Prepare for a low intensity price war over electric vehicles. GM announced that its all-electric  Chevrolet Spark, going on sale next month in California and Oregon, will sell for as low as $19,995 after the full federal tax credit of $7,500.  According to the calculations of Reuters, that’s “as much as 38 percent less than what it takes to buy its larger sibling, the hybrid Volt.”

The larger Volt sells for about $32,500 after the tax credit. MSRP of the base Spark will be $27,495, undercutting the Mitsubishi i-MiEV ($29,975) and the Nissan Leaf ($29,650). It is expected that there will be a reaction.

The car can be leased for as low as $199 a month for 36 months with $999 due at signing. California EV owners may also qualify for other state and local tax credits and incentives of up to $2,500, reducing the price to $17,495. EV owners in California are also eligible for carpool lane access with only a solitary driver in the car.

Starting in late 2014, you’ll be able to buy a Nissan NV with a Chevrolet badge.

The Mexican-built NV will compete against the Ford Transit Connect, as consumers migrate from full-size, V8 vans to more fuel efficient, compact models. Technical specs were not announced, but the vehicle will be dubbed the Chevrolet City Express.

I was a late comer to Mad Men, AMC’s highly successful and critically acclaimed drama that airs on Sunday nights. It was only as the fifth season was underway and I started to see reports on the interwebs that Jaguar was playing heavily into their story line that my curiosity was piqued. When my wife suggested that we try it out on Netflix last summer, I agreed. And quickly became hooked.

POTENTIAL SPOILERS BELOW THE JUMP

   In case you’ve managed to live under a rock for six years instead of four the way I did and have no idea what Mad Men is about, hit this link to AMC’s website and get caught up.

Cars figure heavily into the plots and subplots of the show and have since the very beginning. An ad agency is defined not only by the clients it already has, but also by the ones it doesn’t. The fictitious firm, Sterling- Cooper- Draper- Pryce, that the show is centered around is a small firm, working hard to grab clients and earn it’s place with the bigger firms. By far the most prized account for one of these small firms is an automotive advertising account.

Automotive accounts are pursued like the Holy Grail of advertising in the series. More than once one of the main characters has bemoaned the fact that SCDP has been playing in the advertising bush leagues, with clients that include regional airlines, baked beans, and various other food stuffs.

In season five the firm managed to land their first “car,” when they secured an account with Jaguar in return for pimping out one of the lead female characters to the head of the Jaguar dealers’ association. It was a loathsome move that tarnished what should have been the firm’s greatest triumph.

The opportunity to dump Jaguar finally presented itself in the May 5th episode. (If you haven’t watched it yet and ignored the other SPOILER ALERT, stop reading now.) Through a series of machinations by one of the founders of SCDP, the firm managed to score a chance to pitch a sales campaign for a new “top- secret” Chevrolet. The car, although not explicitly named as such at this point in the series, is the lowly Chevrolet Vega.*

Part of the fun of watching Mad Men is the knowledge that we, the viewing audience, have of the historical events that are right around the corner for the characters. In this case we know that history will judge the Vega (and it’s main competitors: the Ford Pinto and the AMC Gremlin) to be a total piece of crap, but we ‘re going to get to vicariously experience the hope and wonder of the characters as they work on selling the new car.

We don’t think of the Vega as a bright spot in automotive history, but at the time it was seen as cutting edge, from the Vert- A- Pac vertical rail shipping method, that turned to the cars on their noses to pack 30 units to a railcar instead of the standard 18, to the new Lordstown, OH assembly plant that was the most automated auto plant at the time.  It was also extremely popular, selling over a million units in it’s first three years of production.Detroit was finally taking a growing piece of the automotive market, the sub- compact car, seriously after decades of leaving it to VW and Honda.

It’s also the perfect car for the fictitious advertising agency of SCDP to be hustling. So much of the show centers around the conflict between the brash, forward thinking ad men and their conservative, traditional minded clientele. Almost every pitch meeting shown on the show begins with the SCDP creative team pitching a daring, non- traditional approach to selling the client’s product, the client balking at the pitch, and the SCDP team either selling out and coming back with a boring alternative that meets the client’s expectations, convincing the client to take a chance, or telling the client to get bent and throwing away the account.

Since the Vega is new, one can expect that SCDP’s flair for edgy, provocative advertising would have a better chance of being accepted and used. But they’re also going to be confronting the largest, most conservative client that they’ve ever worked for. The conflict between the creative teams and Chevrolet’s management should make for a lot of drama.

Personally I’m waiting to view the Vega through the characters’ eyes. Like I said before, we know from history that the Vega  is doomed by rust, labor strife at the new Lordstown plant, and numerous quality issues that will all but lock GM and the rest of Detroit out of the small car market for a generation. But on the show it’s 1968. The Vega is known as the XP-887.  Things we take for granted like using a computer to design a car and then building it on an assembly line populated by robots is exciting and new, bursting with possibility.

It’s going to make for quite a show.

* I am 99% sure that the car has to be the Vega. During a scene in which one character was informing the creative team about the pitch, I think he referred to the secret car as the “XP-8 something something.”  It’s an all- new car, designed by computer, and the SCDP staff talks about getting the chance to “name it.” The Vega is the only thing that fits.

Almost exactly one month after TTAC first broached news of a possible compact rear-drive Chevrolet, TTAC commenter and GM North America vice-president Mark Reuss is still dropping hints about such a product.

Speaking to Automotive News on the prospect of a possible competitor to the Scion FR-S

“A really nice, light, rear-drive car that’s inexpensive — we know that rings a bell, that’d be a huge win for us if we had that.”

While reaction to the Code 130R was reportedly strong, Reuss said that the Code’s styling would not be put into production. Apparently, the Alpha platform would not be used either, echoing earlier comments by Reuss. That would necessitate another compact, rear-drive platform like GM’s former Kappa architecture, and of course, further variants to help make that venture profitable. Bring it on, GM.

Take a good look at the picture above. What do you see? If your answer is that you see three black Chevrolet Equinox “cute utes,” you’d be wrong.

I took the picture at about four in the afternoon on a sunny day at my local Chevrolet dealer. According to their window stickers, each of those trucklets are a different color. The Equinox furtherest from the camera, facing the building, is the only one that is Black. The one closest to the camera, next to the curb, is Black Granite Metallic. The third Equinox is painted Tungsten Metallic. Here’s a shot from a different angle of the Tungsten Metallic and Black Granite Metallic trucks. See the difference?

Yeah, me neither.

And if that’s not enough different shades of Pretentiously Named Dark Color That Looks Almost the Same from 50 Feet to satisfy you, Chevrolet offers a fourth shade of Almost Black for the Equinox called Ashen Gray Metallic. Here is a picture of an Ashen Gray Metallic Equinox parked next to a Tungston Metallic Equinox. The AGM truck is on the left. I think.

Keep in mind that these pictures were taken on a sunny day. Time, and the fact that the dealership was still open and I didn’t feel like dealing with any salesmen desperate to close a sale before the end of the month, kept me from examining the trucks any closer. I returned the following Saturday evening after the lot had closed for some more pictures. The sky was clouding over as a thunderstorm approached, so there wasn’t any sun to bring out the metallic flakes that help to differentiate the individual colors. Here are all four of them in order from darkest to not quite as dark.

