No Reserve 1996 Caddy Fleetwood Brougham on 2040-cars

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2015 Cadillac Escalade blings its way into LA

The new Cadillac Escalade sauntered out onto the Los Angeles Auto Show stage, showing off its new familial face and redesigned interior. That exterior, with its slim, wrap-over headlights and tall, vertical taillights (both made up of LEDs) is a subtle but significant departure from the past styling of General Motors' flagship SUV.
And while there's no shortage of stuff to discuss about the Caddy's exterior, its cabin is where the big changes happen. Aside from the column-mounted shifter, the cabin receives a heavy going-over, receiving Cadillac's new CUE infotainment system and a significant upgrade to the materials. Comparing it to furniture, Eric Clough, Cadillac's director of design for interiors, said, "An exceptional level of craftsmanship has gone into the redesign of the 2015 Cadillac Escalade, and it all centers on the premium materials and extensive use of cut-and-sew live stitching."
Under hood sits a 420-horsepower, 460-pound-foot, 6.2-liter V8. Fitted with direct injection and active fuel management, fuel economy for the big Escalade should get a much-needed boost beyond the current model's 14-city and 18-highway miles per gallon, although official numbers haven't been published quite yet. A six-speed automatic is the sole gearbox choice. Cadillac has also fitted the new Escalade with GM's magnetic ride control system, which should deliver a more refined ride than its predecessor.

2016 Hennessey CTS-V is properly ridiculous with 1,000 horsepower

We truly live in a halcyon era of automotive performance with models like the latest Shelby GT350 Mustang and 707-horsepower Challenger Hellcat. And now Hennessey Performance Engineering is bringing something with absolutely obscene power to the world with its tuned 2016 Cadillac CTS-V that packs a ludicrous 1,000 horsepower. The latest CTS-V isn't even on sale yet but should be a powerhouse straight from the factory. Under its carbon fiber hood is a 6.2-liter supercharged LT4 V8 with 640 horsepower and 630 pound-feet of torque that makes the sedan capable of a 200-mile-per-hour top speed. Hennessey's take ditches the blower in favor of two turbos to feed air to the engine. To cope with the extra power, the mill gets upgrades like forged aluminum pistons and forged steel parts for the rods and crankshaft, and transmission upgrades are also necessary to make it all work. Buyers can even spec things like carbon-ceramic brakes and a widebody kit to allow for bigger tires. The crazy numbers are leading to some big performance claims from company founder John Hennessey. "I believe that our 2016 Twin Turbo CTS-V will have a top speed approaching 240 mph," he said in the Caddy's announcement. Hennessey is building just 24 of these 1,000-horsepower sedans for the 2016 model year. However, for those that want to keep the supercharger under the hood, the company is also offering upgrades with 750 hp and 800 hp for the CTS-V too. All of them sound absolutely ridiculous in an utterly fantastic way. 2016 HPE1000 Twin Turbo Cadillac CTS-V Texas Tuner Plans to Build World's Fastest 4-Door Sedan Sealy, Texas-When the next generation Cadillac CTS-V hits the streets later this year, it will have 640+ hp and a top speed of nearly 200 mph. To the team at Hennessey Performance Engineering (HPE), this is a good starting point. The company plans to pick-up where they left off with the last gen CTS-V by producing the world's fastest 4-door sedan: The Hennessey HPE1000 Twin Turbo CTS-V. "A couple of years ago, the State of Texas gave us the opportunity to test one of our specially tuned CTS-Vs – our VR1200 Twin Turbo coupe. It ran 221 mph (356 km/h) on State Highway 130, near the Circuit of the Americas", said company founder, John Hennessey. "It was still pulling on when we ran out of road. I believe that our 2016 Twin Turbo CTS-V will have a top speed approaching 240 mph (386 km/h)". Hennessey plans to offer a limited run of only 24 units for the 2016 model year.

GM will likely build PHEV batteries in China soon

It's a big week for batteries. Friday, Tesla will hold a big event at its Gigafactory in Reno, NV. But even in Michigan, there are things happening on the electrified automotive front. This was proven when GM invited journalists to its Brownstown Battery Assembly Plant today, highlighting the six different battery packs it makes for nine vehicles around the world (plus a tenth, coming to Asia, that has not yet been announced). During our tour, we learned a few interesting tidbits that we thought readers would like to hear: The Cadillac CT6 plug-in hybrid launches in China this fall before coming to the US next year. GM builds the battery packs in Michigan and ships them to China for final assembly in the PHEV. For now, this is all fine for GM to qualify for China's incentives for building green cars in the country. But, as Bill Wallace, GM's director of global battery systems, told AutoblogGreen, this could change thanks to the country's 'Made in China 2025' plan. The situation is "evolving," he said, and it's a safe assumption that GM will need to build packs in China some day. For the CT6 PHEVs that will be sold in the US, the batteries will make a round trip, since GM will only build the plug-in version in China. As for the range of the CT6 PHEV, that hasn't been announced, but since China offers incentives for vehicles that get at least 50 kilometers (31 miles), that's a likely target (the US range (UPDATE: GM did announce an expected range for the CT6 PHEV in the US at the LA Auto Show last fall, saying it would "travel approximately 30 miles on a full electric charge"). The battery pack in the CT6 is also a clunky box-type thing, totally unlike the near-elegant T-shape used in the Volt. This despite the fact that the guts of the two packs are similar. Both have 192 li-ion cells and weigh almost the same, but GM tuned the CT6 pack for acceleration instead of range, the way it did with the Volt's pack. Still, the main reason the packs are different is because the CT6 is a rear-wheel drive vehicle, and the tunnel that the Volt's pack uses is occupied by the driveshaft. Despite the highly touted second-gen Chevy Volt going on sale last year, GM still has the capacity to build battery packs for the old, first-gen model. This is because the company is legally required to be able to provide replacement packs for warrantied vehicles (for up to 10 years), and the second-gen packs don't fit into the first-gen vehicles.