Cadillac Catera's Siblings

One of the labels I attached to this post is "Badge Engineering" -- where different car brands are based on the same basic body and differences are trivial.  That's essentially true of two of the three cars discussed here, but slightly less true of the third.

That third car is Cadillac's Catera model that I wrote about here.  At the time I didn't show the Opel Omega that it was based on, hence the current post.

Further background on the Camera that offered by General Motors for model years 1997-2001 can be found here.

At the time, GM owned Germany's Opel firm and England's Vauxhall, the latter selling rebadged Opels with right-side steering. The Wikipedia entry on the Opel (and Vauxhall) Omega is here.

Cateras were based on the Omega B1 (1994-1999) and Omega B2 (1999-2003) that had few exterior differences.  Even though Cateras were built in Opel's Rüsselsheim factory, they were modified to satisfy presumed American tastes for a sporty Cadillac.  Unfortunately for GM, the basic Opel body was given only minor changes, and didn't strike potential Cadillac buyers as being enough like a "real Cadillac" to bother buying: sales averaged less than 20,000 per model year.

Gallery

General view of a Catera.

Rear quarter view.  Note the broad sweep across the trunk lid between the tail lights.  The tail light segments not on the lid are Opel's, but the chrome strip, reflector strip and brake light band are for the Catera only.

Front view showing the Camera grille.  The grille pattern and crest are Cadillac features, and the low, chin air intake zone is also Catera's.

Here is a similar view of an Opel Omega.  Very few differences from the Catera.

Rear Omega view.  The main difference is the simpler trunk lid features.

Front quarter view of a Vauxhall Omega.  Its grille fits in the Opel's opening.  Otherwise, there are no visible exterior differences: true badge engineering.

The same can be said for the Vauxhall's rear in this "for sale" photo.