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tvdirect - For cleaning and polishing stuff, I swear by (not at) Meguiars products. Check out their website. If they don't make it you probably don't need it. You can even call the toll free, on weekends, and get a live person who can help you understand what to use where. It really helps 'cause they really do have a lot of purpose-made products.
theBug - OK I'm sold, dual exhaust it is dyno justified or not.
Stupid Human Trick - I was detailing the window gaskets the other day (with Meguiars handy detailing applicator - a small soda straw with foam sponge tip filled with vinyl and rubber restorer). Went to do the gasket around the moon roof and got no retraction. Yikes! Finally figured it out. Last time I used it I must've closed the interior sunshade with too much gusto. Result... the sunshade jammed the glass enough to defeat the retraction motor. Moral of the story...? Think suave class and sophistication when closing sunshade, not macho posturing.
calicadi: Justified, you betcha. The pipes are calling you man. The custom shop (a local vogue) did an awesome job on the installation. I told them that I didn't want to see any hardware (as seen in all the advertisment photos) underneath, just the chrome pipes, and they complied. I just think it looks tacky, especially on a Cadi.
I could have gone straight to the custom shop to have it done, but I went through the dealer to avoid any future warranty issues. As I thought prior to doing so, the price (the middle man factor) didn't change at all.
thebug...
All of the cars on my dealers lot are light platinum.
They have a 3 step process with a Cleaner Wax/Glaze/Carnuba Wax.
The cleaner wax contains a mild polish and the glaze covers up the scratches.
The glaze will make the metallics in the paint
pop right out.
It made my bronze mist intrigue look incredible and my bright blue metallic Camaro gets so shiny you can't look at it in the sunlight without sunglasses.
lets keep it up.
Since you don't want to pay for a bunch of unwanted options to get XM, I was thinking you could do the same. However, you'd probably be ripping out a factory deck, that even in the base model, is 10x better than what my OEM was.
That said, Pioneer makes some pretty nice stuff and if you find the right place, they can install it so it looks right. I guess it all depends on how bad you want XM!
"In my thinking, if they were to add the most common options into the base model, the price itself would eliminate a large portion of the market segment they are seeking, and many would have never taken a second look at the product. A lot of us would said 'I can't afford that' and moved on to another model. That's how the hook works."
"When looking at the CTS, my thoughts were, don't let the $29,350 fool you into thinking you can get this for cheap. One has to know, you can have it loaded, but it won't be cheap, or you can have it cheap, but it won't be loaded."
"It would be interesting to find out how many people purchased a base model BMW, MB or Lexis. As we know, many of these options are standard on the said competitors, and you have to get whether you want them or not, and it also cost more."
I originally wanted just a base version CTS, to save costs, but after looking around and discussing the options with my BMW buddies, I decided to go for the more loaded car. I'm EXTREMELY happy I did, but 12 months ago I never would have thought that. Yes, price is one thing, but a year later you just might be kicking yourself for getting a lesser car.
I just wanted to add, what is all the upset over the CTS wood trim? My Luxury Sport has genuine Zabrano wood on the top 1/3 of the steering wheel (like Jaguars and other luxury sedans), gear shift knob (wood knobs have been around for 80+ years) and on the four small door handles (4" long). Is that just "too ugly" for you folks to stand? Are you guys seeing the Dealer trimmed versions perhaps? I agree they look a bit ugly, with all that tacked on wood trim, but remember it certainly isn't "stock".
I also posted a comment at CaddyEdge.com that perhaps you guys should look into the "wood delete" option, that may or may not exist. Six months after I bought my Carmine Red 1991 Caddy Sedan Deville I discovered that I could have ordered my car without the white pinstripe, or gray lower body color by specifying "pinstripe delete" or "lower body color delete". Something you might want to inquire about...
Much changes over time. I own a Lincoln LS and follow this board for obvious reasons, and recall when the LS board was not only in the top ten, but at the head of it. Now the LS board is doing well to average 2 posts a day.
It'll be interesting to see where the CTS board is in another two years. I'm guessing it'll be in far better shape than the LS board is now, but I'd never speculate as to why.
It got pretty heated and pat shut us down several times last Summer.
It is good that there is more activity now. I think all of us are excited about the New V6.
Sales will probably go up or at least maintain their pace.
