Why do you own one then?
Because this:
With the right set of wheels I think this car is one of the finest looking automobiles the USA has produced since the 70's.
Is one of the truest sentiments ever expressed in a Cool Wall thread. And the engine sound is to die for. And they are so worthless that a Ford Taurus of the same vintage costs about the same price used. And I also couldn't find a 540i with a stick when I went car shopping, or any GS430s. And the Lincoln LS looked like a Mercury Sable inside and a Mitsubishi Diamante outside. But mostly what Dennisch said.
Anyway, there's a big problem here, with this car. Nearly as much as any other in GM's history (probably not as much as things like the Reatta or Fiero, but close), and way more than the previous generation, GM didn't know what to do with it. But to get to that, we need to go over some things:
Nice styling, but not that cool. Maybe if it was RWD.
Awd would have done that good.
The G-Body was designed to be able to. GM chose, after the E39 5 series launched, to continue with FWD (presumably to keep down costs).
But unfortunately, even though this Seville had much more technology features than the previous generation, it was still behind pretty much any European or Japanese luxury sedan (sold in the USA).
That's not
really true. Circa 2004? Sure, though GM used the car as a test bed for a couple things that were extremely modern in the last couple years.
Circa 1998? Eh... They still had a lot of fancy tricks in the bag to try and basically brute force the car's shiny new platform to be a decent alternative to a BMW. And GM threw way more weight than they ever should have to make this an international car at that. Clarkson even sorta liked it, even though it had some tuning changes that made the European market model worse. They still had their fairly new adaptive dampening system, their fairly new traction control and stability control system, their brand new variable resistance power steering, their fancy/gimmicky massaging and adaptive seats.
I've driven a Lincoln LS, which was the supposed American entry in the market done right until the CTS finally came out and washed away 30 years of American car supposed awfulness in the market segment.
It was in my shortlist when I was looking. RWD, 5 speed auto with manual change option; instead of FWD 4 speed with a PRD321 gate. Double wishbones all around instead of struts in front and admittedly multi-link in the rear. Purpose built chassis co-developed with Jaguar with a brand new drivetrain vs a chassis first used in an Oldsmobile and a Buick and an engine largely unchanged since 1992. ~150 pounds of weight difference that is mostly sitting over the front axle in the latter. Car of the Year winner in multiple magazines and supposed hidden gem against the usual 5 series buyer, vs. an immediate also-ran that was basically forgotten as soon as the Deville was switched to the same chassis.
And it truthfully wasn't even close. The Cadillac handled better. It rode better. It was faster. It had a much nicer interior. It was better balanced and more sure-footed. It sounded far better and the transmission was much better behaved. And it didn't look like a Diamante.
I can tell you that this 4000 pound FWD automatic corners absolutely flat, corners neutral (meaning you can rotate it
very easily if you know what to do), corners precisely and commutative, and still absorbs most any bump or road vibration you can throw at it. Magnetorheological dampers are absolutely
amazing. The four speed automatic is perhaps the best programmed slushbox I've ever driven. It downshifts
right now when you want power, it will shift well past redline, and it will hold gears solid if you throw the cars in corners, and even downshift for you if you are really flying through the twisties; even if it is just in drive and without any change in throttle input. The stability control is pretty much perfect, never interfering unless you are doing something really damn stupid. Nevermind the the obviously better BMW 540s, even the damn STS Pace Car must have been truly amazing.
And I know they could have just phoned it in, because I've driven a car where they have:
And it was terrible by every standard.
None of this really worked, obviously, but Cadillac weren't stupid. They
knew it wasn't going to. The E39 BMW caught them off guard just as much as the Greyhound had caught BMW off guard and their hand was forced. One of the main problems, though, was ultimately how little they tried, and even more importantly why they didn't. Let's go back to this:
This car is legitimately amazing. I honestly like my wheels much more:
But this showed everything that they
could do with it, easily; and most of what I've done is to copy this. But this car gives a good explanation for why this car stagnated so badly even when it was behind the curve when it debuted. Cadillac worked very hard to make it so all of the enhancements on that car could be easily positioned as an upper level STS. A 540 Sport competitor sort of thing. Probably not an amazing one, but one that showed that Cadillac was going to
try. And they were fairly extensive mods. It used the redesigned and more efficient Northstar that was going to debut in 2000, but with the higher compression and hotter cam of the earlier Northstars to keep running on Premium gas. Freer flowing intake and exhaust. Stiffer suspension, standard strut bar, bigger brakes, thicker anti-rollbar, reprogrammed CVRSS, wider and larger wheels (18 x 8.5!) with stickier rubber (255/45!).