Black

Granite Black Metallic

Tungsten Metallic

Ashen Gray Metallic

Seriously. It’s not just me, right? These colors are almost the same.

For 2013 the Chevy Equinox is available in 11 different colors. That’s actually on the high end for modern mass produced vehicles and it’s down from 12 options during the 2012 model year. The Equinox’s big brother, the Traverse, is available in 9 shades, as is the Suburban.  The Cadillac XTS makes do with only 8. Somehow, the marketing mavens at GM have given buyers of the fifth cheapest car in Chevrolet’s lineup more color options than they gave the higher end flagship models.

On the other hand, if 4 of the 11 colors are so similar that 9 out of 10 eyewitnesses to a drive- by shooting involving a Chevy Equinox after dark would describe the getaway vehicle’s color as “Black,” are consumers really being offered much choice at all? On Chevy’s  ”Build Your Own Page,” photoshopped onto a beach background, each of these colors appear very different from one another when viewed on a computer screen. But in real life, parked next to one another, they look way too much alike. This lack of choice was augmented at my local dealership by the fact that of 19 new Equinoxes for sale, 10 of them were painted one of the four “Almost Black” colors in question. The point was further driven home by the almost complete lack of diversity in interior color ordered by the dealer. Only a single model had a gray interior. All of the others were black.

Chevrolet (and presumably, the dealer) would most likely reply that they are simply responding to what customers want. Every year DuPont publishes a survey of the most popular automotive exterior colors broken down by market. In the latest survey black and gray were the second and fourth most popular colors in the North American market, as well as in the world overall.

All well and good, I suppose. There’s no reason why black and gray shouldn’t both be part of the lineup. But why offer two of each color and why make your grays so dark? Compare the color range in the four pictures above to the picture of a 2012 Equinox painted in a discontinued color called Graystone Metallic I found for sale on the used car side of the lot.

Graystone Metallic

So why would Chevrolet be so seemingly afraid of color? Their competitors aren’t. At the Ford dealership across the street I found these two Escapes. The dealer had stocked multiple examples of both.

Frosted Glass and Deep Impact Blue

It seems that Ford and Chevy have reversed their traditional roles when it comes to exterior colors. Most people have heard Henry Ford’s famous quote regarding the color of the Model T:  “Any customer can have a car painted any colour he wants so long as it is black.” Most people don’t know that prior to 1914 the Model T was available in multiple colors and the black standard was only adopted as Ford refined his assembly line process. The conventional wisdom is that Chevrolet (and GM overall) were able to grab market share because their models were offered in a greater variety of colors. There’s some truth to that belief, but it’s not the whole story.

It’s obvious that the old days of dozens of color combinations for each model are gone. That doesn’t mean that consumers shouldn’t be given a few more choices than the manufacturers seem to feel comfortable offering today.  At the very least, there’s no reason to offer four shades of practically the same color. C’mon, Chevrolet. Take a chance and show us some color.  Dump two of those four colors and give us another green or a real brown. Throw in a Burnt Orange or a Turquoise instead. Your competitors are doing it.

The 2013 Indy 500 will feature a Corvette C7 as its official pace car. Great for the Vette, and a rather obvious, if predictable choice. But what about the unsung heroes of the Brickyard?

For me, it’s a wash. Something about the after-dinner-mint color of the Chevrolet Beretta really appeals to me, but the Dodge Viper edges it out slightly. Word is that in 1991, the Dodge Stealth was slated to be the pace car, but the UAW threw a fit over a Japanese car being used. The replacement ended up being the not-quite-production-spec Viper, piloted by Ol’ Shel himself. Let us know you picks below.

Soon after TTAC’s article on General Motors’ new model make over, the naysayers were out in force. Commenter jpolicke for example suggested selling GM stock if its future relied on engineering coming from South Korea. However, signs abound that this time around GM is finding its way. Let’s examine some of the pros and cons:

On the plus side:

• GM South Korea products have been well received in most parts of the world.
• 70 percent of Cadillac buyers are first timers.
• Buick has some of the lowest aged buyers in the business in North America.
• The latest cars (gasp!) are good.

On the negative side:

• The corporate drama continues with no letup, as evidenced by the latest shenanigans from Dan Akerson and Susan Docherty.
• No sign of a permanent solution to the Opel question.
• Insufficient and inadequate brand structuring in Europe, come on GM pick one (Opel? Vauxhall? Chevrolet?) and run with it.

The fact of the matter is that I’m no GM lover. I have never harbored a thought of owning a GM car. Then, a funny thing happened. I spent some time in a Brazilian-built, so far Latin American-only, Chevy Cobalt. It made me want to buy one. This car competes in one of the fastest growing segments the world over, that of the B segment-sized, A segment-priced car (think Dacia). I should know, I own one. But I would trade mine in on a Cobalt quite easily. While not the best looking in its class, the car rides well, is quiet, comfortable and offers some of the best interiors this side of a Fusion. Then I drove a Cruze (the hatch is beautiful). I took a ride in a Spin (so practical). GM launched the Onix (the car to buy in its particular market, pictured above). In America, our own Steven Lang has praised the Sonic, while much to the chagrin of haters, TTAC has also positively reviewed the Spark. Yes they have weak points, but they have strong points too. Enough to make this previous doubter, a believer.

The second fact of the matter is that the auto industry is a whole ‘nother ballgame. One Ford (with exceptions) is showing its value. Chrysler is internationalizing its line (Cherokee is proof positive). Buick now comes from Europe. The healthy, desirable, competitive, good as apple pie American Chevies all hail from the Far East. Even pick ups are not developed solely for Americans anymore (global Ranger, Colorado/S10, Amarok). American companies that fail to see this will inevitably fail. Americans are showing they want better-handling, more frugality, tighter packaging, smaller engines. V8s don’t rule the land anymore. Ford is thinking of dropping the Taurus and is concentrating on the Focus and Fiesta. VW’s Jetta is selling briskly. With the exception of the pick ups, most cars in the top 10 sales chart in America are either small or medium sized, and come with inline fours.

The old GM is dead and buried. The old, exceptional American market is no more. Blame it on the government, blame it on CAFE, blame it on the weather if you wish. I for one think American consumers have themselves to blame. With their large scale adoption of import brands, choosing smaller engines, and generally badmouthing anything and everything coming out of Detroit, they have gotten what they were looking for. Detroit has changed. GM has changed. GM’s transformation specially has been quite thorough and the company now offers cars that can compete and, more than that, can be sold because buyers want them. Much like in Brazil, where the model makeover is in full swing but has not yet borne fruit, it takes time. Like commenter 28-cars-later said most consumers (count me in as one) are “a bit slow on the uptake”.

Fans of the C7 Covette may be interested to read this breakdown of the extra 90 lbs that the C7 Corvette has put on. For someone such as myself who is used to the OEMs brushing off weight gain or other uncomfortable facts with eye-roll inducing PR pap, the ‘Vette team deserves credit for this itemized breakdown of every component that added to the weight of the C7.

