1996 Chevrolet Impala Super Sport from North America - Comments

Battery went dead after four years of very tough work.

Heater fan went down, but it got fixed under the warranty.

The best car you can possibly get for your money. Very fast and comfy. Eats any Mustang that tries to race it. The best car ever period.

1996 Chevy Impala was made to smoke mustangs and any other car that comes across it. It's a fast and good looking car. It keeps me goin and has not let me down since the day that i bought it.

Why do you people have to make your overly biased comments under every vehicle you own. Just because you own a car doesn't make it the fastest, kick ass car out there. Please stick to relevant information, the I raced a viper in my civic and won doesn't mean civic's are faster then viper's.

Oh and sorry to burst your bubble, but a impala running a 15sec 1/4 mile does not beat mustang's running low 13's. It's not faster then camaro's/firebirds or stangs. It's simple math. "made to smoke any car it comes across" seriously do you actually believe that?, NEW ground breaking news, Impala SS fastest car ever made, quick sell your SRT-10 vipers, Rousch/Shelby mustang's and ZO6 vette's cause the Impala SS is faster! lol.

Don't get me wrong I actually like these cars and wouldn't mind owning one. But as a fun sport's sedan, not a high end sports car.

To the poster above.

While I respect and understand your point of view, it is clear to me that you are limited by your lack of technical knowledge about this vehicle. The B and D body vehicles date back to the Chevrolet Bel Air and had been improved upon for decades. Honda with their Civic and Toyota with their Corolla have done the same thing in keeping a platform for years and constantly improving upon it. This is what makes cars reliable - time and effort put into their engineering. The body on frame Impalas and Caprices are as reliable as the day is long because of the chassis/body configuration's inherrent advantages. That alone makes the car better than 90% of vehicles going. Unfortunately GM made a poor decision and cancelled this platform, leaving the Ford Crown Victoria line of cars the only remaining body on frame platform available as a new car. I am very financially secure. I could afford a car such as a BMW or Mercedes, but won't waste the money because their unibody platforms and weak structural integrity makes them a real laughing stock in the quality department. That's why I drive a Lincoln Town Car.

However, the Impala had something the Crown Victoria does not (or at least no longer) have. A small block OHV V8 engine (the Crown Vic is overhead cam). The small block V8s are the most reliable powertrains ever made. They are cheap to fix... and cheap to modify. Relatively inexpensive modifications are easily made the these cars, and yes, can make them faster than than just about anything (including Dodge Vipers) at the racetrack. I highly doubt you would still be of your opinion if you gave this some detailed attention.

Response to the above poster, I never mentioned reliability in my comment nor did I say they are not capable of being fast cars. You are comparing apples to oranges my friend, how fast a car is stock and what it can built to run are two totally unrelated things. If you bother to research that you will find that anything on the road can run into the 10sec range with engine swaps, and proper modifications.

My comment simply said that these cars in STOCK configuration are NOT faster then mustangs and the like as the first poster would like us to believe. Research the 1/4 mile times and see for yourself.

This is my opinion still as while I might not be technically familiar with the history of the B and D body cars and their reliability virtues I will stick with my "not per say mine" 3rd gen camaros/firebirds, Fox body mustangs, 300zx, 3000gt and Supra's as affordable fast and great handling sports cars requiring only a small investment to improve their performance.

9:52 as a Viper owner I am somewhat curious about your track comments or are we just being a slight bit overzealous with our comments? How did you overcome the aerodynamic issues for starters at 190 mph plus/ remaining street legal as well, then address your race inspired frame superior to a Vipers for openers?

