2014 Cadillac Cts Luxury Sedan 4-door 2.0l on 2040-cars

Auto blog

Cadillac CT6 to get twin-turbo V8

Say what you will about his decisions at Infiniti and now Cadillac, but Cadillac CEO Johan de Nysschen knows how to deliver a compelling interview. During an online Q&A session with Jalopnik readers, de Nysschen offered substantial hints at what's coming for the brand. By dropping coordinates on the brand's star chart, in reading the entire thing and connecting the dots you can see a Cadillac that is much grander than the one we know now. The CT6 that got revealed during the Oscars telecast? Answering the question of whether it would have the performance to compete with a Mercedes S550 or BMW 750, de Nysschen said the big sedan's "lightweight body structure allows us to achieve formidable performance even with a twin-turbo V6. Imagine how this car would perform with a twin-turbo V8." In clarifying a subsequent question that also dealt with how the CT6 would compare to German rivals, he wrote that the CT6 would have "a very wide mix of engines, starting with a two-liter turbo, up to, eventually, a high-performance advanced V8 turbo." Patience and the future and the word "eventually" were heavy themes. The brand will embrace diesel engines as well, de Nysschen writing, "We will have four-cylinder and six-cylinder diesel engines, but not before 2019." As to the return of something like the XLR, which was Corvette muscle underneath a Cadillac body, he wrote, "I think in the fullness of time, we will get around to developing a high-performance, very-emotive sports car as a halo for the Cadillac brand. But we have so many projects to occupy us through 2020 that this will have to wait a little while." And on the design language across model lines, which enthusiast Cassandras have warned is too similar (as if that hasn't worked out for the Germans), he wrote that it is "undergoing gradual evolution and you will notice stunning new designs in future models, which remain unmistakably Cadillac and reflect our DNA but which take our sophisticated Art and Science design to a new level." But of course he would say that, which is what brings us back to patience and the future and eventually, when we'll see what this all really means. It all reads well enough, and we'd love to see it happen. One thing we won't see are the ducks that once adorned the Cadillac crest; when a reader asked if he could have them back, de Nysschen said, "No, you can't have them back. I play with them each night in my bath." Head over to Jalopnik for the full read. It's worth it.

2020 Cadillac CT4-V, CT5-V revealed, less powerful than predecessors

Expectations have reached stratospheric heights for the 2020 Cadillac CT4-V and 2020 Cadillac CT5-V, and for good reason: Their ATS-V and CTS-V predecessors were potent sports sedans with gobs of power and handling and braking to match. Now the new sedans have been revealed, and they're not what we expected. They each lose two cylinders compared with the other vehicles, and on paper, they don't look as capable. But we do have hope that these won't be the end-all, be-all performance Cadillacs. First, let's look at the cars. The CT4-V will be the base of the V brand, and it's our first look at the small luxury sedan. It has a roofline and window treatment more like past Cadillacs, eschewing the C-pillar garnish of the CT5. It also naturally gets dark trim and headlights, a unique spoiler and quad tailpipes to distinguish it as a V. Under the hood is a turbocharged 2.7-liter four-cylinder that is based on the engine in the new Chevy Silverado. It makes 320 horsepower and 369 pound-feet of torque, a far cry from the ATS-V's 464 horsepower and 445 pound-feet of torque. Cadillac CT4-V View 12 Photos Power goes through a 10-speed automatic transmission only. Both rear-wheel drive and all-wheel drive are available. It gets a mechanical limited-slip differential whereas the ATS-V had an electronically controlled limited-slip differential a la Camaro ZL1. The brakes have four-piston calipers at each corner versus six-piston front units and four-piston rear units on the ATS-V, and the rotors are smaller. Magnetic Ride Control remains standard on the rear-drive version, but the all-wheel-driver version sticks with conventional shocks. The new CT4-V is about 200 pounds lighter than the ATS-V, though, and it has 50/50 weight distribution. Additionally, both the CT4-V and the CT5-V have Super Cruise available as an option. Moving on to the CT5-V, it looks like a regular CT5 but with dark trim and lights, quad tailpipes and a unique rear diffuser. Instead of the CTS-V's 640-horsepower supercharged V8, the CT5-V uses a twin-turbo 3.0-liter V6 making 355 horsepower and 400 pound-feet of torque. Changes made to the 3.0 for the CT5-V include a new intake system and new exhaust, and it revs higher too. Like the CT4-V, it comes with a 10-speed automatic and either rear-wheel drive or all-wheel drive. It does get the electronically controlled limited-slip differential.

Junkyard Gem: 1993 Cadillac Allante

The General's Cadillac Division had lost much of its status as a world-class styling and engineering innovator by the 1980s, while younger rich Americans signed on the line which is dotted for European luxury machines packed full of futuristic technology. Something needed to be done to win back the hearts of those buyers, and that something was the Cadillac Allante two-seater. Here's a final-model-year Allante, complete with one of the very first Northstar V8 engines, found in a Denver yard. The overhead-valve Cadillac V8 engine of 1949 shook up the automotive world, and the double-overhead-cam Northstar V8 of 44 years later had a similar effect. Finally, a high-revving, smooth-running modern V8 to compete with those pesky European and Japanese carmakers! Only the Allante got the Northstar at first, with other Cadillac models following soon after. After the underwhelming power output of the pushrod HT4100 V8s used in the 1987-1992 Allantes, the upgrade from 200 horses to 290 helped boost sales of the '93 to the highest annual figure ever achieved by the model: 4,670 cars. Unfortunately for GM, production costs of the Allante proved to be murderous in the long run. Shortened Eldorado frames were loaded onto specially-fitted 747s in Detroit and flown to Pininfarina's new Allante factory in Italy. After Pininfarina built the bodies, they got loaded onto the 747s, flown back to Detroit, trucked to the Hamtramck assembly plant, and given running gear there. GM called this system the "Allante Air Bridge" and it cost plenty. The cars looked both futuristic and Italian, which they were, but the Allante's price tag stood at heights far above those of the rest of the Cadillac line: $59,975 in 1993, or about $108,500 in 2020 dollars. You could buy a rear-wheel-drive BMW 850Ci with a 282-horse V8 and manual transmission for a mere 10 grand over the Allante's cost that year, or a Jaguar XJS convertible for just $56,750. The Allante had front-wheel-drive and a not-so-modern four-speed automatic transmission, which hurt sales among the enthusiast types who flocked to Cadillac showrooms for the CTS-V a decade or so later. No European machine of 1993 could top the Mars Base appearance of these vertically-arranged, all-pushbutton HVAC/audio controls, though.