Rental Review: Buick Cascada

"My bird IS the word" (mybirdistheword)
02/17/2020 at 12:48 • Filed to: None

Would you say this is “similar” to a M ustang?

Well according to dollar rental, it is. I wanted a convertible for my trip to L.A, and it was only 250$ for a whole week. a no-brainer as far as I am concerned. despite the bait and switch the rental went well, no BS from dollar regarding additional fees. the various dents and scratches I expected from a rental so I was unconcerned. Beggars can’t be choosers I guess.

The Buick had about 42k miles on it, and I put a considerable amount on. Due to the chilly weather and a backseat passenger, The top was up for the majority of the trip, although we did have some fun moments with it down. Highlights included the Angeles national forest, Joshua Tree national park, the marvelous 405 freeway, and various beaches like Laguna, San Clemente, and Malibu. Will post about the trip later this week.

1: Performance: That’s all anyone cares about right? The car was wholly unremarkable. Acceleration was punchy at lower speeds, but the car fell flat on its face at highway speeds. The steering had some on-center vaugeness and my sister said it felt numb, although I didn’t really notice so perhaps I’m just used to cars like this. When I finally got to drive my FOST again it just reminded me how nice it would have been on those mountain roads. The car did not have excessive body roll and the suspension was altogether about what I was expecting from a typical modern car. Transmission had a few odd shifts but due to being outside my comfort zone I didn’t really mess around with the manual mode.

2: I nterior: Also mediocre, a running theme for this car. The seats were relatively comfy, and my back had no complaints on these long drives and being stuck in the car all week. The ride was less than what I expected from a luxury car. Basically, this rode like a C hevy. L.A has some surprisingly shitty roads for a town that never gets winter and the C ascada was having none. The layout of the dash controls were super un- intuitive, but I became used to over the course of driving so they were not too big of a deal, however the infotainment was absolutely terrible. D id nobody at GM take a course in user interface design? menus were laid out horribly, any sort of changes in the car would reset menus so if somebody was trying to connect their phone it would erase the entry for the GPS. Everything was very trial and error all week . C onnecting an Ipod via the cable only worked about 1/4 of the time, and using the bluetooth required a deep dive into the manual. You could not use the GPS without having the radio turned on, so you would have to mute the radio if you didn’t want to listen to it. Total absurdity. Points for having decent legroom for the back seats, although the family complained that they are very “vertical” and not the most comfortable. Nobody liked being blasted in the face by cold air but that is the same for any convertible.

3: Fun factor: This is hard for me. I have had loads of fun with convertibles in the past, for some reason this was not really hitting with me so I am going to mark it down as the fact that I was massively distracted by traffic, sightseeing, and the non-optimal weather to really enjoy the thing. The car did feel very classy and stealthy in traffic, and the color combo with the black and red made up for what is otherwise not the coolest car. The convertible top had a folding divider in the trunk that gave a very sizeable and usable space when the top wasn’t desired. The car on the whole was very pedestrian feeling. I don’t know if this is news to any of you. It made me wish I had simply gotten the basic M ustang convertible. Considering the cascada starts at $33,070 according to google, I don’t understand why dollar even stocks these. Ford shows $34,505 for the ‘stang with the automatic.

Apparantly, according to my sister’s-boyfriend’s kids, convertibles are not cool in L. A. They told me it’s like a tourist thing. That didn’t stop them from enjoying it. I promptly told them they were silly, as this is definitely the town for owning a convertible.

Overall: 6/10. Fix the infotainment and it would be 7/10 perfectly acceptable. W ould be at least 8/10 if it was a damn mustang instead.

DISCUSSION (16)

HFV has no HFV. But somehow has 2 motorcycles > My bird IS the word
02/17/2020 at 13:11

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Sometimes the best part of getting a rental is getting back to your car and remembering why you love it.

SBA Thanks You For All The Fish > My bird IS the word
02/17/2020 at 13:17

Nice trip. Looking forward to more details. I’m glad you made it out to The Tree. As for this:

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Peter Egan hit the nail on the head on this one when he said, after relocating back to his native Wisconsin, that the irony was that he used his convertibles “top down” far more in Wisconsin than he ever had in his many years living in LA.

The dirty little secret is that, while we don’t get super-cold weather, you do get a lot of marine layer and overcast-cool mornings. Fog. Cold clammy ocean air. Mist. Damp and cool. So you tend not want the top down on an average morning. By lunchtime? The sun’s beating down a good part of the year, but it’s hot and intense and you often feel it’s too hot and likely to give you a burn.

