Neo-retro? Déjà new? Chevy freshens the bloodlines of an old breed.
So here it is, the third and final entry in the 21st-century pony-car-revival derby. Get your bets down early because we don’t expect to see any more resurrections of famous makes from the galloping go-go Sixties—Barracuda, Firebird, Javelin, et al.—and even gloomier, we think it likely that, given fuel prices and other concerns, this revival is likely to lack the fervor and duration of the original movement.
The first production version of the new Camaro we’ve seen and touched is this yellow car displayed in our gallery. “Touched” includes sitting in, briefly, but did not include driving. And “production” means production sheetmetal but not a showroom-ready car. That happens much later. New Camaros will appear in Chevy dealerships in March, arriving as 2010 models. Convertibles (softtops, no folding hardtop) are due about a year later.
While we have not had our first Camaro driving experience, here’s what we know. Like rival offerings from Ford and, more recently, Dodge, the latest Camaro was inspired by one from the golden age, specifically the 1969 SS model owned by GM design chief Ed Welburn. However, unlike the other revivalist ponies, Chevy’s isn’t a slavish stylistic rerun of the original. Like the Camaro concept that appeared at the 2006 Detroit show—all but identical to it, in fact—Chevy’s neo-retro approach, brought to production readiness under the supervision of Tom Peters, adds plenty of fresh touches, most notably the front end and the dramatic fender creases and character lines, touches that had die-makers tearing their hair and muttering dark curses.
“Those shoulders at the rear have the deepest one-piece stamping we’ve ever done,” says Al Oppenheiser, chief vehicle engineer on the project. “It took us 10 or 12 iterations to get it right.”
This is a much bigger coupe than Welburn’s ’69 SS, and it’s bigger than the current Mustang, though the Dodge Challenger, riding a slightly abbreviated Charger sedan platform, dwarfs them both. Like the Challenger, the Camaro has some sedan in its structural résumé, too, elements of the Zeta I platform developed by Holden, in Australia, that give the Pontiac G8 its eager road responses. But there’s enough difference in the Camaro version—shorter wheelbase and stiffer overall, particularly from the A-pillar forward—to justify a Zeta II designation.
At 112.3 inches, the Camaro’s wheelbase is 2.5 inches shorter than that of the G8, and overall length is 6.5 inches shorter than the Pontiac from Oz. Also, the Camaro team moved the front wheels forward 3.0 inches (part of the Zeta II program), and the coupe’s 63.7-inch front track is an inch wider than the G8’s, as is its overall width—at 75.5 inches, it’s a smidge narrower than the otherwise much bigger Challenger.
Like the G8, the Camaro uses struts up front and a multilink arrangement at the rear. However, the engine rides an inch further toward the front, and the steering rack sits ahead of the front axle. Chevy will offer 18-, 19-, and 20-inch wheel choices for the Camaro, but the tires that wrap these rims will share a common rolling diameter—28.7 inches. This touch, new for a GM car, keeps the wheel wells nicely filled and also makes for simple speedometer calibration.