Cadillac News: Rumorpile: Cadillac Flagship Gets Approved

[William Maley]

William Maley

Staff Writer - CheersandGears.com

July 24, 2012

Automotive News reports that General Motors has given the green light to the Cadillac Flagship. The new flagship is expected to begin production sometime in 2015.

Design of the new Cadillac flagship will be influenced by the Ciel concept shown at last year's Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance.

The flagship will be based on the long-rumored Omega RWD platform. There will be the option of AWD as well. Power for the new flagship will include the 3.6L V6 and a range of V8 engines.

Source: Automotive News (Subscription Required)

William Maley is a staff writer for Cheers & Gears. He can be reached at [email protected] or you can follow him on twitter at @realmudmonster.

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[G. David Felt]

IF this is true, it is very exciting indeed!

[Drew Dowdell]

Not approving it would have been one of the biggest boneheaded post BK moves GM could have made.....

[Z-06]

Good. Now time for S Class humpers to be worried about.

[A Horse With No Name]

Good. Now time for S Class humpers to be worried about.

Amen, brother....!

[smk4565]

Good. Now time for S Class humpers to be worried about.

Nothing to worry about, the S-class is legendary. It chases no one, yet everyone else benchmarks against it. Lexus spent over a billion dollars in the 80s trying to beat it, and probably a few billion since, and they still can't beat it. Cadillac needs a flagship in a bad way, but the S-class is near unbeatable because of a 40 year reputation of being the global standard.

[Z-06]

SMK, you just proved my point.

And to answer your comment, yeah, that's why according to your metrics - sales - the 7 series has outsold the S class so far in 2012. And that is why a 2008 S600 with a price tag of 143,000 is now a CPO for $59,000 at a dealer in Melbourne, FL. My 2008 CPO Z06 depreciated far less than that and it is just a Chevy with no legendary-ness or used as a benchmark and is beaten by everyone.

[A Horse With No Name]

Sports cars depreciate FAR less than luxury cars. By your logic, a Honda S2000 is also an awesome car, as it has held a huge portion of its residual value.

All luxury cars pretty much depreciate like crazy until they wind up being driven by wanna be punks in bad neighborhoods wanting to look like someone.

But yeah, S class....may have something to worry about.

[A Horse With No Name]

And BTW, Cadillac....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muePkLkuUs4&list=PL6DFA7703BA281A4F&index=16&feature=plpp_video

[Z-06]

Sports cars depreciate FAR less than luxury cars. By your logic, a Honda S2000 is also an awesome car, as it has held a huge portion of its residual value.

All luxury cars pretty much depreciate like crazy until they wind up being driven by wanna be punks in bad neighborhoods wanting to look like someone.

But yeah, S class....may have something to worry about.

Okay Fair enough. Cadillac Escalade 2wd with ~48,000 miles and with Ultra Luxury, package (retailed for $67,000) can be had CPO for $37,000 that is much less depreciation than the S class. I was arguing about how "valuable" smk perceives the S Class.

[A Horse With No Name]

And your point was taken...

I think SMK is the reality director for the Fast and furious movies, personally...

[smk4565]

S-class has sold 37,539 in first half of 2012, they say that is the most in the segment. I could only find that the 7-series sold 17,000 the first quarter, so they are close. But the 7-series is new, this generation S-class has been on sale since 2006. Sales will pick up when the new model comes out, they are on pace for 75,000 this year, but when the W221 first came out they were selling over 90,000 a year. The S-class is more expensive than the 7-series also, more revenue comes from it.

The S-class was just named world green car of the year as well, so the Volt, Prius and Leaf have been put on notice.

[balthazar]

...a 2008 S600 with a price tag of 143,000 is now a CPO for $59,000 at a dealer in Melbourne, FL.

Wow. Ignoring the fat incentive that must've been on the original tag, plus whatever the dealer actually paid the owner vs. it's sale price now, 4 years in that S600 cost the owner around $85,000 !!

[ZL-1]

Let's see if it arrives before 2050

[CreativeVision]

I'm confused on what role the XTS plays in the lineup if this new flagship competes against the 7-Series/S-Class. With CTS growing to be a 5-Series/E-class competitior, I assumed the XTS was the natural next step up. Is the direct competition less german luxury then, and more Lincoln/Lexus?

[Robert Hall]

I'm confused on what role the XTS plays in the lineup if this new flagship competes against the 7-Series/S-Class. With CTS growing to be a 5-Series/E-class competitior, I assumed the XTS was the natural next step up. Is the direct competition less german luxury then, and more Lincoln/Lexus?

The XS is the MKS/ES competitor...i.e. FWD lux sedan. It's not really in the same heirarchy as the RWD cars...i.e. the ATS/CTS/future flagship.

