Quote:
Originally Posted by The_Blur
The only mistake they made is not letting Pontiac get one. Other than that, the Camaro is perfect—no regrets when it comes out.
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I owned a 1969 Firebird, 400, factory 4-speed. Factory hood tac. 400 hood. It was a GM Pale yellow color, with black deluxe interior, factory bench seat, but still had hurst 4 speed lever with small shift boot.
When I see the 2010 Camaro interior, I am reminded of the interior/speedometer/steering wheel I had in the firebird.
The reason people crave PONTIACs is because in the day, the styling was allowed to be excessive, and/or outrageous.
BUT G.M. WILL GO UNDER and have to fire lots of people if they don't just focus on only ONE musclecar. SO it is best for everyone not to complain.
Thank you John Delorean for creating an option package to place a large V8 into a mid-size car BEFORE the GM heads knew about it and it was too late for them to do anything about it !! MMMmwwwahahahahaaha he was so smart !
Despite a GM corporate policy that prohibited the use of engines larger than 330 in³ in intermediate-sized cars, such as the Tempest/LeMans, De Lorean got around the rules by specifically offering the 389 in³ V8 as an option package. The rules were vague at GM as "new models" required corporate approval but "option packages" did not. When the 14th Floor (GM's executive row) caught on to the existence of the GTO, it was too late to pull it out of production and Pontiac responded that no more than 5,000 GTOs would be built in 1964; with that the corporate brass was appeased.
Shortly thereafter, Car & Driver magazine in its March 1964 issue featured a road test of a 1964 GTO with the optional Tri Power (three two-barrel carburetor) version of the 389 V8 and four-speed transmission to be tested against a Ferrari GTO, but the Ferrari didn't make it to the party so the magazine ended up testing the "Pontiac" alone and recorded a then unheard of 0-60 mph time (for a stock production car as opposed to an exotic sports car) of 4.6 seconds and a standing quarter-mile of 115 mph (185 km/h) in 13.1 seconds.
The publication of that road test substantially increased demand for GTOs as Pontiac dealers often found themselves swamped with more potential buyers than cars to sell. Pontiac responded by dramatically increasing GTO production to meet the demand. By the end of the 1964 model year, approximately 32,000 GTOs had been assembled, well above the initial projections of 5,000 units.