| Author | Message | ||
     Vladimir Ivanovich Kirillov Grand Master Username: soviet Post Number: 1162 Registered: 2-2013 |
I could compare my 1982 Rolls Royce Silver Spirit with a 1982 Cadillac Fleetwood. But I will compare it with my 1976 Cadillac Fleetwood because of certain prejudices. First is that in 1977 Cadillac went cheap. In fact Cadillac threw the pooch to the ground and screwed it majorly. If a Cimmaron was the Standard of the World then I am a two legged eggplant. It was indeed the cruel and vicious prostitution of a grand margue. Compare a 1976 with 1977 and even blind Freddy will tell you they are very different cars. Put simply I would not give you a bag of tomatoes for post 1976 Cadillacs. Well ok one bag but only if I have a buyer waiting. The 1982 Spirit is a very solid car and beautiful to boot. Unbelievably even the inside door lock button is metal. I don't think I have ever come across another car that had an inside metal door lock button. Closer investigation reveals its made of brass then chromed. Then there is the interior of the Spirit. Stunning wood work on the dash and door caps together with the most attractive leather seats I have ever seen. Even the hood lining is classy. You could have debt collectors at your door, the bank seizing the house, the wife raping the postman and red lights and sirens behind you and still feel good driving a Spirit even to the local prison. The interior of a 1976 Cadillac Fleetwood is also luxurious but is no way in the same class as the Rolls Royce Silver Spirit. For a start the dash is plastic and the wood work on the dash is plastic too. Ghasty stuff indeedy and the chrome on the plastic comes off nicely. The dash is attractive but really nowhere as classy as the Rolls Royce. The Cadillac is much bigger than the Rolls. I find both cars attractive. The suspension on the Rolls is super heavy duty whereas the Cadillac's suspension is just heavy. The Rolls Royce uses forged iron not pressed steel like the Cadillac. Both cars are comfortable but the Rolls Royce on a nasty gravel road does not give an inch unless you are driving too fast like a fool. Emergency braking from high speed in the Cadillac sends blood rushing to your forehead but the Rolls Royce is superior in that it would be far less prone to fade given it has all round disc brakes not drum disk like the Cadillac. One area the Cadillac is ahead is abuse. You can abuse service wise for decades the Cadillac but do that with the Rolls Royce, especially coolant change wise and you enter a world of financial pain that could be worth more than the car. The Rolls Royce V8 is built like it was meant to be installed in an aircraft. Virtually everything has a lock tab on it. The 500 Cadillac 8.2 litre is the largest V8 ever introduced into a car. Its mean as hell and GM tested this engine for over a million miles before it went into production. If you are a total power freak these engine can be built up with readily available and not too expensive parts to 1,000 hp plus. Just what you would need to do to blow up a 500 Cadillac engine remains a mystery to me. The gearboxes in both cars are the same except for the bell housing and output shafts. Putting aside all the craziness of different measures of power the Rolls Royce is about 215 hp to the Cadillac's 375 hp and last time I checked Cad Power in USA would build you a 600 hp 8.2 litre V8 for $8,000 USD and to my knowledge a performance RR engine for the Spirit is not available on the planet apart from stealing one out of a twin turbo Bentley R. But what about a 1967 HR Holden. Why compare? Well for $25,000 AUD you can get yourself a very nice HR Holden with no airconditioning, no power steering, no power windows, no power seats, no power door mirrors, no power door locks, no power boot, no power aerial and a fibre camshaft timing gear which will strip when pushed hard and a steering wheel shaft that will impale you to the seat right through the spine in a solid head on crash. The Rolls Royce has gear drives on its camshaft to crankshaft and that is true performance stuff. Also, with the HR Holden you get untinted windows and lovely vinyl seats oh so sticky and slippery without the air conditioning in summer especially in humid climates (read rudely bloody uncomfortable and something nice to do to people you hate). For the same $25,000 AUD you can buy a reasonably nice Spirit which in my opinion is ten times the quality of the Holden and given the choice I would always go for the Rolls Royce. I know you can get a nice one for $25,000 because I got mine for $10,000 and people readily accept I paid $40,000 for it. Summing it all up I think Spirits and Spurs are top value for money these days and well worth spending money on. Why do Australians pay idiotic prices for car which are basically just one tick above a Volga or a Moskavich? I think it has to do with reminiscing because Australia in 1960 was a totally different place to Australia in 2018 and there is a need to get back there and buying any Holden up until the time General Motors Holden committed buggery upon the entire population with the Commodore in the late 1970s is one way of time travel. But the Holden, though a solid car was very very basic with zero luxury. 1976 Cadillac Fleetwoods are luxury cars and they have tripled in value in the last 10 years and that's in the USA. The Rolls Royce Silver Spirit has for reasons I cannot fathom dropped 50 percent in value and are ludicrously cheap today compared when purchased new. And I think that's a good thing for collectors and hobbyists like myself because I can afford to own one. If fact I will go further and say I cannot find a car that offers so much in quality value than the Spirit at todays prices. Of course if you are not a mechanic and can't be bothered teaching yourself and reading the advices on this forum and in the RROC technical library then you are truly stuffed or rich or need to be. | ||
| Graham Hutton Experienced User Username: gph Post Number: 23 Registered: 1-2019 |
I used the logic in this post in a discussion with a group of car enthusiasts a few weeks back. while there were sage nods of agreement. in the end, it all comes down to what ever floats ya boat. I am a late comer to the Marque (in so far as about to acquire one)but I have been a fan for decades. |
