Interesting Corvette info -> 928
12-11-2003, 06:11 PM
#1
928 Collector
Rennlist Member
Rennlist Member
Thread Starter
Interesting Corvette info -> 928
Very very interesting ....
don't click: http://corvette.caranddriver.com/get...d=83&siteid=CD
this site on Caranddriver is LOADED with hidden refreshes, so I'm posting the article here:
CAR and DRIVER ROAD TEST: Corvette!
Wherein America takes on all comers.
By Brock Yates
page 1 of 3
[ printer friendly ]
You have waited long enough. So let's get it over with right now: the new Corvette is a truly stout automobile. It is all that the fevered acolytes so
desperately wanted their fiberglass fossil to be — a true-born, world-class sports car loaded with technical sophistication.
Lest such a claim be dismissed as more hyperbolic reverie about the blowzy old doyenne of the boulevards, consider the following:
Item: The roadholding on this new machine is so advanced that we recorded the highest skidpad lateral acceleration — 0.90 g — ever observed
with a conventional automobile by this staff. That figure practically trivializes the previous high-water marks, in the 0.82-g range, generated by
such exotics as the Porsche 928 and assorted Ferraris.
Item: It is hands-down the fastest American automobile, capable of 140-mph top speeds, 0-to-60 times under seven seconds, and 15.2-second
quarter-mile forays at 90 mph. In fact, these figures qualify the Corvette as one of the half-dozen fastest production automobiles in the entire
world!
Item: Its braking, thanks to an advanced Girlock four-wheel-disc system, makes the car stop as if it had been dropped into a sand bank. Our
70-to-0-mph brake test produced a stop in a mere 173 feet — seven feet shorter than the best 1982 distance of 180 feet, recorded by a Porsche
928, and not far off the all-time record of 165 feet, set by a Porsche 930 Turbo!
"I'll take all comers. You bring what you want," is the way Fred Schaafsma puts it, and he ought to know. He is part of the tiny cadre of Chevrolet
engineers who, while huddled in a temporary patchwork of trailer offices at GM's proving grounds in Milford, Michigan, brought the new car into
being. A native of the Netherlands, Schaafsma (real first name: Freerk) is fiercely loyal to the car he helped develop and is proud of its unique
combination of qualities: its traditionally lusty big-inch V-8, its fully independent, forged-aluminum suspension with plastic leaf springs, its
optional four-speed manual transmission with automatic overdrive in the top three gears, its plastic-over-steel-frame construction. "I was born and
raised in Europe, and I know that a car doesn't necessarily have to be like a European machine in order to be good," he says. He and his
cohorts openly admit, however, that the Porsche 928 was the "data point" on which a great deal of the Corvette development centered. "When
we compared our car against the Porsche, I can tell you there were a lot of good feelings at Chevrolet."
For those who expected the 1984 Corvette (yes, '84 — it will be marketed as such for eighteen months) to be a cross between a Lamborghini
Countach and an F-16, there will be disappointment. The shape is clean and forthright, devoid of the phallic silliness that distinguished its
predecessor during its protracted career. It comes in a single body style, that of a classic two-seat sports car with a removable, one-piece roof
panel and a hatchback. It is 8.5 inches shorter overall than the old car, and its wheelbase, at 96 inches, is two inches shorter. But the new car is
beamier by an equivalent amount, which translates into additional interior space, including 6.5 inches extra shoulder room.
A first encounter tends to leave one faintly unfulfilled, as if the long-awaited confrontation should have been more dramatic. But that notion fades
as the honesty of the effort becomes evident. This is a dead-serious sports car. It defers to the bizarre only with its video-game instrument panel,
which features all manner of multicolored, liquid-crystal bar graphs and digital displays in metric and English. "We were having a little fun with
the instrument panel," admits Dave McLellan, the widely respected chief engineer on the Corvette project. "There are a lot of things about the car
that go beyond basic needs, and in this sense the Corvette competes with things like fast powerboats and ultralight airplanes. Like them, the
Corvette goes beyond serious transportation. This is a sports car, and we wanted it for one simple mission — to go fast."
don't click: http://corvette.caranddriver.com/get...d=83&siteid=CD
this site on Caranddriver is LOADED with hidden refreshes, so I'm posting the article here:
CAR and DRIVER ROAD TEST: Corvette!
Wherein America takes on all comers.
By Brock Yates
page 1 of 3
[ printer friendly ]
You have waited long enough. So let's get it over with right now: the new Corvette is a truly stout automobile. It is all that the fevered acolytes so
desperately wanted their fiberglass fossil to be — a true-born, world-class sports car loaded with technical sophistication.
