f-body

The name of a body style used on two car: the Chevrolet Camaro and the Pontiac Firebird. The f-body was introduced in 1967 as a way for General Motors to compete with the Ford Mustang.

To this date there have been four generations of f-bodies.

The first was produced 1967 to 1969, and was a bit smaller than the later models.

1970 to 1981 was the second generation. This time, in my opinion, the car became more of a muscle car than before. Bigger and with more power. Around 1974 power started decreasing, though, due to high gas prices and insurance rates. This killed the whole muscle car era. The later second generation f-bodies got heavier and had less power under the hood.

1982 to 1992 was the third generation. The car lost the round shapes of the early seventies (although it had already started losing them a bit during the late seventies).

1993 saw the light of the fourth generation and at the time of writing (2001), it is still the current one. The shapes were again quite round, but the hood has a sharp point in the middle.

Common details among them were a rather long hood and a short trunk. The roof is rather low and they often have a small rear wing. Engines in them were most often V8's, but a V6 has been availible most (if not all) production years and there have also been a 4 cylinder version (which sold very badly). The biggest engine availiable was the 396 cubic inch big block engine from the early seventies.

Already from the beginning, the f-body was a huge success, and it has continued to be one of the best selling cars in it's class.

Also body style of the '76 to '80 Dodge Aspen and Plymouth Volaré. The Aspen and Volaré were successors to the Dart and Valiant A bodies. The A and F body cars were both considered compact cars in their time when compared to the much larger models available.

By the time these cars came into production the muscle car era was at an end resulting in considerably less horsepower in these cars than in the pavement ripping, big block Mopars of the past. Regardless these cars were light enough that with the right engine they preformed rather well. The 360 with a two barrel carburator for example moved the car from 0 to 60 in about the same time as the same year Camaro Z28 and Corvette L82 both of wich had 350 four barrels.

All in all over a million and a half F-body Mopar cars were sold.