Blake Noble

C'mon. No one here can honestly say that the '99 concept was better. And I also remember reading all the way back in 1999, in an issue of Car & Driver, that the final design of that particular concept came from a man who didn't even know anything about the GTO or its history. It always made me think of a 1993 Pontiac Grand Prix coupe from the front.

Well, then, what is my natural hair color, since you've been snooping about. Guarantee you will get this one wrong. I promise! :AH-HA_wink:

I think if you had better photos, you would see a totally different person. :AH-HA_wink: It's too bad I have better things to do than use a camera, though!

Don't tell me you're afraid of little old me, now. I'm just a harmless ####ry-boy, trying to spread good will!

Well, I don't know about that but I will send you the KY version of that package, complete with a six-pack of Ale81 and a box of Moon Pies.

*raises hand* Didn't someone post a screen cap of it a year or two ago, by the way? I think it might have been Ted, but I'm not totally sure. GMI is probably so far back in the closet, they're finding 2015's Christmas presents.

Can't say I disagree. The chances if we see an F6 Camaro after this F5 depend on how well the F5 sells, you are right. Global sales are on the Camaro's side this time, though, as North America will share this one with Australia, Europe, and so on where as the previous generations didn't have such a luxury. I can't exactly see a four-cylinder F5 Camaro setting on the lots collecting dust, however. I think some people who want the car but still want respectable mpg ratings will go for it. But then again, I don't see it accounting for a large portion of the sales base, either. I see that as the six-cylinder model's role, regardless of the availability of the four-cylinder. I know that the Iron Duke didn't last very long in the F3s; it was gone by '87 I think, due to poor sales. Who's to say history won't repeat itself?

I don't even know where to begin with this block of compressed $h! ...

You know, I'm not going to worry about it to the point where it starts to wrinkle my forehead. If we do see the Eco DI Turbo under hood as the base engine, the 3.6 DI won't bring some outlandish premium over it, should you decide to buy it instead. In the end, I guess a test-drive will prove if the four-banger is adequate enough, if we see it. But I have my many reservations that it would actually be up to the task.

It's about time someone else got reg's joke. :AH-HA_wink:

With a manual, the benefits are numerous and the drawbacks really are few, if you care to learn how to drive it properly, which isn't some massive time-consuming task (it took me around a month to get the hang of my old S-10). For example, with the stick, you have a much better control over the powerband available from the engine and you can control that power to react to different driving conditions (weather, hills, etc.) in ways an automatic could only dream about.

Oh, don't get me wrong. The 2.0 DI turbo would be a nice base engine if the Camaro were riding on a much lighter rear-drive platform (i.e. Alpha) and I wouldn't and couldn't really complain, regardless of the Iron Duke failure of the 1980s. However, the F5 comes to us on Zeta, which is a honestly great platform that, as bad as I hate to admit it, has one and only one true fault: it's not exactly a featherweight for it's class. I just ... can't see any four-banger working out all too well in any Zeta car.

Caliber = guns (ex.: "the caliber of that rifle is .30-.06"). Magnum = type of gun (ex.: .44 Magnum handgun, quite obviously). I think of gun-related items when I hear those two names, and I think that's what Dodge intended to get across, but you get the idea. (But, then again, I do live in a state that is anti-gun control, so ... ) And also, you have the Chevrolet Beretta (one of the least aggressive cars ever made with a fairly aggressive name, although "Beretta" does make me think of the name "Betty" for some odd reason) and Beretta handguns, but I'm just beating a dead horse now.

You know, I really can't keep from thinking of that wrought-Iron hunk of crap ...

I really hope that the Solstice Targa stays Pontiac-exclusive, but if the Opel crew decides they want a new GT variant, I hope it is a true coupe that follows the original GT, leaving the Targa versatility to Pontiac and Pontiac alone. On a totally unrelated note, I guess the GT is proof Opel can make something other than sewing machines.

Let's see ... there's the Caliber, and then the Magnum before that ... I guess Dodge failed to get your memo.

GM Outside News is a navigation nightmare. I loathe trying to find my way around that site. It's for that reason alone go there very, very, very, very sparingly. :rotflmao:

Hmmm ... another good name might also be Thunder (i.e. "Thunder From Down Under," haha). All the talk of Pontiac Trans Sports and Montanas in this thread made me remember this forgettable minivan concept car from 1998, I think it was, the Montana Thunder concept.

Well ... they do say seeing is believing, so I present to you, gentlemen, the elusive Camaro Z/28 RS! Yes, Delaware, that is a Z/28 model F-Body. Would anyone mind reading that little badge in the grille for me, though? I believe my contacts have popped out. :AH-HA_wink:

Hmmm ... I'm not totally against the idea of the DI 2.0L Turbo going under the hood of the Camaro, but I really don't see it performing all too well given Zeta's rather porky weight. But who knows? Maybe I'm wrong, however I am getting those '80s blues. Anyway, the V6 model still shouldn't be that much more than the four-banger model, regardless if they both are options on the spec sheets.

Well, I'll offer up this little bit from Wikipedia:

I remember reading an issue of Car & Driver from 1997 that compared the '97 Camaro Z/28 30th Anniversary model to the original '67 Camaro Z/28 that said the '67 model in question did have the RS package. If I get the chance, I'll dig it up, and look around on the net a bit, but I'm pretty sure the RS package was available on the Z/28 model.

I've found a whole new reason to love the Solstice. This car, let it be said, is sort of a true poor man's Porsche. Parallels with the 911, Boxster, and Cayman models are quite numerous. It also has a lot of parallels to the Corvette as well. This will be one of the best cars for under thirty-grand.

Yes, the basic Sport Coupe model Camaros were available with a RS package upgrade. Again, as O.C. said, the RS package was available on any model Camaro as it was basically an appearance package, not a separate model of the Camaro series with any sort of performance gain like the Z/28 or SS models.

Just some food for thought: I'm going with the V6 model Camaro because I cannot afford the V8 model. Insurance and the sticker price shut that option down for me, sadly. However, there are ways to milk a V6 for all it is worth, and knowing that, it makes me a little less unsatisfied. I just hope that Chevy doesn't take Dodge's approach with the Challenger and offer auto-only V6 models. That would highly upset me; a manual transmission is a must option for any car I want to buy. Ford offers a shift-them-yourself option with the Mustang V6, so why would the folks at Chrysler Corp. (and even potentially GM) risk losing any sort of sale to their competitor by skimping out with a V6 manual option? Being in the minority is a nightmare.