ok i am saying sorry to the firebird guys first cause i'm going to vent about the firebird.


Ok i hope that the firebird/GTO does not share a single body panel with the camaro for it will kill camaro sales and we'll be right back to where we are with no mid level mucle car made by chevrolet or pontiac, and as far as i'm concered GM needs to drop the whole pontiac brand all together and save some money, they have no good looking cars/SUVs, if it wasn't for the chick car aka solice selling so well they wouldn't be around, and thats the way it should be

 

oh, and the current Chevy line is a thing of beauty? If the Camaro weren't coming out GM would have lost a life long customer to Dodge. My Charger has WAY more style than ANY Chevy product except for the Vette and maybe the new Tahoe.



Don't get me wrong. I've always been a GM man, and mostly a FBody man, but there ain't nuttin at a Chevy dealer today that I can get excited about. (except the Vette of course) At least Pontiac and Saturn has the Sky and Solstice. Two of the nicest looking cars in any showroom.

 

I was a mopar man for years and had four 68-73 chargers. But...the availability of GM modification parts compared to Mopar parts switched me over years ago. I thought I wanted a new charger despite the 4 doors until I saw the interior. I was shocked at how cheap and plain it it. I think thier top of the line interior is identical to the interior of a plain jane police car. Sorry...but it needs some work and I sure hope that GM does a better job with the Camaro. If not...it will be the Vette for sure. In fact....I drove the charger and CTS the same day and ended up with a new CTS for $120 less a month on a two year lease. And obviously the interior of the CTS blew away the Charger.

 

huh, I find the interior in the Charger to be VERY nice. (except the plastic door panals.) Other than that I love it. Go figure. But as far as 350hp (425hp if you opt for the SRT8 version for another 8K) RWD, catchy styling, nice exhaust note, attention grabber, it can't be beat by anything Chevy has to offer at the moment except the Vette which costs 20 grand more.

 

I think there is room for a Firebird, just as much or more than there is for a 300C and Charger and Challenger.

Camaro, Firebird and GTO.

But it must be done right, not just a rebadged Camaro as some of the past versions.
It can share platforms, wheelbases, powertrains even some interior features in modified form, but NONE of the body panels.
I would say following up the Camaro by a year or so with a Firebird would continue the excitement and interest in GM, which they need..
(Instead of quoting past sales, they should test the waters...this is a new generation, new platforms, new tech and I think it'd be a mistake not to consider it.)

 

90rocz I completely agree. Hopefully others (in GM) will too.

 

just curious as to why you wouldnt wait for the results of Camaro sales while going after more non overlaping markets? A year isnt long and it would seem youd have to start on it immediatly. Charger and 300 are sedans that can be justified as somewhat practical. At least I would think so. Challenger doesnt have a firebird. At least not yet...

 

Maybe it does. Chrysler has kicked around the idea of a Cuda to follow shortly after the Challenger.

 

Just a couple questions. I don't understand how "there were only 901 low priced, LS1 powered Formula coupes made (the entire Formula line sold only 1068)" since the entire Formula line in 2002 should have been LS1 powered and coupes as there were no WS6 that year or any Formula convertible at all. Unless those extra 167 Formulas were converted to Formula Firehawks. That just seems like more than I would expect.

Perhaps there aren't very many Firebird fans but I consider myself amongst them, however few they may actually be in reality. I don't have fond memories of Burt Reynolds in Smokey and the Bandit as I was born in 1981 (I guess the closest Trans Am pop culture thing was Knight Rider when I was growing up). I never really cared for the Trans Am name all that much either. Not that I hated it, but I didn't think it was any better than Firebird, and certainly not as nice sounding as Formula.

Maybe they will just have to make a nice Alpha coupe and call it the Pontiac Formula and put a discreet flaming chicken somewhere in the logo

 

I would rather see the Firebird come back than the GTO. The GTO was on hiatus for over 3 decades, and came back for only 3 years. The taste it left in the public's mouth wasn't awe inspiring, either. The Firebird has a much richer history behind it, and it shares an almost identical stigma about it with the Camaro. If the Camaro can fight it's image, the Firebird shouldn't have a problem, and with it's long history Pontiac could always fall back on it's heritage.

Just seems stupid to me to throw away the Firebird's past so quickly, and resurrect the GTO for the 3rd time.

 

QFT...

 

I've owned 4 Trans Ams...Love the WS6 4th gens. But....Unfortunately, these cars have the absolute worst image of any car on the planet. Those of us who love them are fanatics about them. But if you are a 35 year old female bank teller, you do NOT want to come back to work on Monday and tell your girlfriends that your blind date picked you up on Saturday night driving a Trans Am. Even that article had the damn "Mullett" word. You can drive a Mustang, and that is fine. You can drive a Camaro, and that is fine. But a Trans Am means you are white trash from hell. Unfortunately, this does not fit the image GM is trying to build for Pontiac.

GTO, on the other hand, does. It is more mature, more upscale. You can show up for a date in a new updated GTO and not have your blind date hide from you.

 

Trans Am, is a Firebird trim level, which can be dropped w/o much fan fair...that race series had it's time anyways.
But bringing back a Firebird, or Formula Firebird, would not carry old stigma's and fit right in with today's Mustang, Camaro etc...
The last year Firebirds were some of the Baddest looking cars on the planet!, at the time!..although some better paint colors and textures wouldn't have hurt.

 

Mustangs and Camaros carry just as bad a stigma, especially the Camaro, so I have no idea what you are talking about. Besides, GM could drop the Trans Am model and still have a Firebird.

 

Yeah, I can't see how anyone could say Trans Am is any more mullet oriented than Camaro. Mustang I am not so sure about, because I think to most people it means a stylish coupe.

I think it would be interesting to see how Trans Am versus Firebird stacked up to the average person off the street (who wouldn't own an Fbody).