Junkyard Gem: 2007 Pontiac G5

The Pontiac G5 was a badge-engineered version of the Chevrolet Cobalt coupe, sold in the United States for just the 2007-2009 model years. It was fairly quick, with 148 horses in the base version, and could be had with a 5-speed manual transmission. After the faulty-ignition-switch public-relations nightmare a few years ago, the perceived value of Cobalts and G5s dropped, which means it doesn’t take much of a crash for an insurance company to declare one totaled. Here’s a crashed-not-very-hard ’07 that I spotted in a Denver-area self-service yard.

Manual transmissions in these cars were uncommon, but at least you could get one.

Now that these cars are showing up at the cheap wrecking yards, they become very attractive for use as track-day or autocross beaters. See, not all Junkyard Gems are old cars!

In Canada, the G5 was known as the Pursuit for a brief period, and it inspired madness.

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