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2021 Chevrolet Camaro Production Resuming Next Week

A crisis that has wiped out hundreds of millions of dollars in potential income across the automotive industry, the microchip shortage has wreaked havoc on General Motors since the beginning of 2021. But on the upside, the biggest of the Big Three in Detroit is restarting production at the Lansing Grand River assembly plant, thanks to better chip availability.
Chevrolet Camaro 8 photos
Photo: Chevrolet
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According to Automotive News, the manufacturing facility will return to normal output levels by the end of May. Spanning over 3.4 million square feet in Michigan, the Lansing Grand River complex is responsible for some of the automaker’s worst-selling products, including the Chevrolet Camaro.

General Motors couldn’t do better than 7,089 units in the first quarter of 2021, representing a decrease of approximately 1.3 percent over the first three months of 2020. By comparison, the Ford Mustang and Dodge Challenger moved 17,274 and 15,096 units in the same period.

Lansing also makes two luxury sedans for the Cadillac brand. CT4 and CT5 are their names, and obviously enough, the successors of the ATS and CTS sold worse than every other Cadillac in the lineup, including the full-size Escalade that starts at $76,195. The smaller CT4 accounted for 2,627 sales while the CT5 ended the first quarter with 4,374 examples to its name.

Turning our attention back to the Camaro, the pony car is expected to lose the 1LE track package for LT trim levels for the 2022 model year. Scheduled to enter production on June 14th, the newcomer won’t get a 55th-anniversary edition, according to a recent report. As if that wasn’t bad enough, Chevrolet won’t launch a more stirring variant than the ZL1 1LE.

Alas, Camaro enthusiasts shouldn’t be surprised if the seventh generation will drop internal combustion altogether for a full-electric powertrain. GM has already teased a sports car with Ultium battery modules and drive units, and General Motors president Mark Reuss doesn’t rule out an e-coupe.

In related news, Lansing Grand River is rumored to churn out electric vehicles from 2024 onward. If everything goes according to plan, GM announced that it would phase out internal combustion-engined vehicles by 2035. Ford of Europe is even more ambitious, promising to discontinue ICEs by 2030.
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About the author: Mircea Panait
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After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well.
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