First [New] Camaro Crap-Out Comes 40 Miles From Dealership

Jalopnik ^ | Wed Apr 29 2009 | Ben Wojdyla

[Spktyr]

Maybe worse than the first Camaro wreck is the first Chevy Camaro breakdown. This "p**sy magnet" Bumblebee-yellow Camaro lost all electrical power and coasted to a stop with a scant 40 miles on the odometer.

The ecstatic new owner, a forum fan-girl by the name of BUMLB, was crushed when the car conked-out cruising through a parking lot at a leisurely 5 MPH, completely losing all electrical power, locking the gear selector and the key in the ignition. A flatbed towed the disabled car to a dealer where diagnosis found the cable running from the trunk mounted battery had frayed on the starter motor and grounded out, causing complete loss of power. A new cable running a different route will be installed at the dealer. Hopefully this isn't something we'll be seeing more of on other cars. [Camaro5]

[smokingfrog]

YouTube: Pony Car Mash-up

[Onelifetogive]

I’m a Jaguar fan. I hate stick axles. :D

I have one of 28 1994 6.0L V12 Convertible XJSs. Not a perfect car...but still turns lots of heads.

[Antonello]

Now how do you screw up a Camaro, a classic American car?

Well, I guess you can start by putting the battery in the trunk.

[Mr Rogers]

The B210 wasn’t bad. My sister had a 210 station wagon version. She wrecked it more times than I can count...something about talking instead of looking for stop signs. Darn thing always got fixed, and her oldest daughter inherited it. BTW - her oldest managed to wreck it for good.

I may have driven wild, but I never hit anyone or ran a stop sign when another car was around. Who would have thought it would be the fast driving boy who avoided the accidents?

[GivemeaBREAK!]

they do it for space considerations under the hood, temperature considerations(hot under hood) and for weight distribution ratio.

[Spktyr]

Relocating the battery to the trunk is a very popular modification for older Camaros. Summit Racing makes a lot of money off battery relocation kits.

[Eaker]

Who would have thought it would be the fast driving boy who avoided the accidents?

I started legally driving at 16 and had 20+ tickets by the time I was 17. I think I was about 22 before a car ever passed me.

No wrecks that were my fault in 34 years of driving. My first speeding ticket in 15 years was a couple of months ago driving the slowest vehicle I have ever owned, my Jeep.

Karma is a bitch as the cop had me cold flying along at 47 in a 35. Whooo-Hooo.

[Spktyr]

The B210’s problems were 1) they hadn’t figured out rustproofing in Japan yet and the nice high-carbon steel it was made out of, like a fine blade, rusted quickly and 2) if you bought one with A/C, when you turned the A/C on it felt like you’d lost half the engine.

[Mr Rogers]

My sister was in Tucson. No rust.

All of us understood that air conditioning wasn’t for small cars. My 53 HP Honda Civic relied on windows down and evaporating sweat...and there was a LOT of the latter!

But it is a dry heat, so...

[Yardstick]

Saw a couple just like it on eBay the other day. About $12k. Which to me is money well spent considering how much vibe a car like that has. You’ll turn more as many heads with one on those in primo shape as you will with a new one.

[Cobra64]

Battery in the trunk sounds weirdly perverted.

You don't know much about cars then.

Ever heard of BMW?

[roadcat]

Datsun’s big moment came before the oil crises with the 510 and the 240Z. For a lot less money than a domestic, you got a much better albeit smaller car.

My mom bought a 510 in 1969, switching from a 1963 Chevy Impala. She was much happier, especially with the gas savings and easy parking. The Impala had a bad habit of breaking U-joints (in the center of a two-piece driveshaft), among other problems. After that, she only bought Datsuns/Nissans.

[Spktyr]

What’s really amazing is the sheer number of 510s that have managed to survive and that you still see running around. When you consider that their competition such as the Mavericks, the Vegas, and the like were all made in much larger numbers, yet you never ever see them on the road (because they’ve all died) - but you’ll still see 510s wandering around from time to time.

[sushiman]

Yet there are those Americans that insist we MUST buy American , no matter what .

[cyclotic]

I’ve got a whole box of those exact weights in my garage. A friend of a friend invented them (the adhesive weights) and we use them for setting the weight on Pinewood Derby cars for cub Scouts

[hometoroost]

If Joe Biden was in the car at the time the problem could be found somewhere under the plugs.

[Clinging Bitterly]

We had a '69 510 and I reckon it was not too bad a car but it did rust and leak. And there are not so many around here for that reason. Ours went to the bone yard when the carb went bad - just too much trouble to fix and too expensive to buy a new one. Pintos & Vegas are even more scarce around here but probably not so much missed.

My favorite old Jap car was a very early ('66?) Toyota Corolla my dad had for a while. It had an automatic, something like the old cast iron double pump Powerglide with reverse down at the bottom of the pattern. Couldn't do much with 1200cc but I did learn how to use the tranny's "features" to make some serious smoke. As mean as I was to that little car I never broke anything.

We had a Toyota Crown wagon for a time as well, and that was actually a very nice car.

Had one of these too:

A gas guzzling 100HP roller skate. And a couple RX3s, not any better. Fast as hell, but redline 'em one time & they're shot (uh, so I've heard). But they did put an alarm in the dash to tell you when you had ruined the engine, in case you couldn't tell by the smoke.

[truthguy]

BMW’s have batteries in the trunk. It is very logical. It frees up space in the engine area. Believe it or not it’s also easy to use when you give or receive a jump start.

[exit82]

My fav car is a ‘68 Camaro.

One small correction—34 years ago was 1965.

I think you guys meant 32 years ago, as the ‘67 would not have been available before the fall of 1966.

[exit82]

Sorry guys, disregard post #99—I’m off by ten years!.

Can’t believe these cars are 42 years old already.