Plus convertibles get broken into, leak in the rainy season and generally get to be a hassle. So, yeah, the stereotype of the Angelenos driving around Top Down all the time turns into a real cliche— for rich guys in Italian roadsters, moguls in SLs... and tourists in rental Mustangs.

My bird IS the word > SBA Thanks You For All The Fish
02/17/2020 at 13:24

Yeah I can imagine the summers can get pretty brutal. The caterham that Hillbank had the customer installed air conditioning which I had a good laugh at, but it made perfect sense. Colin Chapman can suck it, that desert sun sounds rough .

Chariotoflove > My bird IS the word
02/17/2020 at 13:30

I think the Cascada suffers from being left behind. Buick moved ahead these last few years, but the Cascada is essentially the same as when it debuted as an Opel in 2013. They didn’t even update the center stack to take away the button forest the way they have with other Buicks since.

SBA Thanks You For All The Fish > My bird IS the word
02/17/2020 at 13:33

yeah, I took “the wrong car” (a topless Spyder) out to a vintage rally one year in May—- figuring Desert Hot Springs, through Joshua Tree, laps at Chuckwalla, Indio, Palm Springs, Palm Desert, over the pass toward Julian... What could be more fun in an open-air car in spring weather ?

I’d have rather spent those three days sitting next to a blast furnace in Gary Indiana. And the trip was in Early May. Brutally cold at 7AM and baking my brains out by 11 AM.

My bird IS the word > Chariotoflove
02/17/2020 at 13:42

I guess that is more a reflection of how much cars have improved in the last decade. I am continually impressed.

Chariotoflove > My bird IS the word
02/17/2020 at 13:51

For sure, and Buicks in particular. The safety and luxury advances in just the last 5 years are amazing. My 2015 K900 was pretty competitive in design and features with a Lexus, etc. when it came out, but it’s now left behind by what new lux models can do with infotainment, interior materials, etc.

TheRealBicycleBuck > SBA Thanks You For All The Fish
02/17/2020 at 13:55

These are the same reasons that a convertible sucks most of the time in any state. I’ve had friends with t-tops and convertibles. With the exception of the maniacs with Jeeps, the only time the tops came off was at night when we were cruising with friends.

SBA Thanks You For All The Fish > TheRealBicycleBuck
02/17/2020 at 14:04

I think Peter Egan’s point was just that, at least in the Upper Midwest, you get a lot of warm (but not too hot) clear summer weather from May to September when you can drop the top in the morning and enjoy it all day long. It’s rare to get those sustained conditions where you can really enjoy it.

Nothing like an July evening in Wisconsin with the top down and the sun going down over the hills and the corn.

TheRealBicycleBuck > SBA Thanks You For All The Fish
02/17/2020 at 14:28

I’ve always lived in t he South, so those kinds of days are a foreign concept down here.

Notchback88 > HFV has no HFV. But somehow has 2 motorcycles
02/17/2020 at 14:33

Last time I went to JRTC in Ft. Polk I drove a soft side HMMWV for a month. You get used to the “dynamics” of the Humvee and the month goes by quickly.

Getting back into my ‘13 FoST reminded me of just how fun it was and what throttle response could be.

I’m going back this year, maybe I can write up a Jalopnik-style review of it when I’m done.

thatsmr > My bird IS the word
02/17/2020 at 18:55

GM said aha! Lets go after the Sebting/200 niche! Oops not much of a niche.

My bird IS the word > thatsmr
02/17/2020 at 20:20

I lament the loss of convertibles, however I do not lament the loss of the sebring.

My bird IS the word > Notchback88
02/17/2020 at 20:21

Do an oppo review. Tell me how bad it is so I can stop wanting to buy a surplus one lol.

jules > My bird IS the word
02/18/2020 at 02:19

I thought I thought the Buick Cascada was expensive at 33,000 until you reminded me that the Mustang is now 35,000 as a convertible. What happened to the days of a car being under 10,000 or 15,000. So I guess a shitbox Mustang 5 years old for $10,000 is a steal

Notchback88 > My bird IS the word
02/18/2020 at 09:09

Ha, I will, with as many pictures as I can.

Short take: Supremely uncomfortable. Passenger gets cooked by the engine AND the battery. Shakes over 55. Feels like every time the fan kicks on after 50mph you lose 30 hp.

Decent tq, good off road capability, shit engine otherwise.