Cadillac CTS coupe concept joins sedan in Sydney

Has Cadillac got the drop on its principal rivals in Australia? Whilst other marques competing in luxury and prestige market segments have chosen not to attend this year's Australian International Motor Show at the Darling Harbour Convention Centre in Sydney, Cadillac has made its debut here with the radically styled CTS in both sedan and coupe form.

The illustrious GM-owned luxury car maker will be distributed in Australia by the GM Premium Brands network, with 16 dealers throughout Australia and New Zealand already on board to sell the American cars. Whether the public will accept Cadillac as a competitor to companies such as Audi and BMW remains to be seen, but the CTS is a car that might just sway opinion.

The CTS is built on GM's costly and sophisticated Sigma platform which rides on a short/long arm (SLA) front suspension system more like the one that Ford fits to the local Falcon than the simpler MacPherson-strut system in Holden's Commodore. At the rear, the suspension is a multi-link independent system. Cadillac is offering Australian CTS buyers the choice of two suspension packages, standard stability control and airbags for front, side and side-curtain applications.

The CTS has been the foremost example of Cadillac's 'Art and Science' look, which is bound to polarise opinion in this country. A further step in the evolution of this theme, the CTS Coupe has been styled under the guiding hand of former Holden designer, Mike Simcoe -- the man who led the team that designed the 21st Century Monaros.

In America, the CTS has been a very successful model for Cadillac and the right-hand drive units being exported to Australia are the second generation model, introduced late last year. Cadillac's sales have risen by almost 60 per cent in the US, just since the introduction of this new car in 2007. In a critical sense, as well as commercially, the CTS has runs on the board, having secured American magazine Motor Trend's '2008 Car of the Year' award.

"With cutting edge design, serious performance and a comprehensive package of luxury appointments, Cadillac will appeal to prestige car buyers and offer a genuine alternative to the traditional European brands," said Director of GM Premium Brands, Parveen Batish, explaining how Cadillac might appeal to buyers.

For Australian buyers, the only drivetrain available in the CTS will be the 3.6-litre direct-injection petrol V6, which is based on the same HFV6 engine architecture as the local Commodore's Alloytech engines. This engine, which is designed to run on standard 91 RON petrol, develops 227kW of power and 370Nm of torque, driving to the rear wheels through GM's 6L50 six-speed automatic transmission with sequential shifting facility.

For testing, GM's suspension engineers took the CTS to Europe and pounded it around the Nurburgring to determine it was up to the task of dynamically matching European rivals from BMW (5 Series) and Mercedes-Benz (E-Class). Wheels are 18-inch alloys in a nine-spoke design and the CTS is equipped with a high-performance four-wheel disc braking system.

GM is not letting much out about the CTS ahead of the car's on-sale date early next year, but does admit that the CTS will feature a quality interior with hand-cut and sewn (French stitching) trim elements, an "innovative" theatre-style ambient interior lighting system and an audio system with iPod/MP3 integration and a 40-gig hard disk. The audio system is supplied by Bose and pumps sound through ten speakers. That hard disk allows the occupants to pause or review radio broadcasts.

Other features that will be made available include heating and ventilation for the seats, cruise control, tyre-pressure monitoring, reverse parking acoustic guidance, bi-xenon adaptive headlights, keyless access/start and remote start. In addition to the standard satin metallic finish for the centre console, the CTS will be offered with the option of 'Sapele Pommele' woodgrain trim.

Not to be overshadowed by the production sedan, the CTS coupe concept on the stand is powered by a 2.9-litre turbodiesel V6 that is expected to power locally-built Holdens in due course. GM has confirmed that a production version of the coupe on the stand will be sold locally, later next year. It's likely to be available with the same petrol V6 and six-speed auto combination offered in the sedan, but turbodiesel variants are a distinct possibility in the future.

In the US, Cadillac has revealed a wagon version of the CTS, but according to Batish, not only is it uncertain to come to Australia, it's not even definite it will be built in right-hand drive.

"The first thing is: make sure it's a right-hand drive," says Batish, "and the second thing is: does it fit the market, is there a market for it?"

No such doubt about the sedan though.

"The CTS design is contemporary rather than traditional and the dramatic and sharply tailored exterior adds unique passion and attitude," says Batish about the sedan.

"Inside, Cadillac has combined advanced technologies and electronics with outstanding craftsmanship. CTS has been designed and engineered to challenge the very best in the world."

Now, it's up to the Aussie consumer to say 'yea' or 'nay' to that.

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