Talk:General Motors Corsa

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[edit] Merge

I don´t think this article should be merged with Celta, because Celta and Corsa are different cars. As a matter of fact, they are sold side by side in the Brazilian car sellers. Celta is the mini, and COrsa is the supermini. Carloseduardo 13:15, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

OPEL CORSA MK1 (1983-1993)

In early 1983, Opel launched an all-new front-wheel drive supermini - the Corsa. It was built at Zaragoza in Spain and sold in Britain as the Vauxhall Nova. Power came from 1.0, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4 and 1.6 petrol engines, which were mostly noisy and unrefined. Reliability too was far from perfect. But the Corsa's key selling points were its competitive starting price and low running costs. It was aimed squarely at the Ford Fiesta, Volkswagen Polo and Austin Metro. The launch of the Nova saw the Chevette disappear from the Vauxhall range.

Bodystyles were hatchback (three and five doors) and saloon (two and four doors). The most popular bodystyle was three-door hatchback.

In the autumn of 1990, the Corsa was facelifted with a new front end and improved interior, but the age of the design was starting to show in the face of more modern rivals like the Peugeot 106 and Renault Clio.

The last of the first generation Corsas rolled off the production line early in 1993, and the Nova name was shelved on British Vauxhalls. Even now, more than a decade after the end of production, the Vauxhall Nova is proving popular with 'boy racers' because of its low insurance premiums and paltry value.


OPEL CORSA MK2 (1993-2000)

The second generation Opel Corsa was launched in early 1993, a completely new car - this time using the Corsa badge on Vauxhalls as well. The front-wheel drive chassis was designed to make driving as easy as possible, which made the Corsa an ideal choice for driving schools. The 1.2, 1.4 and 1.6 petrol engines and 1.5 diesel were all-new injection units. More expensive versions of the Corsa could be had with power steering, electric windows, central locking, antilock brakes and airbags. Like almost all of the competition, the Corsa was available only as a hatchback with three or five doors. Running costs and asking prices were both low. The Corsa proved to be an instant sales success in Europe.

A facelift in the autumn of 1996 saw the Corsa receive a new grille and the chassis retuned by Lotus to give better handling. Economical 1.0 three-cylinder petrol and 1.7 turbo-diesel engines were added to the range. But there were few real changes.


OPEL CORSA MK3 (2000-present)

The third generation Opel Corsa was launched in the autumn of 2000, a welcome launch because the old Corsa was falling behind the likes of the Fiat Punto and Peugeot 206 in the supermini sector.

At the front, the new Corsa preserved traditional Vauxhall/Opel styling characteristics, but at the back it resembled a Fiat Punto. Beneath the exterior lay a spacious and comfortable interior, which came with impressive equipment levels. Almost all of the range could be had with air-conditioning, electric windows, CD player and central locking as either optional or standard equipment. The 1.0, 1.2 and 1.4 petrol engines were carried over from the previous Corsa but the 1.7 turbo-diesel and 1.8 petrol were both all-new.

Lotus was responsible for tuning the new Corsa chassis, which was interlinked with 'speed sensitive power steering'. This combination gave excellent ride and handling. In many ways, the new Corsa felt like a large car trapped in a small body. Its classy dashboard would not feel out of place in the Vectra two sizes up.

After four years in production, the third generation Vauxhall/Opel Corsa is still one of the best superminis on sale in Europe. In 2002 it overtook the Ford Fiesta in the British sales charts but was beaten to the top of the supermini sector by the Peugeot 206.

[edit] Car article overwrites

Who or what causes these entries to appear? They have been appearing across many car articles over the last few weeks, sometimes on the talk pages. They look suspicously copy-vio and not very encyclopedic. There are a dozen more if you go back through my contrib list, including several Renault, Peugot, and VW cars. akaDruid 09:15, 4 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Seems to be a bizarre form of vandalism. Feel free to revert if in doubt - most of the changes do not enhance the article, and I agree, do appear to have been lifted from elsewhere. Graham 12:07, 4 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Yep, some anon has been doing this. The funny thing is, I don't think they're copyvio! The revisions are textually different! I think someone thinks they are helping by wiping the entire contents and writing new from scratch each time! We haven't been able to get the message to them that that's not how Wikipedia works... Yes, please revert whenever you see this happen and look for the other "contribs" from that IP when it happens. I've been integrating the (actually quite valuable) info from these rewrites when it happens, so you can add them to my To Do list at my userpage if you want... --SFoskett 17:51, Oct 4, 2004 (UTC)
Whoever it is, they are using many IP addresses. I've started a (incomplete) list of the pages, times and IP addresses at User:Akadruid/overwrites, so please do use any of those, or add any more you find to the list. Hopefully we can turn this apparent vandalism into A Good Thing between us! akaDruid 10:43, 5 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Like Sfoskett, I don't think they're copyvio even though they sound a bit like a brochure. I mentioned on another page that the writer has his/her own conventions, such as the capitalized MK and no space afterwards—which I doubt would appear in a properly published text. The many IPs are likely due to the writer's ISP assigning what is available when dialling up, rather than any malice. Anyway, like most of you I have been knocking them into shape, taking the pertinent info from them and putting them into the earlier versions, etc. Stombs 04:10, Dec 20, 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Gamma platform - is it responsibility of GM DAT or Opel/Fiat?

