To halfway get away from the GTO...

If the Holden Ute makes it over here in limited numbers, are we going to hear the same resistance from hardcore enthusiasts over styling? How will the new GTO owners feel about a "truck" version of their car?

Having seen the Silverado SS pics (there's something uninspiring), a revived El Camino SS seems better suited to take on the SVT Lightning and PVO Ram SRT-10. I would think the press and enthusiasts would be more excited about it than the Silverado as well.

Opinions?

------------------
-JERRY-
'02 Impreza WRX
'88 Fiero Formula
'90 Sunbird LE For Sale
Formerly owned: '93 Firebird Formula

 

A quick look and info on Ute SS

I dunno, but it seems to me like another car that would serve GM well to import.

 

I see 2 issues with the El Camino coming back.
1) Won't it compete with the upcoming SSR?

2) There will probably be a small group of hard core enthusiasts who will blast GM for bringing back the El Camino.

 

I'd buy one, much cooler than lightning!

 

Damn !!!!
http://www.purefect.com.au/PlanB/burnout.jpg

 

I think it would be a hit. For a truck crazed market, I can't believe it's taken this long for one of the big 3 to come back w/ something like this. Granted they had no RWD platforms to base it on (imagine an El Camino w/ a Camaro front end......) I saw an Impalla SS (94-96 style) El Camino show car many years ago, and it was AWESOME. From the front doors forward, it was an Impala SS, but the bed was seamlessly integrated to the Impy's styling. It was a knockout! I have a picture of it somewhere.

 

Put me in the no column.

While it may seem like it makes sense (and it might) I just was never an El Camino person. I thought they were an odd breeding of a car and truck that never meshed well... I feel the same when I look at the UTE, and actually I think "Dodge Rampage" more than "El Camino"

Plus, would people bitch the same way about a Holden derived El Camino if it didn't hold up to El Camino's fabled history?

 

i don't like it. They need to make their mind up and go with either a car or a truck.

I don't see it competing with either the lightning or SRT-10 Ram. Both are full sized trucks.

Another thing, a mag i looked at over the weekend had the base price of the SRT-10 in the 50 thousands. Holy chit. That's just too much. A lightning still comes in at 20 some thousand dollars cheaper.

 

Darth, judging by the GTO response, you're probally right.

Just the same, I think it'd be a great edition. The fact that there's nothing like it in the US anymore should make it worth bringing over.

Holden will be exporting 20,000 vehicles to the US annually. 18,000 will be GTO's. Any guesses on the other 2000?

 

We had a couple differt threads on the Maloo Ute imported as an El Camino about 6-8 months ago, about the same time that it was rumoured that the Monaro would be imported and called GTO, and we talked about the GTO then as well, except the discussion was missing the personal attacks back then.

I can only speak for myself, but I said then and I say again that I like the Ute 100 times better than I liked the Monaro. The Monaro looked too vanilla and too Cavalierish for my taste. As a sidebar, please keep your personal slams of me to yourselves. I am perfectly entitled NOT to think much of the Monaro's looks as compared to the Ute's looks.

From what was posted at the time, the Monaro team did the best they could working with a limited budget and next to no factory support to turn a very ugly four door car into a halfway decent looking two door Monaro. Feel free to correct me if I am wrong, but I think it was a Commodore. (It was a car that looked like the extict four door Lumina, only bigger.)

I think they did a decent job with the limited resources that were available to them. I think the Monaro looks better than the 99 up Mustangs, for example. But the low buck re-design cannot escape its homely roots, even if you stick GTO badges on it.

Lets look at the Maloo Ute now. I read that the Maloos designers used the US El Caminos as the muse, as the core inspiration. Pay attention, cuz this is a huge and important distiction between the two cars origins. And it made a huge difference as how the final design turned out. The result: Maloo is the best looking El Camino ever. It took the old ideas and modernized them. It the perfectly executed Retro ideal. Quality goes in, quality comes out. It looks like an El Camino, cuz it was supposed to.

Lets look at the other hand. Can anyone say the GTO was the inspiration for the Commodore or the Monaro? Of course not, and the final results of those two cars dont look like any GTO we ever had here, no surprise.

Now if GM had bought the tooling for the old Dodge Rampages and slapped El Camino badges on them, then I would be upset. Can you understand the difference?

 

Nice post Reno. Makes a lot of sense.

I agree with Darth a lot of times, and even while I've never been a huge El Camino person it does have it's own solid following here and there is nothing else like it here. I strongly believe that GM needs product that distinguishes itself from everything else just as much as it needs strong direct competitors to existing products.

------------------
Mark

94 Z28, Red, A4, 3:23
Lone Mods--LPE CAI, !Lapeer Dragway.
(Hey, I'm a college boy I can't afford gobs of bolt-ons!)

Best time: 14.658 @ 95.1
with SES light on and Driver off! (First and only time at track)

The F-body will NEVER die.

[This message has been edited by Z28Wilson (edited June 30, 2002).]

 

I've always said styling was subjective. I tend to place much more emphasis on a vehicle's hardware & a slick look than anything that relys on gimmicks. I won't & don't critisize anyone who has a difference of view on GTO on those ground.

It's when some stary throwing the baby out with the bath water when I get a little dumbfounded. When someone says that GM performance is in the dumpster because a car simply doesn't look retro enough, or that the only reason anyone would purchase a car is because they will buy any POS GM puts out because they are somehow "performance starved" is a few kilometers beyound nieve & condencending.

There are people who put their neck out to bring performance back. If GTO proves them right, there is quite a few vehicles in route.

BTW, I think El Camino would be a hit here. I agree in many ways about your observations.

 

if gm imports the maloo than they might sa well bring this over as the next caprice/impala ss,mind you this is a Middle eastern web site.i cant believe that Gm makes Osama cooler cars than the USA

http://www.gmarabia.com/chevrolet_ca...ce/caprice.htm

 

Holden started making Utilities in 1951 - 8 years before the El Camino was introduced. I think Holden and HSV have plenty of local knowledge to design their utes without needing to copy the El Camino ...

 

And I have seen Ford, Hudson, etc Utes that were manufactured in the US and other places years before the first 1951 Holdens even.

Holden did use the US El Camino as inspiration. I read it on the Holden website, and in other web published interviews with Holden designers.

Dont be embarassed about El Camino influence, it turned out great!