TLDR (but looked at the pics): Had it as a rental. Decent car, good driving characteristics. Trunk and back seats are horrible. V6 has good power. Great gas mileage even when occasionally flooring it. Would consider on the used market.

I was in California for a few weeks and instead of a compact car I was given this:




I've never been a fan of them but I'll review it the best I can.

Exterior

The car does have a presence. You can see from the amount of hood line, and the very small windows that this is only a sports car. I believe this is the 1LT, as it had the V6 in it. It sits fairly low to the ground, so getting in and out can be a neat trick if you're in the geriatric group (like me). But overall not horrible. One issue I had was the parking bump stops. I rubbed the bottom of the car on every single one. Curbs as well.






Trunk

I will say this is the most horrible trunk opening I have ever dealt with. You can see from the picture that it actually goes in fairly deep. And if your cargo has the right dimensions, you can put a lot of stuff in there. Unfortunately for me, I had to have a suitcase ride shotgun with me because the opening would not allow anything else.

Interior

I'm an ergonomics kind of guy. I do believe that there should be good form and function inside. Well, this is hit and miss.








The sight lines out the front are pretty bad, considering the height of the hood. Out the rear is worse. This is where the rear view camera comes in, as the picture is sharp and does have the guidelines. The visuals on the dash were good. I liked having a small display area with information in between the speedometer and the tach. The wheel had a nice feel to it. The gauges were all very clear, read well even with fairly bright sunlight on them. Just below the 10 and 2 o'clock positions behind the wheel are the paddle shifters. The wheel buttons took a bit of getting used to, but not bad.

The HVAC controls are a little tough to get at, but you can also control the through the radio and touch screen. The temperature is an odd adjustment: You turn the silver ring that is the air vent on the lower left. Fan speed is controlled by the silver ring on the air vent at the lower right. That took a bit to get used to.

The touch screen, as you can see, was a bit on the small side. And it did have Apple Car Play and Android Auto. I only used Android auto and that worked just fine. Took only a minute to set up. Read my OnePlus 6T with no issues. This also had XM for the first three days, then it shut off. Didn't really use it much but the radio worked fine as well.

In the transmission well there's a mode button, with three modes available: Sport, Touring, and winter/snow mode. I kept it mostly in the sport mode, but did put it in touring a few times. But I always seemed to have to go through the snow mode to get to one of the other modes, pushing the button either way. Maybe it was just me

For the driver, the seat was a power adjustable seat (fore, aft, up, down, and lumbar). For longer hauls it was fairly comfortable, and the side bolstering kept my hips in place. Is it Volvo or Subaru comfortable? No, but pretty good. The rear seat is, well, meant for three year olds or less. IT is really tough egress, and with the front seat set for my 5'9" height, there was about 6 inches of leg room back there. Avoid at all costs putting humans in there.

A pet peeve of mine is the HVAC controls. Looking at them, you could say that they would easily be in the Chevy Cruise, the Equinox, or Camaro. I get it, you save development and parts money, but it just looks cheap. Speaking of cheap, the interior materials, a lot of different grains of plastic. Lots. At times it felt more like a coffin than a car. The pedals are nicely spaced apart, and the dead pedal is located in a good spot for those long drives.

Engine and Driving Characteristics



The engine is the 3.6L V6, with 335 HP and 284 Lb-Ft. of torque. The car had no issues bringing that power to bear. During highway driving, it was not hard to be doing 75 or so, and feel the need to pass Californians doing 76 in the left lane and holding up traffic. So in Sport mode, the car would slightly hesitate and drop a few gears (this is a 10 speed automatic) before it would accelerate. Maybe .5 seconds or so from mashing the gas to seeing the speed go up. And it does go up rather quickly. Going down 101 south of Salinas, I was able to easily pass who I wanted to pass. And using the pdles was a bit of art, as one downshift was usually not enough. But they functioned just fine. You can use them with the shifter in D, or you can move the shifter towards the driver and it will hold whatever gear you're in.
The steering was for me a bit of a let down. It felt a bit artificial, and I found this a bit odd, expecting a normal rack and pinion set up instead of the variable electronic system this has connected to the rack and pinion. In lower speed situations, as in driving up Highway 1, it felt direct enough, It's at higher speeds I felt it was a touch vague.

A surprise to me was the cylinder deactivation and gas mileage. When driving at slower speeds (under 50), the engine would go to "V4" mode. I didn't notice unless I saw the display change to V4. This helped me with the gas mileage, as I averaged ~28 MPG. And I did drive like an ass hat and an old guy. So I was impressed. The key is the transmission, where I would be cruising at 85 mph, butt he tach would be under 2000 RPM. pretty nice.

Road noise: The A pillar area is not a great point of insulation, so quite a bit of road and wind nose comes through. Of course, with this type of car it's not going to be Mercedes quiet by any stretch, but it wasn't too bad. Even the V6 makes a nice rumble when you put your foot down.

Conclusion

Would I buy one? While the V6 was peppy and fun to drive, if buying new I'd have to defer to the 6.2L for not that much more and a nice and tidy 455 HP. But the V6, on the cheap, used, would not be a bad thing, if you're looking for a sports car that can get pretty good MPG, and is sporty to boot.

 

Solid review - had one as a rental when my wife and I went to Hawaii.

Powertrain was decent but oh my god, the side / rear visibility was absolutely atrocious. Like, you needed to rely solely on the backup camera and even then the screen / resolution was subpar.

Not a bad car, but the visibility was enough for me to hate it .

 

I did forget to mention that the side mirrors are actually pretty decent, as I think they are fairly wide. But visibility out of this thing is rough at best.

 

The LFX is a stout little V6. Lighter than an LS, so they're slowly gaining popularity as an LS alternative for swaps. Have seen a few early Miatas go LFX over LS. They're still pricey though.
It's been years since I've been in a newer Camaro, from the first few years they were reintroduced. You've got to be really good with your mirrors, as the visibility isn't great at all.

For my money, I'd likely but a Mustang over the Camaro or Challenger, but wouldn't turn down time in one for fun.

 

Had one a couple years ago on rental. At a hair under 6'5" guy it was a fold operation in and out of it.
Mine too was the v6, It was OK, but the exhaust note inside the car drove me absolutely nuts!
Had to be driven in sport mode at all times to avoid 10 gear at 55 mph.
Solid car, quick, too low horrible ride.

In closing your review was spot on IMO.

 

Unless it is a convertible, i will never drive a Camaro if i had other options. That thing is a deathtrap with all the blind spots...

I was given the choice between Camaro and a Camry once at Vegas airport, i took the Camry... and i hate Camry with all my heart.

 

That interior is hideous but I guess it matches the rear