I keep seeing references on GM DAT developing next GM Gamma platform in various GM-related articles, but Fiat Punto article says it's joint responsibility of Opel AG and Fiat. There are recent PRs from Fiat stating this, and there's no mention of GM DAT activities anywhere. Please visit Talk:GM_Gamma_platform for further discussion! --DmitryKo 22:40, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Souped up

Souped up has just been changed to suped up presumably because the writer thinks (wrongly) that suped is a contraction of supercharged. In fact souped up is correct, here's an extract from the Cambridge Dictionary:

SOUPED UP
to make mechanical changes to (something, esp. a car) to make it unusually powerful Example: He souped it up so that it could go at speeds of over 100 mph.
I've reverted - Adrian Pingstone 15:33, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)

This is correct - it's "souped up" not "suped up". FYI, the American Heritage Dictionary says that it comes from "material injected into a horse to make it run faster". --SFoskett 14:23, Apr 11, 2005 (UTC)
Oh, for christ's sake. What your dictionary entries show is that a misspelling can occasionally become so common that people forget the derivation of a term. The term entered the language in the 1950's, when hot rodders started applying superchargers to their cars. Describing a car as "Souped" up is a pun, that has been a staple of humorous essays in hotrodder publications since about that time.
These people have it right:
http://www.suped-up-cars.com/
Oh, and BTW: the American Heritage Dictionary is hardly an authority. The Oxford English Dictionary has no entries for either "suped" or "souped".
While it is understandable to have changed it to "suped" (because of supercharger and "super"), "souped up" pre-dates the automobile by a few centuries. It refers to the "soup" that you would inject an animal with, and has been used to describe many performance-enhanced items since then.
As for authorities, I'd say any dictionary that DOES have an entry (with an etymology) is more of an authority than one that has none, or some web site. But since you like the web, compare Google's number of matches for "souped up" and "suped up" and you will see that the former is 8 times more popular than the latter. Finally, if you persist with this edit war, I will not hesitate to change the phrase to "modified" or "hot-rodded".  :-) --SFoskett 16:58, Apr 11, 2005 (UTC)
Wrong, Mr Anon!! Firstly, we are not writing Wikipedia for the hot rodder but for the ordinary reader. So what hot rodders use among themselves is irrelevant. Secondly, the use of For Christs Sake is sad . Thirdly, the derivation of the term for the ordinary reader is not suped from supercharge but souped from the injection given to a horse to alter it's speed. My evidence is from two respected sources:, the one-volume Collins English Dictionary and the Cassells Dictionary of Slang. Cassells says "souped-up=intensified, especially of a car that has been modified by its owner to exceed the factory performance:from SOUP=anything injected into a horse to alter its speed or temperament. First used in the 1930s". So the term did not originate in the 1950s!
Collins says "soup-up=to modify a vehicle in order to increase its power but gives no derivation. Neither have any mention of suped-up. What say you now? Best Wishes (written before I saw SFoskett latest contribution)- Adrian Pingstone 17:15, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)


Hi. The Chevrolet Corvair had a model called the Corsa as well. I don't know if that's important enough to mention or not. They did make thousands of them...

[edit] German Corsa B image - good enough?

Substitute "Bild" with "Image" and there you go!
Substitute "Bild" with "Image" and there you go!

There is an image of the Opel Corsa B on the German Wikipedia [1] and I was wondering if there is a possibility of using this image on this article. If so, how do you transfer the image here? -Daniel Blanchette 17:37, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

See Help:Images and other uploaded files#Embedding external images. Too bad it's not as easy as putting a namespace prefix in the wikilink... --DmitryKo 10:19, 18 January 2006 (UTC)
It's in the commons, actually: (Bravada, talk - 14:26, 26 June 2006 (UTC))

[edit] Diesel Engine

Any mention of the 1.5 Izuzu diesel engine in the Nova? These little engines have gained quite a reputation, and can be argued to match the GSi at top speeds!

