[quote=“gt1cooper”]
Yes, for an ignition switch issue. That in itself is not that bad, the fact that they covered it up for so long is; many deaths could have been permitted.
However, this car in itself, as cars are the sum of their parts, is not unsafe, is very pretty, and is an amazing piece of engineering. It could probably figure out capitalization with the CPU in it!
The only thing which I could possibly consider unsafe are the drum brakes which I believe this car has in the rear; not unsafe for driving, but for changing the pads! I’ve broken fingers and cut deep into my hand to where I needed stitches from silly mistakes changing out the pads, or removing water from the inside, or switching them out for discs (Our 69 Mustang had discs in the front and drums in the rear from factory). It probably is much easier to do today though.
By the way, which website is this? (That you are an admin) My neighbor has an 05 Cobalt SS with new internals and upped boost, with around 380 WHP. It does manage to put down that power admirably on the Yokohama R1’s he has on it. It’s made me want to look into them [/quote]
Well, I have the recall notice from GM on the ignition switch. The car has had 3 recalls on it in the 8 years since it was built. None of them were problems I had experienced, and I have yet to go get the most recent ignition switch replaced, but I still had the recalls done just to be safe. The car is paid off, and has been a phenomenal experience with a newer car. Before this, I had never owned a car build after 1989. I like muscle cars, and they pretty much stopped building those in the 80’s and early 90’s. For reference, my first car was a 1969 Camaro with a factory 427 sitting under the hood. (no, I do not have pics, as in 1985 we didn’t have the internet or digital cameras) My father and I rebuilt it from a boneyard body and short block.
The site is Cobalt Universe dot net (I’m not sure we’re allowed to post other sites here?), and it has been around since 2010. User name is same here as it is there. It’s a pretty small site, with only 50 or so active users. Running a forum website is a lot of work. Thankfully it is not my site. I am the co-admin and the owner does most of the work. I mainly just respond to problems/issues in his absence (and issue the banhammer on spammers and troublemakers).
As for drum brakes, they can be dangerous if they are really old, or poorly maintained, but they’re not really so bad otherwise. The benefit of them, since this is FWD, is the E-brake cable is tied to a drum which is far more safe than attaching it to a disc brake setup. The large majority of stopping is done by the front brakes anyway, plus it is a manual transmission, so most of my braking is done with the left foot and right hand.
The 2.2L L61 is not nearly as powerful as the SS model’s 2.0L LSJ your friend has, even before the internals were done, so mine will be very mild compared to it. I’m expecting in the ballpark of 210 at the front wheels, which is a pretty hefty upgrade from the ~130 it currently has. You might be surprised to know, the 2008 Cobalt SS/TC (LNF) held a record on the 'Ring in it’s class for quite a while! At 260 (crank) it is actually a pretty powerful factory car, and has some pretty good handling in the suspension to keep it on the pavement.