It’s hard to argue with an oil cooler, a revised drivetrain, beefier brakes and a nicer interior. I still think the car is an aesthetic step backwards from the C6, but there’s an overwhelming contingent of you who feel differently. Since we’re as popular at GM as Joe Biden is with the NRA, the first person to submit a real review of the C7 to TTAC (dealer car, press car, private car, it doesn’t matter) will get some kind of press trip swag courtesy of yours truly.

It’s a headline you might have seen in the past couple days: “Tesla Model S outsells Nissan Leaf (or Chevrolet Volt, you pick)”. To the layman, the story is that this amazing car from an amazing American upstart company is outselling lowly Chevys and Nissans to become America’s favorite EV. The angrier among us may wonder how a car that costs twice that of a Leaf or a Volt can outsell them both. TTAC just wants to know how any media outlet can make this comparison in the first place.

Like every other auto maker, Nissan and GM reports sales on a monthly basis, broken down by nameplate. Tesla, on the other hand, only reports on Model S “deliveries” each quarter (when they report their quarterly earnings). Nobody is really sure what that means, and everybody wants to know why Tesla doesn’t just report sales like everybody else. They haven’t given a good answer either.

Of course that hasn’t stopped outlets from the New York Post prematurely crowning the Model S as the winner of 2013′s Q1 plug-in car sales race. The Post says that

Tesla, worth less than $6 billion, is expected to deliver at least 4,750 of its Model S vehicles in the quarter, a spokeswoman told Bloomberg.

While we’ll know whether the Volt outsold the Leaf (and vice versa) on April 1, we won’t know until May 8th to find out how the Model S did. And even then, Tesla will only announce how many “deliveries” it made, and may not even say whether those are in the United States or globally. Either way, none of the big three EVs look to be coming close to the overly rosy predictions that were once imagined.

While I’m not taken with the styling of the C7 Corvette, it’s hard to argue against the value proposition; $51,995 ($1,400 more than the base C6 Coupe) will get you into a base model C7 Corvette, while the droptop model will cost $56,995. For the improvements in performance, fuel economy and interior materials, it’s a paltry increase. I can’t help but wonder about rumors of an entry-level C7, with a smaller displacement V8 and less feature content. What kind of pricepoint could Chevrolet realistically offer that car at? $52k doesn’t exactly make it a car for the everyman, but for what you are getting, it’s almost impossible to beat.

Reader Summicron manages to both praise Jack’s review of the Dodge Avenger while also bringing up a very interesting point. Summicron writes

Baruth does the best job I’ve ever seen of answering the question:

“What does this hardware actually do?”
versus:
“What will snobs think of me if I buy it?”

This immediately made me wonder what vehicle is most unfairly maligned by the auto press and popular opinion?

The Chrysler 200 and Dodge Avenger are most frequently singled out by the automotive media and armchair auto execs as some of the biggest stinkers for sale right now, but as Jack’s review shows, they really don’t deserve the bum rap they get.

My own nomination is “any crossover”. The amount of hate that this segment gets is, in my opinion, totally unjustified. I was at a launch event not too long ago where I overheard a fairly prominent journalist (in terms of access and audience, not necessarily talent) bragging that they “did not review crossovers, because who gives a fuck”. When I published a fairly positive review of the Infiniti JX35, which is guilty of being a CUV with a CVT, there were legions of negative comments decrying my fairly positive assessment. Such a vehicle was evidently a capital crime against all that car guys stand for. Meanwhile, the notion that some people want a CUV for any sort of rational reason seems to dumbfound a very vocal minority. Clearly, millions of consumers each year continue to make the wrong choice and must be re-educated. I still think the CR-V is brilliant (but boring to drive, yes).

But my real nomination will come as a shocker to many of you who insist that TTAC is nothing more than a propaganda arm for a nefarious anti-GM conspiracy. Are you ready for it? It’s the Chevrolet Malibu. I had the chance to drive the 2LTZ with the 2.0T engine and, well, it wasn’t bad. I wouldn’t say it’s top of the class, but there’s no way that it deserves the absolute dog-piling that the critics gleefully participated in. The 2.0T powertrain was quite powerful and dare I say smoother than in the Cadillac ATS, MyLink was simple to operate and it made a comfortable cruiser along I-95. The back seat was a bit small, but not enough to upset my brother, who is 6 feet tall and wears a size 48 suit jacket. And the trunk was certainly generous. I generally concurred with Michael Karesh in thinking that it was a pretty good car. It seems like the Malibu just became the unfortunate whipping boy for a journalistic corps that couldn’t tell human excrement from Swiss chocolate. The again, I haven’t driven the other versions, and Karesh was none too impressed with the eAssist. But who cares what I think? Let me know in the comments.

1973 Ford Pinto Sportiva Concept

Is it a cliche to say that as a writer I try to avoid cliches? Anyway, I do try to avoid the word legendary (see Dash Parr on being special), but some concept and show cars are, well, legendary. Not in the sense, of course, that people tell grand tales about them but because they are remembered, ending up in books and blog posts. Some concept and show cars are, if not the stuff of legends, certainly the stuff of history. Other cars, not so much. For every memorable Cadillac Evoq, Sixteen and Converj, there’s been at least one La Espada or Aurora, cars that never really caught the public or auto enthusiasts’ imagination even if they may have influenced production cars. A concept car can cost an easy million dollars to build, but once that year’s auto show season is over, it’s often forgotten.

For a long time, after they came off the show circuit many show cars were destroyed or otherwise passed out of company hands. They were of no further use to the car companies so they were discarded. Few things become as quickly dated or as passe as last year’s concept cars. After collectors like Joe Bortz and Steve Juliano started finding and restoring those cars, though, car companies have tended to regard show cars as worth saving, if only because of their pecuniary and publicity value, though I think some folks inside the companies do have a clue as to their historic and cultural value. Today I doubt many show vehicles are deliberately destroyed and when they do let concept and show cars slip the bonds of their corporation, car companies try to get maximum value out of the transaction. As part of their centennial celebration a decade ago, in 2002 Ford had Christie’s auction off 50 concept cars from FoMoCo’s corporate collection, with the proceeds going to charity. During GM’s financial crisis and bankruptcy, in 2009 the company culled out 250  prototypes, SEMA show cars, and concepts from their Heritage collection and sold them at the Barrett-Jackson auction in Scottsdale. Since then, car companies have auctioned off a number of other prototypes for publicity and charitable purposes.

While researching Detroit’s legendary (if the shoe fits) Alexander brothers, who built a series of award winning custom cars and also made show cars for Ford in the 1960s, I came across a photo of the 1973 Pinto Sportiva Concept (not an Alexander brothers’ car, though I suppose it’s possible that Larry Alexander may have worked on it as by then he was working for Ford as a master metal modeler in Ford’s prototype shop). It’s a notchback take on the Pinto that presages the Mustang II which was itself based on the Pinto platform, and to make it at least somewhat interesting, Ford gave it a targa roof.