In regards to the frame or body type of a a vehicle determining the reliability, that makes little to no sense at all and so does the comment regarding ohv engines and the most reliable engines ever. your baseing your reliability on the fact that down to the basic points, the technology is archaic. The unibody has been phasing out the body on frame, or more correctly, the space frame for the last 70 years, and for a good reason. Unibodies utlyze the entire body of the vehicle for structural rigidity, so they are inherintly lighter, safer, and cheaper to build. The only reason the ford continued using the truck frame under the vic is because they wanted to go out of business, and they have almost succeded. The only reason trucks them selves have yet to change to unibody style is because the ease of changing the frame to different styles/lengths/drivelines/powertrains etc. a trait important for trucks. Then again, today most frames blur the lines between the different types. Most unibodies feature seperate subframes to carry the weight of seperate components, and cars like the corvette with its tubular hydroformed steel space frame is neither unibody nor truckframe. so anyways you need to research before you say something like that. Our OHC 5.4l expedition hit 260000 miles on the oringinal motor, my 1986 all original rx7 rotary has 100000 miles and has better compression then when new, and any SOHC or DOHC honda, mazda, Toyota, or chevy 4 cylinder motor can be expected to last nearly forever..

it engineering that makes vehicles last, not archaic technology..

thats why honda, who puts more work into there vehicles then anyone else, will always have the most reliable cars ever, and that the chevy small block, which has millions of engineering hours in it, is still around despite its over fifty year old technology

Well well well.. smells like a little (warette) of who would be the smartest technologician or the ones who knows the best of how it is..hmmm! I do have four cars with LT1 engine (2 roadmaster and 2 trans am) and also before I've had 2 honda (civic and accord) and I can say that honda were a little more reliable, but NO FUN to drive unless you mod. them seriously to meet the same fun as a SBC. And many of my friends do own honda and they are die hard fans and thinks they are the best cars in the world.. But it is like comparing apple and orange. It all depends of what you like, from my part I will buy a honda only when there will be no more SBC cars available because when you try an LT1 or an LS engine (even with their flaws!) you don't want to look back.. honda are now in a second class.. And to the ones who wrote that a unibody made cars are safer than my full frame roadmasters (not my trans ams)..I would like to see it, head to head with a full equipped honda Accord (with inflating balloons everywhere) at 30+ MPH who would still walk and who would go in an ambulance.. On another point I know that after 300k miles any honda can't be rebuilt because after that so many miles the body is finished enduring all the stress of these miles.. My civic had less than 200k (including winters) with a still going strong engine, but the unibody couldn't hold the suspension parts anymore and windshield was always cracking because of a (working) body and you cannot plan of rebuilding them like the big framed cars or trucks.. I love archaic engines because you CAN work on them and do not like to go waste my money to have their fancy electronics tools to work on FANCY full electronics cars (LT1 have some I confess) Buy the way many police forces had the venerable SBC and still going strong with many hundreds of thousands of miles... In conclusion..Hondas are good, but have their limits (especially up north and over 250k miles) even with the greatest cares.. But a full frame with a SBC you can be sure with good cares you can give 'em when you die and they will still roll..

"My comment simply said that these cars in STOCK configuration are NOT faster then mustangs and the like as the first poster would like us to believe."

One cries for a stock to stock comparison when easy, minor modifications make the other car run faster than your own. There is no limit to the cylinder head, camshaft, intake, and exhaust configurations for the Chevrolet small block.

"...I will stick with my "not per say mine" 3rd gen camaros/firebirds, Fox body mustangs, 300zx, 3000gt and Supra's as affordable fast and great handling sports cars requiring only a small investment to improve their performance."

F Body powertrains are identical the 1996 Impala. With the exception these and of the 302 Mustangs, none of the cars engines' performance can be improved upon without costly superchargers/turbochargers that start at $5,000. They also do not handle well. Small block V8 engines will eternally reign supreme as simplistically effective; producing more power than competing designs for far less money.

Just to make things clear to the above poster, Camaro and firebird commonly known as F body has aluminum heads and B body like caprice, Impala SS, Buick roadmaster or Caddy Fleetwood has cast iron heads, but they sure share the fabulous 5.7 LT1 engines that no Ford or Chrysler, modified or not, can't beat the durability, reliability and confidence you can get from these engines.. There are no match!, Many police forces are regretting these engines since GM killed it after 1996 model year for the B body and 1997 for F body (1998-2002 are LS1). Ford and Chrysler has good engines but not as good and reliable, cheap to fix or modify than a SBC. Just ask police officers, limousine services owners, taxi drivers what engines they would like in their cars?..Good chances that most of them will say Small Block Chevrolet please 305 or 350! and Ford 5.0 second, Ford 4.6 in third, sorry but no Chrysler!