Camaro’s loss foreshadows GM’s future – ilmuhangat

I have driven cars and trucks from nearly every carmaker. Only once have I evaluated a vehicle and liked it so much I bought one — a sixth-generation Chevrolet Camaro.

I feel comfortable behind the wheel. It’s powerful, responsive, comfortable and roomy. It’s immensely satisfying to ilmuhangat and perhaps most importantly, it’s attainable. The Camaro is great-looking and receives compliments wherever I ilmuhangat it.

The End of the Line

The Loss of Affordable Performance

The death of the Camaro means more than the discontinuation of a model. It means the end of affordable Chevrolet performance. The Corvette, with a base MSRP of $64,500 is now the only performance car remaining in the lineup that demonstrates GM’s engineering prowess. The discontinuation of the Camaro puts an end to GM muscle cars, the end to V-8 powered Chevy cars, and the end of the Pony car rivalry with the Ford Mustang.

Camaro is the book-end to nearly 70 years of small-block powered performance cars that began with the ’55 Chevy. Its loss is the end of an era. Arguably, it’s also the end of the brand’s most successful sales formula.

The sixth-generation Camaro represented the culmination of 112 years of chassis and powertrain research and development. It’s an engineering heritage baked into every new GM car and truck via a set of internal benchmark calibrations.

To describe it another way, it’s GM’s secret sauce. The Camaro was the culmination of those benchmarks, more so than other GM models. Sports and muscle cars represent the pinnacle of a car builder’s craft.

The Business Case for Camaro

The fifth-generation Camaro outsold the Mustang five years in a row. In 2016 when GM unveiled the new sixth-generation Camaro, GM CEO Mary Barra was “confident” the new Camaro would continue outselling the Mustang. Arguably, the new Camaro was the better muscle car, but Barra may have been overconfident.

GM priced the Camaro thousands of dollars more than the competition and did little to promote the new car. Camaro advertising was nearly nonexistent and the car’s sales slipped.

Three years later, when the Camaro was due for replacement, GM claimed there was no business case for the Camaro. A performance coupe makes business sense to Ford, Toyota, Subaru, Nissan, Honda, BMW, Audi, Mercedes and Porsche, but not to the company that invented the small-block V-8. Go figure!

Reincarnation 

GM also discontinued the Camaro in 2002. That left the Ford Mustang as the sole pony car on the market, which it also is now.

The Camaro made a triumphant return in 2010 with an all-new 5th generation Camaro, replete with retro styling reminiscent of the 1969 Camaro. The ’69 model year is widely seen as a high point of the Camaro’s styling and performance heritage.

The retro fifth-generation Camaro was based on the Zeta platform developed by GM’s Holden division in Australia. It was a sales success, but its hefty 3,750-pound curb weight was a dealbreaker for some. The sixth-generation Camaro was better for one primary reason — it weighed 400 pounds less.

The death of the sixth-generation Camaro feels different than the car’s demise 2002. GM promises all its future vehicles will be electric. Muscle car enthusiasts knowing that weight is the enemy of handling and drivability dread the prospect of an electric Camaro. To enthusiasts, an electric Camaro is insulting. 

Electrification

Tough Love

I grew up in a GM family. Some of my earliest memories are riding in my mother’s baby blue 1959 Cadillac Coupe DeVille, my uncle’s fire engine red 1960 Buick LeSabre, and my dad’s white 1968 GMC C20 pickup.

I became fascinated by the company that created rolling sculpture and engineered great driving machines. I have had an interest in GM’s vehicles, history and personalities since.

The GM Elite

No other company, automotive or otherwise, has had so many large personalities achieve monumental success in business, industrial design and engineering.

GM is the auto industry’s equivalent to the New York Yankees. It’s a disproportionate group of talent in one organization.

These talented executives, engineers and stylists have one thing in common— they were customer-focused. They built cars and trucks people wanted, and that people aspired to. It’s the formula that made GM a juggernaut in the automotive industry.

A Visionary In Her Own Mind

If GM follows through with its “All Electric Future,” the company’s success or failure depends on EVs developing into a dominant market force. The company’s future also depends on the quality and reliability of a single component, the Ultium battery. Both of these suppositions are questionable in light of recent revelations.

A Shift in Public Sentiment

An inadequate public charging infrastructure and the realization most public chargers are frequently broken has begun to taint EV ownership.

Respected engineering consultants Munro and Associates recently acquired a Hummer EV and deconstructed the Ultium battery pack. Disassembly of the enormous 2,818-pound stamped steel battery assembly revealed major weight and thermal inefficiencies, needless complexity, and inadequate redundancies.

No attempt has been made to reduce weight. To the contrary, GM has used steel in the Ultium’s construction instead of lighterweight materials such as aluminum. The battery pack is made up of 244 discrete stamped steel components that are laser projection and MIG welded. The battery housing alone has over 3,500 welds. Utilization of 103-ampere battery cells is particularly questionable because unlike battery packs from GM’s competitors that can tolerate the failure of several individual battery cells and remain in service, the loss of even a single cell in the Ultium battery can disable the vehicle. This comes as a bit of a shock considering how bullish Barra and company are to utilize the Ultium battery in its entire product portfolio.

EV Market Outlook

Citing high repair costs, Hertz announced this week it will begin selling its EV rental fleet. The company recently listed 607 ex-rental Teslas for sale at a deep discount. Hertz plans to sell 20,000 EVs.

Elon Musk has canceled plans to build another plant in Mexico. Toyota is pivoting back toward hybrids. Ford has cut EV production in half. Several of the world’s major automakers are now openly discussing EV alternatives. But one change in EV strategy has directly impacted GM. Honda has backed out of a joint development deal with GM to build affordable EVs.

Iceberg Ahead

In a major vote of no confidence Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway recently sold off its entire $848 million stake in GM.

GM has no plan “B” and Mary Barra won’t back down from her all-electric vehicle future. Slow sales have forced GM to shelve plans to expand Hummer EV and Silverado EV production and there’s a sales hold on the Blazer EV due to software problems.

Like GM’s failure to respond to the Camaro’s declining market, Mary Barra’s over confidence and unusual fascination with electric vehicles may be GM’s undoing.

Flawed Strategy

It would seem Barra is trying to emulate Elon Musk. Her primary focus is the pursuit of government subsidies at the expense of customers and employees. Subsidies that can, and likely will, disappear instantly should the next presidential election usher in a new administration.

Even the most clueless automotive executive knows that sports car enthusiasts won’t buy a 6,000-pound, four-door crossover, but recent leaks reveal that GM may have just such a vehicle in the works to replace the Camaro.

General Motors has learned nothing from Ford’s nearly sales-proof Mustang Mach-E crossover that currently languishes on dealer lots with a 214-day supply on-hand. The industry standard is a 60-day supply.  

Preparing a Golden Parachute

After the unprecedented stock buybacks came Camaro’s premature cancellation on December 14^th and the layoff of 3,000 workers from the Lansing Grand River plant (where the Camaro was built) on Dec 18. GM previously claimed the Lancing Grand River plant would remain open and would build future GM EVs.

The question remains: Is Barra preparing a golden parachute? Who benefits from GM’s defunding of its EV development war chest? Will the sale of the company’s ICE Trucks and SUVs be enough to sustain the company?

I doubt it. I mourn the passing of the Camaro and its departure may serve as a metaphor for GM’s future.