I am coming up on my 1 year of ownership of my 2017 Camaro SS and might as well fall in line with others posting their impressions after 1 year.
I had wanted to own a pure RWD NA V8 car in my life time before CAFE/fuel prices/fuel economy regulations required the use of forced induction, hybrid systems, prices of these cars to shoot up higher than they already were, or a combination of all of these. The ideal vehicle that met all that for me was the Corvette. I always admired the 'Vette growing up and loved the C7 when it debuted. Alas though the one I would want was outside my comfort zone in budget. The 6th gen Camaro SS then caught my eye. The whole process started in May 2016 a few weeks after picking up my parents new 2016 Suburban and with a new car itch went back to test drive the new 6th gen Camaro SS and instantly fell in love with the car. I was not impressed with the 5th gen Camaro SS, but the 6th gen Camaro SS riding on the Alpha platform was a complete transformation compared to the 5th gen where you felt the weight of it and noticeable body roll when thrown in the corners. In July I went to test drive the 2016 Mustang GT both the automatic and stick with the performance pack to give the S550 a fair shot, but walked away unimpressed. Good cruiser car with sporty ability, but for me lacked the precise feeling the Camaro had. Would have loved to consider the GT350 as that Voodoo V8 sounds glorious, but again outside of my price range.
In November 2016, I went back for one final test drives of the Camaro to decide between stick and auto. Fortunate also had it the stick Camaro also lacked MagRide so I could also determine if MRC would be worth it. Long story short, while I loved the TR-6060 in the Camaro and had a complete blast driving it, rush hour gridlock killed any idea of getting the Camaro in the manual and MRC was worth it. Come January 28th, the car was ordered, February 27th it was built, March 20th delivered.
Almost one year to the day, 2,686 miles later, and I still completely love the car. My smile has not left my face every time I get in the car, press the start button, and hear the 455 HP 6.2 liter V8 start up and drive off. The torque of the LT1 is just insane and it just pulls and pulls. The dual mode exhaust makes the V8 sound freaking amazing when the valves are open and bypassing the muffler. When you back off the throttle when the engine is above 2500 RPM, you hear a nice crackle and popping as the engine winds down coming out of the exhaust. The car turns like it is on rails( with the stock OEM summer tires), the steering is precise, and tossing it around the corners is effortless. Body roll is kept to a minimum, changes direction quickly and it takes the corner with ease asking for another. It does not match your expectation of what a muscle/pony car would drive like( and why the 5th gen and Challenger failed to attract me). It drives like a sports car. The 8 speed automatic does a nice job of managing the power, always seems to be in the right gear for the power demanded, doesn't hunt, and shifts smoothly and quickly when left to its own accord. In manual mode, there is a slight delay between pull the paddle and it actually shifting, but not a huge deal as some reviews make it out to be and certainly not the worst I have experienced. It's an overall good transmission and reviews seem to trash it solely on the slight lag in shifting when in manual mode.
I like the interior just as much. I love the design of the dash, the HVAC controls are nicely lined up in one row, and I love the fact the boarder around the vents is what adjusts the temperature( Temp and fan speed in 1SS since it lacks dual zone, where my 2SS has dual zone). I love the steering wheel. At 3 and 9 positions, it is the most comfortable steering wheel I have ever used. I don't find myself wanting to take one hand off just to give it a "rest" sort of speak. It has a nice leather wrapping and it is just a joy to hold and turn when tossing the car in the corners. The materials used where you will touch it most often are good. The center arm rest, the door sills, the middle part of the dash, etc use soft touch material/faux leather. Yes the less likely areas to be touched are hard plastics like the top of the dash. What has always got to me a little bit is seeing Matt Farah just knock on the top of the dash to illustrate it is hard plastic( not bashing him, I like his content). Yes it makes the sound you expect hard plastic to make when knocked on. But when touched like a normal being would touch it, it is hard, but it has a nice smooth grain to it that doesn't make it feel cheap unlike the POS hard plastics GM used to use.
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The seats are comfortable and they reasonably hold you in place when you toss the car around. The leather again is of nice quality and they are ventilated and heated. In the summer the ventilation results in a nice cool breeze being blown on your back( once the AC starts blowing cold air). The heated seats are not as strong as I would have like it and takes a bit to warm up. The heated steering wheel on the other hand warms up quickly and is nice and toasty.
Yes there is very little storage space in the interior. It has a very small map pockets on the doors, the center console storage is pitiful, while the glove box is of decent size. Hasn't been an issue for me yet, but certainly a downside. And yes the visibility is also not the best, but again something that hasn't been an overall issue for me with properly adjusted side mirrors and the blind zone alert system. Yeah slightly annoying when #1 at a street light and I have to bend down to look if it has changed green yet. But overall, wouldn't give up the awesome look of the exterior profile to have more glass. AFM( Active Fuel Management or cylinder deactivation) has been a slight annoyance. Under light throttle under acceleration it will activate at a bad time( it's probably the automatics version of the famous 1-4 skipshift GM manuals are famous for
). You can also hear the AFM valves in the exhaust( which reduces the droning while in 4 cylinder mode) open and close.
So far the only quality issue I have had with the car was the headliner starting to sag by the rear window and got it replaced under warranty. It still isn't perfect( still some sag), but it looks a lot better when looking at the rear from the outside and frankly don't want to screw it up any further. Back in June of 2017 at 4 am in the morning driving to work, had egg fall on the hood of the car which sadly caused some impact scratches( who knows if it was a bird nest that gave out or some jerk in a tree). That lead me to get a ceramic coating done to the car which to my surprise hides the damage really well( can only see it at certain angles). Then in November 2017, I discovered mice also liked my car and chewed up the hood insulation to make a nest under the hood. The hood insulation and not yet been replaced, there are no signs of a new nest being built, and the traps have killed about 8-10 mice so far. Though I am still finding mouse poop under the hood occasionally, but again no signs of further damage or a new nest. But still unsettling I am still having mice wonder in the car.
As you can tell in the review, I am still in love with my Camaro. I can't wait until April where I will be able to put the summer tires back on the car and get that grip and look back( too much sidewall with my winter setup
). And I also look forward to doing my own oil change with it. Do I have any regrets? Well not with the car itself, but I do wish now I would have widened the cars I would have test driven. I wish I would have test driven the SS sedan and Challenger Scat Pack at the very least. Maybe test drive the C7 to see if I could have gotten myself to accept buying a used one. The car has not been driven much over the winter. Not afraid of driving it in the snow, but getting the salt off the paint and the lack of opportunity to wash the car quick enough to get the salt off. So it has only been driven on days after a rain shower came through washing the salt off the road and has dried off. Hence the search for a second car has begun, but not in any rush due to my parents being kind to give me access to their cars in the winter.
Overall the Camaro SS gets a 99/100 on the quagmire score. Almost a perfect car IMHO, but like every car out there does have some drawbacks, but the positives by far outweight the negatives and don't bring my score down more than 1 point off( ok maybe I am biased, sue me
).
