Semantics. GTO sales were down 20% from '05 to '06 and GM was moving less than 12k a year. If a platform share is not done with the Camaro, you can say goodbye to the GTO...again.

Australia is known for its hot cars, I'm sure the sales were great and it was just a platform change.

 

Standing by a car and being a cocky a** are to different things.

They may be able to run with the exotics but they aren't an exotic. Your car is worth 20k. Can you find any exotics for 20k? Exotics come with a name. A name like "Ferrari".

http://www.autozine.org/countach/countach_7.htm <---is that the car your passing? My car outperformed those numbers when I was stock. Once again. Your car is slower than mine. Being cocky is fun!

 

And to think Vette owners are considered arrogant!!

 

Muscle cars were two door versions of family cars with a big engine dumped in. The Monaro/GTO is within that tradition. It is a two door Holden Commodore with the biggest engine that could be found dumped in it (LS1/LS2).

The Monaro/GTO is a two-door tourer. The times someone quoted up-thread for the 05 GTO vs a 2003 Corvette are not bad for what is a family car with the back doors ripped off.


cam

 

I love adding fuel to the fire...

GM tries to band-aid crappy cars/sales by adding power and it NEVER works.

Newest gen Camaro/Trans-Am/GTO/SSR all have one thing in common... they all started with XXX HP and once sales dropped, GM threw power at them and sales dropped even more. 'You can't polish a turd...'

Ever sit down and think why the Mustang GT had 100 hp less than the Z28/TA from 98-02 and still outsold them 7 to 1? Ford finally upped the HP to 300 years after their competition went away.

GM is only bringing back the Camaro with a fresh complete redesign. That's the only way it can make it. You can't sell cars based solely on a good engine.

 

I was driving on Rt 1 (Roosevelt Blvd for the locals) and one pulled up to me. He was reving his engine and obviously wanted a go at the vette. So I punched it and surprisingly he was keeping up with me. It was probably less that a 1/4 mile though, b/c I slowed down as we were approaching a light. I think the vette would have taken it if we had more track room. But, I'll give him credit. The GTO did have some power. My .02

 

I see what you're saying, and you make some good points, but I think it would be much closer than you think, let me tell you why:

1). rwhp. You are comparing YOUR rwhp to MY rwhp. This is no way indicated the AVERAGE rwhp of both these platforms. MOST ls2 GTOs dyno aroun 340 rwhp. MOST Ls1s dyno around 300 rwhp. That is a 40 rwhp difference. That is a significant difference! Maybe not enough to ALONE keep it tight, but it sure as hell helps a lot.

2). Gear Ratios. The C5 (and fbody for that matter) is very undergeared. GM fixes this in the C5 Z06 with shorter 1-3rd (and 5th) trans ratios. The GTO has these shorter ratios. See my ratios web page for specifics:
http://ubfm.net/ratios.htm
Ratios make a SIGNIFICANT different in sprinting ability. Imagine if your C5 had 3.90 gears, it would be noticeable faster, right? That's what the GTO has stock. Our ratios are equivilent to 3.90s in a C5. That helps us with sprinting! That's helps us move our fat asses to 60 in 4.7 seconds!

 

You can't really compare when you factor in mods. That's why I said STOCK. When you are modding, you can ALWAYS one-up the other guy. You get headers? I get a cam. You get a cam? I get heads. You get heads? I get a 402. See what I mean? Modding is all about money, how much do you have to invest in your ride to make it the baddest thing on the block. You can make almost anything faster than anything else within reason.

Lets keep this discussion to STOCK.

HOWEVER, us ls2s have a major advantage. We have ls6 heads stock. Your ls1 heads are crap compared to our ls6 heads. That's why ls2 GTOs are able to put down 420 rwhp with a MEDIUM size cam. Let's see your C5 try to do that.

 

The GTO didn't sell well. We only sold 40k units over a span of 3 year run. Compare that to the Mustang, which sells over 250k a year!

Also the platform was discontinued down under....not sure they would have kept it around even if they would have sold more.

Problem was, GM didn't market the GTO, hardly at all. No one outside of the enthusiast community even knows about it. Most poeple are like, GTO what? What does that stand for? lol! Ls2? Is that a cookie? Not alot of people know about the ls1, let alone the ls2...that really hurt sales. The ls2 is a GREAT engine. It really makes the GTO. It wouldn't be so awesome without it. But you can say that about MOST performance powertrains...so nothing abnormal here...

That doesn't mean it was a bad project. It was a great project! Budget 400 bhp in a rwd platform that comfortably seats 4, SUBTLE exterior, not HEY COPS LOOK AT ME styling. GREAT interior, awesome seats, decent IRS/strut suspension that is easily upgradable. I mean, you can pick up a low mileage ls2 GTO for low 20s, talk about an awesome deal! It's NOT a sports car, it's a Grand Tourer. The styling is subjective, you like it or not, but it has it's own deal. Apparently it's something certain vette owners don't understand...talk about close minded!

 

In my humble opinion, it is not a GTO. They had a chance to renew the Pontiac GTO; but instead chose to put a Corvette engine in a Australian rental car and CALL it a GTO.
I will take notice when they actually put a Pontiac engine in a Pontiac, and put the GTO emblem where it belongs.
Again in my own humble opinion.

