General Motors shared photos Wednesday of its upcoming uber-opulent Celestiq testing on public roads near its Warren Technical Center. While the $300,000 electric sedan is still quite far out from hitting a dealership near you (let alone having its final production-ready version revealed), it’s hard to ignore its side. Specifically, its ultra-long wheelbase.
Using a key measurement that Cadillac shared early on, we can use these new photos to come to a conclusion: this thing is going to be an absolute unit.
Cadillac showed off the Celestiq’s beautiful wheels last month and shocked just about everyone when it revealed the size. A 23-inch wheel—what the Celestiq rides on—means that the sedan will have even larger wheels than the brand’s venerable Escalade SUV. In fact, the only vehicle across any GM brand that is revealed to have larger factory wheels equipped is the Chevrolet Silverado EV. The Silverado will also be the very first production vehicle to ever leave the factory with 24-inch wheels. See what we’re getting at? Because we know the size of the wheels, we can scale the entire photo to get an approximate measurement of both the wheelbase and overall vehicle length.
We estimate that the Celestiq’s wheelbase will fall somewhere between 122 and 125-inches, with the actual scaled drawing coming in at 122.8 inches. This should put the Celestiq right around the same wheelbase as the Audi A8 L, Bentley Flying Spur, Maserati Quattroporte, and Mercedes-Benz S-Class.
Moreover, we can also estimate that its overall length will fall somewhere between 195 and 200 inches—the actual scaled measurement came in at around 196 inches. This would make the Celistiq nearly a half-foot shorter than any of the above-mentioned vehicles that share similar wheelbase lengths. Given its use of electric motors rather than gasoline power, it’s likely that the Celestiq may be able to make better use of the available room in its slightly more compact package without compromising on interior or cargo space.
It’s important to note that while we can confirm that the wheel size is the same (the Michelin Pilot Sport EV tires on the latest photos confirm the Celestiq is rocking 23-inchers), there are a few variables at play that could throw off our napkin math measurements a bit. First up is the angle of the car, which is not exactly parallel to the camera in this photo. Another side shot is closer to being aligned, however, the wide-angle lens used to take the photo produces a bit of distortion in the image. With a little bit of post-edit profile correction for the lens used by the photographer, we get similar dimensions in both photos.
Measurements aside, it’s still pretty clear that this is a fairly long car. In fact, one might dare to call this sedan a modern-day land yacht, because it’s undeniably huge from just about any angle. Its engineering constraints seem to stay fairly true to the original concept, which is a given considering that vehicle hardpoints are generally defined early on during vehicle development and don’t typically change. The important styling bits that will undeniably define this car’s legacy, however, are still hidden behind the curtain…at least for now.
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