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Comments
Can't we all just get along? ;-)
:-D
Also a much bigger filter element than most of the sealed canister-type filters.
What's old is new again - the Euro makes like them because they're 'greener' - fewer big lumps of steel being thrown in landfills.
I am interested in the '04 CTS 3.6l. Is this engine just an enhanced 3.2? I am wary of buying a car with a new engine design.
My Navy blue Impala has dozens of tiny pits on the paint. Some of which show the grey primer underneath.
I think these paints are water based, not solvent based.
Don't want to get flamed by anyone but I think the quality of the CTS's paint could be better.
I was beside a 330i today and its's black paint was almost flawless, while all the CTS's I have seen have noticeable orange peel and the paint seems to lack a little depth.
I never seen a Cadillac with the diamond paint that looked right. Always seems to be applied unevenly.
$9.86 ea. plus whatever shipping/tax they add on.
Anybody find them cheaper online???
$9.86 ea. plus whatever shipping/tax they add on.
Anybody find them cheaper online???
Jemiller, thanks for the link to the M5 owner's forum. A proud group, as they should be. I'd never seen the picture they had posted of us on the 'Ring. It's amazing the places those photos show up. By the way, your request for a CTS-V preview for your M5 owner's group wasn't ignored. I actually heard about that one (didn't know it was from you, small world!) but with the clinic going on out in California we couldn't make it work. We have two show properties at the moment making them very hot commodities. That doesn't however excuse you not being contacted directly with an explanation. Sorry.
Great discussion on manual vs. auto transmissions. In their purest forms they really do have separate missions and completely different selling points. However Jemiller hit it on the head - the CTS-V is a car developed with pretty specific tastes in mind and its low volumes reflect that.
B4Z, we took care of T56 gear rattle (which is somewhat inherent in most manuals) with a dual mass flywheel. No hint of neutral gear rattle or drive away rattle.
By the way, we've got two weeks off for the GM shutdown so I look forward to checking in more frequently!
I also feel the windshield chips easily. I already have a chip. 2300 miles
The guy who got his bezel fixed. What did they do? How is the part different? Does it seal off the edge so bugs don't get in it? I want to know what to tell them in the dealership.
Have fun with your daughter! It's the hardest job you'll ever do (and even harder for your wife), but it's definetely the most rewarding.
Should be one hell of a car.
Do you guys have any plans for a Sport V6 model?
18" wheels, different grille, xenons, etc?
Kind of like what BMW does.
What do you think of my idea of seperating the xenons from the 1SB package and making them available on the base car with the PDX package?
Probably a marketing issue?
I am trying to get a pic of the new silver smoke.
Do you have a link to an actual pic?
Who'd ever thought that at the age of 40 I would be thinking of buying a Cadillac.
Cadillacs are cool again!
Thanks for all your hard work on the CTS.
Dinan sells two lighter flywheels for it. The lighter of the two is a nice old-fashioned slab of machined aluminum with a steel friction insert, think it weighs 14lb. But they'd had so much trouble with gear rollover rattle complaints in the past that before they'll sell you the 14lb flywheel, you have to sign an agreement that you've been warned about the rattle and you won't whine about it. I don't think they get many takers for that one.
The SMG-adapted T56 that Ford's got in the Astons is getting a lot of good press, can we assume someone somewhere's got this on the bench for future V-series use?
The oohing and aahing right now seems to be going to the dual-clutch SMGs that minimize interruption of power delivery during shifts. Was reading a blurb yesterday that at least one design can engage both first and second gears momentarily (presumably with a dose of clutch slip on both sides) on dragstrip launches so that all the shock loading doesn't go through the first-gear cogs, shafts, and bearings. Cute.
In all the SMGs in hardware or on the drawing boards now clutch actuation isn't something the driver's foot has anything to do with.
You've got some with paddles, some with levers, but the basic premise is the same - one way upshifts, the other way downshifts. How abrupt the clutch engagement is depends on the guy who did the software calibrations (and some have driver-selectable degrees of neck-whip.)
Left-foot-stop, right-foot-go, just like M. Schumacher, or a 125cc shifter kart.
The Germans went to water-based paint in the '90s, there's been griping about that too, but frankly I think a lot of it is just that there's a lot more crap flying around the roads now.
I went by to take a look at the '04 with the 3.6L and the General Manager said take it for a spin.
The first thing I noticed with the hood open was that it idles quieter, and that it takes Mobil 1 synthetic oil.
