2010 Chevrolet Camaro RS V6 . Click image to enlarge

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Review and photos by Jil McIntosh

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2010 Chevrolet Camaro

Oshawa, Ontario – When it comes to General Motors’ portfolio, it’s common to hear critics complain that the company doesn’t have enough small, fuel-efficient cars or hybrids, and that it’s making a huge mistake by bringing a muscle car out in the current economic and environmental climate.

And yet, of all the GM cars I’ve ever driven – and I couldn’t easily estimate how many that is – I have never, not once, garnered as much attention in one as I did with the 2010 Camaro.

Never mind that my tester carried the V6 engine, rather than the fiery V8 that can reach 426 horsepower with a manual transmission, or that mine used a six-speed autobox rather than the stick. I took it to a cruise night, where I parked it alongside a new Dodge Challenger and Ford Mustang, and if you don’t think that’s the Holy Trinity sitting right there, then we have nothing to discuss. And a number of car enthusiasts who normally wouldn’t cross the street to spit on a car newer than 1948 came over to see.

2010 Chevrolet Camaro RS V6 (right) with Mustang and Challenger. Click image to enlarge

Will the Camaro single-handedly save GM? Of course it won’t, but that isn’t its reason for being. There are many consumers who simply want something that will take them from A to B, and they often don’t even know the name of their car’s model. But there are also buyers driven by passion, and while many will be forced by their pocketbooks to leave in something more practical, they need a reason to walk through the dealership door in the first place. That’s the Camaro’s job. It’s a halo car, a concept that many naysayers don’t understand, but it’s also a brilliant halo. The Corvette has traditionally held that position at GM, but it starts above $66,000. By contrast, you can get into a Camaro for as low as $26,995.

That gets you the base V6 LS; moving up the scale, the 1LT trim is $27,995, while my 2LT tester started at $31,595. The V8 comes in two trim lines, the 1SS at $36,995, and the 2SS at $40,995. Getting into a Mustang takes $23,999 to start, while a base Challenger’s lowest tag is $25,995. The price discrepancies are relatively minor, given that the appeal of each will probably run more along the traditional owner brand loyalties than by which one costs the least.

2010 Chevrolet Camaro RS V6 . Click image to enlarge

The 3.6-litre V6 has direct injection and churns out 304 horsepower and 273 lb-ft of torque. Enthusiasts will want the stick, but the automatic, which includes manual shift mode, works just fine. Aficionados will probably also want the V8 too, but for everyday driving – which is what most buyers do, after all – the six-cylinder delivers decent performance at reasonable cost, and you should still be able to make it to 96 km/h in 6.1 seconds if you’re late for work. Official fuel figures with the automatic are 11.4 L/100 km in the city and 6.9 on the highway. I had far too much fun during my week with it, though, and pulled off 13.4 L/100 km, which I suspect would improve once the novelty wore off and I wasn’t trying to better that 6.1 seconds every time the light turned green.

I don’t like the exhaust note on the Camaro V6, which is too thin and raspy; the V6 Mustang sings a far better tune out the back pipes. But the driving experience is pretty sweet. The Camaro’s platform is modified from the Australian Holden Commodore. It also slips under the Pontiac G8, a car that got a raw deal, since its lackluster styling kept many from getting behind the wheel and realizing it’s one of the best-driving vehicles in its class. The Camaro’s not quite as nimble as the Mustang, which comes in 177 kilos under the Chevrolet’s 1,713 scale tip, but it’s still pretty light on its toes, and it’s tight as a whip around hard corners, with MacPherson front struts and independent rear. Standard rims are 18-inch on the LS and 1LT; my 2LT would normally have worn 19-inch wheels, but the RS package swaps them out for 20-inch (and mine was upgraded yet again to polished aluminum ones, from the stock RS “midnight silver” finish). That’s a lot of tire and while my car was no slouch, the smaller wheels might have returned a little more road feel. But then, we’re back to the aspect of cruising: if you want to look good on the boulevard, you need the big meats, and they sure do look sweet on this car.