Did you know about the 1973 Ford Pinto Sportiva Concept? Neither did I. How about the 1988 Lincoln Machete? Putting aside the concept car itself for a second, how on Earth did someone at Lincoln think that “Machete” resonated with the Lincoln brand, or with its customers? Those cars got me thinking about obscure concept and show cars so I headed to one of my favorite places to find pics of cool cars from the past, the Chicago Auto Show’s website. The Chicago show has hired professional photographers to shoot the show since at least the early 1950s and they’ve graciously compiled a year by year archive on the show’s website that goes back to the turn of the 20th century. In recent years Robert Shiverts (Oscar & Associates) has been the show’s official photographer. The pics that Shiverts and the other official show photographers have shot over the years are a great historical record of American car culture.

I’ve gone through their dropdown menu of concept cars and picked a few whose names I didn’t really recognize (and a few that I think deserve more attention). Some of them did influence production cars even if they didn’t achieve fame as show cars, others are doubly obscure.

Many of the photos are from the Chicago Auto Show site, but I’ve fleshed out the gallery a bit with some publicity and other archival shots.

Acura’s alphanumeric production car names are hard enough to keep straight. Do you remember the 1995 Acura CL-X concept?

1964 American Motors Rambler Cheyenne Wagon. Western motifs were popular in the ’50s and ’60s, particularly with station wagons.

Also in 1964, AMC showed the Tarpon concept, a great looking fastback based on the compact Rambler American with an almost boattail design. Unfortunately, AMC head Roy Abernethy overruled designer Richard Teague and the roofline ended up on the midsize AMC platform as the Marlin. The proportions didn’t work quite as well. Dodge’s similarly fastback styled but better proportioned Charger outsold the Marlin by a wide margin.

Before there was the Rambler Cheyenne, there was the 1959 Buick Texan, based on the Invicta wagon.

As you can see from the 1958 Buick Wells Fargo, western themes weren’t exclusive to station wagons. The Buick Wells Fargo was made especially for actor Dale Robertson, whose western tv show, Wells Fargo, Buick sponsored.

The 1983 Buick Questor had state of the art electronics, with a laser based keyless entry and a computerized navigation system. That was just two years after IBM introduced the Intel 8088 based 5150 personal computer and the same year two guys named Steve introduced the Apple IIe. Some of the Questor’s electronic features ended up on the production Buick Reatta.

Not to be confused with Brooks Stevens’ masterful Studebaker Sceptre concept, the 1992 Buick Sceptre gave a preview of Buick’s soft curvy design language of the 1990s. It also had one of those newfangled cellular telephones.

They wouldn’t go financially bankrupt until 2009 but General Motors’ creative bankruptcy was evident by 1995. It’s one thing to recycle a concept name, or another to keep a popular car on the show circuit for a couple of years, but reusing the same actual car a dozen years later with virtually no restyling shows that even the famed staff of GM Design didn’t have much left in the tank by the 1990s. In 1995 Buick revived not just the Questor name (companies recycle concept names all the time), it brought back the same car, only with new paint and upgraded electronic gizmos. It’s a little confusing because they recycled the car but by I believe that by 1995 the Questor had 14 micro-computers, automatic level, attitude and spoiler control, a “systems sentinel” to monitor the status of vehicle systems, heads-up display, computer based map and navigation system, automatically aimed headlamps, theft-deterrent system, road traction monitoring and control system, TV rear-view mirror (GM first put a rear facing tv camera on the Centurion Motorama car in the 1950s), and a touch-command system for entertainment, comfort and convenience functions. As a concept car in general, the Questor accurately predicted many of the features on today’s cars. As a concept car to promote the Buick brand, though, it didn’t do much.

1998 Buick Signia station wagon. It’s made some ugliest cars of all time lists but I don’t think it’s that terrible. Okay, on second thought, maybe it is.

1999 Buick Cielo. Remember it? Had Bill Mitchell been alive to see it, I think he would have said that it looked like a fish.

1954 Cadillac La Espada. Actor Ronald Reagan was the Grand Marshall for that year’s Chicago Auto Show. Reagan later rode in Lincolns.

1950 Cadillac Debutante, with all unpainted interior metal plated in gold. In today’s politically correct world, would Cadillac use even fake exotic fur, let alone the Debutante’s real leopard skin?

Cadillac used the Aurora name in 1990. The name would later appear at the top of Oldsmobile’s lineup.

2002 Vizon Concept, a preview of the Cadillac SRX. The Vizon was an early version of Caddy’s Art & Science design theme.

Lately there have been rumors that Chevrolet might expand the Corvette lineup to include a four seater. Expanding the Corvette line is not a new idea. At the 1954 Motorama, Chevy showed hardtop, fastback and station wagon versions of the Corvette, introduced only a year before. For the Motorama in 1957, Chevy debuted the Corvette Impala concept which seated five. Most Motorama cars look a little bizarre to my tastes, but the Corvette Impala was damn near perfect. It’s fate is unknown, probably scrapped.

Did Chevrolet really use the obscure, difficult to pronounce and deliberately misspelled Sigizi in 1992 to introduce the dustbuster minivans? Just what two things are connected sygyzistically in this lozenge shaped vehicle?

Continued tomorrow in part 2, Chrysler to Ford.

Ronnie Schreiber edits Cars In Depth, a realistic perspective on cars & car culture and the original 3D car site. If you found this post worthwhile, you can dig deeper at Cars In Depth. If the 3D thing freaks you out, don’t worry, all the photo and video players in use at the site have mono options. Thanks – RJS

Over at Jalopnik, Patrick George discusses the recent trademark filing by General Motors for the Chevelle name. After a brief discussion regarding trademark procedure, George makes a logical conclusion; the Chevelle name may end up attached to something less than worthy, similar to how Dodge’s C-segment car ended up with the Dart moniker. But there is a potential ray of sunshine here for enthusiasts.

In January, TTAC commenter nadude (or as he’s known to everyone else, Mark Reuss, GM’s North American head) told an Australian news outlet that the Code 130R concept car “would be a great entry for us.” The Code 130R was a BMW 1-Series-esque concept car that used an FR layout and an efficient four-cylinder engine, not unlike the Scion FR-S.

As for how the car might make it into production

“I don’t know if they (Toyota) are making any money but it is a very attractive car…we would do something with the knowledge of Alpha and the background, but we wouldn’t take Alpha and try and shrink it.”

Currently, Alpha only has two vehicles based off of it; the Cadillac ATS and the next generation Chevrolet Camaro. GM will need to utilize this architecture further, as a way of amortizing its costs. Toyota is following a similar approach with the FR-S, spawning multiple variants to help absorb the costs of developing such a platform from the ground up.

While Reuss’ comments seem to suggest something different, it’s hard to make an armchair guess on how GM would get the Code 130R into production. At least GM has some kind of basis to start with, not to mention the will of some of its top level execs. As TTAC’s resident “voice of a generation”, I’ve already given the stamp of approval to the Code 130R. Unlike the SS, I could actually afford this, and the FR-S, as many of you know, doesn’t quite do it for me. So how about a compact, 4-cylinder Chevelle with rear-drive based off of some kind of Alpha platform? Sounds good to me.

Remember GM’s boast about how their new trucks could tow a segment best 11,5000 pounds? Turns out there’s a big ol’ asterisk that wasn’t expanded upon.

PickupTrucks.com reports that the 11,500 pound tow rating will only happen when a special package is ordered.

