1930 Cadillac V16 Series 452 'Madam X' 7-Seater Limousine

In January 1930, Cadillac announced its most sophisticated and technologically advanced product yet in the form of the Series 452, the industry's first ever V16. Designed in the Roaring Twenties to be the last word in luxury motoring, the V16 wasn't ready until the Depression had begun to curtail sales of luxurious and expensive motor cars but managed to remain in production for the remainder of the decade and provided Cadillac with a superb flagship. The new Cadillac was a mechanical marvel, at the heart of which lay the amazing overhead-valve V16 engine, whose design has been credited to Owen Nacker. A thing of beauty, the engine bay was plated, polished and enamelled and the motor developed 165hp in its initial guise and drive was fed to the rear wheels via a three-speed gearbox. Built on just the one wheelbase length of 148-inches, the 452 could be ordered with a huge number of catalogued styles by Fleetwood (custom-made bodywork from various other coachbuilders made up a tiny percentage of overall sales) and one of the most stylish was the 'Madame X'. Designed by Harley Earl and launched at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York, the 'Madame X' was apparently inspired by the Broadway play of the same name. Ultimately the term 'Madame X' was used to describe several Fleetwood four-door bodies exhibiting certain distinct features, including style number 4175 as found on the Cadillac featured here. In total, just 3,251 of the 452/452A series were built in 1930-1931 and surviving examples are to be found in the most prominent car collections around the world, their owners appreciating the technical sophistication and mechanical artistry that went into producing each and every car.