2006 Cadillac DTS: The last stalwart at Cadillac gets a sportier shape.

[TahoeMikeZ71]

http://www.caranddriver.com/shortroa...illac-dts.html



Short Take Review: 2006 Cadillac DTS - Short Take Road Tests


The last stalwart at Cadillac gets a sportier shape.

BY ROBIN WARNER, PHOTOGRAPHY BY AARON KILEY
September 2006
Cadillac has updated its sole remaining front-drive car, the DeVille, the only Cadillac left from the old school of big cars for white-haired guys. The 2006 model has a sportier shape, a new interior, even a new name. It’s now simply a DTS.
Not surprisingly, the DTS now sports Cadillac’s revisionist signature grille and a degree of the current knife-edge styling seen on CTS and STS models. But the DTS is still pinned to the familiar G-platform, GM’s front-drive, large-sedan structure that debuted on the then-new 2000 DeVille and is also used on the Buick Lucerne, a big front-drive GM sibling that invites comparison.

The DTS is mechanically identical to a V-8 Lucerne — both use the 4.6-liter Northstar engine and a four-speed automatic transmission — but the Cadillac is 4.4 inches longer and one inch wider. As a result, the DTS gets more back-seat room (55 cubic feet compared with the Buick’s 51) and 19 cubic feet of trunk space, two more than in the Buick. But that size also contributes to the Cadillac’s additional 212 pounds over the Buick’s even two tons, so it can’t quite keep up with the Lucerne. The DTS needs seven seconds to reach 60 mph and 15.4 seconds at 92 mph to cover the quarter-mile, 0.1 second off the Buick’s pace in both tests [“Buick Lucerne CXS,” C/D, March 2006].
Our test car was a “performance sedan” with the 1SE preferred-equipment option. That gets the buyer a small bump in horsepower, 291 instead of 275, and a small drop in torque, six pound-feet less than the usual 292. The 1SE also has a different shift algorithm and suspension tuning, although it doesn’t make the DTS feel like what we would call a performance sedan. The car felt like the soft-riding Lucerne, and as noted earlier, it isn’t any quicker. But for a car this large and nose heavy (over 60 percent of its weight rests on the front tires), its body motions seem well controlled. Even during a spirited, tire-squealing trip around an interstate on-ramp, the DTS takes a relatively flat set and maintains course. And although the bucket seats are about as supportive as a theater loge, you’ll only manage 0.77 g of grip anyway, not enough to break the butt-to-leather-seat seal. Again, that grip level is respectable for a car of this nature but nothing we would label high performance. We were unable to measure skidpad grip for the Lucerne, but given that both cars came equipped with 18-inch wheels wrapped with Bridgestone Turanza EL400 touring tires, we’d expect similar results. That holds true for braking as well. Our test car needed 178 feet to stop from 70 mph, one foot more than the Buick.


Read more at link: http://www.caranddriver.com/shortroa...illac-dts.html

[giagastormer]

Not a bad review. Very impressive interior.

[asim]

Originally Posted by giagastormer

Not a bad review. Very impressive interior.

The interior is pretty good, as long as it isn't in gray. Gray ruins pretty much every car these days, it looks way to plasticky in gray, even in the DTS.

At least there is a bow tie derivative in the DTS, unlike everything else GM is doing these days.

[mbukukanyau]

Cadillac should kill this dog and make a new DTS in its place.
They say it compete the Lexus LS
(Ahem!)

[TahoeMikeZ71]

Originally Posted by mbukukanyau

Cadillac should kill this dog and make a new DTS in its place.
They say it compete the Lexus LS
(Ahem!)

They are. In 2009/10 it's going on the LWB Zeta platform.

[PsychoBueller]

This car's only been out for a year. Glad they finally got around to driving it. I guess Lamborghinis and Ferraris on the cover sell magazines, but I'd like to see more timely reviews of new/heavily updated models that most people could actually afford to buy.

[megeebee]

Ok review. Nice car. But I hate that old steering wheel.

And this is WAY off topic, but this article is the most hateful example of something that's been knawing at me for years now, and I'm gonna say somthin':


I am absolutely utterly sick to death of condecending and insulting references to older people. And before anyone asks, I'm 48. Older people have to be the last segment of the population that is still acceptable to disperage in print. Would the world allow such things to be weritten about any other group based on any other factor? Race? Economic background? Sexuality? Gender? Of course not! And that's the way it should be! But no other segment of the population gets derided and sneered at, ESPECIALLY in the automotive press, like those over 60. Those pictures in the article were just the last straw. I'm writing to the magazine as well, but it's not the only one that so happily and sniedly indulges in this kind of yellow journalism.


Thanks for your patience.

[Jesda]

Old people smell bad and young people are noisy and stupid.

NEXT!