The maximum towing capacity for the Silverado and Sierra is 11,500 pounds, but that will be only with trucks outfitted with the max-trailering package (special note: the gross combined weight rating is said to be 17,500 pounds). The highest tow ratings without the max-tow package for regular cabs is 10,200 pounds; for crew cabs it’s 9,700 pounds. And all max-tow package-equipped trucks will be running 3.73:1 ring and pinion gears; 4.10:1 gears will not be offered for 2014.

Despite the slightly misleading claims from GM, Ford’s own site is a convoluted mess of different wheelbase lengths, engines, axle ratios and different towing packages that doesn’t tell nearly the full story either. For now we can say GM has the win in towing capacity, but nobody has the moral high ground in making things clear.

GM will have two new mid-size pickups out in 2015, just in time to steal the spotlight from the all-new Ford F-150. And according to TTAC Commenter and GM exec Mark Reuss, the two trucks should have fairly different missions.

Speaking to the Detroit Free Press, Reuss said that the Chevrolet pickup will be a “lifestyle” oriented truck, while GMC’s truck would be aimed at fleets and small businesses. Reuss also said that the new trucks would have all-new powertrains and be slightly larger than a Toyota Tacoma. We can only hope that this includes some kind of diesel, perhaps the Duramax that’s offered in the Thai version of the Chevrolet Colorado.

Perhaps our Aussie/global readers can fill us in on the subtitles of the Colorado vs. Hilux debate as well.

The multi-billion dollar endeavor of developing a new car has effectively ended the one-off specialty car that many enthusiasts still clamor for and wronglyassert is feasible in this era. Supermodel-thin margins, a saturation of brands and vehicles and an ultra-competitive global marketplace have killed the previous formula for developing a production car, which was mostly a one-off solution to local road conditions and buyer tastes

The necessity of scale is a double-edged sword; if the bean counters deem a product too costly and it may proceed as a watered down version of the original concept. If a new architecture or platform is approved, then we are practically assured multiple variants spun off that platform.

As it turns out, GM nearly took the cheapskate approach to developing the Cadillac ATS. But at the 11th hour, the General decided to change course, and enthusiasts will be all the better for it.

Automotive News outlines how Cadillac’s 3-Series fighter very nearly became Cimarron 2.0, with plans underway to build it on the front-drive Delta platform.

“We were going to do a front-wheel-drive Cadillac compact off of Delta because it was going to be less expensive,” Doug Parks, GM’s vice president of global product programs, told me at the Detroit auto show in January. “There were people in the organization saying, ‘It’ll be OK. We can dial it in.’” So serious were the plans that Parks, who was based in Europe at the time, found himself driving 150 mph on a test track in Spain in a 2.0-liter turbo test mule built on the Delta platform.

“We actually made it pretty darn good,” Parks said. “But in reality, you can’t go beat BMW or Mercedes when you don’t have the right weight balance and everything else.”

GM’s decision to develop Alpha ensured that its performance vehicles have a new lease on life. The ATS will be the start of a range of cars, with the next-generation Camaro to follow. Two vehicles off of Alpha won’t be enough either, but what will follow the Camaro is anyone’s guess.

GM announced that prices of their new 1500-series trucks would remain flat, while the new 5.3L V8 is estimated to beat Ford’s F-150 Ecoboost in fuel economy and towing capacity.

Silverado and Sierra trucks with the 5.3L engine will apparently return 16/23 mpg city/highway in 2WD and 16/22 in 4WD configuration. The new trucks can also out-tow the Ecoboost F-150 by 200lbs (11,500 lbs versus 11,300 lbs for the Ford) while besting the 5.0L Ford trucks by a full 1,500 lbs.

Until EPA and real-world fuel economy figures are confirmed, we can only report on GM’s estimates. Also worth noting is that fuel economy ratings for the 4.3L V6 and the uprated 6.2L V8 were absent. Pricing for the Silverado will be flat, with the new model selling for the exact same base price as the 2013 versions – but without the very generous discounts that have been available for the last 16 months.

2001 Chevrolet Silverado LS with tasteful aftermarket NRA front license plate.

Car enthusiasts can be a fickle and judgmental lot when it comes to passion for things automotive. Certain types of vehicles are expected to be driven by a person who wishes to appropriate the label for themselves. Do you drive a Miata, S2000, or one of the original British sports cars that they echo? You can lay claim to the title of gear head or enthusiast without being challenged. Have a foreign car, especially a European one, that costs more than a Midwestern starter home? You probably won’t be called a poseur if you show up to your local cars and coffee gathering. Then, there are people who love trucks.

I yield to no man in my love of the sporting automobile. I’ve got a muscle car of my own tucked away in my garage. There’s nothing finer than a Saturday morning drive through the Kentucky hills, taking corners with more enthusiasm than talent, and feeling the wind buffet through the open T-tops as the V-8 drowns out the chorus of Springsteen’s Born to Run. But put a gun to my head, order me to choose between my Camaro and my 2001 Silverado pickup with the caveat that the vehicle I don’t choose will be set on fire, well, then I guess we’ll enjoy some F-body flambe.

Portrait of the author as a young man. Notice how far Mom kept me from the truck’s open bed, even when parked.  Picture taken by Dad, November 1981.

Grandpa Lonnie Hester only owned three vehicles during his slightly more than four-score and ten on this earth: all of them pickup trucks. The first was a Ford Model A that was replaced in 1949, the year my father was born, with a dark green Chevrolet. Grandpa Lonnie was tight-fisted and the only option on the truck was a heater because my Grandmother Ruby believed that riding around during the winter in the unheated Model A had contributed to my Aunt Jean’s early death. Grandpa ran that truck into the ground until Grandmother convinced him that not only did he deserve a new truck, but that it would also be a great help to my dad if he passed the ’49 on. That truck stayed in the family until I was nine.

Grandpa’s truck was a ’73 C-10, but the color on this ’76 C-20 is spot on. 

The first vehicle I ever drove was the truck Grandpa bought to replace the ’49: a powder- blue 1973 Chevrolet.  I was eleven when my father took me out into the pasture behind my grandmother’s house. I jerked and lurched through the field as my dad instructed me on the finer points of working my way through a three- speed on the tree with the occasional reminder that I needed to steer right… steer right… GO RIGHT OR YOU’LL HIT THE (thump) hay bale.

Three years later, and I was introduced to the time-honored tradition of cruising. Still not old enough to (legally) drive, I rode shotgun with my buddy Paul in his black Chevy S-10. He had tinted the widows way past the limit, installed the fat double- bladed wipers all the cool kids had in the late eighties, and mounted an enormous pair of speakers behind the seat. We terrorized the streets of Oxford, Alabama, after Wednesday night youth group, hollering at girls, conducting Chinese fire drills, and alternatively blasting Tone-Loc, AC/DC, and Charlie Daniels at volumes that today would definitely get kids written up for violations of municipal noise ordinances.

The three-across bench seat was perfect when one or (Score!) two girls needed a ride, particularly since everyone had to crowd more towards the passenger side in order to be out of poor, lonely Paul’s way so that he could shift. If more girls needed a ride, there was always the open bed in the days before mandatory seatbelt laws. I would occasionally ride back there myself (to keep them company, you understand) even though it would have simply killed my mother to know that I ever went anywhere without a seatbelt on. Doing things that would cause your mother to die if she knew is part of being fourteen. (Sorry, Mom.)