The Impala thread used to be huge, but has died to a couple of posts a day.
Even the intrigue thread does more, and that car hasn't been produced in over a year.
I also think there are fewer posts in Townhall than when I joined 3 years ago.
http://www.xmfan.com/viewtopic.php?t=3372&highlight=
I am really enjoying XM and there is now a $30 rebate on the SkyFi and some other receivers. But I think the SkyFi is great.
One, I'm taking my CTS back to the dealership tomorrow for their second crack at fixing a high pitched background squeal in the radio (not the Bose system). The first time, they had it two days and had me in an Enterprise Toyota Corolla for those 2 days because whoever took my appointment didn't follow through on the loaner.
They said they had replaced the original radio with a new one but that didn't fix it. They said GM helped them troubleshoot it over the phone and they had discovered and tightened a loose ground wire in the trunk area. When I picked up the car on the Friday it was ready I wasn't out of the lot before I noticed the same stupid squeal on a station. I wheeled back into the service area and got the advisor to listen and he said my advisor was already gone and I should call him back on Monday.
The squeal is not as bad as it was before the service, but it is definitely still bad- on some stations worse than others. Even when it is not squealing, I don't think the radio sounds good. Has anyone heard of anything like this? Does anyone else with the base model radio think its quality is not what it should be? My 2001 Chrysler Mini-van has better sound in my opinion.
The squeal occurs on many FM stations, some worse than others, but no AM stations. It occurs whether the engine is running or not. The squeal does not vary with RPM. Its volume increases when you turn up the radio volume. I thought it might be interference with the Onstar system but I haven't made a correlation.
My second thought is about Octane. My first tank was whatever the car came with. It ran great. My first fill was with 93. Again great. I tried 89 on the next tank. I didn't notice any difference in performance and no knocking. After reading some threads here I tried 87. Again no knocking but although it might be my imagination, it did not seem as peppy. Today it was time for another tank and since prices are back down, I decided to go for 93 again and I decided to track the mileage very carefully. After the fill-up, to my surprise, the car was idling rough as I sat in the gas station writing down the details of the fill up for tracking purposes. The gas was Amoco Ultimate. It calmed down once I got down the road. I'll share what I find out about the mileage.
I'm interested in others' thoughts on the radio and the gas. I know there have been lots of posts on Octane but I haven't been able to reach any conclusions from the posts.
As for waxes I've tried almost everything (McGuires, Zaino, Turtle Wax, Eagle One, etc>) and in my opinion Mother's is by far the best at adding a protective shine. I think Zaino actually looks nicer when clean but just doesn't leave a protective coating that lasts for several washes like the Mother's does.
When it comes to gas, I've been putting regular in my CTS. As far as I can tell Super or Premium doesn't add any noticable difference in HP or idle quality.
In addition, I'll stand by my opinion that GM should have added to the list of standard features when it built the CTS. BMW, Mercedes and Lexus are more expensive because they are "more expensive" not because of the list of standard features. You could just as easily list several less expensive cars like Chrysler, Honda, and Hyundai that have standard features that the CTS is lacking.
Lastly, when it comes to 'dealer trades' in Portland, OR I've had terrible luck negotiating on ANY car that isn't on the lot that I'm dealing with. When I went to Kuni they didn't have the car I wanted, couldn't locate a car, and weren't willing to deal on a factory order. I went straight from Kuni to VicAlfonso and closed the deal on a new CTS (which was on the lot) in 2 hours.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item- =2418110402&category=43903
a) What it costs to build the basic vehicle.
b) What added 'features' cost.
c) And what you can sell it for.
BMWs and the like have a very high basic platform cost. There's a lot of content in the stuff you don't see - the structure, engine, suspension, etc. Now, in the rest of the world, you get a BMW 520i with a manual transmission, cloth upholstery, all-manual seat adjusters, etc. (I don't think you get hand-crank windows anymore, but it wasn't very long ago...) and it'll still cruise 115mph all day long and has the same basic structure and durability as any other 5-series.
In the US, of course, the cheapest 5-series you can get is a 525i that's still very highly specced relative to what's standard elsewhere. And BMW's margins have been fairly fat, though currency issues are going to pinch that now.
Something like a Hyundai or Impala, the car itself is basically a throwaway. The structure and mechanical content is cheap, and it'll never work as well a 520i. But, sure, you get the power this and leather that for the same money.
