Bob Lutz On Enthusiast Culture, Stick Shifts, and More

Rob, John and I are each posting a blog on our recent sit-down with Maximum Bob in an effort to address as many as possible of the questions y’all had for the Czar. I was curious about what Bob thought of GM enthusiast culture—is the General interested in harnessing its old-school brand loyalists, the classic and muscle-car fans, the way for instance Mopar has done so successfully? Bob said that Chevy enthusiasts don’t need any coaxing to remain loyal, and that the company can’t remain preoccupied with the past. So if you’re into old-school Bow-Tie, Bob Lutz is probably assuming that your eventual repeat-customer status is a foregone conclusion. Yikes, maybe he hasn’t seen how many of the Camaro and GTO guys are buying new Camries and Kias for their daily beaters?

Speaking of enthusiasts, a lot you were asking about the disappearance of the stick shift from modern cars. Read more…

Bob made the point that manual transmissions harm the all-important average fleet MPG, because, in contrast to the past, they’re now less fuel efficient than automatics: there’s computers now that determine optimal gas-saving shift points more precisely than even the most discerning human. Bob was somewhat enigmatic about the availability of the stick in specific models. He emphasized that the Camaro "will have a manual transmission." I fell for it, but Rob felt it was a bit of a political answer: whether Bob means it’ll have one for its initial run, or during a subsequent model-year, was unclear. The G8 GT will have an optional Tremec six-speed for 2009 [Edit: even this turns out to be untrue. See my retraction!].

As for your concerns about the Camaro’s ugliness, Bob stressed that the car employs an entirely "new design language," and that it’s not meant to be slavishly retrostyled like the Mustang or the Challenger. He said that the ultra-retro Camaro prototypes, which looked a lot closer to the ‘69 Camaro, were even vetoed by Rick Wagoner, who wanted to give the car a look that would have more global appeal.

And for those who will never buy a new car, GM or otherwise? Hey, even we are helping out. Every time you buy an old hulk, you help raise the market value of that vehicle, and with each notch that its value climbs, there’ll be a larger contingent of folks who decide they "might as well" buy new. It’s when people hang onto their old rides that "fleet renewal" doesn’t happen, and once again, mean old CAFE standards are to blame for that. Or something. Anyway, we had a great time with Bob, who was very gracious with us over dinner and gave us a lot of really interesting stuff to mull over. More from John tomorrow, and in the meantime you can click here and here for some video segments of our discussion with Bob.