From the [i]Detroit Free Press[/i] on 2/21/10

[Clem Z.]

Re: From the Detroit Free Press on 2/21/10

My 1965 Impala - was $2300 base. I added $1100 in options and only had a 327, and four speed for the high dollar extras. ALL the rest was HD this and that at 10 to 20 bucks a pop. No AC, or PS or PB. I think Posi might have been 50 or 80 bucks. At that time I was making around 6K per year.

using the inflation calculator my $4500 59 corvette would cost $33,500 today.

[Wayne B.]

Re: From the Detroit Free Press on 2/21/10

Haven't we been here before? That "more affordable" and meet the needs of "a changing public" has destroyed about every American sports car excluding the Corvette. Rememnber the T-Bird? Now throw in "Political correctness" with a government owned company...and don't tell me that there is no influence on GM coming from the White House, and you have the same old poisoness formula that killed every sports car most of us grew up with. Leave it alone or take the whole Corvette division and spin it off as it's own company and let Corvette people, fans and workers, decide what Corvette will be in a free market and not a bunch of people with an agenda that never had a Corvette, never wanted a Corvette and always hated what Corvette represented in a market where people were free to buy the kind of car they wanted with the money they earned.

They can sell those "reasons" on the Dailey Kos. I'm not listening to their "doublespeak" for me 2+2=4 not five,

[Clem Z.]

Re: From the Detroit Free Press on 2/21/10

remember when GM came out with the fixed roof coupe in 2000 to have a lower priced corvette and they did not sell so to be able to use up the contracted for roofs they came out with the first ZO-6s

[John H.]

Re: From the Detroit Free Press on 2/21/10

I wonder how they will score the Volt in CAFE computation?

Chuck -

The regulators are wrangling with that method right now, as no one method works out equally for all the different types of series/parallel hybrid powertrains; the Volt is even more unique as a hybrid, as the gas engine never drives the wheels - it only charges the batteries. The Volt volume won't ever be high enough in our lifetime to have much impact on the overall GM CAFE calculation either.

[Terry M.]

Re: From the Detroit Free Press on 2/21/10

Chuck -

The regulators are wrangling with that method right now, as no one method works out equally for all the different types of series/parallel hybrid powertrains; the Volt is even more unique as a hybrid, as the gas engine never drives the wheels - it only charges the batteries. The Volt volume won't ever be high enough in our lifetime to have much impact on the overall GM CAFE calculation either.

Nor will the volume be high enough to have an impact on the electrical grid -- in spite of all the dire warnings of the nay-sayers.

[Michael F.]

Re: From the Detroit Free Press on 2/21/10

I say without big tech changes 2016 standards will be rolled back or changed down....the people will speak and congress, president will have to listen as people won't buy new cars and will in turn vote for people who think their way, we in America like big, fast cars, they tried to take that away in 80s and look what happened. al gore and his type need to move somewhere out of US.

[Tom S.]

Re: From the Detroit Free Press on 2/21/10

I agree algore and his type need to leave U.S. alone.. I live in Soth Florida and I am sick and tired of global warming. It is cold here has been for two months and more on the way this week -end .Right around freezing at night. We had one Saturday about a month ago that never got out of the 30's. If this is global warming I think you would get an argument from many on the east coast. Tom

[Erv M.]

Re: From the Detroit Free Press on 2/21/10

If the corvette line has dropped to less than 14,000 cars per year and stays there it will die its own death.

I would imagine in 15 years customers in the age group of 40+ will be seeking rice burners. Demand for these cars will increase as you want what you could not afford during your youth, sound familiar to you?

A good example is the Model A, the demand has dropped and they are a dime a dozen. This was not the case twenty years ago.

I would like to know what the sales were for the Solstice or the Saturn version? Really not a big stretch to say it is a cheaper version of the corvette.

[Clem Z.]

Re: From the Detroit Free Press on 2/21/10

I agree algore and his type need to leave U.S. alone.. I live in Soth Florida and I am sick and tired of global warming. It is cold here has been for two months and more on the way this week -end .Right around freezing at night. We had one Saturday about a month ago that never got out of the 30's. If this is global warming I think you would get an argument from many on the east coast. Tom

we have been down here in the swamp since the 1st of feb and it has been damn cold as i had to use my Pa. windshileld ice scraper 2 times so far.

[Tom L.]

Re: From the Detroit Free Press on 2/21/10

I placed a post on this probably more than a year ago. The low price point Vette project was up and running, in some capacity, not too long ago. A friend of mine was an engineer for GM for nearly 20 yrs, many of those yrs building C5s. After leaving Corvette, he went to the plant that was building the Solstice/Sky.

I learned from him that a "Chevrolet Stingray" was in the design stage. The car was to be a low price point Corvette that was to be built on the Solstice platform.

That, of course, was pre-bankruptcy. Since then, the Solstice has made it's way into the history books and the plant that built them is closed. My guess would be that the new Stingray died with the Solstice.