Americans buy a lot of junk, but they seem to have an absolute fetish for leather upholstery.
The CTS has a pretty high basic content for all the mechanicals, though the finish, trim and upholstery on the car is fairly low-cost. $30K is still a very aggressive price point to try to hit with the CTS, it's a matter of figuring out what to leave out to get there.
j1205, I'm sorry to hear about your sound isssues. I too have the base model. In my limited experience with the fm radio (I mostly listen to cds), I haven't noticed any squeal problem. I actually think the sound quality from the base radio is pretty respectable --no worse than the sound from the supposedly premium Infinity Gold system in our Grand Cherokee. The only problem I've had was a vibration from the rear deck woofer which I was able to track down and easily remedy (I think I posted about it earlier).
Mind you, I don't think if I owned a CTS, I would be ripping the stock system out, but if really, really, really want XM...
I read somewhere, that this was an attempt to test its appeal on the public. My question is, is that a roll bar of some type going across the center?
It's hard to tell from the angles provided. At any rate, I think a coupe would be much nicer.
thebug...
If I had read more carefully, I would have noticed that the lux sport has everything that the lux package has (duh again), and I should have dropped the lux package instead. By the time I realized this , the car was already in production, and the order couldn't be changed.
This would have only raised my monthly payment by $18.00. Today I'm kicking myself in the rear because now I have to shop around for larger wheels (nice ones are really hard to find) which I wanted in the first place. And to boot, I will have to discard a perfectly good set of wheels at the cost of $795, (duh one more time).
thebug...
You would think, that because they had no speed limit, they would require the safety features more so than we would, but that's not the case. They didn't have Ralph, or Ralph likes, so they didn't have to deal with it. It would be interesting to see if they've changed.
Many GI's would buy them (for use in Germany only) and sell before they returned stateside. The market for Euro-spec autos between GI's was pretty big when I was there.
Having an American-spec car would increase the price anywhere from 10-12K, not including the VAT (@14% in the early 90's) or value added tax. The good thing is, GI's could weave the VAT, and the cost of shipping was usaually covered by the dealer. If not, the average cost of shipping was $750 to any U.S. port.
thebug...
Bottom line: No way, no how unless you want to put your DIC in the trunk.
For instance, US airbags were more powerful than Euro-spec airbags and dash contours were sometimes changed because US DOT required that the airbag restrain an UNBELTED occupant. On the other hand, less-powerful Euro airbags designed only to assist in restraining a BELTED occupant wouldn't kill or maim shorter drivers or kids, as US bags have. I think everyone's gone to a depowered or two-stage bag design in the US to work around this little bit of nastiness.
The US has other specific equipment and labeling rules, once again not necessarily better (US headlight requirements were for years so bad that US-legal headlights were illegal in much of the world) but different (some markets require side-marker lights, some don't, some require specific colors, some don't.)
All this affects exported US vehicles as well - if GM wants to sell a CTS or any other car in Europe a lot of things have to change (interesting to note on all the CTS-V pics the little wedge of headlight reserved, one guesses, for the headlight wiper that's required by law in some countries, particularly Scandinavian.)
Canada's addicted to their daytime running lights, and GM seems to be going along for the ride on that fetish, but DRLs are illegal in Germany and other places. Some cars get different wiring, some cars get a different headlight switch, some cars you just add a relay to enable them (or pull a relay to disable them), some cars (e.g. recent BMWs) it's software-configuration controlled. I can just hope, if I should buy a CTS-V at some point, that there's some way to get rid of them.
Now if only GM would build it...or how about a V-series CTS in this body style?!
- Ray
Hoping for better acceleration on the 3.6 / automatic than published so far . . .
Anyone at GM awake?? I know... probably not a large enough market for the coupes, but wouldn't it be great to have one of them?
thebug...
thebug...
What have you seen for 0-60 numbers for the 3.6L?
Hard to believe the number would be over 7. My ancient 3.8L pushrod was rated at 7.7-7.8 in my Intrigue. 60 more HP should do more than a half second, but I'm not no expert in that area.
Also very curious to see how they will handle the pricing on the 3.6L since the auto is mandatory.
None of the major car magazines has published test numbers AFAIK.
- Ray
Hoping for something closer to 6.5 - and an under 15 sec. quarter mile . . .