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Junkyard Gem: 1997 Cadillac Catera

GM's Cadillac Division was having a tough time in the early 1990s, with an onslaught of Lexuses and Infinitis pouring across the Pacific to steal their younger customers while high-end German manufacturers picked off their older customers. Flying an S-Class-priced model between assembly lines in Turin and Hamtramck hadn't worked out, so why not look to the European outposts of the far-flung GM Empire for the next Cadillac? That's how the Catera was born, and I have found a rare first-year example in a North Carolina car graveyard. Across the Atlantic, GM's Opel and Vauxhall were doing good business with prosperous European car buyers by selling them the sleek rear-wheel-drive Omega B (whose platform also lived beneath the Holden VT Commodore in Australia). Here was a genuine German design that competed with success against BMW and Audi on their home turf! So, the Omega B was Americanized and renamed the Catera. Opel wasn't a completely unknown brand to Americans at the time, since its cars were sold here with their own badging through Buick dealerships from the middle 1950s through the late 1970s (for a much shorter period, American Pontiac dealers attempted to sell Vauxhalls). Even after that, plenty of Opel DNA showed up in the products of U.S.-market GM divisions. The Catera was by far the most affordable Cadillac for 1997, with an MSRP starting at $29,995 (about $59,113 in 2024 dollars). Being a genuine German car, it looked much more convincingly European than the DeVille ($36,995), Eldorado ($37,995) and Seville ($39,995). Inspired by the ducks on the Cadillac emblem (they were really supposed to be martlets, mythical birds with no feet and occasionally lacking beaks), Cadillac's marketers went after youthful car shoppers with a whimsical animated duck named Ziggy. For the 21st century, the birds were removed from the Cadillac emblem in order to attract California buyers under 45 years of age. As we all know, the Catera flopped hard in the marketplace. What sold well in Europe turned out not to translate so well in in North America, especially when bearing the badges of such a historically prestigious brand. The Catera's engine was a 54-degree 3.0-liter V6 rated at 200 horsepower and 192 pound-feet. Just as had been the case with its predecessor, the Allante, no manual transmission was available.

Cadillac prices 410-hp XTS Vsport from $63,020*

Cadillac has officially released pricing for the 2014 XTS Vsport. Buyers can expect to pay $63,020 for the fleet four-door, including destination and handling fees. That kind of coin will snag you a twin-turbocharged 3.6-liter V6 good for 410 horsepower and 369 pound-feet of torque. As you likely already know, engineers have done a lot more than simply bolt a pair of turbos onto the company's tried and true naturally aspirated 3.6-liter V6. The engine uses an all-new block, strengthened connecting rods and domed aluminum pistons and is fed through a revised direct-injection fuel system. Combined, the tweaks allow the V6 to suck down 12 psi of boost.
The price tag puts the 2014 Cadillac XTS Vsport well under potential (if ambitious) competitors like the Audi S6 at $71,900, plus destination fees. A base BMW 550i will set you back $62,700, excluding destination charges, but throwing options at the German sedan will quickly see that number climb higher. You can check out the full press release below for more information.

Next Cadillac CTS-V confirmed for Detroit

As a car enthusiast, you should be excited for the 2015 Detroit Auto Show. Hell, we can barely contain ourselves – it's shaping up to be a great show. And this bit of news only heightens our expectations – Cadillac will be bringing its third-generation CTS-V to January's North American International Auto Show. That bit of high-performance news has been confirmed to Autoblog by Cadillac officials. In fact, we've received an official invitation to the brand's press conference, and while the latter is light on information, it does say, "it's time for the V-Series to elevate to the next level." Considering our last experience with the CTS-V, we're not sure what there is left to elevate, although we're hopeful that Caddy will come up with something. What that could be, of course, is very open to speculation. When the last CTS-V debuted in 2009, it arguably outgunned Germanic challengers like the 500-hp BMW M5 and 518-hp Mercedes-Benz E63 AMG for a lot less money, boasting a detuned version of the Chevrolet Corvette ZR1's 6.2-liter supercharged V8. Could that trend carry on, with the next CTS-V borrowing the supercharged, 650-hp mill from the new Corvette Z06? If escalation is the name of the game, the Z06 engine would seem to once again allow Caddy battle it out on firm, big-booted footing with BMW and Mercedes-Benz. Of course, all will become clear on the morning of Tuesday, January 13. Like we said, we can hardly wait. Related Video: