There aren’t many performance sedans left to serve the market, save for the staple Germany luxury vehicles. The Dodge Charger and Chevrolet SS have carried the torch for American automakers for some time, but as we’re all aware, the SS will exit production later this year, and a revised Charger is still years away.
Then comes Kia swinging for the fences with the 2018 Stinger, a rear-wheel drive performance sedan with an available 3.3-liter twin-turbo V6 engine. At a time when we’re readying our goodbye to the 2017 Chevrolet SS, how is it that Kia can introduce such a car?
Even as the market turns to crossovers and utility vehicles, Kia sees a market for a performance sedan. And as the Chevrolet SS sits on its deathbed, we can’t help but wonder if potential Chevrolet SS buyers may find solace in the 2018 Kia Stinger.
It looks great, seems to have the performance credentials for the segment and will likely undercut any comparative vehicle in its class. And the price is likely a major factor here.
The Chevrolet SS has long been out of reach for many due to GM’s decision to not de-content the vehicle in the slightest, while the Stinger will likely take a Pontiac G8 strategy and provide accessible price levels with the base turbocharged four-cylinder engine. It’s a tried and true formula: shake up a segment long defined by a select few.
But, it may an even more timely move for Australian friends. As the 2018 Holden Commodore moves to front-wheel drive, the 2018 Stinger may be just what the market calls for when it comes to a proper rear-wheel drive performance sedan, even if there won’t be a V8 under the hood.
We simply want to use this space as a call to action, whatever weight it pulls. There’s a market for these vehicles, and Kia may be jumping aboard the niche at just the right time.
Moving opposite to market trends.
With four model years recommended for purchase.
This example is a former NCRS award winner.
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Breaking out the spec sheets for a comparison.
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I am with Mohchey !!!!
To give more sports and muscles to Chevy's image, GM can give birth to the code 130R as the rebirth of the Nomad, and the TRU.140S as the Nova (supposition). Those two cars could use the D2XX platform and a variety of engines, the 1.6 T, 2.0T and 3.0T of the CT6 with the AWD
If SS sales are any indication, that's a very miniscule void to fill. But anyone who lusts for a Stinger wouldn't have so much as entertained the idea of driving an SS. I strongly suspect SS people aren't Kia Stinger people either. It's an identity thing - an ideological thing - not a "segment" thing. Ironically, that almost guarantees the Stinger will be a hit compared with the SS even if it fails to lure too many American appliance fans away from their beloved SUVs.
This doesn't mean that there isn't a very limited but real market for a RWD V6 and V8 powered family performance sedan from GM, but as rationalists such as scott3 love to pound home, what "business case" would they have to build a car that very few Americans would ever consider buying just for the sake of carrying on tradition? On the other hand, that hasn't stopped Kia. A Kia Stinger might be an attractive and impressive car, but I will never buy a Stinger because even though on a bar graph, a Stinger might be comparable to an SS, they're otherwise worlds apart.
Commendable that Kia gave it a real name, though - a memorable one with character - while American companies continue going out of their way to adopt soulless globalist alphabet soup car names as if to beg acceptance from the rest of the self constrained world. So much for American exceptionalism.
In the spirit of the times I have a suggestion - Make GM Great Again. That Kia introduces a spiritual successor to the Buick Grand National just as GM bows out of the musclecar business is sobering proof there's more work to be done before GM and greatness are again synonymous.
Agreed. People that buy Chevys wouldn't even look at a Kia. I know I wouldn't, because I'm a 100% GM guy, always have been.
Personally, I think the Kia Stinger is ugly and there's no way that it could fill the void of a Chevy SS.
Chevrolet should build a RWD Impala based on long Alpha, and sell it globally even in Europe