Automotive - Eric's Autos: GM Cars That Didn't Deserve The Needle

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Eric's Autos: GM Cars That Didn't Deserve The Needle

Eric Peters

Sometimes, the best comes last - and not in the nick of time. The Studebaker Avanti comes to mind. Styled by automotive legend Raymond Loewy, the 1964 Avanti was a last-ditch effort to resuscitate Studebaker - which for many years had been struggling to stay afloat. The car was almost universally admired, but it just wasn't enough to save the company.

The same situation is repeating itself today with Pontiac and Saturn. These two divisions of General Motors made creditable efforts to stave off their execution - and just before the ax finally dropped, they each produced cars that could have made a difference, if only they'd come along a few years sooner. Or been just a little bit better.

* Pontiac G8 - This car had the potential to be Pontiac's latter-day GTO, or rather the car the latter-day (and short-lived) 2004-2006 GTO shoulda coulda been. With four doors instead of two, the G8 had the versatility and potential market appeal a two-door like the GTO never offered - with impressive power/performance from its available 6.2 liter, 402 horsepower V-8.

Where - and when - did Pontiac stumble? First, by not realizing that it's not the mid-1960s and most modern performance cars have four doors, not two. This led to the second misstep, which was focusing on the two-door GTO, which was Pontiac's attempt to rewind to 1964, when the original GTO was launched and the company rode to glory on its success.

Almost five years went by from the time the new GTO was launched (and cancelled) to the time the new G8 was finally ready for production . . . just in time for $4 per gallon gas followed by the near-collapse of the entire economy. Followed, in short order, by the bankruptcy and government takeover of General Motors.

Pontiac, a division that had been under-performing for years, was put on the gurney for a quick execution.

It did not matter that the G8 was an excellent car; Pontiac - the brand - was all-but-ruined. One car, too late, cannot save a division with zero cachet, whose main "buyers" over the past ten years had been airport rental fleets.

Few people are going to reach into a public toilet to grab a silver dollar.

Had the G8 appeared in '04 or '05 instead of '09 (and instead of the GTO), back when gas was cheap and the economy still functional, Pontiac might have surfed a wave of newfound popularity back to The Light. The brand might have been rehabbed; other models could have partaken of the glory. Pontiac could conceivably have weathered the storm that was to come. It's a tragedy.

The one upside is that G8s are going cheap. The death of Pontiac means fire-sale prices on remaining 2009 models. Don't worry about the mechanicals; the G8 shares its drivetrain parts with other GM models (Corvette and Camaro) and while Pontiac dealers will disappear, GM dealers won't - so getting your orphaned Pontiac serviced will not be a problem.

Finally, as both a desirable and a one-year-only model, the G8 may be the only recent vintage Pontiac whose value will go up as the years go by. There is nothing wrong with the G8. It just came along too late.

* Saturn Sky - This car had the looks. Visually, the Sky roadster is a stunning piece of work. I attended the West Coast media launch of the Sky a few years back and the car got as much attention from people on the street as Paris Hilton gets from the paparazzi. And it was positive attention - something no Saturn model had received in years. People loved it. They waved us over to ask about the car. I've been doing new car evaluations for more than 15 years now and this was one of the warmest receptions I've seen a new model get.

Unfortunately, the goods were (in typical GM fashion) sub-par in too many places to be overlooked. Just stupid, easily fixable mistakes - that were never fixed or not fixed in time. For example:

The buttons for the power windows were mounted so far to the rear on the driver's side door panel that it was almost impossible to operate them with your left hand. You had to reach around with your right hand to open and close the windows.

The gas gauge was the size of a dime and buried a foot deep in the darkened recesses of the gauge panel - and thus, often impossible to read.

The cupholders were mounted on the center console, but like the power window switches, so far back they were literally unusable while the car was moving. The car came with a five-speed manual. Most roadsters were coming with - or at least offering - a six-speed.

Worst of all, the Sky leaked wind (and rainwater) like a ragged out '69 MGB. The roof seal was atrocious. I drove three different press cars and they all leaked. At 60 mph, the wind noise was so severe it was difficult to have a conversation without yelling.

Still, I was pulling for the car because it was beautiful - and because it had so much potential. But Saturn - like so many of GM's other divisions, so many times over the years - did nothing to correct the car's flaws. Like the Fiero in the 1980s and the Allante in the 1990s, the initial enthusiasm soured once people spent some time with the car. As word got out, sales drooped - then went into freefall.

So the Sky - along with Saturn itself - is doomed to head off into the great white yonder. It didn't have to be.

And what makes it all the more tragic, given the Sky's potential, is that it shouldn't have gone this way. The car deserved better. A bit more finesse, a few readjustments here and there - and the Sky could have become a real threat to the BMW Z4, Honda S2000 and Mazda Miata. Instead, it goes down in history as another GM misfire. What a waste.

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www.ericpetersautos.com or EPeters952@aol.com for comments.

This news arrived on: 10/06/2009

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