I was a little surprised at the vigorous defense that was afforded the 1976 Cadillac Seville last month by a few readers, apparently the post hit a bit more of a nerve with some than I thought it might. It’s good to see that every car has its fans. Today we have another Cadillac that has gone down in history with even more controversy, unfortunately most of it not to the good side of the ledger. With only around 132,000 produced and presumably sold over seven long model years, these do still occasionally pop up in junkyards. The final year was the rarest with only 6,454 produced, of which we have an example here that I came across very early this year. GM has a long reputation of sometimes continually improving a model to an acceptable state, only to then immediately kill it, so this one might just be as good as they ever got, letting it be presented in the best light possible.
Of course we are all aware of the general history of the Cimarron; Cadillac decided to “engineer” their own version of the Chevy Cavalier to debut for 1982, not long after every other division also had debuted theirs, thus it was a crowded field. Basically the “engineering” pretty much consisted of printing a brochure, sticking a few crests on the car, and coming up with a price for the sticker. Of course being a Cadillac, it had to cost more. And it did, although it really wasn’t any different than the Chevy or the other versions, at launch even being saddled with the same wheezy 88hp four-banger.
Not so premium, indeed, and not really the way to take the fight to the Europeans, i.e. soon encompassing vehicles such as the Mercedes 190, BMW 3-series, Saab 900/turbo, Audi 4000/90 etc, all of which while perhaps not brimming with horsepower at their introductions, were generally tuned for excellent handling, good high speed road manners, solidity and build quality allowing extremely long service lives if properly maintained along with gaining relatively significant power increases and engine options during their lifespans.
That first year I don’t believe the Cimarron even had a Cadillac name badge directly on it, however a few years later it finally got affixed to the grille. There were other updates during the run, cosmetically mainly fore and aft, at the front going to composite headlamps for 1987 with a more sculpted grille. I actually don’t generally mind the styling of the Cimarron (nor that of the Cavalier, Skyhawk, Firenza and J2000/2000/Sunbird J-Body compatriots). I’m also perhaps one of the rare people that prefers the original front end with the four quad sealed beams, to me it looks stronger than this more aero front end which looks sort of frowny.
Nothing says quality like a hood badge, it works for BMW so it shall work for Cadillac too, except it doesn’t really since one has been doing it for decades and the other did this as pretty much a one-off. I’d probably though mock a hood ornament even more, and will admit that this one has actually held up quite well without the colors of the crest itself fading to any appreciable degree.
As I mentioned, that first year 1.8l four banger produced all of 88hp, then for 1983 it was enlarged to 2.0 liters and gained fuel injection, somehow however output actually managed to drop to 86hp. For 1985 there was finally a 2.8l V6 option shared with the Buick and Cavalier which then as of 1987 became the Cimarron’s only engine option and for 1988 produced 125hp. Surprisingly a 5-speed manual was standard but a 3-speed automatic was optional and I have to believe overwhelmingly the chosen transmission. Had a V6 been available from day one as the only option I believe the car would have gotten far less vitriol hurled at it.
For comparison though in 1988 the BMW 325i produced 170hp, the Mercedes 190E 2.6 produced 164hp, the Audi 90 (1988) produced 130hp from its inline 5, and the Saab 900 turbo produced 173hp. The Audi and Saab were FWD as well with AWD as an Audi option, but considered very well-handling cars, while the RWD dynamics of the BMW especially were considered impeccable.
The Cimarron for 1988 started at $16,071 with various options available at even more cost. However, the four door Cavalier started at $8,195 that same year, so about half. To be fair that did not include a V6 or many of the Cadillac’s standard features, but that wasn’t the talking point, the huge price differential was, for a car that largely looked the same. I’ll be the first to admit the Europeans named previously, especially with their premium engine option, were all base priced significantly higher than the Cadillac by 1988.
This though doesn’t necessarily make the Cimarron a good value comparatively, merely cheaper. Which is how it was generally viewed but not as good cheaper in terms of less costly to purchase but bad cheaper as in a lesser vehicle. While it is perhaps possible that people who were interested in a Cimarron may well have taken a look at the European showrooms, it was extremely rare for anyone genuinely interested in one of the others to conversely set foot in a Cadillac showroom to experience the Cimarron. Cadillac had wounded itself with the Seville, but really started prepping for amputations (of sales volumes) with the Cimarron.
I wax and wane on the design, of the 1988 Cadillac lineup I find more than a few of them a bit difficult to appreciate when viewed together and there are some wildly different themes going on across the range that year. The Cimarron here got decent wraparound taillights later in life and included euro-like amber turn signals but kept the crestwork within the lens along with the luggage rack, sending mixed messages; either you’re a Euro-fighter or you’re Broughamtastic. It’s hard to pull off both. The chrome bumper with plastic endcaps isn’t great either but am I cavalier (sorry) in saying the same seems to work on the BMW but not as well here? Those doorhandles though, so partsbin GM. Most Cimarrons were at least spared the vinyl top treatment.
