General Motors North America sent a few people down to GM-Holden with the intention of developing a vehicle that could be used in Buick (At about the same time, Chevy vetoed using the V-car for the 5th gen Camaro, effectively dooming it).

The whole effort of intergrating some of Holden's products for Buick, Pontiac, and Chevrolet stalled because of a combination of GM-NA's internal politics, the "Not-Invented-Here" mentality, and GM's focus on trucks. The whole thing was publically disguised behind the story of engineering difficulties of making Holden's V-chassis conform to US standards.

What changed things was Cadillac & Bob Lutz.

Cadillac's devotion to returning to RWD and (of all people) Ron Zarella running blocker for them, layed the basis for the new "Sigma" & soon to be out "Zeta" RWD chassis.

New arrival Bob Lutz recieved a forwarded e-mail from one of the people GM-NA sent to Holden to work on the Buick project about how he felt the Monaro would make a great GTO for Pontiac, and he took a trip to Holden to see for himself. Before he left, he was sold on the UTE as El Camino, the Statesman as the Park Avenue, and the whole stalled program got a new boost. If Lutz wasn't a vice chairman, able to overule much of GM-NAs politics and hand ringing, the whole project would still be stalled.

So when we get our Camaro back, be sure to thank:

*Buick Motor division-for thinking enough of RWD at one time to convince GM-NA to send people to Holden to try & make it happen.

*Cadillac Motor division (and Ron Zarella)- for basically ramming the Sigma through a GM that wasn't quite sold on RWD or Cadillac competing with the worlds best.

*Pontiac Motor division, & Lynn Myers (with high powered help from Bob Lutz)- for most certainally ramming the GTO down the throats of GM's excuse-makers from engineering to product people.

*Also add GM-Holden of Australia (of course) by disproving the contention of some at GM-NA that it would be expensive to prepare the car for the US (it actually was relatively dirt cheap) and that a small company like Holden couldn't expand production to meet the numbers the US would need.

As in any business, it's all about money, and money's all it's about. When GM-NA actually took a look at how cheaply Holden could operate, and their expertise in building a multitude of products from the same chassis for pennies of how GM-NA operated (the reason why engineers & product people here were hostile to the idea of bring over Holdens in the 1st place?), Holden ended up not just recieving money to replace the V cars, but got the assignment to create a modular RWD chassis that could be used worldwide, including here in the US.

This new chassis "Zeta" is a modular chassis. It essentially is a chassis that has various components that can be simply welded in for different lengths, widths, and body configurations, much like a Lego block set. An example would be say the rear footwell section. That could be stamped for a short coupe, a large sedan, or a UTE. On the assembly line where the floorpan is assembled, whatever piece is needed is welded in, depending on the model. This way, a large variety of vehicles can be made on the assembly line from the same group of parts. This is Holden's specialty, and why they got the assignment.

Another example of what Zeta is, think of the Ford's Fox chassis. That was a extremely advanced chassis when it came out. Most cars built on it was bigger & lighter than it's predecessors. Fox was the basis of everything from budget Fairmonts to top level Lincolns, and plenty of cars in between. It was made in different lengths, widths, and carried everything from base 70 horse 4 cylinder engines to the current 420 horse blown Cobra.

As far as the Zeta suspension & driveline components, that will come out soon enough. Keep in mind that outside of Corvette-XLR, GM is going to have only one set of components for their RWD cars. If you take a good look at the Kappa & Sigma components, you pretty much have seen some pieces of Zeta.

In short, "Zeta" is more a structure than a new set of components, which like the Solstice, will be primarily off the shelf with new parts developed only where necessary.


BTW, to bring another GTO story to light: Holden did exactly what GM-NA directed by drafting a Pontiac nose to the Monaro, tuning the exhaust, and making it meet US standards. GM-NA directed nothing more than that be done: the point was to get it to market for the time being, not to redesign the car. Holden could have easily done more, even through HSV.

Then why GM didn't spend more to make the GTO more agressive looking??? The volume didn't justify spending the extra money. With only 18,000 slated per year it didn't make financial sense (still need to make a good profit here).

There will be some "slight visual changes" for 2005. Not much, but it is a nod to some GTO critics.

 

Exactly . You have nailed the essence of Zeta with perfection,Guion. It's a new day and I see a fine sunrise.

 

So the Buick concept is showing when? New York?

 

Some questions Guion...

The "Zeta" Structure would theoretically be faster to develop than SIGMA and KAPPA correct? (being that they are mostly compenents shared)

You mentioned that the V-car chassis was vetoed by Chevy.. any particular reason for this? i.e. the chassis was not strong/long enough etc. (any reason besides - it wasn't made in the USA)
(i.e any technical reasons?) as I recall it was mentioned that any car on that chassis for NA would be a temporary car but at least they would have had a 2+2 coupe correct.

please shed some light on this if you can. Thanks in advance.

 

Faster to develop? In theory, I'd say yes. But I need an engineer to chime in on that question.

Chevy vetoed building a version of the Monaro here because in the view of Camaro's gatekeepers "it wasn't a camaro". I disagreed strongly with that till I 1st saw the Monaro in the flesh & got to spend time with them back in 2000. Though it's the right size on paper & the performance is right, it's a mid-size car inside & it's about 54" tall. The Camaro "gatekeepers" view the Camaro as a low-slung, wide car. I'm sure there was also some "not made here" sentiments. But far as I can tell, GM wasn't going to spring for a new chassis, and Monaro was pretty close to a take it or leave it proposition.

The El Camino idea could have happened even before Bob Lutz came to GM (it isn't covered by autombile standards), but there is that pesky 25% tarraff we have here regarding imported trucks.

 

Good article thanks for that

Answers my HSV questions as well.

 

i think this was my favorite part

 

I thought it had more to do with the weakening US dollar as compared to the Aussie dollar. A year ago it was alot cheaper to buy products from Austrailia, but their dollar went up as ours went down.

 

Im a little tired..so does this mean that the Camaro is dead again?? sorry like I said IM tired and reading this is a little "worded" and got me confused..

 

good stuff gui.

 

Well IMO, they should have taken the extra time and money to make the car more historically correct and exciting, because I still just do not see the GTO selling the projected amount for this model year as is. And there's still only one level of the GTO available, no other models, looks, or anything even announced.

 

It's not dead.

You are tired.

Get some sleep.