My new to me 2005 CTS-V!!!
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Thanks Gman!
Welcome! How do you like it so far??
Welcome to CF !!! What year is the car?
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My bad. It's a 2005
Good to know. I saw a few exterior trim hints that said it's an early model. I'll move this thread from the chit-chat Lounge up to the correct year group CTS-V repair and maintenance forum.
I recognize that car. It used to be owned by a guy with the username "crankedupforit". His name was Mike, and he passed away a number of years ago after a battle with cancer - Sad News (crankedupforit). You said you don't know a lot about the car, so what information do you know? It would be interesting to know where the car has been since Mike passed in 2014. Based on your pics, it doesn't look like anything has been removed from it - as you said, it's still set up for track work.
Here's his signature, which is still present on his old posts:
Here's his signature, which is still present on his old posts:
He was a pretty active member (over 1500 posts), so if you used the Advanced Search feature and search for his username you should be able to learn more about the car. For instance, in this thread that I started about hood venting he beat me to the punch on my idea and got his done (see post #51 and onward from there). You can see that's the hood on your car, and that's how I immediately knew which car it was.crankedupforit said:
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Hey AAIIIC,
That is really sad news. It breaks my heart to hear that. I actually did find a post he made where he posted pictures of the car. A part of me wondered if it was the car we bought. I do know the engine was built by Katech. I actually had a chance to talk to them on the phone about it. There is alot of suspension done to the car. I guess I know my mechanics and can see what was done. But I guess what I meant by I only know a little about the car, was just the history. I was told by the seller it was a track day car. So I was trying to find the history of, and the progress of the car(I enjoy stuff like that being a track guy). Thank you for the post. I'm gonna do some in depth searches for his posts. That sounds like what I'm looking for.
That is really sad news. It breaks my heart to hear that. I actually did find a post he made where he posted pictures of the car. A part of me wondered if it was the car we bought. I do know the engine was built by Katech. I actually had a chance to talk to them on the phone about it. There is alot of suspension done to the car. I guess I know my mechanics and can see what was done. But I guess what I meant by I only know a little about the car, was just the history. I was told by the seller it was a track day car. So I was trying to find the history of, and the progress of the car(I enjoy stuff like that being a track guy). Thank you for the post. I'm gonna do some in depth searches for his posts. That sounds like what I'm looking for.
Do you think the seller you got it from was the one who got it from Mike's wife? Not that it really matters, I'm just kind of curious how much it has bounced around different owners over the past 6 years or so. Based on how unchanged it is, I wouldn't be surprised if the seller has had it the whole time.
It's definitely bittersweet to see the car come back to this community. I didn't really know Mike, just "knew" him through this forum and a couple of email exchanges, but he seemed like a good guy, and he was one of the small group of folks that's foolish enough to seriously try to track these cars. Obviously he put quite a bit into making the car what it is, so it's good to see the car is in the hands of another track guy.
Suspension-wise, I think most of the things are in his signature block.
It's definitely bittersweet to see the car come back to this community. I didn't really know Mike, just "knew" him through this forum and a couple of email exchanges, but he seemed like a good guy, and he was one of the small group of folks that's foolish enough to seriously try to track these cars. Obviously he put quite a bit into making the car what it is, so it's good to see the car is in the hands of another track guy.
Suspension-wise, I think most of the things are in his signature block.
- Looks like he changed the springs on the KW coil-overs - those are the bronze-ish Swift springs, I believe. The "stock" KW V3 springs are 10kg/mm front, 9kg/mm rear (or is it N/mm? I always forget ). The Swift springs should have part numbers on them to show what rate they are, probably 12k.
- I can't tell from the pics if it's still got 2-piece rotors up front. I don't think UUC still does CTS-V parts, pretty sure they got out of the CTS-V business a while ago, so finding replacement rings may be an issue. With that said, I don't know if UUC actually did the rotors themselves, or if they sourced them from someone else. I believe Girodisc made/makes 2-piece rotors for the V1, so maybe they could help. As for the engine & transmission mounts, if the UUC stuff fails, Creative Steel makes them in a couple different flavors.
- MAP refers to MA Performance. They made those trailing arms for a bit, then stopped making them, then they reappeared for a bit. I'm not sure if they're still in the CTS-V business or not.
- SW was Spectre Works or Werkes, something like that. They disappeared a while ago. They made Delrin inserts that fit into the big voids in the mushy rear subframe mounting bushings. They looked like so - 2004-05 Cadillac CTS-V Delrin Cradle Bushing Set. "Way back in the day", that was the only option for firming up those bushings. Now you can buy complete replacement poly bushings from Revshift or Creative Steel.
- BMR is still around.
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So the gentleman that I bought it off of was actually a track guy as well. (He runs in the champ car series). He said he has had it for about 3 years and barely drove it during that 3 years due to everything else he does. So that dates back to around 2016-17ish. Now who he bought it off of I only got a little bit of information. I could ask him again how much he remembers who he bought it off of. But I feel like he had more of a story behind who he bought it off of. Not just, I bought it off Ebay. So maybe he bought it from whomever bought it from Mike's wife. When I talked to Katech they said it left their shop in 2010 with 35k miles and the car now only has 43k on it. So after it was sold it doesn't sound like it was driven alot.
Yea I noticed the UUC rotors and wondered if I could find a rotor that will bolt to UUCs hat.
Thanks for all the suspension information. Other than the sway bars, nothing else had any manufacturer logos, so I was curious what they were.
The car is definitely in good hands. I do collision repair for a living and my wife is a painter. We absolutely love these cars and fell in love with this one the second we seen it. We plan on keeping the car forever and it will always stay in the best condition possible. Also I have a terrible car obsession, I take care of them better than I do myself sometimes.
One last note, I do hope that me posting the car here doesn't upset anyone that knew Mike well. That would be the last thing I would want.
Yea I noticed the UUC rotors and wondered if I could find a rotor that will bolt to UUCs hat.
Thanks for all the suspension information. Other than the sway bars, nothing else had any manufacturer logos, so I was curious what they were.
The car is definitely in good hands. I do collision repair for a living and my wife is a painter. We absolutely love these cars and fell in love with this one the second we seen it. We plan on keeping the car forever and it will always stay in the best condition possible. Also I have a terrible car obsession, I take care of them better than I do myself sometimes.
One last note, I do hope that me posting the car here doesn't upset anyone that knew Mike well. That would be the last thing I would want.
I'm new here and certainly don't run the show, but I'm happy that you bought this slice of history back to the community and thank you for doing so.
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Thanks BMWWW, I hope to be a pretty active member here. Before buying this I only owned Fbodys (we have an 01' Trans Am and an LS swapped 84' Camaro). So other than the LS6, this platform is a little new to me but I've learned alot in the little time we've owned it.
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Hello I have just recently purchased this car and was hoping that you could give me some insight on it. I’ll upload the latest pictures but still not much changed
![599115]()
![599116]()
Welcome to the forum, and congrats on picking up a very well-prepared car! This thread covers pretty much all that anyone here knows about it. You can search for old threads by crankedupforit to find everything he ever posted about it.
interesting the other guy flipped it so quickly. Also amazing that all that suspension work and engine work but has the stock 6 lugs. They do look awesome, but seems like a track car would want wider tires.
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