[edit] General Motors' Corsa?

I question the point of calling this article "General Motors Corsa".

Despite the fact that Opel's cars are badged as Opel, Vauxhall, Holden and Chevrolet, they are designed and engineered by the Opel subsidiary of General Motors.

I don't see this approch being used for all the other General Motors models.

You don't write the "Ford Motor Company" DB9 for Aston Martin or the "Ford Motor Company" XJ? Or maybe the Volkswagen AG Flying Spur for the Bentley?

It serves no useful purpose as far as I can see. Can somebody please change it?

Neither do Ford or Jaguar or Lincoln or Mercury or Volvo sell versions of the DB9, that is a faulty argument, and while they are certainly engineered and built by Opel I would question the claim that they are entirely Opel designs, and the significance of the use of the model by several members of the GM family should not be overlooked, neither should the significance of the Vauxhall badged version being the first of the new model to be officially unveiled. Because of all of these issues I see nothing wrong with referring to it as the GM Corsa with redirects from the other pages.

You´re completely right. This is being taken care for the Opel Astra which currently is incorrectly title General Motors Astra. The move has been already proposed and support is unanimous on the article´s talk page. When that's done we will move to General Motors Corsa which should be titled Opel Corsa, and after that we'll move to General Motos Zafira which is also wrongly titled. Loudenvier 14:26, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
I should point out that while Opel Corsa should be the main article, it might be a good idea to have a Chevrolet Corsa spin-off article. GM do Brazil did its own versions of the Corsa which were not present in the European model, namely sedan and wagon versions in the Corsa B, and sedan and pickup (Chevrolet Montana) versions of the Corsa C. --Pc13 23:34, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
I think that they the Corsa B sedans and wagons can be (and actually are) perfectly covered in the Opel Corsa article, just like the Buick/Chevrolet Sail etc., and the Chevrolet Montana, just like the Combo, does have a separate article already (though it is dreadful). Bravada, talk - 07:52, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
I understand your point of view, but I think that perhaps it´s not interesting for the sake of simplicity to have two different articles. Unless the Opel Corsa article gets too long to include information from Chevrolet Corsa, then I think the articles should remain "merged". If the article gets too long, then the "Chevrolet Corsa" section should make a brief overview of the brazilian car history and then provide a link: Main article: Chevrolet Corsa which is inline with wikipedia manual of style. The reasoning for this is that when someone looks for Chevrolet Corsa then he will automaticly arrive at Opel Corsa, which would bring a hell more information and background, because Chevrolet Corsa is so related to Opel Corsa that it´s hard to take them apart. Loudenvier 13:00, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
May I just point out that it is not sold as the "Opel Corsa" in the big English speaking markets so its common English name is justifiably either Vauxhall Corsa or Chevrolet Corsa which is what wikipedia article naming is about. From the MoS, "Names of Wikipedia articles should be optimized for readers over editors; and for a general audience over specialists" GraemeLeggett 09:27, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
That's exactly why the title should be changed as soon as possible. Corsa is from Opel. Automobile articles are named after the brand name that introduced them, this is a guideline of the Automobile Project. The rationale is that exists too much overlap in car naming that skipping the brand name would incurr in the necessity of disambiguation. General Motors Corsa in the WORST case. It's not optimized either for readers nor editors. The car was never branded by General Motors. It was based on Opel Kadett, it's in the category of Opel Vehicles. See Opel Tigra for another car produced by Opel based on the Opel Corsa. Please read the guidelines on Wikipedia:WikiProject_Automobiles/Proposed_naming_convention. If th Vauxhall or Chevrolet corsa information came to be too big to fit on the main article about Opel Corsa, then an article for each should be created, so someone looking for Opel Corsa would immediately know that there are brands of the car that have so much information in addition to the info already in the Opel Corsa article that they deserved their own articles rather than only redirects to Opel Corsa (which, I think will not happen, because I don't think there is so much exclusive information on those Corsa's to deserve a main article for themselves). I understand your worries and I proposed the correct naming of Opel Corsa for the article to address exactly what are worrying you. Regards. Loudenvier 13:56, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
Though you agree on a change of title. I don't buy into the reason why Opel Corsa is necessarily the preferred title. I did finally find some discussion over naming conventions in this past discussion archive of WP:Automobiles. Wikipedia:WikiProject_Automobiles/Proposed_naming_convention has nothing on naming other than disamibguation techniques and the proposed convention appears to have been moribund since creation in May 04. GraemeLeggett 14:36, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
The fact is that General Motors Corsa is a mistake in itself because it does not exists. The Opel Corsa was created by Opel, so that's why it should be called Opel Corsa. The main article about Corsa should be Opel Corsa whith sections or other articles for the Corsas branded by Chevrolet, Vauxhall, etc. The Opel Astra has been recently moved from the wrong General Motors Astra, you can see the discussion on the talk page of the Astra for more arguments. Regards and thanx for being interested in the discussion, the worst thing in wikipedia is when you propose an important change and it went unoticed!!! Loudenvier 17:03, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
On the contrary, the "home market" convention is commonly used, even if we failed to put it down correctly. Large scale changes are under way within WikiProject Automobiles, better description of conventions will surely be put online shortly. Bravada, talk - 14:50, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
I agree with Loudenvier. General Motors Corsa does not make sense. The Corsa was developed by Opel. Therefore, the article should be named Opel Corsa. The other Corsas are all related to the Opel Corsa. These relationships can be stated in the Opel Corsa article. Wizmo 20:05, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Fuel Matters