Looks are subjective, of course, and there were as many opinions as there were people around to provide them. One of the major complaints I heard, primarily from fans of the old Camaro, was that the design isn’t true enough to their favourite generation. Depending on what keys were in their pocket, it should have looked more like a ’68, or a ’69, or a ’71, or whatever. (Hell hath no fury like a car guy scorned.) The reality is that designers have to walk a very fine line when dealing with retro vehicles, trying not to alienate the devotees while appealing to modern sensibilities. I think the Camaro is very well-done in that regard. You want a ’68, buy a ’68. This is a thoroughly modern restyle, right to the xenon headlamps included in the RS package, and which add a fabulous halo light, similar to BMW’s “corona ring,” which really makes the front end stand out.

2010 Chevrolet Camaro RS V6 . Click image to enlarge

If there is a major flaw to the design, it’s in the sharp kick-out of the haunches. On most colours (and there are a generous ten available), the fender reflects light differently than the door does. The result is that they don’t look like the same, as if a panel had been repaired and the painter didn’t match the colour very well.

So is the Camaro perfect? No car is, and this one has a few faults. I drive a chopped-top hot rod, and so I love the look of the Camaro’s tiny windows, but I was far less impressed when I had to check for traffic or back it up; reverse sensors would be worth their weight in gold on this car. The high sill makes it tough to get in and out gracefully, and pant legs will definitely suffer when the rockers are covered with grime in foul weather. The dead pedal is too flat, and the inside door handles are all wrong: too low and too far forward on a door this long, especially if it’s breezy and the wind catches it.

The dash is a mixed bag: better-fitted than Challenger’s panels, not as interesting as Mustang’s engine-turned accents, and it would probably look much better without that huge black plastic desert in front of the passenger. I really like the steering wheel, though; they’re usually a weak point in GM’s styling, but this one’s pretty slick. The 2LT and 2SS models have four rectangular gauges in the centre console, ahead of the shifter, which measure oil pressure and temperature, coolant temperature and amperage. They add to the retro feel, but given that there isn’t a lot of small-item space, I’d gladly trade them for a storage bin. Another complaint was with OnStar’s Turn-by-Turn Navigation, included for a year on the two LT trims and the 2SS, and which downloads directions into the vehicle’s audio system and message centre in lieu of a navigation system. After I had the operator download my home address, the directions took me four kilometres past it, turned me onto a dead-end road whose name sounded nothing like it, and proudly repeated my address and told me I’d arrived. Oh well, it was a chance to drive a bit longer.

2010 Chevrolet Camaro RS V6 . Click image to enlarge

In keeping with its tradition as an “everyday” muscle machine, the Camaro is set up for a wide variety of body shapes, including the supersize crowd: there are bolsters of sorts, but the comfy seats are meant more for straight-line cruising than for carving corners. It isn’t easy to get into the back seat, but once you’re there, you’ll find a bit more space than expected – not much, but you should be able to take a couple of friends for a short spin. The rear seatback folds, as a single unit, and increases the size of the trunk from a length of 104 cm to a length of 180 cm of cargo space. That’s relative, though, since getting anything into the trunk is made more difficult by an opening that’s a mere 84 by 38 cm. A 20-inch wheel and tire that was easily swallowed by a Dodge Challenger’s trunk had to be squeezed into the Camaro’s through a series of contortions worthy of Cirque du Soleil. A friend who owns a Pontiac Solstice and who wants to buy a Camaro was pretty impressed, given that the Solstice’s trunk holds about as much as a motorcycle does, but I wouldn’t want to be packing the Camaro for a two-week driving trip.

Overall, though, Chevrolet had one shot at getting the reinvented Camaro right, and it has succeeded. It handles well, it rides smoothly, the brakes are strong, the engine is powerful, it’s great fun to drive, the juice goes to the right set of wheels, and when you’re pointing it down the street, all is right with the world. General Motors has some huge challenges ahead of it: it needs some volume sellers, it has to overcome consumer reluctance, and somehow, it’s got to convince the government that putting all its eggs into one hybrid basket is not the answer, no matter how much influence the bailout money buys. But when it comes to putting out a car that turns heads, races pulses and gets people interested in a company they’d all but forgotten, GM has hit this one squarely on the head. Bowtie boys, it’s time to come home.

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