Happy Holidays!

We had a big cold front blow in last night. Was in the upper 70's yesterday, 30's this morning, only low 50's today. Holiday weather! Got up to go get the family breakfast and the Roadmaster just barely started. Whoops!

Air'd up the tire and pushed the GTO out of the garage (you all have to push cars out of the way to get in the attic too....right?) and got all the "Christmas Crap" out of the attic, then loaded the family in the Roadmaster. Went to Wal-Mart first, and sure enough the cold had zapped my 3-year-old Wally World "Never Start" battery. Was 7-months out of free replacement but at least got a pro-rate on a new battery. Car starts fine again.

Next we went to Home Depot and came back home with an 8-foot tree strapped to the roof. Spent all afternoon working on decorationg the house with the family. Fa-la-la-la-la----la-la-laaa-la. ; )

Here's my favorite Texas Christmas Song.....to put you all in the proper holiday spirit...If this doesn't make you smile nothing will. ENJOY!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P37xPiRz1sg

Merry Christmas.... Seams strange to have Christmas without even a little snow.... I'm jealous.

200OZ wrote:

Merry Christmas.... Seams strange to have Christmas without even a little snow.... I'm jealous.

We generally do not have snow in Central Pennsyltucky either, but the weather is not so balmy!! We usually get at least one ground covering event in December, but nothing sticks for more than a couple of days until Jan............. I guess when we left Roch Cha Cha we move to the south?

Everyone gets sick down here this time of the year. It'll be in the 70's-80's for 4-5 days, then a cold front will blow in and it'll drop down to the 30's for a day or two, and then the southern winds will blow up off the gulf and push the cold back up to Oklahoma. Your body doesn't know how to act.

We do get snow 1-2 times a winter, but it only makes the grass white and is usually gone in 24hrs.....still the entire town shuts down when it happens.....and then it's 75 the next day.

Funny looking at that snow pic from last winter. I had the 79 Buick and 88 Iroc-Z in the garage, both with those yellow New Jersey plates. Seems like I'd try to find project cars locally....but it's good to have friends who find me toys. ; )

The Iroc and my little white Catera are long gone. I miss the Catera. ; )

I've never met anyone who missed a Catera. I unerstood them to be universally known as the biggest disposable pile of rebadged junk that GM ever imported.

No?

I loved mine to death, no joke. They have a terrible reputation, so clean, low mile ones can be bought really cheap. These were rear drive, and the basis for the 2004-06 GTO. Lots of GTO parts interchange....I just wish they'd had GTO engines!

By '99 a lot of the reliability issues had been taken care of, but you can't be scared to get your hands dirty if you own one. What had not been done, I did myself. The biggest Catera flaw is an oil cooler built into the V of the engine block, under the intake manifold. When they fail, oil and water mixes, and people think it's bad head gaskets....it's not. I bypassed that internal cooler and installed and external cooler in front of the a/c condensor. Other BIG issue was timing belt failures. I put on an updated Opel tensioner, new idlers, and did the valve cover gaskets in one shot. Car ran super and was such fun to drive, like a go-cart.

These are HEAVY little cars. Everything is overbuilt, which is why it was so shocking how many issues they had. The doors weigh a ton, and the car just feels expensive when you drive it....too bad it looked like a bloated Corsica...

Mine was a Catera Sport model, fairly rare, with lower gearing, different larger wheels, silver trim on the dash where standard cars had plasti-wood, real Recaro leather seats, rear spoiler and fog lights. It tracked like it was on rails down the highway. The back seat was big too, with a ton of leg room. Nice on trips.

They're true mutts. Made by Opel in Germany, with a Saab V6 engine made in England (also used in the Saab 9000, Saturn LS, and enlarged to a 3.2 to be used in the current Caddy CTS), a transmission made in France and also used in the BMW 5-series, and the stereo and climate control were plucked right out of the American Caddy Seville and DeVille parts bin. The red trunk lid light was neon, no kidding, it glowed oddly at night and I thought it was so sharp.

My Cat had the best Bose stereo of any car I've had, with steering wheel controls, 12 speakers plus a subwoofer, CD and cassette in the dash plus a 12-disc changer hidden in the trunk...the sound was just outstanding. Sunroof, leather, heated seats, it was totally loaded. My wife loved the thing too. Misty was SO PISSED when I sold it to buy my Roadmaster, but I'd always wanted an LT1 wagon and the only way I could swing it was by selling the little Caddy.

