Let’s say you traveled back in time to 1987 with enough money to buy a brand-new Mercedes-Benz 420 SEL, which was $54,440 (about $153,989 in 2024 dollars). But wait! The General would sell you a sleek new Pininfarina-styled roadster built in both Turin and Hamtramck, for just $54,700. What do you do?
That car was the Cadillac Allanté (yes, the accent is mandatory, just as it is with the Plymouth Volaré and Oldsmobile Toronado Troféo), which was sold for the 1987 through 1993 model years.
I found this car in Sparks, Nevada, a couple of months back.
The idea behind the Allanté was that GM would shove those troublesome European luxury invaders off our continent once and for all, by combining Michigan engineering with Italian styling.
Pininfarina was tapped to handle the design work, while a shortened version of the Eldorado/Toronado platform provided the underpinnings.
Car shoppers willing to pay S-Class money might have expected S-Class levels of powertrain sophistication in their Allantés, but what they got was GM’s High Technology V8.
This version of the HT4100 got a unique intake rig that gave it 170 horsepower and 235 pound-feet. For 1989, the 4.5-liter version took over, followed by the Northstar for 1993.
The only transmission ever offered in the Allanté was a four-speed automatic.
There was a digital instrument cluster and what seemed like hundreds of buttons.
The interior was all sumptuous Italian leather and cool-looking gadgets, but the price tag of $154,724 (when reckoned in inflated 2024 bucks) seemed a bit steep. Sales weren’t strong, to put it mildly, and in the end only 21,430 Allantés were built ( I’ve documented eight of them in junkyards through now).
Part of the problem for GM was that the cars had to be flown between Detroit and Turin via specially-modified Boeing 747s, at stupendous expense.
Meanwhile, Lee Iacocca and his buddy Alejandro de Tomaso were going for much the same approach with Chrysler’s TC by Maserati, with similarly unimpressive results. At the same time, Chevrolet shoppers could still buy new Chevettes.
So here we are, fully depreciated 37 years later in the Nevada high desert. Sometimes it works out like that.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
1987 Cadillac Allanté in Nevada wrecking yard.
Imagine a world-class car with Cadillac comfort!
[Images: The Author]
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