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2016 Cadillac CTS-V First Drive [w/video]

A million insects lost their lives today. Boxelder bugs and mayflies making the ultimate sacrifice in Elkhart Lake, their carapaces no buffer against a rocketing rectangle of safety glass. Their bodies gorily streaking into spangles along the diamond-faceted face of the Cadillac CTS-V. Road America is a four-mile ribbon of pavement snaking its way through the emerald center of the country's northern heartland. Since the 1950s it's seen uncountable fields of diverse racing machinery rocket over its hills and around its 14 corners. I would imagine that on those occasions the tramping of onlookers and hubbub of vehicles, both competitive and commonplace, would dissuade a great number of our six-legged friends from making their way onto the track. But today it's just me turning laps. Inconceivably just one journalist, driving the baddest roadgoing Cadillac ever made, on one of the loveliest circuits America has ever carved out. So big-winged bugs made it out to me in a vast array and a tragic sum, and I drilled through them oblivious to anything but one of the greatest days of driving I've ever had. Cadillac has turned its CTS-V from a performance sedan to a monster. For 2016 Cadillac has turned its CTS-V from a performance sedan to a monster worthy of the carnage described above. The words "epic" and "awesome" are hilariously overused on the Internet, but in the case of the CTS-V's 6.2-liter supercharged V8, their literal meanings are fitting. The capacity to produce 640 horsepower and 630 pound-feet of torque is astounding. Feeling those outputs come to growling life under my foot arch, uncorks different reactions in my brain as the day wears on: first trepidation, next cautious optimism, finally red-eyed bloodlust. A glance at the power and torque curves will show you that the charged V8 behaves more like a naturally aspirated thing than a turbo'd on/off switch. Peak torque arrives at 3,600 rpm, horsepower at 6,400, giving the engine lovely, linear power delivery. Even with top torque happening near the middle of the tach, there's no small amount of the stuff when the engine first spins up, so launching all 4,145 pounds of Detroit iron still feels exotic. Launching all 4,145 pounds of Detroit iron still feels exotic. On the roads around Wisconsin, using all of the available power is hardly advisable, but I have no trouble driving this fast car slowly (sort of).

2016 Cadillac ELR gets more power, $9,000 price drop

Cadillac has announced a series of updates to the ELR for 2016 that promises to make the plug-in hybrid luxury coupe a more desirable proposition. Perhaps chief among them is a price drop of $9,005 compared to the slow-selling 2014 model. The news follows an announcement yesterday that the Chevy Spark would get a $1,500 price drop. Cadillac is quoting a net price for the updated ELR at $58,495, which is obviously substantially less than the $75k it was asking for the previous version. But it's important to note that the new price is listed after US federal tax credits. The 2014 model came in at $67,500 after the full $7,500 tax credit, so math tells us that Cadillac has slashed the price on the 2016 ELR rather dramatically by about nine grand with a new MSRP of $65,995. One big upgrade on the performance front is a 25-percent boost in output from the hybrid powertrain that marries a pair of electric motors to a 1.4-liter inline-four gasoline-burning generator. The increase is said to be enough to drop 1.5 seconds off the 0-60 time, now quoted at 6.4 seconds. It'll travel for up to 39 miles on electric mode alone, but with the generator spooled up will go up to 330 miles before needing to stop. The engine management software has also been updated and the regenerative braking system reconfigured as well, but GM's luxury division didn't stop at the powertrain, fitting the 2016 ELR with a raft of other enhancements. Visually there's a new grille with the marque's latest emblem embedded. The suspension has been stiffened, the steering recalibrated and the brakes optimized for better feel. Cadillac is also throwing in the previously optional Driver Assistance package of active safety systems as standard, with adaptive cruise control available as an option. And the infotainment system comes with OnStar, 4G LTE connectivity and on-board Wi-Fi. There's even a Performance Package available with 20-inch performance tires offering 10-percent better lateral grip, four-piston Brembo brake calipers up front to help reducing stopping distances by 12 percent, recalibrated dampers and steering and a thicker-rimmed steering wheel. Because of the higher rolling resistance tires, however, the Performance Package kills four miles off of the electric driving range.

Artist imagines eerie world where cars have no wheels

The wheel ranks right up there with the telescope and four-slice toaster in the pantheon of inventions that have moved humankind forward. But what if a circle in three dimensions had never occurred to anyone, and we all had just moved on without it? Perhaps we'd be driving around in Lucas Motors Landspeeders with anti-gravity engines. Or maybe we'd have the same cars we do today, just without wheels.
That's the thought experiment that seems to have led French photographer Renaud Marion to create his six-image series called Air Drive. The shots depict cars throughout many eras of motoring that look normal except for one thing: they have no wheels. The models used include a Jaguar XK120, Cadillac DeVille (shown above), Chevrolet El Camino and Camaro, and Mercedes-Benz SL and 300 roadsters.
Perhaps one day when our future becomes our past, you'll be able to walk the street and see with your own eyes the rust and patina of age on our nation's fleet of floating cars. Until then, Monsieur Marion's photographs will have to do.