First SSR sold to public
I would drive it before an Assteck though 
08-04-2003 | 03:18 AM
#30
Re: Link to first SSR sold to public ----> I like it..to pricy though. Just wait till someone gets some mods onto that engine. But yea can't wait to see what kinda bugs it comes with from the factory..condsidering it has that niffy re-tractable top. Should be fun LOL.
08-04-2003 | 12:43 PM
#32
Thread Starter
Joined: Nov 2001
Posts: 44,826
Likes: 1,249
From: Chicago, IL
Re: Link to first SSR sold to public ----> I read a few more car magazines why hanging at the in-laws.
IMHO the SSR will be a flop. Road & Track think it's a dodo and will follow the Prowler and the Thunderbird.
At $41K base price, 4700 curb weight, and with 2500 lb towing capacity, it's not going to sell the 15,000 units it needs to move in the 2nd year or production to survive. IMHO it's a cumulative pile of crap. Someone at GM should have said "Wait guys, we can't release this, it does not that fast OR PRACTICAL." In my mind for 40 large it needs to be one or the other.
I bet the GTO will be a huge hit, as will the CTS-v, and then we will see Chevy come out with a GTO clone!
IMHO the SSR will be a flop. Road & Track think it's a dodo and will follow the Prowler and the Thunderbird.
At $41K base price, 4700 curb weight, and with 2500 lb towing capacity, it's not going to sell the 15,000 units it needs to move in the 2nd year or production to survive. IMHO it's a cumulative pile of crap. Someone at GM should have said "Wait guys, we can't release this, it does not that fast OR PRACTICAL." In my mind for 40 large it needs to be one or the other.
I bet the GTO will be a huge hit, as will the CTS-v, and then we will see Chevy come out with a GTO clone!
08-06-2003 | 11:08 AM
#34
TECH Addict
Joined: Nov 2001
Posts: 2,556
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From: Nawf Carolina
Re: Link to first SSR sold to public ---->
I bet the GTO will be a huge hit, as will the CTS-v, and then we will see Chevy come out with a GTO clone!
GM is stuck so deep in internal red tape and stupid business school theories that I don't think they'll ever get to where they could be (the premier automaker in the world). I was recently reading a 1993 issue of Car and Driver, about how all the new brand managers and marketers from grocery store products were supposed to sweep in and change the whole auto industry thru thier marketing savvy. What did it get us, the Malibu and the Aztek.
Brock Yates summed up how I feel about all of GM in one paragraph this month in his editorial in Car and Driver. He was speaking about the Indy 500, and prior to this paragraph, about how Chevrolet has been running a rebadged Oldsmobile engine in thier IRL cars, and the ground pounding they got by Honda and Toyota (in Toyota's rookie year) at Indy.
Sadly, it follows a pattern of half-assed efforts by Chevrolet and GM in many aspects of racing, tracing back to the aborted Corvette SS campaign of 1957 to the Grand Sport shutdown in the mid-1960s to the IMSA GT program in the 1980. The Cadillac debacle at Le Mans from '00 through '02 is the latest disaster. Yes, the Vettes have done well in recent international endurance racing, as long as the Vipers, Ferraris, and the Porsches don'tplay seriously. Chevrolet, beyond the elemental work necssary to refine the ancient pushrod engines for NASCAR, has never devoted the same cost-is-no-object intensity to its racing programs that is commonplace at Toyota and Honda, not to mention Mercedes-Benz, BMW, and Porsche.
Toyota recently came out with an updated minivan. Prior to this, they made the cheif designer drive 40,000 miles in the predessesor, so he would have ample time to note and provide fixes and improvements for anything he didn't like in the older one. I highly doubt there are cheif stylist at GM driving around in Malibus, Impalas, Jbodies, Monte Carlos, or Azteks looking for any flaws so they can improve the next model (although they should be forced to as punishment for signing off on these cars).
They just don't get it. If you design a great car, you can tell the marketing staff to go home because they're useless. Its only when you design uninspired shitboxes do you have to "market" them, usually by not even showing them in the commercials, lest you wouldn't want to scare people away.
They want to sell 15,000 SSRs a year. Instead they should try and make the next Monte Carlo as captivating and beholding to the eye, as well as offering performance options, as the 1955 Chevrolet was, a car that sold over a million copies.
J.
08-06-2003 | 01:33 PM
#35
Chop-Foo Director
Joined: Apr 2002
Posts: 4,709
Likes: 0
From: Haymarket, Virginia
Re: Link to first SSR sold to public ----> Hell, I love the prowler too. Just wish it had a little
more under the hood.
Guy at work just got one, (or just started driving it to work)
and it is just plain sweet!
more under the hood.
Guy at work just got one, (or just started driving it to work)
and it is just plain sweet!