The trunk is decently trimmed out, and even the extremely high liftover height, being a vestigial remnant of early 1980s engineering, wasn’t as criticized back then as it would be today.
Too many crests. One per car is my preferred limit, preferably on the hood. Always keep them wanting more, don’t just throw it at them. Yes, this likely appeals to the traditional Cadillac buyer but that isn’t who this car was aimed at. Know thy audience and all that.
And zero of these is my limit. Who has ever used this on a sedan? I get it on an MG or similar and on the roof of a wagon too, but not a trunklid. It’s just tacky.
Moving inside, the overwhelming blueness has me feeling a little, well, blue. Those seats though do look comfortable. They are leather on the sides and the seating surface is some sort of space age fabric blend sort of material. Bummer about the embroidery though. And that horrendously cheap Cavalier shift lever, well, it explains why this is cheaper than the Euros but not why it’s so much more than the Chevy.
I know I bagged on the Body by Fisher thingy on the Seville, but this is even worse. Really, molded into the plastic sill strip? Really? Horrible along with the exposed Phillips screw head right below it. I’m surprised it doesn’t say “Body by Fisher, Interior by Fisher Price”. And if absolutely nothing else, that is impossible to clean located where it is, it’ll always be dirty.
As charitable as I am towards the Cimarron, the interior really is where it all falls apart for me. This dashboard and center console says anything but premium. Apparently the instrument panel surround is supposed to look like aluminum instead of wood like in other Cadillacs. But while the wood in other Cadillacs generally looks extremely fake, this just looks like gray plastic, not fake aluminum. And the whole dashboard is just a vertical cliff that you sit low behind, just like in the Seville. It actually shares some parts with that Seville too but only because the Seville shared them with a Chevy as well.
Ah, script, so classy. Barf. And I know we’ve seen that glovebox knob before. On every Seville, Nova, El Camino, etc from the decade or more prior to this car.
I appreciate the full complement of gauges (as opposed to that Seville again for example) but the execution sucks, why are two of the ancillary gauges in the middle and the other two within the tach? Is this really the best option? And then there’s the techno anti-Broughamity with the exposed allen heads again, a la 1980 Pontiac Phoenix. What was the last car in America to still have an 85mph speedometer? I was surprised to see it on this one, being an ’88.
With only about 88,000 miles displayed I’ll venture the guess that this is only its first time around the dial, the condition doesn’t seem to warrant having covered another 100k.
The sound system was likely fairly decent, GM had a good thing going in this era with those, and the climate control, well, everyone has likely used one of these setups, I’m sure it did a good job of keeping the interior cold on a hot day. Note the “aluminum” dash trim cracking to the right of the radio and the tach.
There’s a lot of mish-mash going on here and again, nothing really positively sets it apart from a Cavalier.
The back seats look fairly well stuffed if the bottom cushion looks a little short while still not leaving much legroom. Being stuck with the 101 inch wheelbase will do that I guess. I’d pity the family whose kids need to sit back here, wouldn’t the money for this have been better spent on a larger pretty much anything else from GM instead for any of the occupants, even those in front?
There doesn’t seem to be much marketing material for the 1988 so this 1986 will have to do, no matter since I prefer this post-original but pre-final version anyway.
But don’t just take my word for all of this, check these out:
Curbside Classic: Cimarron By Cadillac – GM’s Deadly Sin #10 By Cadillac by PN
Curbside Capsule: 1988 Cadillac Cimarron – Flagship Of Mediocrity by Jon Stephenson
Curbside Classic: 1984 Cadillac Cimarron – Poor Execution Meets Bad Timing by Eric703
Getting my popcorn ready to see if there is actually anything good to be said about the Cadillac Cinnabon.
My biggest bully in school. He was the High School Football quarterback. His parents bought him a brand new Cinnabon in metallic poo brown. Who does that to their child?
At least mine bought me a new fox body Mustang conv.
You are lucky!
My first car was a 1974 Toyota Corolla, which I started driving at age 16. Dad paid $2900 for it brand new and sold it to me in 1980 for $1000, about double what it was worth.
I spent a summer doing farm labour to save that money and then my own father ripped me off.
Never seen one of these in the metal but have seen and ridden in the Australian effort and NZ got one from Japan toom my dad had two one of each in theory theyd be cheap on gas the next time he wanted cheap on gas he bought a Toyota after a lifetime of GM cars.
Youd recognize the glovebox lock and ignition lock on the Holden version too its the same part, they werent quite as nicely finished inside though I recall brown plastic and cheap feeling no leather and no body by Fisher emblem either ( Just what did Fisher do on those?) Oddly though I prefer this to that ugly Seville its a beeter looking car even if its not a great car.
That “Body by Fisher” thing might have meant something in the twenties and thirties, but it was really redundant after the war. Like you had a choice of having your Caddy bodied by anybody else?
