Car: Cadillac BLS 1.9 TD
Prices: £21,473-£25,073 - on the road
Insurance Group: 14
Emissions: 159g/km
Performance: 0-60mph 9.3s / Max Speed 130mph
Fuel Consumption: (average) 46.3mpg
Safety: Twin front, side and curtain airbags, ABS with EBD, Brake Assist, Traction Control
Dimensions: Length/Width/Height 4635/2038/1466mm [est]
AMERICAN OIL BARON
Our Rating: 6.7 / 10
A Diesel Cadillac Might Sound Faintly Ridiculous But The Reality Is Anything But. Andy Enright Takes A Look At The BLS 1.9 TD…
The concept of a diesel Cadillac is a tough one for me to get my head around. There is a precedent, however. Right in the dog days of the oil crisis back in 1979, a Seville with a 5.7-litre LF9 diesel engine was launched. This was a rather clumsy conversion of the petrol Oldsmobile V8 that was remembered as one of the worst engines ever installed in a vehicle. Suddenly the BLS diesel doesn’t have a lot to live up to.
It’s worth pausing for a moment just to let us see a) how far Cadillac has come and b) to allow me to have a good chuckle at the expense of Americans. With its output of just 120bhp, the LF9 lump was, unsurprisingly, a little on the slow side. Developing just over 21bhp per litre, this V8 would trundle to 60mph from rest in 15.7 seconds with that all-important quarter mile taking a lengthy 20.8 seconds at 69 mph. It also gained an appalling record for durability - the bolts in the cylinder heads stretching and the head gaskets blowing with almost metronomic reliability. A booming aftermarket trade soon sprouted up transplanting petrol engines back into these cars.
The latest Cadillac oil burner doesn’t permit such cheap shots. Although it’s so heavily based on the Saab 9-3 that some wags have mused that BLS stands for ‘Bit Like Saab’, this model is a very accomplished performer. Not just good for a Cadillac, good period. It has quite a few factors working in its favour. First off, it’s based on very solid underpinnings. The Epsilon Platform, as GM calls this chassis, delivers a sharp handling and sweet riding family of cars and the BLS is no exception. Then there’s the appeal. Many customers looking for something different would quite appreciate the style of a Caddy, the build integrity of a Saab and the running costs of something like a Vectra.
The engine has a very convoluted history behind it. Initially developed as a joint effort between Saab and Fiat, it has seen service in both these companys’ wares and is manufactured at the FMA plant in Italy. The 150bhp 16-valve engine is the fruit of four years hard development work and it’s one of the finest engines in its class, outpunching the entry-level diesels found in the Audi A4 (115bhp), BMW 3 Series (122bhp), and Mercedes C-Class (122bhp). With prices starting at £21,473, the Cadillac significantly undercuts many of these ‘premium’ offerings. While watching the BLS 1.9TD’s rump disappearing into the distance, drivers of the above vehicles can console themselves with their badge equity.
Mated to a six-speed manual gearbox as standard, with the option of a six-speed auto, there’s plenty of scope for plugging the car straight into the meat of the torque curve. With at least 90% of peak torque available in a broad load running from 1,750 to 3,250rpm, you’ll be guaranteed respectable progress. After all, peak torque for the 16v engine is 320Nm, which is more than you get from the unit renowned as the class benchmark, BMW’s 2.0-litre diesel.
General Motors has worked closely with turbocharger manufacturer Garrett to optimise the performance of this low inertia turbocharger and the result is very close to that target for all decent turbocharged cars, namely to feel like a normally-aspirated bigger capacity engine. The variable geometry vanes in the turbo unit allow the pitch of the blades to be electronically adjusted for strong low-end torque and then tuned to offer a smooth transition into the turbo’s power phase. Although it’s not quite as good as Audi’s 2.0T engine in this regard, it’s certainly close and is one of the better turbo diesels in this sector.
It’s respectably quick too, punting the Caddy to 60mph in just 9.5 seconds, but the in-gear acceleration times that really indicate a diesel engine’s torque response have been slashed dramatically. With