TheGMSource - Chevrolet News - TheGMSource First Look: 2013 Chevrolet Impala!

Thoughts? Straight from Chris Pauwels to your desktop, laptop, or "pad" screen.

What do you think?

He based the sides off the Chevy 140R or whatever compact shown at the NAIAS and the rest speaks for itself.

 

Not bad. The car would look better with a Camaro inspired grill instead of the '08 Malibu grill.

 

The horror

 

It looks like a tarted up Holden Statesman.

 

The same ugly corporate Chevy front end and my other thought is .

 

No.... I will lose all faith if that is the "much touted" Beautiful Impala everyone has been talking about for the last 3-4 years... GM can and MUST do better

 

I doubt the real thing will be that ugly considering how good looking the 2013 Malibu is.

 

just another boring FWD daily driver... I demand RWD!

 

The next fleet sales queen?
Boring at best, maybe a bit ugly. That front clip is horrible.

 

It's obviously not that. That's clearly a chop of the current generation malibu. I recognize that hood, the grille, and the photochop of the headlights straight from a current malibu.

 

I said Statesman in my last post. I meant the Commodore.

 

I wish....

 

Yeah, the chop sure dose use the commodore/G8 for the basis of the Impala chop with G8 greenhouse still intact. Then they threw in new Malibu parts on the front.

Here is the photo they used of the Pontiac G8 GT Show Car, as the starting point of the chop.


The real car will probably look some what close to this. How many different ways can you style a car when you have to build it around that corporate grille. They probably should have used a Buick LaCrosse as the starting point for there chop, that would have gave the chop the proper proportions and stance.

The really cool Impala that was getting all the buzz a few years ago was going to be RWD, and was going to have the modern retro styling. We all know that program got canceled.

 

Yep. It's a chop that Chris came up with.

He's great with putting to paper design ideas, and others go to him to come up with what they think a certain car looks like or to render an idea into a picture. I don't think anyone's better at it.

That said, looking at this car and looking at the photos of the actual cammo'ed Impala, outside of the front, I don't think there's much on this rendering that's close.

But worry not.

You'll see the 2013 Impala soon.... remember, we're already in the 2013 model year.


Umm... that's what it's supposed to be..... a fwd daily driver.

 

That Impala was designed around what was essentially the same hardpoints as the Zeta based Holden Commodore-Pontiac G8.

This new Impala is based around the hardpoints of the Cadillac XTS' version of the Espilon.

While I'm sure some design elements carried over from the initial Impala (perhaps some sheetmetal sculpturing, or tail light designs, etc...), the car will no doubt look notably different than the one initially designed as a RWD Zeta based sedan.

If we're lucky, there will be a book (like Camaro and Volt had) that tracks it's development and has pictures. No doubt, with the drama Impala has had towards the marketplace (it started around 2003!!!) it probably makes a far better and more intresting story than either the 5th gen Camaro or Volt.