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2K views 13 replies 10 participants last post by  I~LUV~Caddys8792 
#1 ·
Hello, I just joined the forum a few days ago. I don’t own a Caddy, but I grew up with them. I am a car nut and still have a giant soft spot for the old 70’s malaise-era models.

Thought you might like to hear my story about Cadillacs and the big role they played in my life over two decades.


I remember the day my dad bought our very first Caddy. It was an overcast day in May, 1975. I was in the first grade and was heading home from school. When I got off the bus, I saw a gigantic SDV sitting in the driveway. Jennifer blue to be exact, with blue vinyl top and cloth maherajjah (sp?) seats.

Man was it cool!

As a little kid, I always felt like a prince in that car. I remember my dad and I taking it to the car wash on Saturday mornings. He loved to drive it, and drive it slow. And whenever he made a right turn (like into a driveway), he’d first cut the wheel a little bit to the left, just like big-rigs do.

Why did he do that? Because that was what made driving a Cadillac so much damn fun!

I don’t have to tell you guys that the thing was big. I would assume that anybody on this Board that owns a pre-’77 Cadillac also had to clean out your garage so the car would fit with adequate clearance for the garage door.

I remember our ‘75 didn’t hold up very well. After all, it was a malaise-era GM car. After just 3 short years, the left rear quarter panel was showing major signs of rust. Three extra large, arolea-sized (hehehe) blisters appeared between the rub strip and metal, hidden only by Jennifer’s own sky-colored paint. Also, the power steering pump went out rather prematurely. Couldn’t have had more than 36,000 miles on the odo...

Oh well, it was a good excuse for us to trade it in. Dad didn't like to keep cars all that long anyway.

Caddy #2 was a ’78, a champagne colored SDV d’Elegance, with velour seats and the casket-handle door pulls. As a kid I really thought the whole d’Elegance thing was something really special. Maybe it was…but looking back on it now, I realize it was nothing more than a trim job with a padded elk-grain vinyl roof, opera lamps, pillow seats, and the aforementioned caskets, all of which placed the car just a half-step below a FWB. And since the ’77 downsizing, when GM decided to kill the FWB-only D platform (why GM, why!?!?), there really wasn’t any point to buying a FWB anyway.

That’s alright, an SDV “d'E” is still pretty special in my book…even to this day.

But man, that ‘78 was a glutton for punishment. Just six weeks after driving it off the dealer’s lot it was rear-ended. Insurance refused to total the car; instead, the body shop did a half-ass frame straightening job and the car was never the same again. The rear sat too high, and the entire car was a little cockeyed. A new set of tires was needed about every 20k miles because of excessive wear.

The abuse didn’t stop there. The car had me to deal with too.

For starters, I consecrated the car when I puked all over the floor of the back seat. Just couldn’t get the door open in time, ya know?

Then, a few years later, I turned 16. Yep, the car didn’t stand a chance.

Actually I’m grateful that I had the privilege of learning how to drive in our big Cadillac. Driving it was always damn enjoyable experience if you ask me, and it's something I’ll always remember. I loved that fingertip steering and the feel of that hard plastic tiller, the easy throttle tip-in, and the sheer feeling of mass when I hurled it around corners.

Although it didn’t have more than 60-70k miles on the odo at the time, by 1983 it just wasn’t running well. Not sure what the diagnosis was, but some idiot mechanic “solved” the problem by increasing the idle.

Anyway, one day after school I decided to flip the air cleaner lid and take the Cad for a spin around the block. No harm in that, right? Hearing the sound of copious amounts of air being sucked into that big old 4BBL is good for the soul, isn’t it?

Well, yes and no.

The car did eventually recover from my mild hooning, but I’ll never forget pulling into the garage after that and listening to the engine sputter and then diesel to a stop some time after I turned the key off.

Although it was a luxurious car, my dad never liked the ‘78 as much as the ’75. The ’78 just didn’t have the as much cache I guess. And it didn’t ride as smoothly. For me, the one thing that always got under my butt (literally) was the velour pillow-style seats. They’d always pull at my jeans and underwear and give me an instant wedgie. You could always see me fidgeting around in that car and never get comfortable. Or, if I finally ever did, it was only when it was time to get out of the car anyway.

