The Impala will be redone on a version of the existing FWD W-chassis for the 2006 model year. There will also be some type of large RWD Chevy sedan in the near future.

Unless this new FWD Impala will be called something else, and the new RWD sedan becomes the Impala, the story's wrong.

Also, the "W" is NOT dead & will continue into the forseeable future.

It will be modified & renamed, but it's not being replaced by "Zeta". GM will be making some type of larger sized FWD midsize car line right into the next decade at the very least.

 

I'd love to see Impala back on a RWD platform, I believe the strong sales of the current FWD Impala have doomed the chances for a RWD Impala in the future

 

I don't see a RWD Impala coming so soon either, but I'd love to see it. If memory serves me correct, the W platfom as originally engineered was designed to somewhat easily convert to RWD, if need be. There were RWD W-body Buick Regal mules as far back as 89 I believe, that nasty, big block powered, green Monte Carlo SS circa 96 or so that used F-body structure mated to W-body structure, not to mention the G-8 car from three or four years ago (although that could have been AWD, I'm not so sure now).

So if GM wanted to, it would be possible to put out RWD cars using the W-body. Question is, would they really want to now that Zeta is fairly close to reality?

 

The Pro street Monte Carlo you are refferring to used a 406 LT1 and was basically a F-body Floor pan welded onto the W-body structure, with widened body panels to cover the wheels.

The G8 used the FWD based Versatrek system, Aztek. It also had a 1 gal gas tank so it was definately a show car only. The W-body platform can't take Versatrek without serious modifications so I would doubt the Impala would get it now since the GP didn't get it during its redux.

Also Guion we know the W-body is hanging around till at least 09 maybe longer, hopefully not. But we also know the G-body replacement is named CHI (this comes from EVOK on C&G.) I think we have been talking about CHI going to Canada and having ALL Zeta's made in the states and Aus.

Cars going on CHI will include the Park Ave replacement and the reskinned Deville, which could both be AWD. The G body platform is much larger and versitale than the W-body.

A big question mark is about the Bonneville's replacement, probably G8-which was just trademarked. Will the Bonnie stick around and move to CHI or will it die and have G8 replace it and Grand Prix on Zeta? It is a good question worth thinking about.