Lest such a claim be dismissed as more hyperbolic reverie about the blowzy old doyenne of the boulevards, consider the following:
Item: The roadholding on this new machine is so advanced that we recorded the highest skidpad lateral acceleration — 0.90 g — ever observed
with a conventional automobile by this staff. That figure practically trivializes the previous high-water marks, in the 0.82-g range, generated by
such exotics as the Porsche 928 and assorted Ferraris.
Item: It is hands-down the fastest American automobile, capable of 140-mph top speeds, 0-to-60 times under seven seconds, and 15.2-second
quarter-mile forays at 90 mph. In fact, these figures qualify the Corvette as one of the half-dozen fastest production automobiles in the entire
world!
Item: Its braking, thanks to an advanced Girlock four-wheel-disc system, makes the car stop as if it had been dropped into a sand bank. Our
70-to-0-mph brake test produced a stop in a mere 173 feet — seven feet shorter than the best 1982 distance of 180 feet, recorded by a Porsche
928, and not far off the all-time record of 165 feet, set by a Porsche 930 Turbo!
"I'll take all comers. You bring what you want," is the way Fred Schaafsma puts it, and he ought to know. He is part of the tiny cadre of Chevrolet
engineers who, while huddled in a temporary patchwork of trailer offices at GM's proving grounds in Milford, Michigan, brought the new car into
being. A native of the Netherlands, Schaafsma (real first name: Freerk) is fiercely loyal to the car he helped develop and is proud of its unique
combination of qualities: its traditionally lusty big-inch V-8, its fully independent, forged-aluminum suspension with plastic leaf springs, its
optional four-speed manual transmission with automatic overdrive in the top three gears, its plastic-over-steel-frame construction. "I was born and
raised in Europe, and I know that a car doesn't necessarily have to be like a European machine in order to be good," he says. He and his
cohorts openly admit, however, that the Porsche 928 was the "data point" on which a great deal of the Corvette development centered. "When
we compared our car against the Porsche, I can tell you there were a lot of good feelings at Chevrolet."
For those who expected the 1984 Corvette (yes, '84 — it will be marketed as such for eighteen months) to be a cross between a Lamborghini
Countach and an F-16, there will be disappointment. The shape is clean and forthright, devoid of the phallic silliness that distinguished its
predecessor during its protracted career. It comes in a single body style, that of a classic two-seat sports car with a removable, one-piece roof
panel and a hatchback. It is 8.5 inches shorter overall than the old car, and its wheelbase, at 96 inches, is two inches shorter. But the new car is
beamier by an equivalent amount, which translates into additional interior space, including 6.5 inches extra shoulder room.
A first encounter tends to leave one faintly unfulfilled, as if the long-awaited confrontation should have been more dramatic. But that notion fades
as the honesty of the effort becomes evident. This is a dead-serious sports car. It defers to the bizarre only with its video-game instrument panel,
which features all manner of multicolored, liquid-crystal bar graphs and digital displays in metric and English. "We were having a little fun with
the instrument panel," admits Dave McLellan, the widely respected chief engineer on the Corvette project. "There are a lot of things about the car
that go beyond basic needs, and in this sense the Corvette competes with things like fast powerboats and ultralight airplanes. Like them, the
Corvette goes beyond serious transportation. This is a sports car, and we wanted it for one simple mission — to go fast."
12-11-2003, 06:19 PM
#3
928 Collector
Rennlist Member
Rennlist Member
Thread Starter
Interesting was the insight into Chevrolet's goals -- aimed at the 928. They seemed to hold a very high regard for the 928, comparing it in many areas of performance .....
12-11-2003, 06:38 PM
#4
Addict
Rennlist Member
Rennlist
Site Sponsor
Rennlist Member
Rennlist
Site Sponsor
That 4 plus 3 transmission was about as bad as they come ..... a manual with an automatic hung on the back sharing the same fluid ...gear bits and pieces circulating in the auto .............. seemed like a good idea at the time . They may have aimed at the 928 but obviously missed !!
12-11-2003, 08:22 PM
#5
Burning Brakes
This was news in 1984. Why post it now?
Maybe you can dig up an old article from the 70's where Ford liked the Audi Fox so much they based the Fairmont on it.
Maybe you can dig up an old article from the 70's where Ford liked the Audi Fox so much they based the Fairmont on it.
12-11-2003, 08:39 PM
#6
928 Collector
Rennlist Member
Rennlist Member
Thread Starter
This was posted in a Porsche 928 Forum. Someone else decided to move it here, not me. It is interesting from a Porsche 928 perspective, what Chevrolet's thinking was, and this is why I posted it in the Porsche 928 Forum.
12-11-2003, 11:03 PM
#7
Cottage Industry Sponsor
Lifetime Rennlist
Member
Lifetime Rennlist
Member
What was that 4+3 transmission supposed to do? How was it operated? Was there a clutch, or chould you shift the manual gears without clutch?