I noticed as soon as i turned the wheel that the
steering is lighter than the 2003 Lux that I drove 3 weeks ago.
It also has a slightly softer ride and a little more body roll.
This car only had a few miles on it so I kept it below 4500 rpms.
First off the transmission braking is hard to get used to. The car slows down when you take your foot off the gas. And it really slows down when in the Sport mode.
I started off from a stop in reg. mode and it definitely has more low end torque and verve. It really pulls well.
I did a couple of part throttle kickdowns and it really pulls strongly. Much stronger than the 3.2L.
The most telling thing was when I put it in the Sport mode. This thing holds low gears like crazy. It doesn't need an automanual. I went through a roundabout and then took a series of left and right curves and it never upshifted!
It also had all the power you could need. The rear tires actually squealed in one of the curves. And I never gave it more than 2/3rds throttle!
This car is any easy 6.7-6.8sec car. More powerful than my IROC and probably quicker in the turns also.
This engine just pulls and pulls. Torque above 3000 rpms is abundant. Much more than my Intrigue.
The only negative I saw was a vibration in the gearshift and the body structure is not the last word in rigidity. BMW's are about 5% better in body flex.
One heck of car. And plenty of power!
In the reg. mode it still has plenty of torque to move out smartly. Unlike the 3.2L which felt soft and underpowered once the car shifted into 2nd gear.
The engine sounds very sporty and there is lots of induction noise under acceleration. I would prefer more exhaust noise.
You know you are driving a real car when under acceleration.
I would have to say that the BMW inline six, the Nissan 3.5L and the Honda V6's are smoother.
But not by a huge margin. This engine is head and shoulders above the 3.2L.
The overall feel of the car and engine is very sporting with a mechanical feel much in the BMW vein.
Although the 3.6L might be a bit too agreesive sounding for the average CTS buyer.
The car is powerful enough that I think a CTS with Sport package could take a BMW 330i automatic on a mountain road.
I really want to buy this car soon.
The CTS has a 3.45 gear vs. the Intrigue's 3.29 or 3.05 gear plus the CTS has a 5 speed auto with much lower 1st, 2nd, and 3rd gears.
The transmission is a revelation. It will hold a lower gear all by itself, and even if you lift off the gas for a couple of seconds it will not upshift!!
The car is noticeably quicker off the line. There is none of that softness from 0-20 that the Intrigue has.
It is also much more responsive to throttle inputs which are felt immediately. Feels like a sports car not a sedan.
I wanted to keep putting my foot into it to hear it and feel it pull.
Just like I did in my Intrigue but more so.
The torque band starts much lower, is wider and there is more of it.
Big improvement over the Shortstar.
Thanks for the review. Nice to see the CTS is improving.
First, I am very pleased to see participation on this forum by someone like pmdriver at GM. I hope it continues.
Regarding an automatic option for the CTS-v. I do hear what you are saying, pmdriver – but: I believe that since even some of the highest performance sports cars and sports sedans (for example: the Audi RS6, AMG M-B sedans, the Corvette, all current Ferraris and even the Porsche 911 Turbo – the BMW M5 clearly being a notable exception) offer some sort of automatic transmission, the CTS-v ought to as well.
My guess is that all of these (even with limited production volume) are offering this option driven by sales opportunities.
Thus, I believe it would be prudent for Cadillac to adapt something like the new Hydra-Matic 5L50-E 5 speed automatic from the XLR to the CTS-v. Or even the 4 speed automatic in current Corvettes, with something like the ’04 GP’s TapShift.
There are those who prefer an automatic, for any number of reasons - and those who will only buy an automatic. And my experience suggests that this does NOT mean they will not buy a high performance sedan. The recent developments in man-u-matics (my current and previous cars both offered this sort of device – with different interpretations of the genre) offer some of the best features of both manuals and automatic.
Just my $.015 worth – deflated this year . . .
Cheers,
- Ray
Very, very glad that GM has seen fit to produce a car like the CTS-v, regardless of transmission . . .
I'd be interested in hearing what "specific tastes" Cadillac is catering to with the design of the CTS-V...?
It seems to me that there's a contradiction in the design of an all-out enthusiast's performance car that has 4 doors and a back seat but only offers a manual transmission.
...or a contradiction in the design of a sleek 2 seat convertible roadster on a high performance chassis that costs 80 thousand dollars yet has a measly 320HP and only offers an automatic transmission.
-I just don't "get it"!
After driving the CTS last night the Sport mode sems to know what gear it needs to be in.
Lots of engine braking when you lift off the gas.