It’s a nod to the oldies who remembered life prewar – Cadillac’s traditional demographic, I guess.
I wished I liked Cavaliers, because then I could like the Cimmaron. Which was not a Cadillac. If I liked Cavaliers, I would have gone searching for cheap used versions of these because they would have been the nicest version of a favorite car. A Cavalier+, so to speak. But I don’t like Cavaliers.
That is the secret for liking cars like this. To like the Versailles, you have to be a big fan of the Granada. And if you like Granadas, you will really like the Granada+. I came to this secret way of looking at life as a Studebaker fan. I used to hate 57-58 Packards. They were not Packards. But that car was a really great Studebaker+. If you are one of the few who like the 57-58 Studebaker.
I know the Seville was based on the Nova, but that car was more than just a Nova+ in the way a 76 Sedan DeVille was more than a Caprice+. Not a lot more, but still more.
And you had me laughing at your riff on the Body by Fisher. All true.
The 1976-79 Seville was based on the Nova…but was emphatically not a Nova.
The 1977-92 full-size Caddys were based on the Caprice…but were certainly not Caprices.
The Cimmaron was based on the Cavalier…and was, in fact, a Cadillac Cavalier. It was an $8000 car, with a ladleful of tacky crap poured over it and a $10,000 price premium.
Serious question: how would this compare, price-wise, to a K-car (E or C platform) New Yorker?
“Body by Fisher, Interior by Fisher Price” Perfect!
+1!
How do you see a Cimmaron in the best possible light? Bury it. Then leave it. Don’t ever dig it up again.
Tulsa made that mistake with Miss Belvedere.
https://tulsaworld.com/news/local/history/throwback-tulsa-remember-when-they-buried-a-car-at-the-courthouse/collection_16dd4640-f35b-5a8b-8be3-fa69ebe3e4ac.html
Oh yeah! That 57 Plymouth was amazing. A more sad car I’ve never seen.
That Belvedere is ‘de-rusted’ and on display!
https://tulsaworld.com/news/local/ten-years-after-being-unearthed-in-tulsa-miss-belvedere-finally-headed-to-illinois-auto-museum/article_c470b9b4-194a-5d63-866f-866389e95027.html
I’ll agree that putting the ’57 Belvedere underground for 50 years wasn’t a good idea, and although it is well known that the new for ’57 Mopars were rushed and not the best quality control, I don’t think burying a Cimarron would be for a similar reason.
My Dad had a previous year (’56) Plaza, it was only a stripper, but these were good honest cars. The ’57 started the “lower” trend that within a few years transformed all cars to sitting lower, and eventually bigger (to reclaim some of the space lost in making them lower), but the reason it was buried I think was to put something thought to be of value away to uncover at a future time. You could argue the choice a bit, but in ’57 I think that the Plymouth was thought to represent the future itself, though we don’t think of this way in retrospect. It pleasing to look at due to its low slung body; it kind of represented the pursuit of outer space itself. If anything the Cimarron was kind of the opposite, it was sugar coating on top of a pessimistic offering, with gas prices looking like they were going to increase constantly along with shortages, and high interest rates. It really was likely a proper offering considering what we knew at that time, even though obviously people would have preferred the previous (larger) model, but if you can’t get fuel for it, what luxury is that?
I never saw many Cimarrons myself, probably because it really isn’t my kind of car, but I do remember the first Cavalier I ever saw, driven by someone I knew (not well though) who was in the quality group in the company I worked for (at my first professional job out of school). Talking about Fischer Price, the rear panel between the tail lights was what stood out the most to me, it looked like a Rubbermaid dish drainer, which sounds like a knock, but it seemed to be a new look to me, and I was actually impressed. Now I fully understand that’s superficial, and it didn’t take much (especially my Father buying a new 84 Pontiac Sunbird which turned out to need 2 engines in less than 80k miles despite dealer maintenance per schedule) to change my opinion, but that’s due to poor execution; the Cavalier was supposed to be GM’s answer to the Honda Accord, which turned out not to be a good attempt, but just think if the Cavalier was similar to the Accord, which might have meant that the Cimarron would have been like maybe an Acura Legend…what would that have been like (especially coming out several years before the Legend)? We might be instead talking about how smart GM was to come out with that car when they did, instead of talking about burying it.
Maybe make a Cadillac Ranch of Cimmarons?
Hubris.
GM had 60% of the domestic market in 1980, and Accountant Roger Smith turned everything into five versions of the exact car. Profits. The executives at GM didn’t want to rock a gravy boat they expected to live off of. GM was a giant bureaucracy with the ethics of the Soviets.
GM honestly believed that Americans would buy their cookie-cutter cars. How could that stupid idea be accepted? Hubris and complacency. No one wanted to question GM leadership.
The Cimarron was not a mistake. It was deliberate. Cadillac executives convinced themselves that creating a Cadillac Cavalier was a good idea. The excuses why it was done were generated after the execution. Blind leading the blind.
