This 2001 Cadillac Seville STS popped up on my latest "cheap car search". For sale with an asking price of $5,900, with only 28,500 miles on its clock, it begs the age old question, "why the hell not"? Well, there are some very good reasons why not to buy this car, chiefly it's head gasket devouring engine, but on the surface and all things being equal, this car would seem to be an excellent value.
While certainly nothing that I would ever aspire to, it is more stylish than a mechanically very similar DeVille of the same vintage while not being nearly as alluring, to me at least, as Cadillac's Eldorado. Style, of course, when cheap car searching shouldn't be a priority but if you can have your cake and eat it too, again, why the hell not?
Be careful what you wish for. To review, the single biggest problem with these cars is it's handsome engine. Oddly enough, these engines are not as derided as other infamous Cadillac mills of the last forty years or so like the V8-6-4 and HT4100 (and others). That's probably due to the fact that when they're not blowing up on their owners they're strong, efficient performers. Then one day the temperature gauge pings into the red and the check engine light comes on. Game over to the tune of four to five thousand dollars. All of sudden your six thousand dollar old Cadillac becomes a ten or eleven thousand dollar old Cadillac with no long term guarantee those new head gaskets are going to be around for long.
Updated for 1998 and packed with much of the stuff that we take for granted today on the least expensive of new vehicle offerings, some critics took issue with their front wheel drive layout and overly fussy tuning of Cadillac's, at the time, state of the art of hydro-magnetic suspension system. Ironically, most if not all critics raved about the NorthStar V-8's smoothness, power and relatively good fuel economy.
When new, if these cars had any real problems, aside from an engine that was a ticking time bomb, despite sticker prices a good twenty-five thousand dollars less than the cars it was allegedly supposed to compete with buyers for, it was that they weren't those cars it was to compete against for buyers. That in lieu of the fact that to the seat pants of its targeted buyers, they more than held their own in terms of creature comfort and, especially in STS trim, performance.
Reality check time - how many buyers of luxury cars actually care about zero to sixty times and lateral g's? Well heeled buyers of cars like this are all about the bling and for most of my fifty plus years on this earth, "Cadillac" hasn't held nearly the "oh-wow" firepower of even the lowest buck BMW or Mercedes. And over the last thirty years Cadillac has been pushed back even further my Lexus and to some extent Infiniti. I've said this time and time again here in relation to Cadillac's and Lincoln's - if you "got it", would you spend "it" on a Cadillac or Lincoln? Honestly, I'd only do it if I absolutely preferred whatever Cadillac or Lincoln had over anything the imports had going on but by and large, a Cadillac just wouldn't do. That shallow? Hey, just being honest.
It's crazy how a car that stickered for nearly sixty grand years ago is worth about as much now as a Chevrolet Impala of the same vintage with similar mileage. And, sadly, given its NorthStar engine, I'd probably spend that same money on the Impala. Why the hell not? Oh, and for the record, Cadillac eventually sorted out the issues with the NorthStar's head gaskets but, get this, it was in the engine's thirteenth year of production. Kid you not. How many times have I said here that it's nothing short of a miracle Cadillac is still around?
No comments:
Post a Comment