Those pace cars weren't just parade queens. They were actual testing rigs for the potential "STSi" model. And it supposedly drove pretty good.
Cancelled at the eleventh hour, because the Sigma-based STS was in the pipeline already so they essentially didn't want to bother. That would be the car that would finally beat back the E39. They would just throw all of their eggs in that basket instead. That car that debuted in 2005,
5 years later. Instead of doing anything to shore up excitement for this car, which could be made available immediately, since they had already done all the work.
So why buy a Seville?
But wait, there's more! In 1995 a new car came out that seriously damaged what was left of the historic Sloan corporate hierarchy:
With its brand new platform that was much better than the Greyhound Seville, and powertrain that was mostly pretty much the same. I've been in both, and I'd say it was the better car; and it was easily a match for it in styling. And it blew pretty much everything else GM made to the curb, Corvette perhaps excepting. If the car in this poll had come out in 1995, to ride on the same platform with the same enhancements, it probably would have been more acceptable against the E39. Instead it came out three years after the Aurora, and three years after the E39, with styling that was basically just a rounded off version of the car that debuted in 1992. Certainly a better,
much more modern car than the one it was replacing. But who cares? It looks the same at a glance. I prefer the styling of mine and think it hides its FWD proportions much better, has a much better eye for exterior details even if the actual shape is much less aggressive, and the interior is no contest even though it was largely an evolution of the final interior change of the previous generation; but I can certainly see the argument that it was dumbed down from the 1992 original.
So why buy a Seville?
There's also another problem, and it is related to the one above; but it is much worse. The Aurora was a more stylish car that was about as good but much cheaper, but the rest of Cadillac's range was completely hopeless. The Catera was... well...
But Cadillac promoted it as the true sporty car in their lineup; not like those hopeless awful land barges that they sell designed in America (
).
So why buy a Seville?
All of the cars still riding on the old FWD platforms carried over from the 1980s were awful; including the Drug Dealer Deville, big Buicks and the terrible Oldsmobile Regency. The Bonneville was pretty decent, but the brand new Grand Prix made it pointless. The Seville really was a sportier, more solid car than anything else GM offered at the time (Grand Prix GTP perhaps excluded), and decidedly different than the Aurora in practice even if not on paper. It still was obviously a flagship for the Cadillac range and the entire corporation.
Then, two years later:
Everything else moved to same platform. And there was suddenly precious little difference between the Deville and the Seville (other than how 🤬 ugly it was). Yes, you could get the Deville with bench seats, cloth interior, column shift and very little sporting pretensions (even no tach!). You could
also get all of the fancy performance options the Seville had standard. All of the fancy audio options it had. The car didn't drive quite as well since it was closer in parts sharing to the other G-Body cars, but who would know the idiosyncracies of the rear suspension until you had to pay to replace it? And you could also get a decent list of fancy new things that the Seville
didn't have. Like night vision (which my grandfather's had). And everything about them was like a Seville that they had spent a couple years doing little quality of life improvements. Their are more cigarette outlets in the car. Much better rear climate control options. Better designed ergonomic things, like windscreen visors of much higher quality and an art-deco sorta looking interior..
And the Seville never got any of them (apart from the redesigned Northstar, and interior revisions that were probably just shared to keep costs down), presumably for the same reason as above with the STSi, so why buy a Seville after 2000? GM didn't seem to know why either, since the Deville
continued to get new things that the Seville didn't (cooled seats and heated steering wheel being the ones that piss me off the most, but also turn signal indicators in the mirrors); with MagneRide and HID lights being the sole exceptions in the other direction (with the former admittedly being a big deal).
So why buy a Seville?
And the aftermarket, it noticed. Before the Deville, they had taken the time to design parts for it. Parts in line with its mission, even. Cat-back exhausts:
3 piece low-profile spoilers:
And similar such things. No BMW level of support, but certainly nearly unheard of for a Cadillac. But then the Deville came out. And everything vanished. So when the car tuning and modification culture was revitalized a couple years later, the Lexus ES and Deville and even the Lincoln LS got some love. But the Seville got nothing.
So why buy a Seville?