You had to be willfully blind to look at a Cimarron and now see how horrible it was. The GM molded plastics, the bad ergonomics, the cramped interior, the gutless engine reveal a blindness that only a mega bureaucratic organization staffed with lemmings could have produced. Cadillac owes the East Germany an apology for cribbing from them. This is a Cadillac Trabant.
Sadly, the pathetic overpaid boozers who created this horrible joke, didn’t see their careers end. Nope – they finger pointed and crafted excuses better than they crafted automobiles, because they knew how to thrive in a bureaucracy, not in a competitive market. Nope – they lived on and retired with golden parachutes.
Every single person responsible for the Cimarron should have been forced to live with one as their daily driver for the rest of their lives.
This is another car with all the makings of grandpa or grandma’s vehicle that got tossed out when said relative kicked the bucket. Wouldn’t be surprised if it ran or could have run with little work when it came in.
I do wonder who would hold onto one of these for 30+ years. I can imagine that there might have been some second-hand buyers who bought these a few years used and thought they were getting a huge discount and buying into the prestige of Cadillac. To hold onto it for so long would suggest a weird blend of frugality/pragmatism crossed with a desire to look upwardly mobile. That was a trait for a lot of the Greatest Generation, who persevered through the restraint and poverty of the Depression and then moved on into the conformist ’50s, where it was all about fitting in and keeping up with the Joneses. By the Reagan era, when some Greats may have been buying their last car, it was all about conspicuous consumption, and a Cadillac said “I’ve made it”, even when it was a joker of a car, like this one.
About twenty years ago, I went with a friend to a home on Shelter Island, NY where he was building a several-hundred-thousand dollar guest house. In the driveway of the main house was a forlorn looking Cadillac Cimarron. It didn’t look like it had seen much use, just that it had been sitting in the sun and the salty air for decades. The owners weren’t there, so I couldn’t ask why multi-millionaires were tainting their immaculately-kept mansion with a Cadillac subcompact that looked like it was abandoned. I think that’s the last time I saw one.
To stretch the Caddy Shack metaphor further, GM polished a turd and the result was this Cimarron.
As for the comment about few Cimarrons being decked out with vinyl tops, you obviously never visited Florida in the 1980s or 1990s, where fake convertible roofs and gold packages adorned nearly every Caddy in the parking lot at Bushwood.
You are correct, that is one cultural experience I somehow forewent… 🙂
The Cimarron is what the Buick-Olds versions of the J-body should have been, at that price and competing with the K-Car LeBarons.
In the mid 2000s I helped an friend in need of a car out via an estate sell of an early eighties
Skylark, same platform. It was only $500, had less than 20k on it, and appeared as new.
Don’t think it had ever seen rain, as there was not a spec of corrosion of any sort on it.
I checked it over and test drove the thing. While it worked as as intended, you could tell
That every single component was made as cheaply as possible.
It is impossible to imagine who would have purchased one of these (Cimarron
included) as a “premium” vehicle.
Defend the Cimarron? I don’t really think there is much to defend but I’ll give it a shot.
Being based on the Cavalier, it theoretically would have shared the Cavalier’s cockroach like ability to stay running.
The closest modern equivalent of the Cimarron would be the Civic based Acura CSX/ILX, which Honda surprisingly still sells. Honda did a far better job at hiding the ILX’s Civic roots than GM did hiding the Cimarron’s Cavalier roots. I think (not sure) GM actually sold more Cimarrons than Honda did ILXs, although that’s not really a fair comparison in todays CUV loving world.
I would agree with the cockroach attribute. I noticed that once the first-generation J-cars started getting really scarce around here, when I would occasionally spot one in the wild, there was a pretty good chance of it being a Cimarron. This is despite the Cimarron being somewhat rare back when the early J-cars were everywhere.
I would guess that the people who bought them didn’t quite treat them as disposable as the Chevy/Pontiac versions.
“What was the last car in America to still have an 85mph speedometer? I was surprised to see it on this one, being an ’88.”
The Ford Tempo/Mercury Topaz continued to only offer the 85 mph speedometer until the end of production in the 1994 year model (see attached). But I think that the GM A-bodies (Century/Ciera) continued to have their 85 mph speedos until the end of their production in 1996.
Yes, the domestic automakers kept the 85-mph speedometers long after the import makes ditched them. My 1990 Sable had one.
I know they are derided, but one big advantage is that they are easier to read for the speeds normally driven. I don’t get today’s speedos with 140 or 160 mph maximum readings for mundane vehicles that can’t come close to such speeds let alone their illegality. The legal speeds are crammed into only half of the dial.
Here’s very close to my ideal of a speedometer, from my 1998 Nissan Frontier. Speeda marked in 10 mph increments, hash marks every 5 mph, and a max reading of 110 mph. Modernize the font, and call it done!
In high school I drove a 1988 Buick Electra, which still had a 85 mph horizontal strip speedometer. It wouldn’t surprise me if they kept that speedometer until the end of that generation in the early 1990s. But that still doesn’t beat the examples you gave.
