Hi all, this is my first post here. I currently have a '92 Lincoln Town Car Cartier with 163k on the clock. While it's been a great car for me, it's not in particularly good shape (I bought it that way). I'm at a point now where I'm in a position to upgrade to something nicer. Well, the other day my fiancee and I went and test drove an '03 DeVille base model, and we fell in love with it. After doing some research, we figured out that the one we want is an '00-'03 DHS, red with tan interior and a sunroof, with under 75k miles. Hard to find combination, it seems, but we're not in a hurry. We want the DHS specifically over the DTS because it has the column shift, and we like the analog dash over the digital.

While we're looking for this car, I'm wanting to find out a few things from the knowledgable members of this forum. Specifically, what should I look out for when looking for one of these cars, and what problems are common? It seems that there are a lot of cooling system issues related to the earlier Northstar engines, but I would hope that by '00 they'd resolved a good number of the growing pains. We're intending on keeping this thing to at least 200k miles. I do all my own work and I don't mind tackling big jobs, but I also don't want a car that is going to require constant maintenance. I need something that's going to be an overall reliable car for me to get me to work everyday. My fiancee and I drive a total of 75-100,000 miles/year between our four vehicles, which includes some very long, cross-country trips, so reliability is important.

Thanks for the advice!

 

Ted, you sound very knowkedgeable. My experience with cars is that if you treat them well they treat you well. Regular maintenance is the key, oil changes, keeping your fuids up and attending to issues when the first show signs of wear or problem. I am a VP Finance in my career, I am no mechanic but I have 3 vehicles including a 35 year old hobby car. I have made a lot of posts here. What I have found and no disrespect to anyone is that it is often the simplest things that are overlooked and often the worst case is assumed. Yes most peoplewill see that there are cooling system problems posted here for the Northstar but honestly the cooling system has to be the most ignored part of a car. How many head gasket failures resulted from overheated motors that had leaksor sytems not flushed and maintained regularily? I do not know, but I do know that if you overheat and engine and drive it you will warp the heads and blow the gaskets. Cadillac dropped the compression of the 2000 motors in part to address the head gasket failures. They also discontinued cooling the Generators with coolant in 2000, another source of leaks. Water pumps do break and a Northstar is no different. We are talking about things that need attention at 50,000 plus miles. Northstars also experience oil usage and carbon issue but this a direct result of drivers not using the power they have been given. Devilles get babied, With nearly 300 HP and 300 ft/lbs torque you can stand down most muscle cars from the hey day yet few drivers will have tried. I would also point out that the crankcase takes 7 1/2 litres of oil 8 quarts?, so you need to know that an oil change cost twice as much. You have already driven one so you know that the car is second to none in quality, comfort and ride. The Northstar is as smooth as silk and on long highway runs you will see some impressive MPG. Mine is almost 9 years old and it takes me to and from work every day and to our summer cottage 100 miles north of Toronto. I constantly receive compliments on the car when gasing up or getting it washed. I am a perfectionist with my vehicles and my local mechanic worked for 15 years at a Pontiac Buick Cadillac dealer before settingup his own shop. I trust him with the car and so far he loves it and keeps it running great. We recently did a compression test at 90,000 miles and it was solid as a rock. I have the service records from mile 26, the delivery mileage. My most serious repairs were the main seals done under recall, the Alternator wentat 30,000 the AC compressor went at 60,000, power steering pump at 70,000, water pump at 80,000, new plugs and wires and one coil packat 90,000. I don't know what you consider excessive repairs but those do not seem that bad to me. I think you will like driving a Cadillac.

This is a December 2006 photo of Katzman's Caddy

 

Thanks for the reply, Katzman's, and that's a very pretty car you have!

I think there's a lot of truth to what you're saying. In the Jaguar world, some of the 6-cylinder engines are prone to blowing head gaskets. Well, that only happens if people don't flush the cooling system at scheduled intervals. The Jaguar V12s are known for dropping valve seats, but that's either an issue of overheating (which is your own fault, once again due to poor maintenance of the cooling system) or if you have the engine rebuilt it can happen if the machine shop does a bad job with the valve seats. So, what you say makes sense to me.

Also, in the Jaguar world we had carbon build-up issues, similarly due to people not using the power on-tap. We called the solution an "Italian tune-up", which is just what's described here for Northstars, basically flog the thing like it was meant to. When I sold a 170,000 mile V12 to a friend of mine that came out of my car, he told me when he tore it down there wasn't a spec of carbon in it. I did good and frequent tune-ups.

Oil change doesn't bother me... my '92 XJS V12 takes 12 quarts, as did my old Dodge ***mins truck. So, I'm used to high oil quantities, and actually prefer it. It gives you a much greater margin for error should you really run low on oil, and it also gives you that much more oil to absorb contaminants. How frequent are the oil changes supposed to be? I believe that the display is supposed to tell you when to change the oil, is that accurate? Usually what I do is I'll change the oil based on mileage and/or color. If it starts to look bad before the scheduled interval, I change it to get the contaminants out that turned it black.

So, if I'm looking at getting a car with fewer than 75k miles, that should put me before a lot of the service items are due that would probably normally get ignored and cause problems. I tend to be religious about getting my maintenance done if not on schedule as close to it as possible. When I used to do auto transport and my 7500 mile oil change would come up (that was the interval on the Dodge) I would call a friend and ask him to look up the nearest oil change place to where I was, and then just stop in there.