I don't have time to try to incorporate this information into the article, or validate the information. A friend of mine emailed me regarding this info. It's a topic that he keeps up with. I'm trying to get him to become a contributor to Wikipedia. But until then, someone 'as' or almost as knowlegeable as he is should incorporate the following:

Brazil has 180 proof ethanol, (90% ethanol, 10% water), at every "gas" station for roughly half the cost of petroleum gasoline. 40% of the autos in Brazil do not burn gasoline. The Chevrolet Corsa comes off the lines to burn this fuel with NO petroleum in sight, and these cars adjust themselves for petroleum fuels also. The fuel is domestically produced within the country of Brazil from agricultural products, mainly cane sugar, not corn and grains.

And this article had some good info to incorporate regarding that also; [2]

[edit] Fuel Economy Related

And this following information starts to break into another area which I don't think belongs on this page, but should be on another wikipedia page and internally 'linked' to something from the Corsa page. I know I and many others would love to follow the hot topics that help ease environmental impact.

Two huge ethanol plants were planned, funded, and ready to be built in Indiana last year. They never broke ground. The petroleum industry simply told them that present distribution and consumer delivery systems would intentionally be made unavailable to them. An additional complete motor fuel delivery system will be need to built to get this fuel to the consumer markets.

Most of people of the world are being scammed by the powerful petroleum industry, yes.

Recent claims by the USA fed to fund hydrogen technology development were undertaken because of the low threat to the petroleum industry. The real and viable alternatives will not be implimented.

Hydrogen IS a viable alternative. It is the methods of unlocking it that are the problem as stated below. The Ballard Fuel Cell is very cool. This thing is real. (http://www.ballard.com/) It utilizes H to produce electricity with no combustion taking place and does not produce CO2. Electrolysis is the current option to split water, and cheap abundant electricity will be needed.

Most of the electricity produced is by methods that damage the environment. All electrysis will do at this time is shift the damages from the vehicle itself to the source of the electricity, and this electricity is not cheap enough to warrant producing the hydrogen.

There's lots of other fun stuff to do as an individual though, but those do not address the demands of our consumer market environment, and the conventions within it, at this time. Or, Stanley Meyer had made a sensational breakthrough, dunno. I never see the detailed plans and the technology explained, only the claims.

[edit] Corsa D

I've just seen the new Corsa D "in the flesh" at its UK launch. I can confirm that it is available in 3 and 5 door models. Anyone mind if I update the section on the Corsa D to include (very briefly) what is on offer? Thanks. 86.136.226.153 15:25, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Vauxhall, vauxhall everywhere

Why is everything in the article referring to Vauxhall Corsa? Isn't it only called that in one Market when it is designed by Opel and also marketed as Opel in the vast majority of places?

Because Vauxhall's market is English speaking and the rest of the Europe where it's an Opel isn't? GraemeLeggett 09:15, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Car not being named "Nova" in Spain

I bring in question this statement:

"The Nova name was not used in Spain, because in Spanish, 'Nova' means "doesn't go"." This is untrue for 2 reasons. One being that the car is called Corsa from the start, but the name was changed for the UK to the Nova. It wasn't called "Corsa" specially for the Spanish market, but rather, it was called "Nova" for the UK market.

Secondly, "Nova" do not mean "No Go" in Spanish - http://www.snopes.com/business/misxlate/nova.asp

So this statement should be removed, no? EnglishDude 13:57, 15 January 2007 (UTC)