot, can now identify stop signs and traffic lights and automatically slows the car to a stop on approach. This feature is still considered to be in beta. GM's Super Cruise uses a combination of lidar map data, high-precision GPS, cameras and radar sensors, as well as a driver attention system, which monitors the person behind the wheel to ensure theyÂ’re paying attention. Unlike TeslaÂ’s Autopilot driver assistance system, users of Super Cruise do not need to have their hands on the wheel. However, their eyes must remain directed straight ahead.

Sunday Drive: Classic American nameplates and one exciting new German

Our look back at last week's biggest automotive stories focuses first on the Jeep Wagoneer, an unequivocal American classic. Not only did the Wagoneer play a pivotal role in kicking off America's current love affair with the sport utility vehicle, it legitimized the Jeep brand in the mind of consumers looking not just for something to ably take them off the beaten path, but to do so in comfort, with the entire family along for the ride. So it comes as little surprise that Jeep decided to take one vintage Wagoneer, modernize it with a 5.7-liter Hemi V8 engine, and put the thing on display as part of its annual Moab Easter Jeep Safari. We're in love. Our next two stories focus on Cadillac. First up is news that the striking Escala Concept is headed for production in 2021 to serve as the brand's flagship luxury sedan. The second story involves Caddy's current top rung, the CT6, which gets a new twin-turbo V8 engine as part of its V-Sport package. And finally, we round out this look at last week's headlines with the 2019 Mercedes-Benz C-Class Coupe and Cabriolet. We're mighty keen to try out Benz's new AMG-fettered turbocharged inline-six engine, and the C Coupe looks like a fine point of entry. As always stay tuned to Autoblog this week for all the latest automotive news. Jeep delivers basketful of concepts for the Moab Easter Jeep Safari Cadillac's striking Escala concept is reportedly headed for production Cadillac CT6 V-Sport wants to take prisoners with 550-hp 4.2L TT V8 2019 Mercedes-Benz C-Class Coupe and Cabriolet revealed ahead of New York