1967 Pontiac Bonneville Automatic 2-door Convertible on 2040-cars

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This or That: 2005 Chrysler Crossfire SRT6 vs. 1984 Pontiac Fiero

Welcome to another round of This or That, where two Autoblog editors pick a topic, pick a side and pull no punches. Last round pitted yours truly against Associate Editor Brandon Turkus, and my chosen VW Vanagon Syncro narrowly defeated Brandon's 1987 Land Rover. In fact, it was, by far, the closest round we've seen, with 1,907 voters seeing things my way (for 50.8 percent of the vote) versus 1,848 votes for Brandon's Rover (49.2 percent). Sweet, sweet victory! For this latest round of This or That, I've roped Editor Greg Migliore into what I think is a rather fun debate. We've each chosen our favorite terrible cars, setting a price limit of $10,000 to make sure neither of us went too crazy with our automotive atrocities. I think we've both chosen terribly... and I mean that in the best way possible. 2005 Chrysler Crossfire SRT6 Jeremy Korzeniewski: Why It's Terrible: Taken in isolation, the Chrysler Crossfire isn't necessarily a terrible car. In fact, it drives pretty darn well, and there's a lot of solid engineering under its slinky shape. Problem is, that engineering was already rather long in the tooth well before Chrysler ever got its hands on it, having come from Mercedes-Benz, which used the basic chassis and drivetrain in a previous version of its SLK coupe and roadster. Granted, the SLK was an okay car, too, but even when new, it hardly set the world on fire with sporty driving dynamics. Chrysler took these decent-but-no-more bits and pieces from the Mercedes parts bin – remember, this car was conceived in the disastrous Merger Of Equals days – and covered them with a rather attractive hard-candy shell. Unfortunately, the super sporty shape wrote checks in the minds of buyers that its well-worn mechanicals were simply unable to cash, though an injection of power courtesy of a supercharged V6 engine in the SRT6 model, as seen here, certainly helped ease some of those woes. In the end, Chrysler was left with a so-called halo car that looked the part but never quite performed the part. It was almost universally panned by critics as an overpriced parts-bin special, which, I must add, was damningly accurate. As a result, sales were very slow, and within the first few months, dealers were clearancing the car at cut-rate prices, just to keep them from taking up too much of the showroom floor. Why It's Not That Terrible, After All: I can speak from personal experience when discussing the Chrysler Crossfire. You see, I owned one. Well, sort of...

Junkyard Gem: 2001 Pontiac Bonneville SSEi

The General's Pontiac Division sold Bonnevilles from 1958 through 2005, which turned out to be well over half of the marque's existence. Named after the Bonneville Salt Flats, some Bonnevilles were huge but pretty quick, others were slow-motion land yachts, and some were nearly indistinguishable from their Buick and Oldsmobile brethren. The final generation, sold for the 2000 through 2005 model years, were among the quickest and most distinctive-looking Bonnevilles ever built, but they arrived in showrooms at a time when the clock was ticking for the division's very survival. Today's Junkyard Gem is one of those cars, an '01 with the hot-rod SSEi package. The Bonneville SSEi first appeared in the 1992 model year, just a year after the Buick Park Avenue Ultra was the first of many GM cars to get the 3.8-liter Buick V6 with an Eaton supercharger bolted on top. Production of the Bonneville SSEi continued through the 2003 model year, after which the GXP version and its Cadillac Northstar V8 took over. The 2001 version of this engine made 240 horsepower, good for plenty of torque-steery fun. Could you get this car with a manual transmission? What do you think? Some cursory research indicates that 1970 was the last model year for a three-pedal Bonneville, and even those cars must be incredibly rare. This one looks to have been in nice shape when it arrived here, with the original manuals still in the glovebox. By 2006, the Bonneville was gone; four years later, Pontiac was gone. This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings. Stop all black Bonnevilles!

GM reintroduces Tripower name in the worst way possible

The story of General Motors' use of the Tripower moniker begins way back in 1957, when Semon E. "Bunkie" Knudsen, then General Manager of GM's Pontiac division, directed his engineers to inject more performance into his brand's line of V8-powered automobiles. Fuel injection was an option, but hot rodders flocked instead to Tri-Power (marketed way back when with a hyphen), which grafted a trio of two-barrel Rochester carburetors onto a single intake manifold. A legend was born. And that legend was born of performance. At idle and when full power wasn't required, Pontiac's Tri-Power system used just the middle carburetor, which helped make the setup easier to tune. Depending on the year and model, either a vacuum system or a mechanical linkage opened up the two outer carbs, thereby switching from two barrels to six, and allowing the engine to take in more fuel and air. And it was an easy marketing win – six barrels is better than four barrels, right? Because performance! So, when news filtered in that GM has resurrected the Tripower name, those of us who grew up attending classic car shows and wrenching on old Pontiacs did a double-take. And then we all collectively sighed. Turns out that today's Tripower refers to a trio of fuel-saving measures that include cylinder deactivation, active thermal management, and intake valve lift control, according to Automotive News. And, at least for now, it applies to GM's line of fullsize trucks powered by a 2.7-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine. We're all for saving fuel whenever possible. And we have zero say in how any automaker chooses to market its products and technologies. But, we'll offer our two cents anyway: Relaunching a storied name from the past is fine. Relaunching a storied name from the past while completely overlooking the reasons the name got famous in the first place is only going to irritate the people who remember the name in the first place. Couldn't they just call this new technology package something else? Related Video: News Source: Automotive NewsImage Credit: Getty Green Marketing/Advertising Chevrolet GM Pontiac Automotive History Truck chevrolet silverado