Well, the GTO is a better performer than most BMWs and has a more powerful engine than the one in the 6 series.

Anyone that spends 70K on a car either has a very fat wallet or poop for brains.

 

If your into driving a sh*t box that falls apart........wait a min. better performer my ***.....:D

 

Says the guy who owns an RX-8 with a rotary engine and a thousand recalls. (I'm not knocking the RX8 but very few new-model cars are reliable in their first production year.)

A pontiac GTO would most certainly outperform any BMW within its pricerange (which is only a 325) and most others.

Here is a review of the British GTO that briefly mentions the 6 series as a competing vehicle.


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/.../23/ixmot.html


There have also been articles in Car and Driver and other magazines comparing the Monaro to very expensive BMW M models. That's BMWs high performance line. The GTO will most certainly outperform most regular BMWs. Even though BMWs are nice cars, I don't understand why people pay the $15-20K premium over RX-8s, GTOs and other cheaper cars that are very close performance wise and have decent interiors.

Also, if you hate American cars you should realize that the Pontiac GTO is a rebadged Holden Commodore. The Chevrolet Prism is a rebadged Toyota. Would you judge it as unreliable even though it is made in the same factory with Toyota Corollas?

 

I owned a 2001 Lexus IS300 First year production and I had no problems with it. I believe there is like 2 recalls on our 8's. I don't feel that is very many, and they aren't anything super major.

 

I also had the 2001 Lexus IS 300. Zero problems. Then again, it was a Lexus.

I haven't had any significant problems with my 8, just minor annoyances (oil pan, plus the recalls).

Both great cars.

 

I don't like my highlander as much as I liked my CRV. It doesn't corner in quite the same way and it has a much worse transmission. It is very bad at anything above 4k rpms. However the highlander does have a 40hp advantage which allows me to maintain the same speed going up hills, something the crv couldn't do.

Anyways I like the M3, and I think that anybody who would take a new GTO over an M3 hasn't driven an M3, especially not on a track. I don't even think the GTO could compare there. I don't like the new styling of the BMWs. The M3 and 3 series still look good though, but I imagine that will be changed soon as well. I think that the X5 looks decent though, but hate what Bangles has done. I think the previous BMW's looked much better.

 

Well, the higher level Commodores have been compared to M5s; the M5 is less of the strictly performance vehicle than the M3 is.

If I wanted a strict performance vehicle, I would rather get a Mitsubishi Lancer than an M3. With $4 grand in mods, the Lancer would smoke it! Plus it would be cool to beat someone that's driving a $60K M3 in a Economy car Lancer. There was a test in one of these sport compact magazines where a Lancer with $4K in mods ran better track times than a Porsche. Though some will trash the styling, without the wing it has a very cool stealth car factor.

Of course for the price of the M3, I could have both the Lancer and the GTO. For the price of an M5, I could throw in the RX-8 and mod them all out. Or I could just save a little money so that my future children can go to college...

 

I wouldn't exactly call the M3 a strict performance vehicle, as in it only has performance, cause it is quite comfortable and has a top notch finish inside. If you wanted a strict performance vehicle you would get an Elise or Attack or something along that nature. And M3's are 50k or so, not really 60k, and a modded lancer and gto would cost probably somewhere near 70k. However a modded lancer is a good car, I just know that I think I would want something that had a decent interior and quality, or something that has only one seat and no radio or anything to save weight if it was really a strict performance car.

 

Ditto.

2001 IS300 - 3 years and 42000 hard-driven miles - zero problems.

 

Why can't the GTO hold its own with an M3? Stock, it would post about the same in a drag race, and the GTO's engine is very easy to cheaply modify. The transmission is shared with 400 HP cars, so it can handle power. It posts .88G on the skid pad with bad tires. Though it doesn't show the absolute best top handling numbers, the performance reviews rave about how neutral the car is. Also it has a smooth ride and an interior better than the one in a CTS-V. And it's also half price of the M3.

