Quote:
Originally Posted by Bhobbs
You're arguing that the Camaro doesn't need to change, as its sales are literally crashing and burning. I can't be the only one that sees the Camaro is heading to a second cancellation. GM is content to just the car die off again.
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Not sure where/when I said change not required to improve sales. What I said was "LT5" is a bad idea and will sell worse than ZL1/ZLE cars. In addition, I said Chevy built a hardcore performance pony car with compromises to achieve this level of performance. How do you suggest Chevy go about correcting these compromises at what is close to the end of the Gen6 life cycle? Spending money on advertising (I know you didn't advocate this) is not going to turn this situation around. The target customer needed to do so is not going to buy a Camaro because of a slick ad campaign.
Will there be a Gen7? Not sure. And if there is will Chevy address some or all of these shortcomings to win market share? It makes sense they would, and if so hopefully not at the expense of the high performance limits of the Gen6 model. One thing that does need to change is the long product lifecycles of Camaro and Corvette. The car business is changing at a pace the Big Three will struggle to keep up with using current product life cycles. Gone are the days when a MY goes 8 or more years. C8 might be an exception for payback reasons, but afterward, I'd expect a new MY every 60 months or less, give or take a bit here and there.
Revisiting the "parts bin" car approach. I'd love to see a C8 with the Blackwing V8 twin-turbo DOHC motor only with VVT Turbos instead of Twin Scroll. Now that would be exciting! Of course, this won't happen. If the rumors hold true we may end up with a Flat-Plane V8 with the Z06/ZR1 using a single or maybe twin turbos. Still exciting but I'm not a FP fan and don't know if I ever will be. I totally understand the advantages of FP, but the cons override these for me. I like reliable cars/engines with cheap (relative) maintenance costs. Look at Ferrari and the cost to maintain these FP engines. There is a reason for the "Factory recommended" maintenance intervals with a five-figure bill at the end of the process. No thanks, keep mine cross plane and simple with low maintenance, again relative.