Q: “Cadillac?”
A: “Si, moron!”
ROFL!
This is what I never understood about the Cimarron. They realized it was a gargantuan embarrassment and mistake right away yet it had such a lengthy lifecycle. Why not kill it after the third year?
I actually looked at one of these once. They depreciated in price so quickly that the used price seemed like a relative bargain. One test drive around the block in the gutless wonder convinced me otherwise.
It was for the best anyway as I soon “inherited” my wife’s Cherokee when we decided to get her a new used Explorer. The Cavalier also wouldn’t have worked with its quite tiny trunk. I really needed the extra space to haul a small sound system, musical instruments and another musician around to gigs in the mountains. I remember driving four hours in a blizzard to play a square dance at a yoga retreat, a very Colorado combination.
Back in the 1990s, when I was seemingly perpetually in the market for low-cost used cars, I sort of wanted to find a 5-spd. V6 Cimarron. I knew many people with J-cars, and they seemed bearable for young & unpicky folks back then, so I figured a Cimarron wouldn’t be too bad, and the depreciation would work to my benefit.
I suspect, though, that if I ever drove one, my impression would have been like yours, and I’d pass it up.
What’s funny is to see one of these parked beside a 3-Series of the same period – and there was exactly one of these that frequented the Country Club I valeted at. The dimensions and the greenhouse lines are almost an exact match.
Nobody does this brand of dry tragicomedy quite like Jim Klein. Thumbs up. I really enjoyed the piece-by-piece analysis of this Cimarron’s individual components. It really helped to understand clearly how the sum of its parts added up to even less than what was apparent.
With that said, I’ll probably always get a bit nostalgic (is that the word?) when I see any old GM iron (and plastic) from the 1980s.
“Thank you” says he and takes a bow. We’re close enough in age that we remember the same era of vehicles from growing up, just from slightly different geographic perspectives, but those memories (or the nostalgia) is what makes it interesting. I’m just whipping off those rose-tinted glasses and grinding them into the junkyard gravel underfoot. 🙂
The first-year Cimarron had a hard plastic storage bin (as fitted to other J-body cars) in the middle of rear seats. So, the J-body models were effectively four-passenger cars. That obnoxious bin was removed for 1983 model year.
Cimmaron had a few firsts for Cadillac: first four-cylinder engine since 1910s, first manual gearbox since 1950s, first-ever “export” taillamps with separate amber turn signal indicators for the domestic market, the first petite-sized car, etc.
For 1983 model year, GM wised up and removed the storage bin from all J-body cars.
Sales-wise, how did Cimarron compare to the ATS? I’m guessing it outsold it, but would an ATS-like Cadillac have sold as well in the 80’s? At least it wouldn’t be mentioned at the beginning of every article about a new Cadillac for the next 80 years.
Yes, this likely appeals to the traditional Cadillac buyer but that isn’t who this car was aimed at.
I thought it was created because the dealers were screaming for a small car during and after the ’79 gas crisis, not because they wanted to compete directly with the small Germans. They did make some suspension changes and offer a manual, probably after realizing it was bound to be compared to them. Perhaps they should have gone full brougham, completely redoing the interior and maybe buying a smooth-riding suspension from Citroen, but they were in a hurry.
It’s unfortunate that they kept the Seville and downsized Eldo at a higher price level than their larger sedans. The lineup got completely inverted after 1988. The big Brougham was cheaper than the FWD Deville, which was cheaper than the smaller Seville/Eldo.
In this century, Cadillac threw away their client base before establishing a new one, just as Olds did. The ATS was even more cramped than Cimarron (or felt like it), but I think they could have sold a lot of a flatter-seated, softer-riding trim of the CTS to people over 55 if the trunk could have taken more golf bags.
I didn’t know Cimarron ever offered (partial) cloth seats. Leather was standard in the early years (it wasn’t on the Deville until 2000).
Sales for the Cimarron ran 20,000 to 25,000 for the first few years. ATS sales averaged 30,000 for the first 4 years. Total sales of the ATS through the 2019 model year are about 140,000.
In retrospect, ideally what Cadillac should have done in those days was create two complete lines of cars, one traditional full-floaty American brougham, ‘Cadillac’, and the other full-import-style, maybe ‘La Salle’. That would have shown that they were in touch with their traditional market and in touch with new luxury-car buyers. It would have showcased what their engineers could do, and be a shot in the arm for the corporation as a whole. It would have given them actual sales feedback about which approach was the most popular. And it would have avoided giving the market half-and-half miscues like the Cimarron.
GM could probably have afforded to do it back in those days, but the guys up top were out of touch, determined to run the corporation on the cheap so long as it kept lining their pockets.
Nice article! Some great turns of phrase in there on a car we love to hate here at CC. There’s something so compelling about a car that hindsight shows to have been a huge misstep.