Despite all of this early exposure to the advantages of a pickup, I never considered one for myself and chose a two- door Chevrolet Beretta for my first new car upon graduation from high school in 1994. A few years later, flush with a steady paycheck from my first full-time job, I again failed to consider a truck and bought a used ’96 Firebird Formula two months before my wife became pregnant with our daughter. If I needed a truck, my dad always had one. When we bought our first house in 2000, I borrowed my dad’s ’94 Ford F-150 for a couple of weeks so I could move odds and ends from our apartment to the house while he got to tear around in my Firebird.

The beginning of the end. Long- term exposure to a F-150 finally seduced me into the world of dedicated pickup truck ownership.

Over those two weeks, I came to truly appreciate a pickup truck for what it could do, besides haul girls and survive low- speed farm collisions without damage. The space. The view over traffic. The ability to just go and get large stuff on my own without having to bum a ride from a friend with a truck. My wife and I had been wrestling our infant daughter in and out of the back seats of two-door cars for over a year. With the truck, the car-seat was level with us. Sure, it was a tight fit in parking lots and it wouldn’t win any drag races, but a truck just made so much more sense than a coupe.

A few months later, the Firebird was traded for a lease on a new 2001 Sierra. I’ve had trucks, new and used, ever since. Sure, I could hitch a trailer to the wife’s Odyssey, but then my truck always has a trailer attached to it. It’s called a bed. If I want to go buy an $800 elliptical machine that some guy is giving away for $40 on Craigslist in an attempt to screw over his ex- wife, I can just hop in my truck and have it loaded it up before the other vultures, who had to attach their trailers or beg a pickup, get there. If my brother needs me to haul a load of mulch (and Black Widow spiders, belatedly discovered after we had spent about thirty minutes shoveling said mulch out of the bed) for him to his rental properties, I can do it. A truck of my own simply represents freedom better than my low- slung, totally impractical Camaro.

2003 Chevrolet S-10 LS.

A couple of years ago I let my daughter drive in a field for the first time. Coincidentally, her first time behind the wheel was also in a blue Chevrolet pickup truck. In another couple of years, she’ll get her permit and I plan to make her learn the basics of car control in my Silverado so that she’ll never be intimidated by large vehicles. Kids today don’t cruise the way my friends and I used to, gas prices and graduated driver’s licenses being what they are. It’s just as well. I can’t imagine letting her go riding around at the age of 14 the way I did. But if she ever has the opportunity, I just have to ask her to do one thing for me:

Don’t ride in the back of any pickup trucks. It will simply kill your father.

Who cares about the Chevrolet SS? GM just stuffed an LS7 in the Camaro. Even though the Camaro is one of my least favorite cars, I cannot wait to drive this thing, visibility be damned.

Recent talk of Chevrolet attempting to convert the 2014 Impala from 75 percent fleet sales to 70 percent retail sales seemed like an improbable figure. Judging the success of any new car is a crapshoot for most of us, but one thing is for sure; the full-size sedan segment as a whole, is declining.

Over the past half decade, the full-size segment as a whole has been in serious decline. The number of product offerings for sale has been cut in half, from 15 to 7. IHS Automotive, an independent research firm, reports that full-size car sales have declined by 42 percent since 2006.

From a peak of 311,128 units in 2007, Impala sales have nearly been cut in half – and the fleet mix numbers suggest that Chevrolet is only selling about 50,000 units at retail. At the other end of the spectrum, the Hyundai Azera is barely moving the needle, consistently selling below 10,000 unts over the past few years. Impala sales will undoubtedly decline with the introduction of the 2014 model – there’s no way that Chevrolet can sustain current volumes if they plan to sell 70 percent of cars to retail customers. But even with sales of 100,000 units, it would still be the segment leader – though the Dodge Charger would be nipping at its heels.

However, an almost-certain reduction in government fleet spending could put a dent in the sales of both models. Sources in D.C. tell us that this could be as much as a 20 percent cutback, or about 100,00-120,000 vehicles. The current Impala, along with the Chrysler LX cars and the Taurus, are darlings of government fleets, and stand to lose the most from this sort of reduction. Meanwhile, the same source tells us that Chrysler is ramping up promotion of its fleet program, with Ram trucks and the LX cars as its main focus.

For many potential large car buyers (whether retail, government or private fleets), a CUV is a much more attractive vehicle, with similar fuel economy and comparable interior volume. For consumers, a CUV is often more appealing to their emotional side, while daily rental fleets can charge more for than a comparable sedan. In other cases, the CUV has a similar footprint but also offers a third row of seats and more cargo room. It’s not a coincidence that some major police departments, like the California Highway Patrol, are opting for the Ford Explorer-based Police Interceptor rather than the Taurus variant.

Speaking of the Taurus, another rumor making the rounds right now is that the Taurus won’t be back after this generation. Poor margins and difficulties during the development process meant that the Taurus has been scrapped part way through the development process, and Ford is content with the Fusion acting as its flagship sedan. If this situation holds true, that leaves Chevrolet and Chrysler as the vanguards of the large American sedan.

Even though rear-drive sedans have fallen out of fashion with most of Detroit, Chrysler seems to have made a business case for the continuation of the rear-drive platform. With Alfa, Chrysler and possibly Maserati sharing the next generation large rear-drive platform, Chrysler and Fiat will have both economies of scale and some high margin luxury vehicles on the same platform.

Previously, Chrysler had little exposure to Europe, Asia and other markets where big engines and a big footprint are seen as negatives. This allowed them to go it alone with the LX chassis and their larger V6 and V8 engines, since their main focus was the United States. Without Fiat, it would have been tough to continue down this road, but now that they can spread the technology across multiple brands and price points, the future of at least one family of full-size sedans is secure.

Furthermore, Chrysler could be in a good position to absorb the rear-drive sedan segment in Australia if GM and Ford walk away from their offerings. The rear-drive Ford Falcon has become a victim of the One Ford policy  while the Holden Commodore will apparently adopt the front-drive Epsilon II platform for its next iteration. The 300C and its SRT8 version are gaining a bit of a following in Australia, which is also becoming one of the SRT brand’s hottest markets. Despite the declining sales of the Falcon and Commodore, it would be nothing short of amazing to see both GM and Ford cede that market to a relative upstart that had almost zero presence in Australia just a decade ago.

One of the most interesting things to come out of the recent Chevy Impala launch – aside from the fact that GM thinks it can sell the thing for $40,000 – is that the current, unloved Impala will live on as a fleet-only special called the “Chevrolet Impala Limited.” To that, I say: great idea.

I’ve been a proponent of fleet-only cars ever since the 1997-2003 Chevrolet Malibu was rebranded the Chevrolet Classic, a name which would’ve been appropriate when it debuted. In fact, I think there should be even more fleet-only cars – an idea that’s unpopular in the automotive industry, but highly praised between my ears. Allow me to explain.

