Posted on 05/14/2024 7:07:35 AM PDT by Red Badger
Sixty years ago, Ford unveiled the Mustang – and it changed everything. Prior to 1964 – the year of the first Mustang’s debut – there was no such thing as a “pony car.” Soon, there were so many of them it was hard to keep track of them.
One of them was the Chevy Camaro, which appeared just in time for the 1967 model year. Its time has just run out because GM has pulled the plug – because GM knows a Camaro with a plug is as oxymoronic as Elvis without the voice (and the presence).
In a backhanded compliment way, this is to GM’s credit.
Camaro will retire from the field with its dignity intact rather than be made into a mockery of itself, as Stellantis (which owns the Dodge brand) has done with the Challenger, another of the pony cars that was inspired by the Mustang. Dodge retired it once before – after the 1974 model year – because Dodge didn’t want to make a Challenger that was a mockery of itself. It was no longer feasible to offer Challengers with 440s and 426s (engines were once identified by their displacement in cubic inches rather than their liters, which served to differentiate them from other engines of the same displacement) or even 360s and 340s, on account of the government, which had imposed emissions standards that – at the time – could not be complied with without single exhaust and catalytic converters and other such devices that did to powerful engines what a naked picture of Hillary Clinton does to the libido of a heterosexual man.
But Chevy – almost miraculously – kept the Camaro (and its sister car, the Pontiac Firebird) in production after 1974, without making it a mockery of itself. The Z28 – which was the high-performance version of Camaro – was retired for a couple of years (1975 and 1976) which is how Chevy kept the Camaro from becoming a mockery of itself.
That and the fact that the non-Z28 Camaro was still a Camaro and there was still plenty of interest in a good-looking pony car, even if it wasn’t especially powerful or fast.
By 1977, Chevy was feeling better about Camaro and brought back the Z28. It wasn’t especially powerful or fast, but it had the potential to be both. Its 175 horsepower 350 cubic inch V8 was still a Chevy small block V8 with a four barrel carb and that engine could be fixed in a weekend’s time with a cam swap and headers and some tuning to equal the power of a 1974 Z28. And the car it was in was still a Camaro – and so still looked good. It had all the essentials that made the 1974 and prior Camaros so appealing.
You just had to make a few adjustments – to get around the government.
The Z28 improved as time passed – and Camaro got much more powerful and faster than it had ever been before. Fast forward to our time and the standard 2024 Camaro with a V6 has more power – and is faster – than the most powerful/fastest Camaro you could buy back in 1970 – the apotheosis of power/performance – before the government tried (and succeeded) in taking it away, the first time.
Now we are at the second time – and the government has succeeded, again. This time, finally. The 2024 Camaro will be the last Camaro – and this time, forever. There will be no temporary hiatus followed by a resurrection – as happened when GM cancelled Camaro back in 2002 and then brought it back, again, for 2010. The reason being the reasons for this cancellation are very different than the reasons for the cancellation last time.
That time – back in 2002 – the Camaro got culled because the Camaro of that generation was not especially popular, especially with female buyers. The fourth generation bodystyle was not like the previous ones that appealed to more than just young guys who liked powerful and fast cars. (The Ford Mustang has always appealed to both sexes as well as most demographics and that’s why the Mustang has been popular with enough people to keep it going for 60 years.)
Chevy realized there was still a market for Camaro – just not the one they were selling at the time. So Chevy stopped selling it. But only for a brief time. During that absence, Chevy – and Dodge – realized they had abandoned their market and thereby given it (the whole thing) to Ford, which by 2003 was the only American car company still selling a pony car.
And Ford was selling lots of them.
So GM – which was not yet run by someone such as Mary Barra, a political appointee who took over shortly after Obama took over – brought back a Camaro (in 2010) that people did want. Just as Dodge brought back a Challenger (in 2008) that people really wanted.
Both prospered – until their time ran out.
That time was last year for the Challenger, which is now no more. The device that Stellantis is going to try to sell as its replacement for displacement is likely to sell as well as a Beyond Meat “hamburger.”
And now the time has come for Camaro, which at least retires from the field with dignity, a casualty of changed times – and changed management.
That leaves the field to Mustang, the last of the Mohicans. And for similar reasons.
“The frontier moves with the sun and pushes the red man of the wilderness forests in front of it. Until one day there will be nowhere left. Then our race will be no more.”
. . .
It's an outrageous reminder of what our unconstitutional government has stolen from us.
BITCHIN’ CAMARO
-The Dead Milkmen
Hey Jack, what’s happenin’?
I don’t know
Well, uh, rumor around town says you might be thinkin’ ‘bout goin’ down to the shore
Uh, yeah, I think I’m gonna go down to the shore
What ya gonna do down there?
Uh, I don’t know
Play some video games, buy some Def Leppard T-shirts
Don’t forget your Motley Crüe T-shirt!
You know all proceeds go to get their lead singer outta jail
Uh-huh
Can’t wait to go down, hey, uh, were ya gonna check out the sand bar while you’re down there?
Uh, what’s the Sand Bar?
Ah, it’s a place that lets sixteen year-old kids drink
Ah, cool
Yeah, hey, guess who’s gonna be there?
Uh, who?
My favorite cover band, Crystal Ship
Wow
Yeah, they do a Doors show, you’d be really impressed, in fact, it goes a little like this
Love me two times, baby
Love me twice today
Love me two times, girl
‘Cause I got AIDS
Love me two times, baby
Once for tomorrow
Once cause I got AIDS
Uh, pretty good Jim Morrison impersonation there
I hope those guys have a good sense of humor and don’t take us into court
Uh, what’s the court?