Caddy #3 was a sad ’85 FWD SDV. This one was wine colored with cream leather. Although I was mightily impressed with the level of technology Cadillac added to the SDV line in the 1980s -- unit-body construction, front-wheel drive, digital readouts for the stereo and a/c, and a couple of on-board diagnostic computers -- the car itself certainly wasn’t much to write home about.

It had a plasticky dashboard compared to the older models, and the styling can best be described as…fugly. Torque steer reared its ugly head (but, strangely, only when Iwas behind the wheel!), and the 4.1L – a direct descendant of the 472/500/425 I believe (can anybody here confirm?) was a dog. The upright seating position and thin seats felt funny and the whole car didn’t feel like, well, a Cadillac.

Interestingly, the ’85 still had the traditional Cadillac Emergency Trash-Can in the passenger footwell. Well, what the hell else are you supposed to call it? I always got a kick out of those things. The thought of having a trash can inside your car is funny. What are you going to throw in there, old drumsticks from KFC?

Interestingly, the “least Cadillac” Cadillac proved to be much more reliable than either the ’75 or ’78. With the FI engine and CCC, the car always started on the first try and ran no questions asked. Look out for the el cheapo-GM-beancounter-serpentine belt though, because the day that went, the car just slowly guided over to the shoulder of the road where it sat until the tow truck could take care of things.

My dad’s next Cad was a ’90 Seville. That car was actually pretty ok. It was black with pimptastic maroon colored button-tufted leather. Again, not a real head-turner, but it actually drove decent for a FWD car (if you hadn’t noticed, Ia m not a fan of FWD). And because it was a small car, and with Cadillac increasing the size of the V8 to 4.5L, it actually had decent pickup off the line.

Another very reliable car, the ‘90 went seven years with no real problems to speak of. I thought it was cool because it was my dad’s first Seville, a step up from the SDV line (by 1990 that step had become only theoretical). He proudly affixed his gold “Cadillac IV” badge to the grill, signifying to the world that he was in that exclusive club of Americans who bought alot of new Caddies in their lifetime.

I was also impressed by Cadillac’s attempt to appease foreign luxury car shoppers by adding real wood to the dash and console. I never had a problem with Caddy’s plastiwood, I thought it always looked pretty nice. However, I did get a laugh at how sparingly the real stuff was used in the Seville line. I could imagine the GM beancounters sitting around a table telling the designers to make the wood strips “as thin as possible” in order to shave a couple more dollars off production costs.

Sadly, my Cadillac story ends here. Because my dad hasn’t driven a Cadillac – or any GM car for that matter – in over a decade. He’s had a variety of cars since then, including a Jag and several Chrysler products, and he currently drives a Pacifica. He has no plans to head over to the local Cadillac dealer anytime soon. “They just don’t make anything I like anymore”, he says.


These days, when we get together and reminisce about way back when, his eyes light up at the mere mention of that old Jennifer blue ’75. He loves to tell stories about the way that huge 500 rumbled with authority, just how damn big that car was, and how he even had a blue leisure suit that perfectly matched the car.

Boy, what a great car!

I know he misses it as much as I do.
 
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#2 ·
Welcome!

My love for Cadillacs came from my Father as well. It is a hobby for both of us and some could call it a addiction!
 
#3 ·
Find an old '75 -- they're probably not that expensive...
 
#4 ·
A few Pacifica payments would buy plenty of old-school Caddy goodness.

If you ask me, the true GM "malaise" (Carter administration tie-ins notwithstanding) didn't hit until 1982 or so. Performance and reliability weren't the best in the late '70s, but things got a whole hell of a lot worse a few years down the line. In retrospect, GM made some damn fine cars in the late seventies.
 
#6 ·
I suppose so about the malaise period. I can only imagine how slow the big guys with the 4.1L's were. We had other GM cars too, like the 80's Buick Century with 3.0L V6. Truly an awful car in the dynamic sense. No style, no power, no guts. Got you from A to B, nothing more. I just can't help but think about cars like the mid-70's Corvettes with their 305's and anemic 350's and urethane 5-MPH bumpers.

Guess as time goes on I appreciate that more.

What's really interesting to me is that most of the tech in the 70's Cads actually dates back to the 50's-60's. The 8.2L and 7.0L engines are can be traced back to the 50's, and still used carbeurators (mostly); the body-on-frame construction was nothing new in the 70's either. Wondering what year the platform for the '75 debuted? Was it late 60' and they kept plopping new body styles on it, or was it all new in the early 70's? I also wonder what the differences are between them..
 