Also, with the dual-mass flywheel, one of the things that has always bugged me about my current CTS it is the heavy flywheel, preventing really quick spool-up when the clutch is disengaged. I wish I could get a lighter flywheel for the CTS...
To recap, in the last 3 weeks, I've had happen:
1. A flat tire (piece of metal slashed the inside wall). Replaced.
2. Two days later, a wife-inflicted series of scratches from a lousy parking attempt in a parking deck. 4 days in the body shop.
3. On the way to the body shop, I noticed the two clocks weren't synced. *Sigh*. Another 3 days tacked onto the original body shop time estimate to replace the gauge cluster.
If it weren't for bad luck, I'd have no luck at all.
I should have figured that my wife would deliver our child last week when the car was in the shop, her OB and the child's pediatrician were both on vacation! Fortunately, my bad luck ran out with my wife and son. Both are doing well. :-)
But I'm really happy to get the CTS back. After driving a Deville rental for a week, I'm happy to get back to something that I can pitch into a corner and not worry about scads of understeer. Not to mention after years of previously driving Devilles, I ca no longer go back to that kind of ride. It's very smooth, but I like the road to speak to me.
And at least the body shop did a good job, although I've been told not to wax it for 1-2 months. And the new gauge cluster is working fine, although it might have been nice to get the new cluster with the water temp gauge....ok, maybe an upgrade is asking a bit too much. :-)
Cheers,
- Ray
Hearing that the computer can do this more consistantly than most drivers . . .
Is there?
BMW's had no problem finding buyers for 6-speed 540is, M5s, the E36 M3 sedan (BMWNA would like to have an E46 M3 sedan, but BMW AG would rather build an M3 wagon) etc.
There's a certain sweetness in an all-around useful car that's still got a hard edge. As I've said before about the M5 - there are many cars that do one thing better, but pretty much none that do everything as well.
And there is, rightly or wrongly, a VERY strong perception in what I'll call the 'serious enthusiast' community that a slushbox devalues a serious performance car. With sedans it's not to the level that an automatic in a Corvette or 911 tags the driver as a gold-chain-and-chest-hair type, but it still puts a dent in the cred.
The E55 and other blower Benzes are utter bullets in a straight line (a stock S600 is a legitimate low-12 quarter-mile car, high 11s with a software change) and their 100mph+ acceleration is hard even for full-fledged GTs to match, but in many corners they're not thought of as serious sports hardware.
Of course, it's not entirely justifiable - I personally can think of several cars that work very well with automatics, as long as you've got a fat-and-flat torque curve the lack of a limited-slip diff in the Benzes and Jaguar S-Type R is more of a limitation than the automatic transmission is.
But if you're GM and you're trying to say "This time we're serious", if you want to have a car that you can show up in the paddock at a BMWCCA track school and have people pay attention, you've got to have the manual.
Now, CVTs and SMGs and 6- and 7-speed conventional automatics muddy the waters pretty seriously, and in the end it's going to come down to whose combination of ratios and software works best.
"...or a contradiction in the design of a sleek 2 seat convertible roadster on a high performance chassis that costs 80 thousand dollars yet has a measly 320HP and only offers an automatic transmission."
Once again, I think you're misunderstanding the target market.
Cars like the XLR and the SL500 and the SC430 are Rodeo Drive shopping carts.
They're not serious sporting hardware, and they're not intended to be. They're cruisers. And for this role the automatic is the right choice.
The SL500 and XLR are far better cars than they need to be for the role they fill.
My head slightly touched the roof near the b- pillar.
You must be longer of leg than I to fit comfortably in the car.
I defintely can't have a CTS with the sunroof.
I also noticed that it cut into the rear headroom also.
2018 VW Passat SE w/tech, 2016 Audi Q5 Premium Plus w/tech, 2006 Acura TL w/nav
Also, personally, I like both the 16 and 17 inch wheels but there were two '03s side by side, one with the 17inch w/ sport package and one lux with 16 inchers. The 17 inch polished wheels definitely looked sharper IMO.
What to do, What to do....
http://us.f1.yahoofs.com/users/15017f98/bc/turbo+video/4+cts1170@- 117.MPG?BCus8A_ARA4aG_NH
http://us.f1.yahoofs.com/users/15017f98/bc/turbo+video/4+cts1170@- 117.MPG?BCus8A_ARA4aG_NH
Just got a postcard from my dealer parts department that my "Lamp" is in, i.e., the leaky read license plate surround. Will have to make an appointment to have it installed.