O
OLDGOAT
Guest
Being an oldgoat has its advantageous. I recall the late 60's to the mid 70's and how oil price increases and shortages, along with pollution controls, killed performance automobiles. It's deja vu time now.
Oil prices are predicted to go up enormously-and stay there. What does this have to do with the new C6 and the Z06? It's so ironic.
Finally after all this time the auto makers learn how to build a fast car that gets what has been considered decent mileage and meets pollution controls. However, with $3.50 to $4.50 a gallon regular gas perhaps by this summer all bets will be off.
We are all speculating about how many tens of thousands of dollars the dealers will add to the Z06 MSRP. Consider that we might eventually see them sitting unsold at MSRP or below. Even now, in my local area dealers have C6's in stock and some are offering $3,000 or more off MSRP and still the cars remain unsold. Prices for big block late 60's vettes dropped to almost nothing during the gas shortage years of the 70's. Now people pay in excess of $100 grand for many of them as collectors/status cars.
The point I am leading up to , from the perspective of experience, is that RIGHT NOW is 1965-1971 in terms of GM performance cars. It took this long to get back to that level ( and even beyond ). If gas prices rise as is now predicted the result will be a repeat of what happened in the past. Bye bye to performance cars again due to even more stringent mileage requirements and fuel cost-not to mention possible shortages.
Think it's been nice getting all the inexpensive consumer goods from Red China? Well, from now on they will be sucking up ever more massive amounts of the global oil supply.
So am I being pessimistic? You may think so but I call it realism based upon experience. As the intro to one of my favorite TV shows used to say " The time is now"....I agree. The time is now to buy a vette is now-or in the next few years.
I wonder what forecast revisions GM will be making for the C6 in light of oil price forecasts. I think the bubble is about to burst. Yah, many who can afford vettes don't even consider gas prices. Yah, even $10 a gallon and many would still drive their vettes with little change.
However, not all the buyers of the 35,000 or so vettes sold every year are so immune to gas prices. Demand for the vette will certainly drop and we will probably , once again, see reductions in power as demand for gas mileage increases.
And the forecast for the Z06 in the face of huge and permanent gasoline price increases? It's gotta be down and not up. Yah, yah, I know many will be able to afford it. But how about affording it when home heating prices have tripled in a few years and a oil price induced recession is raging?
So...for all of us who wish we could have bought a new 1967 427....because it was an end of an era.....my advice is to buy a C6 or Z06 this year or next because I doubt the cars in their present forms will be around much longer.
It's the good old days right now in performance cars. You can walk right in and buy a 400hp C6.
Oil prices are predicted to go up enormously-and stay there. What does this have to do with the new C6 and the Z06? It's so ironic.
Finally after all this time the auto makers learn how to build a fast car that gets what has been considered decent mileage and meets pollution controls. However, with $3.50 to $4.50 a gallon regular gas perhaps by this summer all bets will be off.
We are all speculating about how many tens of thousands of dollars the dealers will add to the Z06 MSRP. Consider that we might eventually see them sitting unsold at MSRP or below. Even now, in my local area dealers have C6's in stock and some are offering $3,000 or more off MSRP and still the cars remain unsold. Prices for big block late 60's vettes dropped to almost nothing during the gas shortage years of the 70's. Now people pay in excess of $100 grand for many of them as collectors/status cars.
The point I am leading up to , from the perspective of experience, is that RIGHT NOW is 1965-1971 in terms of GM performance cars. It took this long to get back to that level ( and even beyond ). If gas prices rise as is now predicted the result will be a repeat of what happened in the past. Bye bye to performance cars again due to even more stringent mileage requirements and fuel cost-not to mention possible shortages.
Think it's been nice getting all the inexpensive consumer goods from Red China? Well, from now on they will be sucking up ever more massive amounts of the global oil supply.
So am I being pessimistic? You may think so but I call it realism based upon experience. As the intro to one of my favorite TV shows used to say " The time is now"....I agree. The time is now to buy a vette is now-or in the next few years.
I wonder what forecast revisions GM will be making for the C6 in light of oil price forecasts. I think the bubble is about to burst. Yah, many who can afford vettes don't even consider gas prices. Yah, even $10 a gallon and many would still drive their vettes with little change.
However, not all the buyers of the 35,000 or so vettes sold every year are so immune to gas prices. Demand for the vette will certainly drop and we will probably , once again, see reductions in power as demand for gas mileage increases.
And the forecast for the Z06 in the face of huge and permanent gasoline price increases? It's gotta be down and not up. Yah, yah, I know many will be able to afford it. But how about affording it when home heating prices have tripled in a few years and a oil price induced recession is raging?
So...for all of us who wish we could have bought a new 1967 427....because it was an end of an era.....my advice is to buy a C6 or Z06 this year or next because I doubt the cars in their present forms will be around much longer.
It's the good old days right now in performance cars. You can walk right in and buy a 400hp C6.
