Chevy HHR SS first impressions; Dodge Caliber SRT-4 musings
I'm back from my first drive of the Chevrolet HHR SS. Chevy brought my fellow hacks and I out to Phoenix for a fantastic drive on the back roads to Tortilla Flat, then out to the Bob Bondurant racing school for a little track time. Five years ago, if you told me General Motors was going to produce a sporty car this competent, there's no way I would believe you. The HHR can hold its own against some very good hot hatchbacks. Full details when I post my complete test drive report on Monday.
The HHR SS' main competitor is, of course, the Dodge Caliber SRT-4, also new for 2008. If you've read my Caliber SRT-4 review, you know it isn't very good. I had a candid talk with one of Chrysler's engineers at an event not long ago. The problem isn't that the engineers don't know what their doing; it has to do with the parameters for the cars set by upper management. That's why things have gone so badly for other Chrysler vehicles like the Chrysler Sebring sedan, Chrysler Sebring convertible and Dodge Avenger.
At dinner before the HHR SS drive, I got the opportunity to sit at a table with Bob Lutz, GM's Vice Chairman in charge of Product Development, and discuss this very issue. He said that something very similar happened when he went to Chrysler in the late 80s. Under his guidance, Chrysler stopped building K-Car clones and started turning out amazingly good cars like the Intrepid, Neon and new-generation Caravan. Someone told him it was a good thing they fired all the old engineers. He told them that they hadn't gotten rid of a single engineer -- they simply changed what they were telling them to do. Let's hope Chrysler's new management has the wisdom to put "car people" back in the driver's seat -- it sure would nice to see some good domestic competition for cars like the HHR SS. -- Aaron Gold
Related:
- 2008 Chevrolet HHR SS photo gallery
- 2008 Dodge Caliber SRT-4 test drive
- 2007 Chrysler Sebring Sedan test drive
- 2008 Chrysler Sebring Convertible test drive
- 2008 Dodge Avenger test drive
Photo © General Motors
I’ve driven the HHR in standard form, and although I wasn’t particularly impressed with the performance of the standard 4 banger, I can see where the SS could be a decent car.
I agree that the Caliber is an aweful car. In fact, aweful can’t even begin to describe how bad it is. I drove a Jeep Compass when they first came out, with an eye toward possibly the Patriot when it was finally released. I also drove a standard Avenger sedan. I can say after those experiences that I WILL NOT under any circumstance, buy a Caliber, or any of the other Chrysler vehicles using that platform. If anyone ever thought that the K-cars were bad, they pale in comparison to this new raft of crap!! These things can only aspire to mediocrity at best. I don’t know how Chrysler could have been so right (arguably, I know) with the LX platform cars in general, and then gone so wrong with the Caliber/Patriot/Compass/Sebring/Avenger/Journey platform.
It’s a bit of an exaggeration to say that under Lutz’ guidance Chrysler started turning out amazingly good cars like the Intrepid, Neon and new-generation Caravan.
The new-generation Caravan was a worthwhile evolution and refinement of the original concept. The Intrepid and Neon were good-looking and unusually good-handling (for American) cars. But all of these vehicles were also noisy, unrefined and disappointingly unreliable. Sure they were vast improvements over the old K-cars. What wouldn’t be? The latest batch of Chrysler products seem to have the same problems as the old Intrepid, Neon, and Caravan. Only worse.
One has to wonder about product management/development in Detroit…I know, it’s been said before. Obviously, no one is listening…
Mike
In my opinion Chryco’s problems began after Iacocca left and he was replaced by Jerry Greenwald(a bean counter) instead of Sperlich(a car guy). It set the stage for corporate efficiency over a product driven company like Porsche/Audi/VW. Unfortunately this is the same mind-set that rules Ford and GM… and we all know how well they’re doing!