Road Test
Follow-Up Test: 2003 Cadillac Escalade ESV
The Real Texas Cadillac
We knew it was just a matter of time before Cadillac offered a bigger Escalade. Actually, we're surprised the company didn't introduce this longer-wheelbase version first. Just as the standard Escalade is essentially a tarted-up Chevrolet Tahoe, the Escalade ESV is essentially Cadillac's uptown version of the Chevy Suburban.
For the elder staffers here at Edmunds, the introduction of the bigger Escalade seems most appropriate. Long before SUVs took over our roadways (indeed, even before the term "SUV" became part of our vernacular), the semiofficial vehicle for the Lone Star state was a Chevy Suburban — nicknamed the "Texas Cadillac." The naming of this newest member of the Escalade family is a little illogical to us; this is the Escalade that the "EXT" badge should have been used for (as in EXTended) instead of being applied to Caddy's fraternal twin of the Chevy Avalanche.
Pretty much all the same virtues and vices of the 116-inch wheelbase Escalade apply to the ESV, which spans 130 inches between its wheel centers. This means that you get a comfortable cabin containing, in this writer's opinion, some of the best front seats in a luxury vehicle, be it a sedan or SUV. But it also means that the ESV has a couple of less endearing qualities that we've decried before, such as the hard plastic and hollow-sounding dash top and cheesy liftgate closing strap.
For 2003, in addition to bringing out this stretched Escalade, Cadillac made a host of refinements to its luxury SUV, even though it had been completely redesigned in 2002. Standard now are xenon headlights and side mirror-mounted turn signal repeaters, and several new options (such as a DVD-based rear entertainment system and XM Satellite Radio) came on board this year. Other '03 upgrades include triple-zone climate control, a new steering wheel with integrated audio controls and slightly revamped seats and gauges.
Those minor improvements make a major difference. Once we got used to the steering wheel controls, it was easy to thumb our way through radio stations and trip computer functions. And the XM radio is great, with 100 channels to pick from, covering everything from alternative to bluegrass, and most of them don't have commercials. This writer loved the "decade" stations; there are six dedicated channels for each decade from the 1940s up to the 1990s. Whatever your musical mood, instant gratification is yours if you've got satellite radio.
There's still room for improvement in this SUV, as our eagle-eyed editors discovered. Although there are plenty of grab handles for the second row, having a pair up front (on the A-pillars) would be a big help for shorter people trying to get up into the pilot's and co-pilot's seats. The parking brake release handle would be easier to use if it were placed farther to the left side of the dash rather than right by one's left knee. And Cadillac likes to brag about the new analog clock designed by Bulgari (a highbrow jeweler from Italy) — too bad its location is so low that it's virtually unreadable.
As we've been with other Escalades we've driven, we were impressed by the fantastic powertrain. Would you believe a 0-to-60-mph time of less than eight seconds? Yep, it dashed to that speed in just 7.8 ticks o' the watch and hustled down the quarter-mile in 15.9 seconds. Not bad for a nearly 6,000-pound truck, eh? Curiously, these numbers are virtually identical to what we got for a standard Escalade that competed in our recent luxury SUV comparison test, and both were all-wheel-drive models with the 6.0-liter V8 (the only configuration that the ESV comes in). When there are 345 horses and 380 pound-feet on tap, what's another couple hundred pounds? And there's more to it than raw numbers; the engine has a subdued but healthy growl when given the spurs and the automatic transmission never misses a beat, delivering quick, timely and transparent gearshifts.
Braking performance was actually better than Little Brother's, as the ESV posted a short 130-foot stopping distance from 60 mph versus the longish 145-foot effort turned in by the Escalade in our comparison test. But although the binders are easy to modulate, the pedal feels too spongy — not exactly reassuring when slowing all that mass down.
Of course, with the ESV, there's more truck to control, yet it had the same easy handling composure and luxury car ride as the "little" Escalade. This writer still feels that the steering is too slow off center and too light (when compared to the Lincoln Navigator, for example) but perfectly acceptable for a large SUV. And even parallel parking this beast (provided enough space was available) was not the nightmare we anticipated, thanks largely to the standard ultrasonic parking assist, which took the worry of disfiguring the nose of an innocent vehicle off our minds. Dare we say, docking the ESV was rather easy?
So let's ask the burning question. What is the reason for the ESV's existence? The practical advantages of the bigger Escalade are increased room for passengers in the third-row seat (who have nearly nine more inches of legroom) and greater cargo capacity (132 cubic feet maximum versus 108 cubes). But really, isn't the standard Escalade all anyone would ever need in terms of passenger and cargo space? Well, Cadillac is betting that the answer is no. And why would the company want to lose any potential sales to its lowly relatives? You know, the ones who wear those silly bow ties.