Honestly, if someone were to give them to me, but take the brand name off the car as part of the deal, I might prefer the larger, smoother riding GTO. But then again, if I could have any BMW I would probably get something more smooth riding than an M3 like a 6 convertable... It does sound like a cool car... A car like the GTO or 6 series says "pimp". An M3 says "ultimate performance freak". I'd rather be smooth...

I checked Edmunds and the typically optioned M3 sells for $55K.

 

The GTO is still just a GM product that looks like a Neon.
Just think what GM could have done with the right retro-drugs.

The Baller

 

The Pontiac GTO is as much a Pontiac as a Chevrolet Prism made by Toyota is a Chevy. It's built and made by an Australian division of GM that we don't get here and then rebadged as "Pontiac". It's not made by any factory that has ever sold products ing GM of America. It's a car that has a fairly good reputation for reliability and durability. It gets good reviews in Europe and the higher power version gets compared to M5s sometimes. It's the car Americans have been begging GM to bring over for years.

Yeah, the GTO is GM. But by a side of GM you never knew existed.

 

And your point is?
That's what they said about the Hummer 2, I just sold.......pure junk. The interior looks like rubber-maid...the paint looks like a spray can job.....and I forgot push-rods.......give me a break,
GM is in big trouble.

 

LOL you must have read that book with all the hate you are giving me!

Hey you can always spend your $80K on your precious 6 series.

Since when was the Hummer a performance vehicle?

 

You are missing the point my friend, I have no hate for you at all.
Just a strong anti-GM conviction. GM did it to me not you my friend.
I have driven the wondeful BMW's and think they are perhaps the finest machines on the planet. Perfection? no, but very close.

The Hummer is not a performance machine but it is a sign of the times at GM.

Sorry if I got carried away.

 

What's with the Ann Coulter reference in the General Automotive forum?

 

"The Hummer is not a performance machine but it is a sign of the times at GM."

The hummer is a specialty vehicle for off-roading just as a Ferrari is a specialty vehicle for racing. People shouldn't buy cars like those expecting reliable transportation. They're bought for their capabilities. Now your new car after getting a Hummer is a brand new RX-8, with a specialized engine that only one mechanic out of several thousands knows how to repair. Since the 8 is mass produced and affordable, it probably won't be as high-maintenence as a true specialty vehicle, but if you got it within the first months of production and have a few problems with it, you shouldn't be ticked off either. Though I am interested in the 8 myself, I wouldn't buy one until 2007 earliest so that most of the initial kinks will be worked out, and any serious problem will be known. Though you shouldn't EXPECT the 8 to unreliable, you should logically understand that you are taking a GAMBLE buying a car like that. A car like the Hummer is in a whole different stratosphere. You should expect high maintenence with a car like that.

In short, think about the vehicles you are buying before you talk about reliability woes. Though they're all made by GM, a car like the Hummer isn't comparable to a car like the Camaro which inturn isn't comparable to a plain-jane car like the Malibu.


Watch, in 4 years you wll be trashing Ferrari after you take your car in for service and it requires its first $15,000 oil change...

 

Kind of nice in a round about way!

 

Hey that book makes perfect sense considering your automotive choices and reasoning behind them.

 

Oh yeah, for the people that bought Lexus IS300s in their first year of production, keep in mind that those cars were already being produced for Japan and other parts of the world for at least an year.

 

The H2 is the little bastard brother of the H1. The H1 is is a speciality vehicle that makes few sacrifices. The H2 is made for the American SUV driver, not the hardcore off-roader.

 

If the H1 is supposed to be another luxury SUV, then I take back my defense of it.

 

Gm is in big trouble but they just made the most money this year in sales and are up for numerous awards for quality and excellence for almost every category of cars produced. Your hate blinds you, it's sad and pathetic. Just cause you had a lemon doesn't mean everything else in the company is. You need to learn that.

 

Please go away troll .....thank you in advance.