The Fleet-Only Car World

Today, GM is the lone brand in the fleet-only game. In addition to the new Impala Limited, they have three other models:

1. The Chevrolet Caprice, which is only sold to police departments, who flip it on eBay to guys who inexplicably can’t wait for the SS.
2. The Chevrolet Captiva Sport, which – despite bring a rebadged Saturn Vue from five years ago – is still better than virtually every current car-based Jeep.
3. The Chevrolet Malibu Classic. Yes, the “Classic” name lives on in the form of last year’s Malibu, which can be sold to rental car companies instead of today’s Malibu so that renters can transport rear passengers with legs.

While GM is the sole brand offering fleet-only models today, that hasn’t historically been the case. As everyone on TTAC knows, the Ford Crown Victoria was fleet-only for its final few years on the market. And the entire Chrysler Corporation was fleet-only from about 2003 until December of last year.

Advantages of Fleet-Only

The most obvious benefit of fleet-only models is that you don’t torpedo the resale value of the rest of your lineup. Here’s an example: last year, GM sold 37,000 Captiva Sports, each of which will eventually be available at your neighborhood CarMax. They also sold around 218,000 Equinox units. Some of those may have even been sold outside of Detroit. Southfield, for example.

If GM didn’t have the Captiva Sport, the Equinox number would’ve jumped to somewhere around 255,000. That’s way too many units. The ensuing used-market flood would’ve plunged resale values, which in turn would plunge new-car values. Economists refer to this as The Chrysler Effect.

Chevrolet would then have two choices: boost sales by lowering credit standards and adding incentives, or redesign the thing. And I think we all know which one they’d pick.

But with the Captiva Sport, the Equinox can stay in relative balance with supply and demand. Which, in GM terms, means two grand cash back or zero percent interest for 48 months.

The other benefit of fleet-only sales is, quite simply, keeping the factories running. We all know the automakers have to sign long-term, high-volume deals with the unions, or else the world risks a strike and the very real possibility that we may have to go a few weeks without the Chevrolet Sonic. Even if GM makes no money on all those Captiva Sports, it’s better than losing money by idling the plants and paying the workers anyway. Economists call that The Mitsubishi Effect.

Disadvantages of Fleet-Only

Of course, fleet-only sales do have one massive disadvantage.

Let’s say you’re John Smith and your personal car is a Camry. You’re landing at the Des Moines International Airport, so named because occasionally a flight from Toronto to Los Angeles makes an emergency landing there. (Actually, there is one single non-stop flight from Des Moines to Cancun, which is essential to the airport because otherwise they’d have to change all the signs.)

You show up at the Enterprise counter to claim your rental car and the perky woman behind the counter informs you that you’ll be driving a Chevrolet Impala with the same tone she’d use to announce that you’ve been bumped to first class, or that you’ve won a year’s supply of dish soap.

You walk out to your car, which turns out to be an Impala Limited. You throw your bags in. And nine miles later you decide that you never, ever, under any circumstances ever want to come into contact with any Chevrolet product ever again. You silently pat yourself on the back for buying a Camry.

This could be a slight problem for a brand that’s trying to add new buyers.

The Solution

As with most things in life, the key is moderation. Fleet-only cars are a great idea, but only if they’re not terrible. While it makes for easy jokes, the Captiva Sport is the perfect execution of a fleet-only car: it’s not so bad to look at, it’s not so bad to sit in, and it’s not so bad to drive. And it doesn’t harm Chevy’s reputation, since the average person hasn’t even heard of it until they go to CarMax, where they’re parked three-deep on every horizontal surface.

The Impala Limited, however, is the exact opposite, so I hope it doesn’t last long. There are a lot of John Smiths in this world, and they’re buying Camrys every day.

Doug DeMuro operates PlaysWithCars.com. He’s owned an E63 AMG wagon, road-tripped across the US in a Lotus without air conditioning, and posted a six-minute lap time on the Circuit de Monaco in a rented Ford Fiesta. One year after becoming Porsche Cars North America’s youngest manager, he quit to become a writer. His parents are very disappointed.

When I was in the automotive propaganda business, one of the most horrifying experiences were changes on the top. CEOs could come and go without drama. Changing marketing managers meant serious trouble. It’s a bit like Indian widow-burning: He goes, you go up in flames. When Joel Ewanick came to GM, he had his old buddies Goodby, Silverstein in tow. When Joel left, the funeral pyre was assembled for Goodby.

Here come the matches.

Officially, General Motors Co’s Chevrolet brand “is consolidating its global advertising”, as Reuters reports. In actuality,  the Goodby hotshop is out, and McCann, the agency that (along with Interpublic Group member Campbell-Ewald) did GM business since the days of the hand crank, is in sole control.

When Ewanick wanted to give the job to Goodby,  Joel ran into a wall of passive-aggressiveness. A political compromise was reached. Interpublic Group’s McCann and Omnicom Group’s Goodby, Silverstein & Partners created a joint venture called Commonwealth.

Picture a joint venture between the Wahhabi Muslims and the Holy Rollers and you have a feeling for how long that joint venture would last after the spiritual leader’s departure.

With Goodby gone, Commonwealth officially continues as Chevrolet’s global advertising agency. De facto, it is a counter-coup by the old cronies.

With McCann back in the saddle, expect more of the same old from GM: Cars that look like you’ve seen them ages ago, launched with recycled commercials.

The W-Body Chevrolet Impala, so beloved by the horribly biased, anti-Detroit, anti-GM staff and readership of TTAC, will live on for one more year, as a fleet vehicle dubbed the “Impala Limited”.

The news came at the launch of the new Epsilon-based Impala, which is moving the full-size Chevrolet in a totally different direction. The W-Body made up as much as 75 percent of its sales volume via fleets, but Chevrolet is looking to turn that around completely, with a target of 70 percent retail sales for the new Impala.

Aside from having the Impala Limited catering to fleet customers, continuing the W-Body helps GM keep their Oshawa plant running at capacity, particularly the Oshawa Consolidated Line, which is set to close once the W-Body ends production. This also helps GM meet its “Vitality Commitment’, which requires GM to maintain a minimum production level in Canada. The new Impala will split production between Oshawa and Michigan.

The Wall Street Journal‘s recent article on compact pickup trucks and rising gas prices has raised the tantalizing prospect of a return to the glory days of the compact pickups. But from what we hear, it would be premature to get your hopes up just yet.

So far, the Chevrolet Colorado and GMC Canyon have been confirmed for sale in the United States – and that’s it. So what about the rumors of more compacts from Ford, Ram and even VW?

The common thread, as far as smaller pickups with improved fuel-efficiency and footprint, is that they are hard to justify. These days, $1 billion is the minimum cost of entry for developing a new model. Homologating a model to FMVSS standards is said to cost at least $50 million (a figure quoted for the Lotus Elise, which still managed to get an airbag waiver from NHTSA, doubtlessly saving tens of millions of dollars). There is no way to do it on the cheap, and that remains one of the biggest stumbling blocks for the OEMs.  That and CAFE. And the chicken tax.

In addition, full-size trucks have become cheap enough that the idea of an affordable compact truck now seems redundant. America doesn’t have the same space constraints that Europe, Asia and South American cities do, so something with a smaller physical footprint doesn’t have the same appeal in the USA. And don’t forget any compact truck must be a global product in today’s market.

