05 CTS-V - Am I old now?

[EclipseTurbno93]

My vehicle life has been pretty boring as of late, I sold my motorcycle early this year, I've had the Miata going on 5 years now, the Taurus rallycar and moped are long gone. So I decided it was time to change things up a bit.

My plan was to get something that was more comfortable than the Miata for work and back, with a manual trans and more power.

So this is a 2005 Cadillac CTS-V and is approximately as far away from a Miata as you can get. 

   

   

   

   

It checks all my boxes and is substantially different from anything else I've owned up until now (4 doors, real trunk, reasonable leg room, a few "luxury" features). 

This is a 2005, which means it comes with the naturally aspirated LS6 from the C5 Z06 making 400HP. It's got a fairly low-key Magnaflow cat-back exhaust on it and as far as I know, that is the extent of the modifications. 

I don't have much in the way of plans for it besides maintenance and driving it. Needs engine/trans/diff mounts as the Caddy ones all collapse as they get old and diff mount should help keep rear end from exploding as these are prone to do. Front brake pads, restore headlights, add bluetooth, change clutch fluid, fix falling out fog-light, replace broken splashguard, change oil pressure sensor (at least I don't think the engine is at 130 psi all the time...), and replace whatever garbage tires are on it now.  Basically a bunch of little stuff as I get to it. No rush, for now just planning on enjoying it!

Oh, I took it over the scales at work for giggles:
   

[Senor_Taylor]

I can't believe you did it. Is the Miata gone?

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[JPolen01]

Always had a soft spot for the things. Should bring many grins on the daily commute.

[EclipseTurbno93]

I can't believe you did it. Is the Miata gone?

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Miata is still around for now while I try to get the AC going on the fiance's car. After that it may be going to someone we know... we shall see.

[Goodspeed]

Awesome! I have never seen this color before - I thought all first gen CTS-V's were only offered in silver.

In for burnout vid when you get rid of those tires.

[Jake]

MmMmMmM I love it. Great color, too.

[V1GiLaNtE]

Needs wagon mod. 

[Evan]

If driving a 5.7L V8 400hp sedan makes you old, I don't want to be young.

Great car, congrats.

[EclipseTurbno93]

Every time I start one of these threads I remember how terrible I am at updating them.

First thing I did was get into the engine bay and do a deep clean/look for anything obviously falling apart. The PO did a good job keeping the surfaces in the engine bay clean, but it was pretty apparent they had not had the engine cover off for a few years.



Next, I started down the “to do” list from my first post, taking care of the things that annoyed me the most first and working my way down. So new brake pads to replace whatever garbage was on them before. Went with some Posi-Quiet ceramics per Matthews recommendation. Much better stopping, and now I don’t have to clean the brake dust off every few days. This was my first experience working with Brembo’s and holy wow, I never want to work with normal calipers again! If you’ve never seen how they’re done, look it up. Literally two pins and done. Beautiful thing.

A friend recommended someone to me for having the headlights done. From what I could tell, without the right tools/experience, these GM headlights are a real pain in the ass. For $25 a headlight, this was worth every penny and I think makes the car look 10 years younger:





The CTS-V1 Facebook pages are a magical place with a heck of a document that walks you through all of the recommended upgrades based on the community’s feedback. I followed this for recommendations on diff and trans fluid, the consensus being Amsoil severe gear with GM limited slip additive for the rear and Amsoil Torquedrive for the transmission. Got the diff change done pretty painlessly with the wonderful recommendation from Jake and Joey to use a garden sprayer with the tip removed. Will definitely use that for the trans when I get around to it.

Next came the driveline and engine mounts. There’s a wonderful little company based out in Oregon called Creative Steel that has been making parts for these cars from when they were new. I went with their mega pack which comes with the engine mounts with heat shields, transmission mount, shifter bushings, differential bushing, and diff block (piece of hard rubber that sits above the diff mount to help deter differential bucking and wheel hop). I also rented a tool which allows you to remove the press fit diff bushing and press the new one in without removing the diff from the car.

What a great little kit, it came in a metal box with a holder for their tool welded in place and a return shipping label for the tool.



Before getting started on these, I went ahead and removed the front fascia and splash guards to take stock and order replacement parts. Ended up needing both wheel wells and a new fog light assembly. I also ordered a missing brake duct which, unfortunately, had to be ordered direct from GM. Kind of them to not remind me about the UAW strike until after I clicked the order button and received the warning that my parts may take a while to ship.



Zach and Matthew came down to lend a hand with installing the mounts. The diff bushing went very smoothly with the tool and we had it done in the first few hours. We decided to tackle the engine mounts next.

Holy wow.

It becomes very apparent that this car was never designed to have this engine once you start fooling around down there. Everything is in the way of everything else and it’s nearly impossible to maneuver things into a workable position. We probably broke knuckles on these damn things for 6 hours. On gravel. Suffice to say we were pretty fed up with GM engineering by the end. The trans mount by comparison took about 10 minutes. Which was a good thing because it was getting dark and there was beer to be drank.

A quick test drive proved we had tightened everything. The new mounts carry a little more vibration into the cabin than stock, which I am okay with because what’s the fun of having a V8 if you can’t feel it just a little bit? I let my back recover for most of a week, had the fog light I wasn’t replacing refinished to match, and just got everything back together yesterday.

It’s good to be back.



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[Senor_Taylor]

Simple maintenance can go a long day! New rubber always feels great!

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[Deceus]

I went with solid mounts in the demon against just about everybody's recommendation. Definitely agree that getting a little extra feedback from a V8 is far from a bad thing. Looks good, man. I secretly want one of these if I ever have need for a commuter vehicle.

[*insertusernamehere*]

Love love love this car. So comf, so fast, sounds so good.