Obviously if I do the proper maintenance on the car and take care of it, it will give me fewer problems over the course of its time with me. Still, even with proper maintenance items don't last forever. The Town Cars tend to have rock-solid reliability, the '98+ cars frequently seeing well over 400,000 miles on the original engine and transmission. While that's not actually what I'm looking to get out of this car (although it would be nice), going up to at least 200,000 would be preferable. Basically, the intent would be to buy this car and drive it into the ground. I do put a lot of miles on my cars very quickly, so even if I buy something with 60k on it now, it's not unreasonable to think it may hit 200k within 3 years of my ownership. When I bought my XJS, I put 4000 miles on it with in the first week of ownership. When I had my Dodge, I put 107,000 miles on it in 2 years... and in parallel I drove about 40k miles on other vehicles. So, I drive a lot.

It's looking like that one of these should be a good vehicle for me. So, the only trick is going to be finding the exact one that I want. If I'm spending this much on a car (which is not what I usually do), then I don't want to compromise on color, sunroof, features, etc.

 

I am with you on the oil chages, however my experience is that the interval calculator in the car is a good measure of your driving habits and weather conditions. I am a 3 months or 5,000 km guy. My last change was Jan.18 and the interval shows 53% oil life left. That's 45 days ago and it has been the coldest winter here in 28 years. So right now it is on track for a change at 96 days or 3 months and a day short of a week. Also thanks for the compliment on the car, just like I said in my post eh?

 

Yep, the car is definitely in mint condition. It's good to know that the oil life monitor seems to back up the 3 month/3,000 mile rule of thumb that most people follow.

I was hoping I'd get some more people (including owners of the '00-'03 DeVille/DHS/DTS) responding with their experiences, but in doing other research it seems that these cars overall have a good track record. That, combined with the fact that my fiancee and I both love the thing, is enough to get me to seriously start searching. Unfortunately, it seems that the particular car I want is fairly rare. I found one that was exactly what I was looking for, but minus the sunroof, and that's not something I'm willing to compromise on. I'm willing to travel for the car even to California, provided I have reason to believe it really is in as good shape as I'm looking for (like-new condition). The specific car would be:

'00-'03 DHS
Under 75k miles (preferably under 60k)
Red with tan interior
Sunroof
No carriage roof, no non-factory add-ons (i.e. no chrome trim or the like)
Night vision preferable, but not a requirement
Under $15k

Checking around on eBay and AutoTrader, I would have no problem buying the exact car I wanted (night vision is much harder to find, but that's also an option for me, not a requirement) but either not in red, not as a DHS, or without a sunroof. I don't want the DTS because I want the column shifter, and I don't want a base because I want the wood wheel and analog gauges.

If anyone has any good suggestions for resources to check out, please let me know. I took a look at the Cadillac "Certified Pre-Owned" searching, but no luck there. The local Cadillac dealers I've talked to only have one DeVille, the white base model that I test drove.

 

This won't help you but for interestI'll mention it. GM Canada has an Optimum Vehicle program, basically used GM cars that the dealers sell that have a 100 point inspection and warranty added. On the GM Canada web site you can put in the details you want, model, year, price range, geographical area of search and then the list of avaialble cars pops up for you. You can choose the ones you want which takes you into the dealer web site for details and 2 dozen photos. This is how I found my car. I picked 6 or 8 to look at and in the course of a weekend saw and drove them all. On the Monday I made the purchase. You also get the full service recordon the car for services provided at the dealer and they give you the build sheet printout as well. Since most cars sold under this program are what I would consider premium used cars less than 4 model years old most have dealer service history, especially in the case of a Cadillac. It is just a great service and demonstrates GM's committment to its products and dealers.

I was going to say that I prefer the LD8 motor over the L37. Torque over HP. The salesmen at the dealer where I purchased told me the Deville with the 275HP/300ft-lbs LD8 was quicker than the Sevilles/STS with the 300HP/295ft-lbs L37. Since you don't want the DTS I believe you'll end up with the low RPM torque machine.

 

In America it's "Certified Pre-Owned", but I've found the Cadillac US search engine has not been particularly helpful for me, and all the vehicles happen to be particularly highly priced. I've mostly been using eBay and AutoTrader to search around. I found a DHS in New York that has 142,000 miles, and I'm going to probably test drive it this weekend if I go back there so that I can see for myself how these cars can hold up under that kind of mileage. Plus it'll give me an idea of the differences in driving a DHS vs a base.The 47k mile example I test drove was, to me, not nearly enough miles to see how these cars will hold up with the rigors of high mileage.

Yes, I definitely agree I would like to get the higher torque engine. When I drove the base DeVille it actually felt more powerful than the STS I test drove, I believe for the specific reason you're mentioning of torque vs. horsepower. My Town Car, despite only making 210 hp, makes somewhere around 300 lb-ft of torque at 3600 rpms. As such, it's actually surprisingly fun to drive at low revs! When people have told me I should just put a Ford 32-valve 4.6 in it, I pointed out that it makes about the same torque at a higher RPM, so the car will actually "feel" slower. The 454 in my Suburban is fabulous for this reason!

I'm leaning towards getting one, I think that checking out a high-mileage example will help me in my decision process.

 

Crusher & Katzman...Ted & Ray...two like minds. I rented a town car back in 96 on a trip to Disney World in Orlando and I had a blast driving that car so I know what you mean. I also have a 99 GMC Suburban, somethinhg like 365 ft/lbs of torque. The only car on your list Crusher I have no experience with is the range Rover as my neigbour has the Jag and I have had occassion to drive her here and there when she may have had a few too many sips of wine. Twelve cylinders is mighty fine!

 

Ray, seems we do have a lot in common! Your Suburban must have the 350, I'm guessing? I've got the 454 in mine. Only slightly more power and slightly worse gas mileage, but I believe it to be more durable since the cylinder temperatures and pressures are lower. Plus having a big block just adds to the cool factor!The Jag is great fun, and as to no experience with the Range Rover, some might say that's a good thing! I love mine, though.