2009 Chevrolet Camaro SS
The new Camaro appeared at the Detroit Motor Show in January 2007 and was an instant hit, and the big news is that the car is going into production almost unaltered.
The 2009 Chevrolet Camaro SS is based on GM’s Zeta platform, which underpins Australia’s Holden Commodore and the new Pontiac GTO as well as the Pontiac G8. The Zeta platform was designed from the start to be adaptable, and so far it looks as if it’s going to spread through most of GM’s brands.
The Zeta platform is also remarkably stiff, and is the ideal basis for the Camaro. The platform can be altered for wheelbase, so the 2009 Chevrolet Camaro SS is not going to be merely a Holden Commodore with a couple of doors taken off (that would be the new Pontiac GTO).
“The new Camaro will be almost identical to the concept, a thoroughly modern interpretation of the 1969 model, considered by many to be the best design of the car’s first generation,” said Ed Welburn, GM’s global vice president of design, who actually owns a 1969 Camaro SS.
The new car will feature multi link independent rear suspension and there will be choices of manual and automatic gearboxes, as well as V6 and V8 engines. The gearboxes will likely be the same six speed manual and six speed auto found in the Holden Commodore.
The Camaro was deigned by a particularly young group of designers, ranging in age from 27 to 35, but they all grew up with a common passion for American performance cars.
Nearly 4.8 million Camaros have been sold between the car’s introduction in 1967 and 2002, when production of the iconic vehicle ended, and there are more than one thousand Camaro clubs around the world.
The standard V6 model will use the 3.6 liter version of GM’s global V6, tuned to between 240 horsepower and 260 horsepower, while the V8 option will most likely be the 6.2 liter version of the GEN VI with around 400 horsepower. But GM is also currently working on a direct injection version of the V8, gaining more horsepower while increasing fuel economy from between three to six percent, and Dave Sczomak, development engineer-GM Powertrain Advanced Engineering, says the technology will bump power to “well over 450HP.” That engine may well make an appearance in the Camaro, either in the standard car or the SS model.
Either way, the SS version will be stripped out for lightweight performance. Expect the SS to weigh somewhere between 350 to 500 pounds less than the V8 Camaro for a 0-60 time around a tenth of a second or so better than the standard V8.
The all-new 2009 Chevrolet Camaro SS will begin with early production versions right at the end of 2008 and will hit the streets in the first quarter of 2009. But it’s not going to be an entirely US car, as the Camaro will be built at the Oshawa #2 car plant, part of GM’s award-winning, Oshawa assembly plant complex in Canada.