Or if you wanted to spend quite a bit less, now you could get a car that was about as sporty (and for a couple years with bigger wheels on wider tires!), with similar styling and a good amount of similar features available in the top dog model (albeit built to lower quality) and some that also weren't available on the Seville (like the HUD) and a drivetrain combo that wasn't coming to be known as toxic like the Northstar. Immediately after the Seville STS was discontinued, GM started equipping these with Northstars and strut tower bars and bigger brakes from the police spec Impala that all existed when the Seville was in production. But the Sigma STS was coming and is gonna beat back the E39, so they'll focus on that instead.
So why buy a Seville?
Or now you could buy the new Aurora (if you were willing to buy a car from a brand that was about to die), which just launched its second generation which had a long list of improvements that were
very similar to the improvements the Seville had over the 4th Generation Seville. Even though it was already very similar to the 5th generation Seville before. And was quite a bit cheaper, especially in its new V6 form.
So why buy a Seville?
And going from that:
Why did that exist
at all, with it's cheapo grey plastic cladding and no smoked signal lights or fog lights and 16 inch wheels on grandpa-spec tires and grey plastic inserts instead of actual woodgrain. Before 2000? Sure,
maybe you didn't want an Aurora and
maybe you knew the Deville was terrible in comparison. But the margin was much narrower than it was in 1992-1997, and it
did not exist after 2000; and you could option your SLS to a performance and equipment level to very close to the STS until 2001 anyway.
And yet that was the model that held the Seville's name after 2003 (albeit with much more standard equipment at that point, probably again just to save GM costs), so as not to confuse the Seville STS with GM's lord and savior, the Sigma-based STS; which will save Cadillac and finally complete the turnaround they have worked on since 1992.
So why buy a Seville?
Look
at this post. Look at how much care clearly went into the car every year to make sure that car wasn't hopeless by the time
this one was ready.
Now look specifically at this 1996 Seville:
Now look at this 1998 Seville, which is completely different and much improved; but it
sure doesn't look it does it?:
Now look at this 2003 Seville:
Look at this 1998 Deville:
Now look at this 2003 Deville:
So why buy a Seville?
And there's more than that. You know the CD touch screen navigation system starting in 2000 came with audio and video input wired to the glove box? It may very well be the first car on the market with auxiliary audio input. And the later greatly improved state of the art (shared supplier with Lexus!) DVD touch screen navigation system had the same.
If you lived in Europe and decided you want a Cadillac. US models didn't bother to have it wired.
Mine does now.
All of the previous Cadillac range had had strut bars of differing thickness as standard equipment as well; albeit with cars with dramatically more willowy chassis. This sporty flagship Cadillac taking the fight to BMW with it's brand new chassis that is one of the strongest on the market came standard with heavy duty cooling, Z-Rated tires, and a big strut tower bar.
If you lived in
Japan and decided for God know's what reason you wanted a car that conformed to no size or displacement regulations whatsoever and had no dealer network. Even Germany didn't get the tower bar (not that the car really needs it, admittedly, but they sure as hell slapped
one in the Bonneville).
Mine does now.
The police spec version of one of the most awful cars on the road had quite the performance package, with 17 inch wheels with bigger brakes than any of the other cars GM sold bar Camaro/Firebird and Corvette:
This admittedly also included the Gran Prix GTP and Bonneville SSEi for cars ridiculously left out of the big brake parade. But most egregiously was the Seville, which had the same brakes (perfectly fine but definitely not the best) that it had always had since it debuted (even though the previous model had upgraded its brakes several times) and never went to the ones GM designed for what was essentially fleet use.
Mine does now.
This 300 hp, 300 lb-ft car with the ability and desire to be flat-footed at every stoplight even better and more controlled than any other car with the engine combo is wholly lacking anything to hold the engine at place except the rubber hydraulic engine mounts, unlike every other car Cadillac had sold in the past decade with more than 150 horsepower.
Including, even, the stubby Grand Am looking piece of crap sold until 1991:
That means that front engine mounts are essentially wear items on
all G-Bodies until the DTS/Lucerne, but the Seville came first and notably didn't have any bracing.
Mine does now.
But it's okay, because the Sigma-based STS is just around the corner, five model years away. That will turn everything around for Cadillac. The E39 BMW is screwed then. No one will
dare do anything like this:
To one of those.
So why buy a Seville?
Seriously, hopelessly uncool. I'd buy one again in a hearbeat if I can find another as good as mine was; but oh boy I'm glad I didn't spend no 🤬 $62,000 on it in 2003.
What was that kid's name?
