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Cadillac Seville
1st Generation (1976-79)
The Cadillac Seville debuted in mid-1975 as a 1976 model. It was based on GM's X-body platform (Buick Skylark, Chevy Nova, etc) but was available only as a 4-door sedan (some claim it was basically a Nova in a tuxedo). The Seville was intended to compete more equally with the European imports of the day, such as the Jaguar XJ-6 and BMW 5-series. It was available with all the usual Cadillac bells and whistles of the day, but an interesting thing about the 1st generation Seville is that Cadillac, in a very bold move, actually priced the base Seville higher than the larger DeVille and Eldorado models - and it still became a huge sales success nonetheless. It was powered by a fuel-injected Oldsmobile-built 350 cid V8. The Seville became the first Cadillac in many decades to be powered by a non-Cadillac engine, but the public obviously didn't care very much. 1977 and 1978 Sevilles carried on with little change other than revised grilles and such, but 1979 became famous (or infamous) for introducing the Oldsmobile 350 diesel V8 engine as an option. The diesel at first became a fairly popular option, but quickly gained several reputations for being notoriously unreliable, as well as smelly, noisy, unrefined, slow... and generally just a very unpleasant powerplant. The rear-drive X-body chassis would expire across the board at the end of 1979.
2nd Generation (1980-85)
The Seville would become an entirely different animal in 1980, to put it mildly. It was now based on GM's new front wheel drive E-body chassis that it shared with the Eldorado coupe (also shared with the Buick Riviera and Oldsmobile Toronado)... but its styling was like no other at the time (probably a good thing). The most obvious change was the new "bustleback" rear end, supposedly mimicking a 1930's Rolls Royce, in which some called "distinctive" while some called it downright ugly. And if that wasn't enough, the Oldsmobile 350 diesel engine was now actually standard this year (Cadillac actually bragged about being the only car company in its ads that had a diesel engine as standard, which I'm sure to them seemed like a good idea at the time). The new gas engine this year was a Cadillac-built 6.0L 368 cid V8, and was thankfully available as a credit option. 1981 Sevilles had 2 new engines available. In addition to the diesel and the 6.0 V8, a Buick-built 4.1L 252 V6 became available, but the most interesting one was the "V-8-6-4", based on the 6.0 V8. It was an idea quite ahead of its time, and ironically GM and Chrysler are now using a similar technology in their V8s today... but alas the technology just wasn't there to make it work in 1981, and the engine was unceremoniously dumped after this one year. It became quite a troublesome engine, and to top it off, it yielded virtually no gas mileage benefits compared to the "regular" 6.0 V8, so it looked like Cadillac went to alot of trouble for nothing and ended up with alot of unhappy customers in the process. 1982 was the year for Cadillac's all-new HT 4100, a 125 hp 4.1L 250 cid all-aluminum V8. The V-8-6-4 and the regular 6.0 V8 were dropped this year, leaving the diesel, the Buick 4.1 V6 and Cadillac's new HT 4100 V8 (if you're getting the idea that Cadillac really had nothing to offer its customers by way of any engine of any kind of authoritative power, you'd be right). 1983, 1984 and 1985 Sevilles carried on with no appreciative change of any kind. Sales of this generation were never really that great, customers quickly grew tired of its odd bustleback styling, it had incredibly lame engine choices, and none of them had what you'd call exemplary repair records. A change was needed, and that's what it got in 1986.
