Car Of The Day: August 5, 2011

Today's car of the day is Johnny Lightning's 1971 Chevrolet Camaro.

The second generation Chevrolet Camaro is a pony car by the Chevrolet division of General Motors produced for the 1970 through 1981 model years. It was introduced February 26, 1970 It was longer, lower, and wider than the first generation Camaro, and is "widely considered the best all-around domestic musclecar ever produced." A convertible body-type was no longer available. GM engineers have said the second generation is much more of "A Driver's Car" than its predecessor.

For more information and pictures of the real car please visit: Chevrolet Camaro

Some cars can wear purple, pink, or orchid in style.  Unfortunately, this isn't one of them.  I love the color, but it looks out of place on a Camaro in all honesty, and would likely be better suited to either a Mopar or Mustang from the same era.

Dubbed "Super Hugger", the second generation Camaro was developed without the rush of the first generation and benefited from a greater budget in light of the success of the first generation. Although it was an all-new car, the basic mechanical layout of the new Camaro was familiar, engineered much like its predecessor with a unibody structure utilizing a front subframe, A-arm and coil spring front suspension, and rear leaf springs. The chassis and suspension of the second generation were greatly refined in both performance and comfort; base models offered significant advances in sound-proofing, ride isolation, and road-holding. Extensive experience Chevrolet engineers had gained racing the first-generation led directly to advances in second-generation Camaro steering, braking, and balance. Although it began its run with a number of high performance configurations, as the 1970s progressed, the Camaro grew less powerful, succumbing, like many production cars of the era, to the pressures of tightening emissions regulations and a fuel crisis. Major styling changes were made in 1974 and 1978; 1981 was the final model year for the second generation Camaro.