 

Holy cow there are a lot of arrogant egotistical Vette owners here! Apparently if you mention anything in regard to the Vette not being the best (fill-in-the-blank) in the universe, then your bashing it!? That is just ridiculous and very elitist for you to assume your car (and you) are better than others.
Some guy might modify a Civic to be streetable and run 10’s in the quarter, and though his car may have cost $100k to get to that point, I wouldn’t trade with him…though I would respect him and his ride. I love my Vette but I don’t have the audacity to automatically assume anything different is bad. (Wasn’t there some guy we fought in WWII that used to think that way?)
What small-minded people.

Lsx24 has not bashed Corvettes in the least. He simply stated their straight-line performance relative to the LS2 GTO are quite similar. TRUE
He stated the GTO is easier for ingress and egress. TRUE
He said they are a sleeper relative to the Vette. TRUE

Why is everyone getting so uptight?


I've had my C5 for 2-3 years now and had a 420-hp SS Camaro ('98) for several years prior. While I love the Vette and do feel it is the best all-around sports car for the money (with the possible exception of the STI, EVO, and Mustang GT) I am not blind to the other fantastic cars in the market.

As mentioned before, the GTO uses the M12 transmission from the C5Z which should negate the marginal power-to-weight discrepancy between the Vette and LS2 GTO for runs through the end of 3rd gear. 4th through 6th gears in the M12 are the same as the M6 transmissions, plus aerodynamics will play more of a role at those speeds, giving the nod to the more slippery Vette.

 

Actually the aussies and the brits get some great cars... What new V8 RWD 6 speed 4 door can you buy here in the US?

I don't think Holden could handle putting out to many more a year. I wonder if part of the sales drop was 1) the price of gas 2) the lack of advertising. How many GTO commercials did you see? I think if they didn't name it the GTO but instead called it the G8 it wouldn't have as much hate.

If you have ever driven one you would know that they are great GT cars not sports cars. It's a one of the best road trip cars I have owned too. I took my 05 for a 10 Day 3K mile vacation and it was great, always comfortable and it got better gas milage than my wife's Jeep Liberty.

I don't think a C5 would be as comfortable for that many miles in that short of span, but that's not what I am getting one for.

 

A new design will only go so far. It has to be priced right too. The car wasn't just a good engine but it was to much $$ compared to the Mustang. Don't you think a new design will eventually fail if its not priced within the range of a Mustang?

 

I like the GTO's. I actually considered buying one before I bought the vette. The dealer where I went to look at them had 2 or 3 05's left over! (this was only 6 or so months ago) This makes me think they were definately not selling very well. I asked to take one out for a drive and the salesman started babbling about how they had to have a deal on paper before they would let anyone drive them. I told them good luck selling them without letting people test drive, and started to leave. He reluctantly got the keys and I took it for a drive. It was nice, had lots of power, and no trunk. A couple weeks later I bought a vette. No regrets.

 

Interesting, all references I have seen to C5s curb weight has been over 3200 lbs. But you weighted it, and it weighed less. I wonder what a GTO would weigh in the real world...

Sources:
http://www.corvetteactioncenter.com/...8/98specs.html
http://www.c5registry.com/Production/98c5c.htm
http://consumerguideauto.howstuffwor...t-corvette.htm
http://www.internetautoguide.com/car...tte/index.html

 

I’m curious to see what the weight of the new Camaro will be. Given the automotive trend of loading on the pounds I expect it will weigh no less than 3,700 pounds (curb weight) and will not be surprised if it ends up weighing near 4,000 pounds. I think that would really hurt how it is received by the public a year after its initial sales.

400 hp in a 4000 pound car doesn’t sound all that great to me given I would use it as a daily commuter and I’m concerned about gas mileage for my near 40-mile roundtrip to work everyday.
The Vette is quite good in that area, wearing the Jekyl/Hyde face quite well (looks and acts very sporty but returns good fuel mileage while being comfortable).

 

Yeah I feel the same way. However, GM usually offers a stripped down lightweight version of most of its performance cars. In the history of Corvette and F-body there has always been a stripped down version that's pretty light.

The Charger is over 4,000 pounds and I wouldn't even give them the time of day in my cars.

 

ShadowLight,
Agreed. The Charger is heavy, the GTO was heavier than I would have liked (still don't understand why it is smaller than the deceased F-body but weighs 300 pounds more!?), the Chrysler 300s are heavy, the Mustang Cobras/Shelby offerings are porkers, the new G8, if memory serves, is slated to be pretty heavy too.
Same with the GXP, I think.

I can modify a car to have more power or handle better, but it is tough to make one weigh less without giving up creature comforts (like a back seat, AC, radio...).

 

Really? That's the only reason he started this thread. He and all his other high school buddies are sitting around and laughing at the comments.

 

2000-C5,
Take a look at the pointed comment lsx24 was replying too:

"Originally Posted by Stingrayrob
A vette will always be a vette, regardless of who wins, but a GTO is still a bloated Cavalier...

Haha, I guess that's better than having an undergeared piece of plastic. "


Now Stingrayrob was just throwing in some friendly ribbing and lsx24 did the same in his reply. Both had smilies at the end of their statements...no harm - no foul. Try not to take things out of context.

Find something else where he spoke out of line or didn't say something true. I can find plenty of that from some of few snotty Vette owners.