#5 ·
#7 ·
i still don't get what's so bad about the 80's! besides the downsizing and the cimaron and the alante and the small v8's.... ok wait. now i get whats so bad about the 80's haha. but seriously. my '85 brougham d'elegance has never failed to start once! the engines coming up to 120k and the whole car is immaculate. sure the power just isn't there but it's really not that bad. a well-maintained engine can go farther than most if properly taken care of.

i must agree, the "golden age" of cadillacs was really the early-mid 70's...
even though its not from the 70's, i still get a thrill when i start the 8.2 liter in my '69.

god i love cadillacs
 
#8 · (Edited)
Hey Lochenjons, I know what you mean, I love 80's caddies too, but they are really not up to quality and drive ability standards that the cars they competed with were, when new. Initially, Engines were the big downfall for the 80's The diesel was standard in their flagship in 1980, by 81 you could have a self destructing gutless diesel Or the shaky, stalling V8-6-4, by 82 it was the diesel or the self destructing gutless ht4100 , (yes if you baby the 4100 you can get many years out of it, but no other luxury cars of the time required that kind of babying, and they all had more power AND got similar gas mileage ). Then the downsizing, cloning styling mistakes of 1985 pretty much nearly did them in.( RWD broughams, excepted) . I still drive an 89 lincoln lsc, way WAY better car then the eldorado's it competed with (2 generations of Eldo) It has a much better engine, way more power, better fit and finish, interior and exterior finish and materials just of higher quality and have stood the tests of time, plus more easily available, and inexpensive parts, and I've had 80's town cars, same thing, couldn't kill them, parts are cheep and they are more powerful then any Caddy of the times..but they never had the legendary Cadillac FEEL.. no lamp monitors for instance, no trunk pull down motors ( until late 80's at least, and my 64 caddy had that!) but I still LOVE the looks, and feel of the Cadillac, I can get behind the wheel of any Cadillac made in the past 50 years and it "fits" me, I can reach everything, I intuitively know how to operate everything, and I really appreciate the tilt AND telescoping steering wheels, and host of other luxury touches that for many years were Cadillac exclusives...
Oh, and by the way, the Allante wasn't a mistake.. that is one of the shining spots for Cadillac of that time.. (of course I'm WAY biased here, I own one and love it) :want:
OOOPS, I guess I just said everything you did in your opening sentence, sorry, didn't mean to ramble, fact is, I've never met a Cadillac I didn't like..:)

Matt
 
#9 ·
For me, the Golden Age of Cadillacs was the '50s and '60s. The '40s and '30s must be included, too.

I like the '71-'76 Cads, but the pre-'71s had more power, better build quality and less plastic.

BTW, I've heard that the '74s had a rust problem, especially around the vinyl roof in the sail panel area, because the metal was thinner there than in previous years.
 
#11 ·
For the 80's - agreed the RWD Caddies were good except for some of the engine choices, after all they were the same car as the one from the 70's.

Also, haven't mentioned the Eldos from 79-85 which were good cars, engines excepted. Their styling was a homerun, still looking fresh even today.
 
#12 ·
I always loved the mid 70's Caddy boats----Jesus, they were HUGE! Looking back on just the massive size that Cadillac had to offer back then,the only model made comparably big since then were the '94-'96 Fleetwoods.
Every now and then i see one those behemoths parked way out away from other vehicles in a shopping mall parking lot---you know they won`t fit in todays downsized parking spaces.
 
#13 ·
I agree with Fleet. The legendary Cadillacs were from the 50's and 60's. They are still usable and can handle freeway speeds. 30's and 40's were also legendary, but practical mostly for shows now.
I have a 1968 DeVille Convertible that has never had a ring job in over 280 K miles and runs strong and has been very reliable as a weekend car and people hauler for over 30 years. Top up it is a great way for 6 people to attend an event that requires car-pooling to be practical. Top down on a sunny day and everyone in the other cars around you smile, wave and even cheer as it glides down the boulevard!
 
#14 ·
Agreed. I love the plush luxury feel and sheer excess of the '74-'76 models, but the 68-70 models I like most because of the assertive, powerful lines and the extremely torquey high compression 472. Nothing says Americana to me like a '68-'70 deVille Convertible.
 
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