Chevrolet News:South Korean Union Rep Says Next Spark Coming 2015, Sonic Delayed To 2016

[William Maley]

William Maley

Staff Writer - CheersandGears.com

July 30, 2013

More news coming out concerning General Motor's small car lineup. During labor talks with the South Korea labor union, GM announced that the next-generation Chevrolet Spark will go into production in the first half of 2015. GM also announced that new Sonic (a.k.a. Aveo) which was supposed to come out in late 2015 has been pushed back.

"The management said it originally planned to launch the redesigned Aveo in late 2015, but the plan was pushed back. It also said it will produce the new Spark in the first half of 2015," said South Korean labor union spokesman Choi Jong-hak.

This comes a couple weeks after a report from Reuters that says the next-gen Cruze has been pushed back till late 2015.

Source: Reuters

William Maley is a staff writer for Cheers & Gears. He can be reached at [email protected] or you can follow him on twitter at @realmudmonster.

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[Drew Dowdell]

Sonic is doing well, no need to rush it.

[ocnblu]

There might be a new trick up their sleeve for these three buggies. Something that's not quite perfected. Perhaps it's a 2-door body for each of them. Or a diesel engine family.

[hyperv6]

I think GM and Mark have learned from Lutz that it if it is not right spend the time and money to make it right before you release it if you can.

In this case they are in good shape to make it right where as the Malibu was just a victim of delay with the chapter 11. I still believe as fast as the changes came GM already knew and had them on the way and just wanted to beat the Fusion out.

Anyways it was Lutz who came to GM and made them fix the GP in 04 and delay the Lacrosse as he did not like them that much. He said the hard points were set so there was not a lot they could do to fix them but they did what they could. He also added the extra chrome around the windows on the Impala when the stylist was afraid of going over budget. He told him better to add it and fail than to fail in not adding it. It made the car look more up scale than without.

This is the kind of thinking Lutz put into GM and I have seen it carry on with many who he left behind. He covered a lot of this in his book on GM.

The new way of doing business at GM looks to be holding with the examples we have had post chapter 11 like the Impala, ATS and C7. I hope this continues.

To be honest it is nice to see them get to the Sonic this soon as the Old GM would have had a poor selling car and delayed it even longer.

[regfootball]

i'd like to see the sonic hatch move a little closer in packaging to the Fit. The Fit has no sound deadener tho.

[daves87rs]

All 3 are doing well at the moment, so no need to rush.

Quite a few companies are updating their small stuff now, so might be an even smarter idea....plus get your money's worth out of the old ones....

[David]

I think GM could make a killing if you put a VOLT style powertrain in these little cars. That would make many happy I suspect.

[Drew Dowdell]

I don't think it would fit as is... it is a fairly bulky system

[hyperv6]

I think GM could make a killing if you put a VOLT style powertrain in these little cars. That would make many happy I suspect.

The batteries would not fit in the Spark. They already have to remove the engine to get in what they EV version will do.

I wish GM would put a full battery pack in the Volt or ELR and make an EV version then make it do anything the Tesla can do at 1/3 the price.

[regfootball]

volt system needs to work its way into the mainstream vehicle lineups. they had better get the price down, range up, and size and weight down also.

[David]

I understand the current VOLT system would not work in the compact and subcompact cars as is, but different battery designs to work with the size of the auto and a proper generator would make this a great little hybrid that many would I think like over a pure electric golf cart version.

I feel the VOLT system should go into the full size Suburban/Tahoe SUV with more battery storeage to allow longer electric range along with the generator to give true road trip use. I see volts popping up all over seattle. Seem to becoming much more popular.