When I did my brief write-up on the 88 Cimarron a couple years ago, I followed up with a pretty in-depth Vintage Review piece with three road tests. I tried to examine the mindset in 1981 that allowed its development and led Motor Trend and Car & Driver to write surprisingly positive reviews. It was underdeveloped on release but still was a huge step forward for Cadillac in terms of expanding its market and the types of cars it would build. If GM had been willing to spend the money to quickly and aggressively improve the car, it might have had a shot at becoming something other than a cautionary tale. But we know now that never happened and GM squandered an opportunity, as it did so many other times in the 70s-90s.
Here’s the link if anyone is interested: https://www.curbsideclassic.com/vintage-reviews/vintage-reviews-cadillac-cimarron/
Are you sure this is an 88? I don’t have references close at hand right now, but I thought I remembered that the digital gauge package was standard in 1988. All the detailed photos are great. I had never realized it had chrome trimmed pedals. That’s one of my pet favs, so bravo Cadillac! At least that’s one good thing about the car.
I didn’t post it but I have a pic of the VIN (the dataplate was too faded to read so no pic but I did get the dash placard) and it dates it as a 88 although the serial # is 315 so a very early one.
Thanks for adding the vintage reviews link!
Hi Jim. I just found this article yesterday and being one of the few Cimarron enthusiasts around, I have a question for you. My car is totally stock other than the real wire wheels the original owner put on the car. I am all about stock, so I’m looking for a set of 4 alloy rims (just like this blue one has). I’ve found a guy with 3 rims, so I really only need one more. Can I ask where this blue Cimarron is located? Is it at a salvage yard that I could call about the rims? Thank you very much.
If anyone would know, I’d love to hear from you.
Hi Dan, congrats on the new (to you) car! Always an exciting time and while I wasn’t into the Cimarron at the time, certainly see how having one today would be exciting!
Unfortunately this particular car would have been crushed within a couple of months of this post running and I know for a fact it is no longer there. Sorry and good luck, there are bound to be others though….
Thanks for responding so quickly. If that car was at a salvage yard, would they have kept (to sell or to be sold) the rims? All I really need is just one!! haha.
I looking in all the right places, but just need to find that one out there. Any leads would be super. Thanks again.
No, that place doesn’t store them separately, unfortunately. I’ll keep it in mind though, Cimarrons still pop up occasionally. One note, finding one good wheel is easier than four so if the guy with three is not asking too much, you might want to get them to hold on to them for now. It’s not unusual to see a corner ripped off a car or someone else to have needed just one wheel etc…
The twin crests on the tail lights are terrible, its like how some people add extra ornaments to their cars in the belief that it improves the look, not something you would expect from Cadillac.
Oh and I could clean that Body by Fisher plastic thing with an old toothbrush and soapy water but on this glorified Holden Camira I wouldn’t bother.
Those taillight crests remind me of the T-Bird emblems on the taillights of the ’64 Thunderbird. That car was supposed to have the new sequential turn signals that year, but problems with the system delayed the introduction to ’65.
Oh yeah, I must have seen those before, but on the big Thunderbird its not so bad sort of expected, on the Camira, (I mean) Cimarron, its just insulting.
They sure look like Thunderbird emblems from a distance! Did Ford sue? 🙂
I believe they used Cimarron front buckets in the ’82-85 Eldo Touring Coupe.
So…Cavalier or Sunbird seats with Cadillac covers?
No, they were different from both, in addition to being leather. Lot more stitching involved.
The Cavalier/Cimarron-what a piece of junk these cars were. I remember reading a print ad on the Cimarron which boasted “semi-independent rear suspension” as the rear axle was designed to flex up to 1/4″. Sort of like calling a nail an interfiberous friction fastener.
Other than the color and slightly nicer seats this interior appears identical to my wife’s fleet spec 88 Cavalier.
GM must have had a Steve Jobs level reality distortion field to believe an optioned up Cavalier with a luggage rack on the rear deck could compete with a 3 Series BMW, or even a VW Jetta. Come to think of it, I was driving a Jetta at the time and the GL spec interior was both nicer and more durable than any J car.
The 80’s Jetta definitely had a nicer interior, despite the lack of leather seats. Not sure I would call VW durable, unless 80’s VW reliability was radically better than modern VW reliability.
The simplicity of the J bodies was both its greatest strength and weakness.
A bit of a difference I think between durability and reliability.
I had 2 different VWs in the 80’s (and a 3rd in 2000 which I still own as my only car). They all lasted quite a long time (outlasted me…I sold each but the one I own now myself for various reasons). The first was a 1978 Scirocco, which didn’t have air conditioning, and I didn’t think it was a good idea to add it, but I moved from the Northeast to Central Texas while I had it so decided to sell it. I bought a 1986 GTi, which I had until I bought my current car (2000 Golf). Each car was working fine when I sold it; apart from “sniggley” things (like the odometer on my ’86 GTi which was intermittent).
