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Cadillac's most powerful two-door help for 2011, the CTS-V Coupe, is a hard-charging tone drinker that looks same a futuristic construct automobile that escaped from its machine exhibit turntable.

Even before fuel prices chromatic to above $4 a gallon, the federal polity tagged the 556-horsepower CTS-V Coupe a tone guzzler, dignified a $1,300 set that has to be paying by every CTS-V Coupe buyer.

The government's render frugalness ratings for this automobile are meet 14 miles per congius in municipality dynamical and 19 mpg on the highway.

But the CTS-V experience is most more than the gluttonous, exciting rush of 556 H.P. and the flooded eager see of 551 foot-pounds of torque reaching on by 3,800 rpm from a emotional V-8.

This super automobile has a support that thankfully keeps tight curb of the car's embody motions and the hefty, 4,200 pounds of weight that could otherwise attain the CTS-V Coupe a handful to drive.

The CTS-V Coupe and the four-door CTS-V sedan are the action versions of Cadillac's mid-size CTS model, which is the smallest automobile at Cadillac.

But filler is relative. The CTS-V Coupe, with way for four, is nearly 16 feet long, or most the length, from bumper to bumper, of a four-door Nissan Maxima sedan.

And the CTS-V toll tags sure aren't small.

Starting manufacturer's advisable retail price, including instruction charge and federal tone drinker tax, for the 2011 CTS-V Coupe is $64,340.

This is $25,300 more than the base toll for a non-performance edition of the CTS Coupe with 304-horsepower V-6.

Note that the "regular" CTS Coupes come with a accepted automatic transmission, patch the CTS-V Coupe has a accepted six-speed manual.

The lowest play retail toll for a CTS-V Coupe with six-speed automatic sending is $65,640.

Competitors to the souped-up CTS Coupe allow the 2012 Ford Shelby GT500 with 550-horsepower, emotional V-8, which has a play retail toll of $49,495, and the 2011 Dodge Challenger SRT8 392, which starts at $44,410 and has a 470-horsepower Hemi V-8.

While the Shelby GT500 has a legacy dating backwards to vie automobile utility Carroll Shelby and the Dodge Challenger is retro-styled to carve to the primeval 1970s Challengers, the CTS-V strength seem historically adrift.

Cadillac lost its luster as the metallic accepted for American luxury cars in past decades, and the CTS-V exterior design clings to the tired, sharp-edged, polarizing call that Cadillac used to reinvent itself some years ago.

Indeed, the silver-color effort automobile with sinister-looking, black wheels drew no looks, eliminate for a homeless Negro who obstinately stood at the passenger-side door, disagreeable to amount discover where the exterior entranceway appendage was. He was surprised to see that the entranceway opened after I slid my fingers into a notch between artefact metal pieces. A hidden, electronic fix behind the metal unlatched the door.

I asked a young guy what he thought of the car, and he needed to be told what it was. He didn't undergo Cadillac, and he didn't undergo CTS or the V version.

But he sure heard the throaty, 6.2-liter, emotional V-8 when I started the car. The powerful engine sounds were a constant, at start and during the drive, even at residential speed limits. The sounds weren't raucous, but they were distinctly different from those of mild-mannered cars.

The six-speed drill in the effort automobile had a comfortable see and good gearing to pull every taste of power. Only in sixth equipment did I intend a significance that the engine was relaxed and render practice was being moderated.

In hard driving, my backwards pushed into the utility seatback apace upon acceleration. There's not a civilised significance of noesis in the CTS-V Coupe; it's an immediate, here-you-go response.

But the CTS-V also could be driven mildly in municipality traffic, albeit with steady ingest of the aggregation pedal, which required more than a lowercase leg effort.

Try as I might, I never saw anywhere nearby the 19 mpg that the polity puts as the route mileage. Overall in municipality and route travel, I managed 15.3 mpg, which is graphic for a powered-up V-8 in a heavy, 2-ton car, but nonetheless farther from the cipher of today's similar-sized cars.

In all, I had a single-tank arrange of 275 miles at a toll of $4.35 a gallon.

Thankfully, the CTS-V does fine with regular nonleaded gasoline, but premium helps deliver crowning performance.

My passengers and I pronto felt every agency strike in the car, thanks in part to low-profile, 19-inch tires. Vibrations came direct to the front-seat cushions, which were in optional, Recaro containerful way that outlay $3,400.

These way did a enthusiastic job of holding bodies in locate during spirited driving, but the cloth insert in the region of the cushions also could attain it arduous to gracefully opening the car.

It's also arduous to start and opening the two side seats. I had to impression over to intend below the smooth roofline. And at 5 feet 4, my nous grazed the cap patch I sat backwards there. The effort automobile didn't have a sunroof, but back-seat passengers can see the modify of the solarise through the super sloped backwards window.

I could not see much of anything as I hardback up in this car, and approaching cars in parking lots were a constant hazard because the side pane pillars were so fat and blocky. A accepted rearview camera helped a bit.

Consumer Reports magazine does not itemize the CTS-V separately, but reliability for regular CTS models is below average.

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