GM is in a unique position with the Colorado and Canyon, having been developed with global sales in mind – much of the development work was done in Thailand (the world’s second biggest pickup truck market), but the vehicle is ready to go for sale in the USA. The global Ford Ranger on the other hand, is about 90 percent of the F-150′s size, meaning it is too close in size and price to be sold here. It’s also not coming here due to the costs of certifying it. Ram may yet launch a “lifestyle” unibody truck, but again, the Ram’s new V6 fuel economy, lower price and all-around appeal is doing a good job of negating any benefits from selling a unibody truck.

But there is a ray of sunshine for compact truck enthusiasts. We already have two great mid-size trucks, the Toyota Tacoma and Nissan Frontier, on sale right now. Of course, in the rush to covet product that we cannot buy in America, we forget about what’s already in front of us.

The forest green 1969 Nova sat unwashed and unloved at the side of the modest house. I studied it from the side of the road with the eye of an experienced hunter and I recognized the signs. Shunted off to the side while two more modern cars sat in the driveway, it was obvious that the old Nova had already passed that threshold of usefulness and begun the descent into eventual abandonment. The grass beneath the car, just a cutting or two taller than the rest of the yard, told me how recently that had been – just a few weeks. There was a chance then, that the car had not sat long enough to totally degrade. Perhaps, I thought, there was still some value to be had.

It was a 2 door coupe, a style I liked, and my practiced eye identified optional wheel covers and matching trim pieces covering the rocker panels. The vinyl top and bright trim on the rain gutters told me this car had been fully loaded when it was new, but the absence of badges next to the front marker lights made it unlikely it was a performance model. Still it looked good sitting there and there might be a chance to have some fun and make a buck. I pulled into the driveway and headed for the door of the house.

The man who answered was friendly enough when I asked about the car and together we walked into the yard to take a closer look. Up close the Nova looked dirtier than it had from the street and I could see the paint just beginning to bubble in all the usual places. Still, overall, it looked good. The smell of “old Chevrolet” assailed my senses as I opened the door and I found myself looking at well-worn bench seat and a column shift automatic. The headliner was good and the back seat nice, but the floor behind the driver’s seat showed some signs of rust. Under the hood I found an oil stained 250 cubic-inch inline six cylinder that fired right up with minimal effort and idled noisily through an exhaust with a missing muffler.

My conversation with the owner was brief. He wanted the car gone but didn’t know how much to ask. I low balled him with an offer of $50 and he countered with “Any car that runs is worth $100.” In the end, we settled for what I had in my wallet, $85. That evening I came back with my best friend Rick and together we convoyed back to my house.

The next day I took good look at my purchase. Unlike my buddy Tim, I wasn’t in the parts business, which was good because from his perspective the old car would have been a losing proposition. The six cylinder engine ran OK and the transmission shifted fine, but these were parts no one would want. The body, already in the first stages of rust, would bring no real money either. Arguably the best bits, the high option trim pieces, would interest only a collector in the midst of a major restoration project and I knew of no such person so there was no money there either. My plan. however, was to have some fun and then eventually resell the car and for that purpose, the car was perfect.

My first step was a thorough cleaning of the interior, something that netted me about $7 in loose change. Next, I took a closer look at the floor behind the driver’s seat and found that the rust had fully penetrated the floor pan. The holes were not big and I, knowing nothing about rust and structural integrity, solved the problem by covering the area with a couple of rubber floor mats. Under the hood, I cleaned the oil stained engine with a liberal application of engine degreaser and water and, while I had the hose out, I washed the car. I followed it up with some wax and the result was good.

I next turned my attention to the exhaust system. With a hacksaw, I removed three or four inches of the damaged exhaust and clamped a purple, Thrush brand glass pack, complete with a cartoon woodpecker smoking a cigar painted on its side, onto the end of the pipe. I finished by hanging the entire contraption up with some plumber’s tape and called it good. The result was a monotonous, undignified, droning exhaust note, but I thought it looked awesome – never mind the fact that no one could see it.

Thrush Muffler mascot

My exhaust work made the car sound like a pickup truck from the 1950s and there were other things that reminded me just how old and out of date the little Nova really was, too. On the street its power steering gave zero feedback and the car’s worn suspension made it jangle over bumps and wallow in the curves. The six cylinder engine made modest power but, thanks to the automatic transmission, very little of what it produced actually reached the rear wheels. The car was painfully slow. Still, I was young and, even though I had a much nicer car at my disposal, I thought the car was great fun. I spent a happy summer cruising around the back roads with all the windows down and music blasting from the tinny AM radio.

Towards the end of summer, my best friend Rick approached me and asked if I wanted to sell the old car. His current ride, a 1969 Charger, was too fragile and expensive to be used as a daily driver and with Fall coming he needed something more mundane to carry him around. The Nova was dull and unremarkable but it made up for those faults by being as reliable as a stone axe. It was perfect for him and sold it to him $350, a bargain for him and a nice profit for myself as well.

Rick was rough on things and from the minute he got it, the old Nova was driven hard. The car’s accelerator was always mashed flat under his foot and the little engine struggled to keep up with the demands he placed upon it. At higher speeds, the car’s old suspension was prone to bottoming out on the hilly back roads and the muffler I had spent so many minutes installing soon broke off and flew into the woods after striking the ground one too many times. I imagine it still looks great there embedded in the earth or stuffed under a log.

Another time on a trip to the drive in, another of our buddies named Marvin, who had been consigned to the back seat, discovered the holes in the floor. In protest of being denied the coveted shotgun position up front, Marvin rolled up one of the rubber floor mats and shoved it through the hole where it dragged on the road until it caught fire. It was fully aflame when he pulled it back into the car and the black oily smoke-filled the cabin. In a panic, Marvin stuffed the burning mess back through the floor where it flew off behind us into the night.

Despite all the shenanigans, Rick wasn’t at fault when the accident happened. The car that ran the red light had almost cleared the intersection when Rick entered it. The resulting collision twisted the front of the Nova up at an odd angle and destroyed the driver’s side fender, hood and front bumper. The guy who caused the accident tried to claim that Rick had rabbit started, but when Rick told the police the old car only had a six cylinder, they had laughed at the notion and had written the other guy a ticket. For once, being slow paid off.

Rick had the old car towed home and hunkered like a wounded animal in his mother’s driveway for the better part of a week until the offending party came to make amends. Rather than make an expensive insurance claim, the man offered to buy the car outright. There wasn’t much haggling, Rick gave him the option of buying the wreck for $1500 or going to court. The payment was in cash and the car was taken away. We never saw it again.

Looking back now I realize it was an ignoble ending for the little car, but it was, perhaps, better than the fate that would have awaited it had I left it unwashed and unloved beside the house where I first found it. At the very least, it had one last summer in the sun and one final chance to finish its days in the fast lane. It remains there in my mind today, droning steadily along on some sunny afternoon, on its way to some new adventure.

Thomas Kreutzer currently lives in Buffalo, New York with his wife and three children but has spent most of his adult life overseas. He has lived in Japan for 9 years, Jamaica for 2 and spent almost 5 years as a US Merchant Mariner serving primarily in the Pacific. A long time auto and motorcycle enthusiast he has pursued his hobbies whenever possible. He also enjoys writing and public speaking where, according to his wife, his favorite subject is himself.