ALT-3 Chevrolet Impala
Chevrolet has produced many great American classics, and at the top of that list we have to include the Chevy Impala. The Impala was so well respected and remembered in the hearts of Americans, that Chevy has brought back the famous Impala brand. So what is it about this car that won our hearts?
There are four main things that we look for in an Automobile: Performance, Dependability, Styling and Cost. In the late 50's,these things came together to make the Impala one of the best selling cars of the next decade.In 1965 alone, the Chevrolet Impala sold over 1,000,000 units, and it has the honor of being the top selling American nameplate of all time for sedans.
First introduced in 1958, the Impala was built on the old Bel Air design. It's six tail lights gave it a unique design, and created a lot of buzz in the automotive industry. Named after a southern African antelope, the Impala was designed with both a two and four-door version.
The 1965 Impala was redesigned, and featured many unique designs such as wood grained accents on the dashboard as well as specialty pulls on the inside of the doors. Even the upholstery was unique to the industry. In the 1967 models, Chevrolet added some safety features to keep up with Federal regulations. These features included a fully collapsible energy-absorbing steering column, side marker lights and shoulder belts for hardtop models.
In 1961, Chevrolet stepped up the image of the Impala by introduce a sports model called the Impala SS. The SS logo would become an important label for car manufacturers, representing a performance package on the vehicle. The term SS would stand for Super Sport, and would be used not only in the Impala SS, but later would be used by Chevrolet in the Chevy SS as well as others.
In 1971, Chevrolet would redesign the Impala again, making it the largest full sized car offered by Chevy. Unfortunately this would come at a time when the economy would require a demand for more fuel efficient vehicles. Between 1973 and 74 alone, car sales would plummet over 20 percent. The new design of the Impala also began to have some reliability issues and was redesigned a few more times until in 1996, the model was discontinued as Chevrolet attempted to cut expenses to become more streamlined and competitive in the industry.
In 2000, Chevrolet brought back the Impala model to take the place of the Chevrolet Lumina. The new design would include front wheel drive and a V-6 engine. In 2004, Chevy produced a new SS model with a supercharged V6. Chevrolet also introduced a police-package which was very widely accepted. Many new and exciting advances have been added since the original Impala rolled off the assembly line almost 50 years earlier. And today it is still an American favorite.
