My Hoopty - 3 Pedal CTS-V

[wawazat]

I have always had a fun car since I graduated high school. This is my most recent project that I bought with 48k miles from the original owners about 6 years ago. Car felt fast bone stock for about 3 months, but I also had a fully built Nissan road race car at the time that made me want more out of this. I sold the Nissan to a friend and started throwing parts at the Caddy. At first it was pretty basic bolt ons to enjoy while I gathered parts to really go to town on it. Fate stepped in first and I cracked the piston crown on cylinder 5 due to running a little too rich and really hot summer air.

Things escalated quickly from here. LSX block with piston squirters added, all forged internals, cam, worked over heads with the biggest intake valve that would fit on stock bore, cam, headers, 3rd fuel pump, flex fuel, etc, etc, etc.

The car now makes 740whp and 708tq on E50 with a very mild pulley ratio. I am still debating if I want to do one more round of parts before I actively start trying to sell the car. With the new house, a couple of kids, and life in general, there is just too much competition for my time to spend hours in the garage tinkering with stuff. I just worry about regret if I dont have something fun to mess with when time is available.

It lives on a spare set of rear wheels running drag radials full time so to keep the drama down while trying to pass someone or have a little fun. With the normal street tires, any aggressive acceleration below 70mph just turns into smoke and swaying hips haha.

 

[wawazat]

Interior Pics

 

[wawazat]

To explain my internal battle on whether I do one more round of parts or not, I should explain my goal for the car when I originally bought it. I wanted a comfy 4 door car that would go over 175mph in a half mile. It takes a LOT to get a 4500lb car to go that fast and there is a lot of strain on the drivetrain to handle the load. When I spec'd out the internals for the LSX block, I wanted to allow for enough ring gap to handle hours on the highway in the summer while making a minimum of 800whp boost only for the occasional romp on an open stretch. For the track, I wanted to be able to use nitrous to both cram more oxygen around the blower and help cool off the intake charge. The setup was built around reliably handling at least 1200whp on a track setting with spray and 800whp in something that could be driven every day.

I never got around to ordering parts for the nitrous setup and just enjoyed driving it in nice weather with warm roads and cool air as well as the occasional commute from OKC to Tulsa. It is such a mild mannered car in normal driving conditions that it catches you off guard when you lean on it a little. I really enjoy driving it, but you better have your milk money saved up for a road trip haha. On E85, I average about 10mpg around town with normal modest driving. A spirited drive around NW OKC typically sees between 7-8mpg hahaha. It is worth it and I am sure I will miss it if I let go of it.

 

[Timmy59]

When's my turn to drive, I wanta smoke'm and grin from ear to ear.. Items such as that turn me into a kid again.. Very nice caddy..

 

[Hodrod]

There is nothing like a Cadillac with lots and lots of HP.............style and grace with power to match.....

 

[DaveinOKC]

Nice, did you have the blower ported? Stay stock displacement or bump up. What cam did you go with? I have an LSA that I am putting in my 69 Camaro in the future.

Dave

 

[wawazat]

Nice, did you have the blower ported? Stay stock displacement or bump up. What cam did you go with? I have an LSA that I am putting in my 69 Camaro in the future.

Dave

I had the snout ported for a 90mm throttle body when I first swapped the upper pulley on the stock bottom end. The blower case is stock though. The cam is from GPTuning, Matt calls it a 2.5 but it pairs up really well with the WCCH heads, 9.8:1 compression, and won't hold nitrous back.

If you are wanting to mod the LSA, I highly recommend cruising CTSVOwners.com. There are some incredibly smart guys on there.

This engine would be rowdy as hell in a smaller, lighter car. Definitely go for it as soon as you can! My real hope if I sell this car is to find a solid driver quality 66-67 Nova to enjoy for now and have some cash leftover to get some padding back that our builder screwed off.

 

[HoLeChit]

This engine would be rowdy as hell in a smaller, lighter car. Definitely go for it as soon as you can! My real hope if I sell this car is to find a solid driver quality 66-67 Nova to enjoy for now and have some cash leftover to get some padding back that our builder screwed off.

when you find that nova, let me know so I can show you some stuff that will blow the savings again, haha. Have a buddy who’s dad has a nova that he dropped an LSX454 in it after a complete from the ground up restoration/modernization. The car is amazing.

I’ve always loved V’s, actually test drove one that put 760ish down on E, that was an exciting test drive, salesman wasn’t super excited when I lit the tires up at 75mph going down Broadway extension. What’s funny is I saw it online, when I showed up to talk to the salesman about it he was all “it’s modded and fast”. Last car I drove that I was told was “modded and fast” was a mustang GT that someone put intake and exhaust on. I had to hide the grin on my face when that caddy came chopping around the corner like Paul Bunyan.

I say if you wanna throw some more parts at it, I would go for it. It’s your project, have fun with it! I definitely think throwing a bottle or two in the back will be more than worth it. Have you done any work to the tranny?

 

[RickN]

Keep that thing away from my wife! She has enough speeding tickets.

 

[cjjtulsa]

"Three pedal"......God bless you.

Cool car - I'd have trouble letting it go.