Cadillac does not build many cars like the Cadillac ELR: a 2-door coupé with 1398 , built from 2013 to 2016 as electrification stopped being an experiment and the crossover took every market. Its designer of record is Exterior: Tim Kozub / Interior: Keith Fisher.
How it came about
The Cadillac ELR is a two-door, four-passenger luxury plug-in hybrid compact coupé manufactured and marketed by Cadillac for model years (MY) 2014 and 2016 – with a hiatus for MY 2015. Using a retuned version of the Chevrolet Volt's Voltec EREV drivetrain, the ELR's lithium-ion battery pack delivered an all-electric range of 37–39 miles (60–63 km) and a top speed of 106 mph (171 km/h). The ELR derived from Cadillac's Converj concept, which debuted at the 2009 North American International Auto Show.
Scheduled for production and subsequently canceled during General Motors' bankruptcy and restructuring, and after a series of on-again, off-again decisions, the ELR was approved for production for MY 2014 with a MSRP at roughly $75,000 — $35,000 higher than the Volt, whose basic powertrain it shared. Styled under the exterior design direction of Tim Kozub, Cadillac presented the production ELR at the 2013 North American International Auto Show with retail deliveries beginning in the United States and Canada in December 2013. ELR manufacture ended in February 2016 with a total production just under 3,000.
The hardware
Under the skin sits 1398 . Kerb weight is 1846 kg. The gearbox is a CVT Voltec 4ET50 multi-mode electric transaxle. The layout matters: the engine drives the front wheels, the packaging choice that gives a small car a big cabin. The wheelbase is 2695 mm. These are manufacturer figures carried by Wikipedia and Wikidata, not road-test measurements.
Family and rivals
Where it sits in Cadillac's history is not in doubt: it was built at Detroit, Michigan. On a showroom list of its day it stood against the Infiniti Q50, the Peugeot 208, the Tesla Model X. Its Cadillac stablemates include the Cadillac 353 and the Cadillac ATS.
The money
On the used market today a Cadillac ELR typically changes hands for $13,000–$21,400, and running it — fuel and maintenance at its age — costs about $3,614–$5,126 a year. Insurance sits around $1,430–$2,160 a year. The figures are class-level estimates from the federal record, with the formula on the methodology page; the model-year pages carry complaints, recalls and repair costs year by year.