I do miss it, but to be honest I kept waiting for a major failure...never had one, but it was always in the back of my mind....especially on trips. I'd read all about them, done all the main fixes, but still.....there was always a "what next" concern.

It was just different...which is something I always look for in my toys. I always looked forward to driving it....but I do like my Roadmonster a lot better, and trust it a WHOLE lot more.

Oh and you want to laugh? The 3.6 V6, base engine in the new Camaro, is nothing more than the latest update of the old Catera/Saab/Saturn 3.0-3.2 V6. It's been updated to direct injection and punched out, but it's still that same engine. For some reason GM doesn't mention that.....

you call that snow? Looks more like decoration to me,.

meh,..
nick
looking at the 3ft drifts outside,

Shoot that was a blizzard. Got the day off. ; )

Morning Mike and its snowing here in yorktown as we speak.Just a little snow here and schools close and everybody
drives like idiots and all the grocery stores empty out of milk and bread.Thats a great pic of your wagon with a
christmas tree on the roof.Brings back some great memories of my youth.Growing up I cant remember of any times
when we didnt have a wagon in the driveway.Could never have imagined back then that at 55 I would be a wagon
nut with 2 B bodies parked out back.
Take Care
Jim Gordon

Glad you liked the pic Jim. I'm the same way, we ALWAYS had a big wagon in the driveway. Think it's important that kids ride backwards while growing up. ; )

And your stories about people's reactions to snow there mirror the way it is here when that happens....thank goodness it's not often!

Stay warm and safe up there!

What's that big thingy on the intake just down from the throttle body in front of the radiator?

On the Catera? It was some kind of an airbox....the plastic hose from the airbox clamped to it...don't get me lying about what it was called, but think the MAF was part of it. Car had two seperate throttle bodies in the single intake...

Weird little car.....but I liked it a lot.

I sold it to a young family with two kids. Guy bought it for his wife to drive, and they live here in Round Rock not far from me. I see the car all the time, at the grocery store, going the other way on my way to work, in line at the fast food places.

It still looks good, but the front wheels always seem to have brake dust on them....something I never let build up when I owned it.

At least I know it's still around.

Who is Lisa Catera?

'Lisa Catera' Comes to Life on Chicago Hope - 10/29/97

DETROIT, -- "Lisa Catera," the punchline to a commercial for Catera, Cadillac's entry-luxury sedan, is alive and well ... and practicing neurosurgery on Chicago Hope.

It's a case of television drama drawing inspiration from the advertising side of the medium. In a recent Cadillac TV commercial, the voice-over urges viewers to "lease a Catera" -- then ends by asking, "Well, who is Lisa Catera?" Turns out that John Tinker, Chicago Hope executive producer, saw the spot and decided that Lisa Catera was a fitting name for the show's newest character. Dr. Lisa Catera, played by Stacy Edwards, debuts on the Oct. 29 episode of the CBS.

Catera brand manager Dave Nottoli notes that Dr. Lisa Catera is exactly the kind of customer Catera is intended for, men and women who are enthusiastic about life and who want a responsive, personal-sized luxury sedan. "We call Catera 'The Caddy that Zigs' because it is such fun to drive," says Nottoli. "We think Catera would be a perfect car for someone like Dr. Catera."

Introduced one year ago, Catera competes against leading imports like the Lexus ES300,
BMW 328i and Mercedes C280 in the hotly contested entry-luxury market. DMB&B/Detroit, Cadillac's advertising agency, developed the Lease A Catera spot.

SOURCE Cadillac Motor Car Division

How about a Catera semi-longroof?

that's a re-badged Opel Omega.

Krzdimond wrote:

that's a re-badged Opel Omega.

they all were Robert, the all were.........

I drove an Opel Kadett in Germany they tried to sell it here as a Chevy Nova in the '90s. Got it up to 190kph before the fuel interrupt going down hill of course. flat ground it topped out at 170kph and felt like it was going to come apart but I was on the autobahn damnit and I was going to drive as fast as i could ha ha ha.