Interesting Camaro and Zeta information

Source: Blogs at MotorTrend.com

The two most obvious, of course, were the Camaro coupe - star of last year's Detroit Show - and its bright orange convertible sibling, a car that will undoubtedly be one of this year's crowd pleasers in Cobo Hall. Both cars roll on GM's Zeta rear drive architecture, which was developed in Australia by GM's Holden subsidiary.

Zeta came into being to support Holden's home-grown Commodore family of vehicles, which form the mainstay of GM sales in Australia. Aussies like roomy, rear drive sedans, and when Detroit went front drive in the 70s, the Holden engineers had no choice but to continue to do their own thing. And it's just as well they did, because without Holden, there's no way GM would be looking at producing a Camaro - and a rear drive Chevy Impala - by the end of the decade.

Zeta is a very versatile architecture. The front axle centerline on the Camaro is about 50mm further forward than it is on the Holden Commodore (and therefore the Pontiac G8, the lightly made-over Commodore sedan that will debut at the Chicago Show next month). The reason for this expensive change is that it allows the Camaro - and the Impala - to run 20-inch wheels without compromising steering lock. In fact, says one Holden source, 24s will fit.

Both the Camaro coupe and convertible concepts are therefore very close to the production versions, say GM insiders. The roof of the coupe will be raised about 15mm for production, and the bodysides will be pulled in 5-10mm. But that's about it. What you see here at Detroit is basically what you're going to get in Chevy showrooms in 2009.