By Jeff Glucker
I would love to own a proper boat of a Cadillac. One of the old land yachts that roamed our interstates, flooded our diner parking lots, and swerved home from late-night meetings as mad men decided things that felt important but ultimately probably didn’t matter much in the grand scheme. Sure, I can still buy one and someday I’d like to. In fact, while I was searching for a Jag to buy, I was also eyeballing old Caddys on Craigslist and FB Marketplace. And right before prices went insane, you could pick up large old American iron for relatively short money. But I can’t help but think how fun one of those hunks would be with some modern bits inside and a quiet set of motors providing endless amounts of thrust.
I want a modern Cadillac Eldorado with an electric powertrain.
It needs to be wickedly comfortable inside. The tech needs to be spot on as it relates to the gauge cluster and infotainment bits. And it needs to pack serious power. Cadillac could build that and charge an old Eldorado trunk’s worth of cash for it.
What other departed cars out there would make for cool, fun, great, electric fun machines? I can’t see any wrong answers here but I look forward to seeing what you all say.
Having a collectible is a real trial. Every spec of dust, fingerprint, nick, dent, or corrosion sends the owner to the shrink, gun store, or poorhouse. It’s never perfect enough. It’s a rolling godforbid.
Answers here could vary as wildly as tastes do in cars, but anything that was heavy to begin with, and wouldn’t be spoiled by the extra weight of batteries – balanced by more powerful motors. Randomly selected vehicle attached.
How about a Chrysler Turbine? The survivors donated for museum display were made inoperable as a condition of donation, so electrification could breathe new life back into them.
Only if they fit a microturbine range extender, otherwise, what’s the point. It’d be like resurrecting the RX-7 name as a BEV without any rotary component. The name is describes the cars entire defining feature (Rotary Experimental)
Obligatory: Buick Electra 225. Because Electra.
I’d drive that back-and-forth to work without shame.
The AMC Pacer.
Sounds like sarcasm, but I’m largely serious. Here was a car designed during the fuel-crisis era with the intention of using a weight-saving rotary engine, but was ultimately stuffed with the same old inline sixes and V8s that AMC had been dropping into their cars for years (not that anything was wrong with them– I love those engines).
Back in my bachelor days I had serious intentions of creating a muscle-car Pacer. I had a 360 V8 and just needed a suspender-ed fishbowl in which to install it, but I instead found a deal on a clean Spirit GT, and went that direction instead. I wouldn’t mind converting the much-maligned Pacer into an EV. I think the quirky little American deserves a modern, eco-forward drivetrain.
My first thought, too. Since the shell was designed for a rotary, it was problematic to fit an existing ICE engine into it, yet it was big and heavy overall. It would have plenty of room for an EV powertrain and batteries. It’s crying out for them, really.
Hey, there ya go! It’s already been done!
However, I hope whoever installed the EV drivetrain isn’t the same one that applied the vinyl letters to the door.
It’s harder to hit the fuel tank if it doesn’t have one.
They can call it whatever they want to, but a small car like the Dodge Omni. This was a kind of car that everyone made in the 1980s, a ubiquitous affordable car. The Hyundai Ioniq 5 is playing this card, also Chevy Bolt.
The Ioniq5 is not playing that card, it’s deceptive, it’s actually Range Rover big.