Junkyard Find: 2001 Pontiac Sunfire
The GM J Platform, best known for being the basis of the Chevrolet Cavalier, was built for a full quarter-century before being axed in 2005. The last J-Body Pontiac of them all was the Sunfire, a Cavalier sibling. Here’s an ’01 with a racy-looking hood scoop I recently spotted in a San Francisco Bay Area self-service yard.
The engine was gone, but I checked the VIN and learned that this car came from the factory with the 2.2-liter version of the “122” engine that powered J-bodies starting all the way back in 1982. 115 horses plus the added 50 generated by the hood scoop. Naturally, the car has an automatic transmission.
A U.C. Davis parking sticker plus several decals representing 1990s California pop-punk bands (e.g., Blink-182, Green Day) tells us something about this car’s final owner. This Sunfire made it to age 15, which is not bad for a J-Body. These cars tended to lead hard lives.
Just the car for escaping your boy-toy’s enraged mother. The remote door locks enable a quick getaway.
To you, it’s a traffic light. To the Sunfire driver, it’s a root canal.
The panic button seemed pretty futuristic back then.
Murilee Martin is the pen name of Phil Greden, a writer who has lived in Minnesota, California, Georgia and (now) Colorado. He has toiled at copywriting, technical writing, junkmail writing, fiction writing and now automotive writing. He has owned many terrible vehicles and some good ones. He spends a great deal of time in self-service junkyards. These days, he writes for publications including Autoweek, Hagerty and The Truth About Cars.
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Weren't these particularly popular in Canada?
By the time 2002 came about, it got the L61 Ecotec 2.2L 4-cyl and 4-speed automatic. In the rental Cavalier I drove it in, it was pretty enthusiastic - so much so that I got nabbed for an 85 in a 60 on I-55 on the west side of Lake Pontchartrain. It didn't hurt that it had 10 hp and 20 lb-ft of torque extra over my 2002 Focus. It didn't hurt that there was nothing substantial to the Cavalier. The far-more substantial Cobalt I later purchased with the same engine (and a stick!) never quite had this Cavalier's enthusiasm; more car to haul around. Typical of GM, the engine/transmission were winners, but the rest of the car actively mocked your financial sense in purchasing it. My 2002 Focus was a much nicer car despite the less-energetic engine.