Cadillac is building towards a structure similar to Lexus's core lineup it seems...FWD volume sedan, FWD/AWD volume crossover, big RWD/AWD SUV, and 3 sizes of RWD/AWD sedans...

Edited July 25, 2012 by Cubical-aka-Moltar

[hyperv6]

The XTS was never a flagship or 7 foe. The XTS was product nearly complete before the Chapter 11 and is used to fill an almost empty show room till more product is ready. Then the roll for the car will be to transition the older DTS drivers to the new Cadillac and also serve service fleets and not harm the resale of rhe ATS, CTS and LTS.

The only thing I worry about after reading post from a couple days ago else where is the unrealistic expectations some are dreaming up. I fully expect this car to be a world class car that can and will do serious battle with the Germans. I expect nothing less than a class leader.

But some on other web sites are expecting a exact copies of the Sixteen or Ciel show cars. While I do expect some of their styling to flow into this car like a Ciel nose with a Sixteen roof line or something like that. I worry many will piss and moan that they did not build a road going show car.

I also feel this car should get the ZR1 like engine treatment where it will more than likely have a Chevy V8 but I hope they tune and dress it in Cadillac only trim. Just as the ZR1 engine is only used in the ZR1 the LTS should have it's own engine and they should not hide the engine with a plastic cover. It is time to dress the engine with some quality trim.

I fully expected this car as it has moved along pretty well. Timing with the ATS and Cadillac anouncing it has a 10 year plan all dove tails this into a good media blitz. With it expected by 2015 we should see something in the next year in camo.

The real question is if this is on the Omega platform what else will we might see?

[smk4565]

I'm excited for this car and to see what they come up with, but Cadillac hasn't had success in this price range in over 50 years. The Allante, XLR, STS-V all bombed out. Different era, but still, this is territory that GM hasn't been been able to break into. If they can nail this car, it will be huge for Cadillac, both in terms of image, and in terms of developing new technology that can trickle down the line.

I am not so sure they can hit a home run on this car though, GM will try to go back to the parts bin to cut costs and cut corners, and if they do it will show. The 2 big problems though are 1: Cadillac has very little international sales presence, while the others do, and 2: Cadillac doesn't have the brand image the others in this class do. Even now, Cadillac's top sedan has a base price of $45k, and in 3 years they want to get people to spend perhaps $90k for a full size sedan, it is a big leap. When the traditional Cadillac buyer walks into a dealer and sees a $45k XTS, and a $90k whatever-TS that are the same size, that could be confusing.

[smk4565]

I must say though, that I am glad Cadillac is going for it, and I'm glad they are trying and aiming big. I'd rather see them go all in and see what happens, rather than be like Lincoln and just sit stagnant waiting to die.

[Carguy]

Range of V8 engines??? I do hope they are working on a new 4VPC DOHC DI Turbo V8!!! Not only for this car but the opt and V CTS and V ATS as well!

[hyperv6]

No V8 for the ATS. Just not going to happen. It would hurt the CTSV too much as it could be faster and cheaper. Not good marketing.

Cadillac is not going all out. Cadillac has a 10 year plan and are doing what they need to do in the order they need to do it. Starting out at the low end and work their way up with world class cars.

I know some have some crazy ideas of what the flagship will be and they should be tempered some what. It will be a car able to take on the likes of the 7 and Benz but it will not be some exotic car. I expect from what has been said we may see a mix of styling of the Ciel and Sixteen but not a full on show car take off. This has to be a car that is good for everyday use with no comprimises. I expect the nose to be along the lines of the ATS and Ciel with a Sixteen roof.

The engine is the wild card as it would be hard to do a DOHC just for this car unless they work with someone else. I could see GM having someone make the block and heads and then use the Wixcom plant to assemble them. But it would not be cheap. I expect a OHV v8 [sorry it is not a small block to me any more] and I hope and pray they trune it to Cadillac specs and only their spec. Where the Chevy is using a Supercharger I would love to see them use a Turbo set up to be different. Also They need to dress the engine up in something better than plastic covers. Real aluminum covers polished or powder coated with stainless fasteners. If they could do it for my Fiero they can do it for the LTS.

The Tubo, DI and VVT would make for a flat torque curve unsee by any GM V8.

[Drew Dowdell]

Apparently, the 5.5 can be set up to be a DOHC unit also.... which could certainly make the LTS special inside of GM.

[smk4565]

If Hyundai can make a DOHC V8, then Cadillac can. It could be used on the CTS, as well as LTS (if that is the name) and possibly future Escalade or a future sports car. And there could be different tunes obviously, with naturally aspirated and turbo or they could do a couple different displacements also. They need a diesel also.