For the elder staffers here at Edmunds, the introduction of the bigger Escalade seems most appropriate. Long before SUVs took over our roadways (indeed, even before the term "SUV" became part of our vernacular), the semiofficial vehicle for the Lone Star state was a Chevy Suburban — nicknamed the "Texas Cadillac." The naming of this newest member of the Escalade family is a little illogical to us; this is the Escalade that the "EXT" badge should have been used for (as in EXTended) instead of being applied to Caddy's fraternal twin of the Chevy Avalanche.
Pretty much all the same virtues and vices of the 116-inch wheelbase Escalade apply to the ESV, which spans 130 inches between its wheel centers. This means that you get a comfortable cabin containing, in this writer's opinion, some of the best front seats in a luxury vehicle, be it a sedan or SUV. But it also means that the ESV has a couple of less endearing qualities that we've decried before, such as the hard plastic and hollow-sounding dash top and cheesy liftgate closing strap.
For 2003, in addition to bringing out this stretched Escalade, Cadillac made a host of refinements to its luxury SUV, even though it had been completely redesigned in 2002. Standard now are xenon headlights and side mirror-mounted turn signal repeaters, and several new options (such as a DVD-based rear entertainment system and XM Satellite Radio) came on board this year. Other '03 upgrades include triple-zone climate control, a new steering wheel with integrated audio controls and slightly revamped seats and gauges.
Those minor improvements make a major difference. Once we got used to the steering wheel controls, it was easy to thumb our way through radio stations and trip computer functions. And the XM radio is great, with 100 channels to pick from, covering everything from alternative to bluegrass, and most of them don't have commercials. This writer loved the "decade" stations; there are six dedicated channels for each decade from the 1940s up to the 1990s. Whatever your musical mood, instant gratification is yours if you've got satellite radio.
There's still room for improvement in this SUV, as our eagle-eyed editors discovered. Although there are plenty of grab handles for the second row, having a pair up front (on the A-pillars) would be a big help for shorter people trying to get up into the pilot's and co-pilot's seats. The parking brake release handle would be easier to use if it were placed farther to the left side of the dash rather than right by one's left knee. And Cadillac likes to brag about the new analog clock designed by Bulgari (a highbrow jeweler from Italy) — too bad its location is so low that it's virtually unreadable.
As we've been with other Escalades we've driven, we were impressed by the fantastic powertrain. Would you believe a 0-to-60-mph time of less than eight seconds? Yep, it dashed to that speed in just 7.8 ticks o' the watch and hustled down the quarter-mile in 15.9 seconds. Not bad for a nearly 6,000-pound truck, eh? Curiously, these numbers are virtually identical to what we got for a standard Escalade that competed in our recent luxury SUV comparison test, and both were all-wheel-drive models with the 6.0-liter V8 (the only configuration that the ESV comes in). When there are 345 horses and 380 pound-feet on tap, what's another couple hundred pounds? And there's more to it than raw numbers; the engine has a subdued but healthy growl when given the spurs and the automatic transmission never misses a beat, delivering quick, timely and transparent gearshifts.
Braking performance was actually better than Little Brother's, as the ESV posted a short 130-foot stopping distance from 60 mph versus the longish 145-foot effort turned in by the Escalade in our comparison test. But although the binders are easy to modulate, the pedal feels too spongy — not exactly reassuring when slowing all that mass down.
Of course, with the ESV, there's more truck to control, yet it had the same easy handling composure and luxury car ride as the "little" Escalade. This writer still feels that the steering is too slow off center and too light (when compared to the Lincoln Navigator, for example) but perfectly acceptable for a large SUV. And even parallel parking this beast (provided enough space was available) was not the nightmare we anticipated, thanks largely to the standard ultrasonic parking assist, which took the worry of disfiguring the nose of an innocent vehicle off our minds. Dare we say, docking the ESV was rather easy?
So let's ask the burning question. What is the reason for the ESV's existence? The practical advantages of the bigger Escalade are increased room for passengers in the third-row seat (who have nearly nine more inches of legroom) and greater cargo capacity (132 cubic feet maximum versus 108 cubes). But really, isn't the standard Escalade all anyone would ever need in terms of passenger and cargo space? Well, Cadillac is betting that the answer is no. And why would the company want to lose any potential sales to its lowly relatives? You know, the ones who wear those silly bow ties.
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