They all required periodic maintenance. The Scirocco had brake issues, plus problems with the 5th injector. The GTi leaked transmission fluid onto the clutch, but thankfully didn’t have the self-machining problem unique to the close-ratio gearbox…it also went through alternator brushes/voltage regulator (combination unit), and I had problems with rear alignment (even though it was fixed, the shop had their alignment tool try to alter even though it was fine, but wore out a new set of Pirelli tires in less than 1500 miles due to it. My current 2000 Golf has NOT been trouble free, it did leave me stranded once when the ignition cylinder went bad after I loaded the car with groceries and didn’t have tools to break into steering column. It also had power steering rack go bad, and the shift mechanism broke such that I couldn’t change gears. Parts aren’t cheap, but the car has lasted almost 21 years thus far.
Never had a Cimarron, but my Dad bought a 1984 Pontiac Sunbird (same platform) new, which needed 2 replacement engines in less than 80k miles despite dealer maintenance per schedule. It also lost its timing belt in less than 1000 miles (brand new car). My sister inherited it, it leaked power steering and had lots of cracked plastics in switchgear…in short, the worst car my father ever bought, it went to the junkyard in 1989 (at age 5). It was neither durable nor reliable. Thankfully, we’ve balanced that out by cars like my Golf (21 years) my other sister’s 240SX (24 years) and even my Mother’s 1988 Ford Tempo, which wasn’t too pleasant a car but was still going at age 19 when it was let go in a state version of cash for clunkers.
If it looks like a Cavalier…
Rattles like a Cavalier…
Drives like a Cavalier…
By any other name it’s still a Cavalier.
Everything about the Cimarron screams CHEAP.
Except the sticker price.
Typical GM of the era. Done on the cheap like Cadillac Seville I derived from the Chevrolet Nova, and Cadillac Seville II, with the bustleback slapped on the existing Eldorado body. And the looks-like-everything-else shrunken fullsizers. Gotta do it on the cheap. Gotta save money so the stockholders can get their piece of the action.
Hope that was all on the minds of the stockholders when GM went bankrupt. Fond memories and a ruined Big Corporation.
I bought a new 1985 Olds Firenze ES, a car some say was never made. It was light blue metallic with dark blue interior. It was well appointed, all options worked. Car was a reliable daily driver. Best part was upgraded firm suspension, outside bright work blacked out and wide Goodyears on all corners. The car had a manual and handled well. But the 1.8 L made in Brazil had no guts and the doors and rockers rusted very quickly. With a little attention it could have been developed into a great car at a good price
The Vintage Reviews link above features a blue ’85 Cimarron. This is a beautiful car- the alloys, the egg crate grille. This could have been sold as the top-level Cavalier. The Cavalier Caprice? 11 grand w/standard leather (Caddy) seats. It would have sold like hot cakes.
The company I was working for in this period had a large contract in Ohio so many of us ended up renting cars in Cleveland. We used rent-a-wreck, which actually had quite decent vehicles. Due to some odd combination of exchange rates and cross border market differences, almost all their fleet consisted of new Canadian market GM cars. They were primarily Chevrolet Citations and the Olds and Pontiac equivalents, but we were lucky enough to occasionally get a Cimmaron. I certainly did not think it in any way represented a Cadillac image. It was fine for our purposes, but I imagine that it would be hard to distinguish from a Cavalier.
How Tuco might have snapped a Cimarron together:
– Cimarron interior
– Cimarron taillights
– 3 door Sport Hatch body
– 87 Skyhawk hidden headlights
– Wreath & Chrest badge
– chrome trim on B pillar, body sides and bumper
– MPFI Turbo 4
– 5 speed
I was about 7 or 8 when these came out. I was also a big reader of the JC Whitney catalog.
I stumbled upon a huge idea. I was going to get *RICH* making Cadillacs out of Cavaliers, courtesy of the Cadillac-like scripts and emblems they sold in JC Whitney. I think I was going to call it the “Catalina”. Stick on the crests, two tone paint on the bottom, and of course wire wheels (a Euro model with blacked-out trim and color-matched wheels was also going to be an option).
Then, I could advertise my “Catalina” in the weekly Auto Trader for a couple thousand less than the Cimarron….and steal all of GM’s customers.
BWAHAHA $$PROFIT$$!!!
I seriously imagined myself in a top hat and smoking a cigar before I turned 10 and worked up a pitch deck, way before PowerPoint was ever invented.
Sadly my dad felt this wasn’t a good investment so things never got off the ground.
I thought the Cimarron was mainly devised as a CAFE special? It’d be a rough go trying to place the initial product within Cadillac’s lineup (though it *did* debut the same year as the “Hand Tighten 4100”) and perhaps the admen got a bit carried away with the attempts to market it as a BMW/Mercedes/Saab/Etc fighter.
I too prefer the earlier ones with the sealed beam front end… would make for a very nice Cavalier (a car that I have a little experience with and has given me no reason to hate). Make mine a V6 and 5 speed, and hold the digital “gages”, thx!