Never mind that, the important thing here (you mean the People’s Court!)
The- no, that’s another story
The important thing here is that we get to the part where you ask me how I’m gonna get down to the shore
Oh, how you gettin’ down to the shore?
Funny you should ask, I’ve got a car now
Ah wow, how’d ya get a car?
Oh, my folks drove it up here from the Bahamas
You’re kidding
I must be, the Bahamas are islands- okay, the important thing here is that, uh, you ask me what kinda car it is
Uh, uh, what kinda car do ya’ got?
I’ve got a bitchin’ Camaro
Bitchin’ Camaro, bitchin’ Camaro
I ran over my neighbors
Bitchin’ Camaro, bitchin’ Camaro
Now I’m in all the papers
My folks bought me a bitchin’ Camaro
With no insurance to match
So if I happen to run you down
Please don’t leave a scratch
I ran over some old lady
One night at the county fair
And I didn’t get arrested
Because my dad’s the mayor
Bitchin’ Camaro, bitchin’ Camaro
Donuts on your lawn
Bitchin’ Camaro, bitchin’ Camaro
Tony Orlando and Dawn
When I drive past the kids
They all spit and cuss
‘Cause I’ve got a bitchin’ Camaro
And they have to ride the bus
So you’d better get out of my way
When I come through your yard
‘Cause I’ve got a bitchin’ Camaro
And an Exxon credit card
Bitchin’ Camaro, bitchin’ Camaro
Hey man where ya headed?
Bitchin’ Camaro, bitchin’ Camaro
I don’t want unleaded!
“This current Camaro just did not sell well in comparison to the Mustang and the Challenger.“
Well they have discontinued ICE Challengers. Watch what happens to those sales figures.
Well.....goodbye mullets!
I had a mid 70’s. Rusted like sin. They should have been ashamed.
I always thought when they re-introduced it, they should have made a 6-cylinder with handling like a Miata. GM has never made a nimble, well handling car.
GM is dead to me. I won’t buy a solen car. All the new ones are stolen from the bondholders.
A Ford employee told me his dealership hadn’t sold a Mustang this year. “Look out there,” he said. “A A double row of 300;horse Power cars “. I’m thinking people probably can’t afford a toy today. They aren’t cheap or family friendly.
Same here except they are E-Stangs................
Well, the taxpayers put up the money, didn't they?
That's political, right?
Hence, a "political appointee". Comissar would be a better word, of course, but - this is what democracy looks like.
RIP Well done, good and faithful servant...
“The new Camaro is butt ugly.”
Beauty is in the eye beholder, and I actually think the exterior of latest Camaro generation looks fine. The problems are: (1) Interior. Its tiny, dark, cramped cabin with poor visibility must be disorienting to, even a shock to the system of, the current generation raised in big, bright, airy SUV cabins; and
(2) Different era. Let’s face it, these “pony cars” were always more or less aimed at the “boy racer” type market. Young men are now more into video games, smartphones, Uber and the like than racing cars or pretending to race cars. The share of 16-20 year olds who have driver’s licenses has approximately halved in the last 40 years.
(3) Price. What was the average new Camaro priced at? $35K or $40k or something like that? Even if there are a few retro boy racer types still out there, how many of them have that kind of scratch?
Yeah, the 10 years to rust is half that in the winter salt laden roads of the midwest.
The decades long chevy sagging doors issue was still going on through the 90s. The door opening resistance (a spring in the upper hinge) was a really stupid design. It puts a lot more strain on the upper hinge bushing, artificially making the heavy door even heavier.
The lower hinge has the actual stops stamped in it. If you let the door swing open too hard the lower hinge stops stresses the lower hinge mounting points on the door and cab, tweaking those areas. (In the early 2000s, I think, GM started using the strap stop system, located halfway between the hinges, and therefore independent of both.)
Here is a guy (7’ tall!) in Iowa showing how to correct the problem, until the door is allowed to swing too hard again....
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yNzVbThpEbw
Exactly what came into my mind when I saw this headline.
Driving around with a 4.9 on the shaker on a gold/black '79 SE.
...should have turned in my man-card then and there.
My brother’s first car after he was discharged from the Army in 1968 was a Camaro.
The total build cost for a replica 69 Camaro will end up costing $175,000-+/-
...for what will essentially be a brand new car
https://dynacornclassicbodies.com/1969-chevrolet-camaro-coupe/
...if anyone was wondering
The Camaro reboot in 2010 had slit windows, and the 2016 refresh doubled-down on the bunker design.
Of the retro pony cars, the Camaro was hands down the best track car, if that's what someone is into.
During an auto show test drive, my 6'-3" son was able to sit in the back seat of a Challenger. That would be more my style for the type of driving I do. I missed out on the new ones, but maybe someday I'll dip my toe in the used market.
Motor Trend did a comparison between a BMW M2 and a Camaro V6 1LE, the "performance" V6. The M2 only bested it by a little on the track times.
Forgot to add that V6 Camaro would have smoked a Miata like a kipper.
I’ve owed 3 2nd gen Camaro’s in my youth.
My first car was a beautiful looking white/red base model with a 305.
Then 2 Z-28’s a silver/black 78 then a gold/tan 1980 4 speed with t-tops.
All 3 were mint and I miss them.
Those were great times...
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