Card and Driver asks Pontiac:
Firebird? or GTO?

http://www.caranddriver.com/carnews/...rd-or-gto.html

 

I posted in that thread a while ago...the C&D forums have some real idiots hanging around on there.

 

There's a lot of idiots EVERYWHERE. Planet earth = Thank god this place is so well moderated.

My vote would go towards a Firebird. Though I'd prefer the firebird get on an even smaller variant of the platform, or an extended version of what's under the Solstice. The Firebird, to me, just always seemed a little sportier (and yes I know it wasn't, it just LOOKED a little more extreme)

 

I hope to someday see another Firebird grace the floors of showrooms.
I hope thats the direction Pontiac goes. But everything i've read leading up to this article has the Firebird still buried. Maybe they'll change there minds.

 

I personally don't see GM competing with itself again. The Firebird/Camaro buyers are from the same end of the pool, while GTO's are from the shallow end. I would LOVE to see a new Firebird. My last 10 cars have been FBodies. I usually buy Camaro then Firebird then back to Camaro again. I currently drive a Trans Am, so the new Camaro convertible will be next, and maybe after I've had it for a few years, there will be a Firebird to go to.
But according to Nostrodumbass the world will end in 2012, so I don't see it happening.

 

That T/A is sweet. Reminds me of my '99 Firehawk T/A that I sold

 

I do enjoy being referred to as a "Bud-guzzlin’, mullet-draped traditionalist"

Nice to know that we're not going to try to change any stereotypes.

 

Ill break the mold and go GTO.
Firebird was nothing more then a scooped and winged Camaro.

 

I'll have to go with you on this one... Maybe not based on the full Firebird past, but rather on the financial realities of what a future bird would be. No one should want a front and rear fascia excercise that might cost the new Camaro program $2-$3 million bucks for not much more than an alternative styling exercise.

Try the new Camaro... it'll be worth it.

 

X3 here.

The only Firebird that sold was the upper level Trans Am and the WS6.

Consider these fun facts:

In 2002, there were 19,700 Trans Ams sold.

Of that number, 12,500 were top drawer WS6s.

But that same year, there were only 901 low priced, LS1 powered Formula coupes made (the entire Formula line sold only 1068), and less than 10,000 base Firebirds were sold.


Basically, there are no "Firebird" fans, even though as a group, they think of themselves as such. In reality, they are fans of the outrageous, Corvette-on-steroids, $30,000+, WS6 Trans Am.

Trans Am name isn't returning. The Firebird name in itself, though historic, doesn't have any evidence of support in and of itself. This is a group of people that is obviously intrested in a high priced, high performance car... not a low priced, or even modestly priced one.

Basically, the position the "super Camaro" will fill.

Three options.

1. A loaded, agressive looking, high performance boulevard GT (essentially a GTO).

2. A Solstice-like 4 passenger sports car that is smaller than Camaro with perhaps turbo 4 or V6 as top power (a reinvented "Firebird").

3. Both.

A "Pontiac Camaro" isn't going to be an option.

 

I miss the Trans Am but I really doubt it will come back like it did. I'm an f-body fan more than a firebird fan and I have owned 3 f-bodys, all firebirds. If GM offers a smaller V6 firebird I sure as hell wouldn't buy it over the camaro. I wouldn't buy a re-badged camaro either. Unless pontiac comes out with a higher scaled more advanced design that still has a V8 but looks nothing like the camaro, I'm still getting the SS (if that's what they call the LS3 camaro)
Also I have no interest in a Gt car like the GTO.

 

I hate to say this but the new Camaro fits "grand touring" better than any other moniker. The days of muscle cars being small chassis stuffed with big engines were over about a decade ago. Positioning Camaro as being a different kind of car than the 2004+ GTO is nothing but marketing fluff. Camaro is on the replacement platform for what the GTO was based on, will use the replacement engine and transmission, will use a similar suspension set-up, will weigh about the same, and will cost about the same IF you get it with the same options. The Camaro will probably sacrifice some stuff that was standard on the GTO to get down to mustang GT prices.

They're incredibly similar vehicles, the camaro is just an evolution of the platform. That's not a bad thing. That's just how it is...

 

I agree with you but when I think GT car I think of M3's and G35's. Though the camaro may be a GT car it is still marketed as an American muscle car that can perform on the street and track. The good ride and ability to hug a corner are added bonuses.

 

Even though I myself don't think it's a great business case. You got to think that it was Pontiac's halo for close to 30 years. Even today when the younger people think of excitment,sportiness, or performance from Pontiac they think Firebird.

Gto may have been great for them in the 60's, the Bird did so much more in all the years it was around.

So it sold crappy the last few years, it wasn't advertised hardly at all not to mention it was an almost decade old design for the body and interior.

 

Id say GTO with a good design, and an Alpha coupe. Those would be very different and more fruitful for GM as a whole. Firebird may sell more than GTO but at the cost of Camaro sales. Also if you go after the different GTO and Alpha coupe first you wouldnt have Camaro overlap and that would give the market(and CAFE) time to decide if there was room for a Firebird while chasing different markets in the mean time.