Had a girl friend I always wanted to turn into a girlfriend (never worked), and she drove one of these in white. It was a 1987, and I didn’t find it to be a bad car. Prolly woulda gagged at its MSRP in ’87, though.
The only experience I ever had with one of these sorry excuses for a Cadillac occurred when they were new. A friend’s father had been lusting after a Cadillac for years. Now in his old age, he finally decided to take the plunge. Excitedly, my friend called me, told me his dad finally bought a new Cadillac!
Now, he said; “Guess which model?”
“Deville?”…”No”
“Fleetwood Brougham?”…”No”
“Eldorado?”…”No”
Dead silence from me, broken by his blurting out “Cimarron!”
I honestly could not think of the Cimarron at that moment, it was just that so dismissed from my mind as a Cadillac.
His dad was delighted with the damned thing, so I was polite and civil, spoke nice things about it in their company. The son related in confidence later that his dad went to the Cadillac dealer on his own, was talked into the Cimarron by the salesman. Had he been there, it would have been a used Deville at minimum…but no Cimarron!
My friend’s grandmother had a similar experience. Her friend had bought a brand-new Cimarron, and proudly showed it to my friend’s grandmother. He was there at the moment. The grandmother was polite, but after the proud Cimarron owner had left, she turned to my friend and said, “THAT is a Cadillac?!”
Growing up as a huge Cadillac fan in the ’60’s and ’70’s I couldn’t wait until I was old enough to buy one for myself. I bought many older Cadillacs, because despite their age, they were always… Cadillacs! The first gen Seville was derived from a Nova, but they had many modifications to the basic platform. These Sevilles had a certain presence, and they did set the stage for the adoption of the “sheer look” by GM. I think that the ’77 DeVille was a car that hit the mark when it debuted.
I had hope that Cadillac would continue to improve, and in many ways they did, but with the second gen Seville, the Cimarron, and the woeful 4100 engines, Cadillac lost their momentum for a while. While modern Cadillacs are some much better in so many ways, they just have seemed to have lost their mystique, except for maybe the Escalade.
It was very cynical of GM to market this gussied-up Cavalier as a Cadillac. Then again, it was the Roger Smith era.
I do recall Motor Trend, in its usual fashion, gushing over the Cimarron when it was introduced. I did take a look at the car because there was a Cadillac dealer within walking distance from where I lived at the time.
My one lasting memory of the Cimarron was a conversation I had with a woman who had just bought one. She was well dressed, looked successful and was a little older than me.I was 25, she might have been 35. I must have been selling Chryslers at the time because I can’t think of any other reason to be be talking with a woman I didn’t know about cars. We were standing in front of her new car as she told me how much she loved finally having a new Cadillac of her own. She sure was proud of it and was smiling and happy as I watched her get in and wave goodbye to me.
I felt so bad for her. She had just spent , or was spending, a whole lot of money for what she thought was a Cadillac. I felt a strong, visceral, wave of sadness and pity knowing that this very nice, intelligent lady was going to feel both disappointed and foolish when she wised up and realized what she had been sold.
Jim Klein: I’m just reading all this now. Yes, I’m a strange type who actually likes the Cimarron and just purchased a very clean 1988. Anyhow, I am actually searching for the correct alloy wheels for my car as the original owner placed some nice wire spoke rims on it. Although they are nice, I don’t like them and want the get the car to factory original. That brings me to this. Can I ask where this blue Cimarron is located? It may just have the one 14″ rim left that I desperately need. Or if anyone would know of one or two rims like this for sale, it would be great to hear from you. Best wishes.
I love the 2.8 multi port fuel injected V6!!!! I adore this motor. My first experience with this masterpiece of GM engineering occurred in 1985. It was married to a 1985 chevy camaro mated to a 5 speed. Oh what fun! 🙂 Good gas mileage too.
Next? Chevy 1989 Baretta. Again. 2.8 with a 5 spd. Nimble. Quick. Dependable. 30 mpg.
Say what?
Next……1986 Cavelier Z24 Fast back. 2.8 mpfi hooked to a four speed. No overdrive but
occasionally we all make sacrifices. Once again. Rock solid. Never made me walk even one time.
Next. My Lamborgini Light. 1988 Pontiac Fiero GT. 2.8/auto. Not a Stealth but not bad
either. Fun. Quick enough. Again. Dependable. MPG fell off a bit, tho, because of the trans.
Finally. 1988 Cadillac Cimarron. I found a 50k mile pristine example in an estate sale in 2015. Literally had been pampered by Grandma and only driven on Sundays. (maybe)
Whatever the case. I knew ALL 1987 and 1988 Cadillac Cimarrons received the 2.8 treatment. Purchased for a decent price. I proceeded to drive this “jalopy” all over the
eastern sea board for the next 6 years.
I know the poor old Cavellac gets a lot of grief. How does one improve without detractors? But folks? I loved that “baby brougham”.