:) Hey guys i Just bought an '04 CTS 3.6 and am in love with it. i love that there is such a big comunity behing this car and hope that i can both learn and help others with any questions that come up. that said i have a couple of questions that I hope some here can aid me in:

I want to get 18" rims for it and need to get all season tires (winter snow). any recommendations?? dont want to slip and slide but at the same time do not want to change them every 10k miles.

I have a non BOSE system, can i add it afterwards? what about XM?

Can heated seats be added to this car if they are not added by the factory? there is a local junkyard that has a '05 with heated seats but not sure if this is a bolt on or if there is wiring involved.

thanks all!!!!

The 18" wheels selections are many, just look through the show me a pic of your ride thread. The 06 18" wheels, 9 spoke and 12 spoke are nice as well(and I'm sure pricey). I have the Michelin Exaulto's that have a 50K mile warranty, but there a bunch of good selections here, check out that thread as well.
The heated seats can be added, but you will also need to change the A/C head unit to activate those seats. It might have that setting on your current one, check with the dealer.
As to the Radio, I have the none Bose unit. It's better to upgrade the speakers and amp. I have Infinity Reference Component speakers in front (6 1/4"),back door Reference Co-ax's (5 1/4), MTX 4 channel amp, and a 100 watt self powered bazooka tube (8"). With the wires and added parts for install, I have $800 in the system. This thing has better sound and depth of clarity then the Bose unit. ( The Bose does sound nice). All our stock speakers are paper coned. They probably have a 4-5 year shelf life before they become sound issue's. My wife's 99 Durango's Infinity's made it 5 years and then the voice coils started to rot due to the Fla heat and humidity. The stock amp has very little power behind it and will work if you only want to upgrade the door speakers. However if you big sound with clarity, upgrading the amp is the way to go. I went the powered tube for my sub (less expensive and I'm not into rattling base. You can buy a 5 channel amp and run all the speakers and an open air sub, or if trunk space is not an issue, run a boxed sub.
Good Luck with your soon to be modding addiction and Welcome to the forum!

you wanna know what tires to get??? 245 45 R18 TOYO PROXES 4. I have recently bought these tires and I love them. I too wanted a nice 18 inch all season (for snow) and these work perfectly. Of course these are high perfrmance all seasons, so they wont be as good in the snow, but you can still use them. If you want more of a snow tire and summer tire then you may have to downgrade your performance aspect of the tire.

Where is the "show me a picture of your ride" thread? The search function isn't working for me.

Thanks for the Info. B Hoth, is the heated seat issue similar to activating xm with a scan tool? just dial it up and activate it? thanks

The Bose system has a completely different amp pinout and speakers than the base system. I don't believe anyone to date has retrofitted one, since the harnessing is completely different between the two. It's possible, but would be a royal pain in the rear. If you get the schematics and pinouts from the service manual, you'll see what I'm talking about.

Ditto for factory XM. If you didn't get it from the factory, the tuner and harnessing are not even in the car, and GM won't sell them to you. Alas, all is not lost. Radios and More makes a kit to retrofit and XMDirect tuner to the factory head unit for cheaper than Cadillac charges for their factory tuner, if you chose to have that factory option. No Tech2 programming required, and it works just like factory through your DIC or Nav.

Here's the how-to on installing the XM:

http://www.cadillacfaq.com/faq/answers/xminstall/index.html

Retrofitting heated seats is another story. I don't know how plug-n-play it would be, but you'll have to get the A/C control panel (with the heated seat switches and single board computer in it), the wire harnessing, as well as the seats. I've read about non-factory installs, which entail inserting flat heaters under the upholstery, and installing new wiring and switches. It won't look factory, but will be functional.

Thanks Odysseus. i gues im just surprised that they would take the extra time to make different harnesses. ususally its the same cabling all around bu i guess not in this case :confused: . i've been looking around and saw a really nice car PC on a CTS. im thinking about doing that rather than spending a whole lot of time on a system that will probably not do what i need.

What are you trying to do? Add a soundsystem? Just add Bose?? Install Nav???

Ok i guess i need to focus. I wanted to add a nav system to the car and put the bose system in. this would cost me over 2.5k (1500 for the nav + parts and 1500 fir the bose). i looked in the forums and saw i can do all the things i need plus with a car PC for around 1500 (750 for the PC, 750 for the sound system). so im guessing im going to go with a PC. I'll open a new thread on this subject when i get some specifics on what parts I will use. thanks for all the peoples help in this

skippy: talk with mbai2 about a carputer. His is pretty sick.

Ya Mbai is the man when it comes to this stuff!! Make sure you talk to him and check out what he did, he will have lots of info for you