[QUOTE]Originally posted by gregstevens
[B]

Me neither...just not sure I'd shell out the cake for it, either!

A friend of mine is thinking about getting a Viper GTS and I am trying to steer him in the direction of a Z06.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by erik
[B]Charlie,

Quick question, why is it important to get into the new millenium when then have an engine that produces over 400 hp and a car that does 0-60 in 4s and the quarter in like 12.4s.

 

I agree with you on the interior. Not a big fan. My buddy has a C5, he loves it, I like it, but for the money, I probably would have bought something else.

ERIK

 

The funny thing about GM sticking with a pushrod V8 in the Vette is that they are doing it primarily as a cost constraint issue with regards to their manufacturing process. In the Bowling Green plant, the drivetrain is assembled/prepped on the floor below the main car assembly line, and then lifted up into the car from below. An OHV engine for the C5 was investigated, but was too wide to fit through the space provided and would have had to be lowered down into the engine bay. This restructuring of their assembly method would have cost GM alot of money, so they stuck with pushrods.

Clark

 

Where did you get this from. Everything I've seen in multiple sources says that they used an OHV engine to be able to have a sloping hood and good CD. It's for vehicle packaging, not factory packaging. Especially since an OHC (what you meant to say, I think) engine wouldn't be wider, it would be taller. Lastly, you may not have seen the frame of the C5 but I'd be pretty certain that you couldn't lift the engine up from the bottom.

Bottom line, I think you may have heard some "piss on Chevy" bullshit from someone who was irked about the power in the engine. Dissing vettes and camaros is pretty common among those with slower cars that are more "high tech".

BTW lvs2k, the pronunciation is SAHba SAYzair. You wouldn't care, though, if you'd seen him drive a road course. At least on video, he looks pretty ham-handed (sort of the way Beig thinks about me. )

I'd love to have a Z06 and an S2000. Since Suz had back surgery, I've been driving her car, the Z28, again and I'm also enjoying it

 

Second embarassing error for me this week. Owing to my bad memory I realized tonight (when I opened a C&D) that I was talking about that other editor (from R&T) whose name escapes me. And a small change in pronunciation: SAHba sayZAIR. Sorry Csaba. I actually know nothing about your driving.

 

What are you talkin about? Vettes are broke all the time Well my fathr had a C4 that was junk so I can't speak from exprience about the C5. I doubt that it's better by a significant enough margin to make it a reliable sports car, but then again reliable and sports cars shouldn't even be used in the same sentence....unless it's a honduh

 

jschmidt,

This manufacturing method and reasoning was told to me by a former GM Engineer. Although he wasn't part of the Corvette team, this was one of his GM tales/stories he used to talk about.

Yes, I did mean OHC (thanks), but an OHC V8 would be both taller AND wider assuming the same angle between the cylinder banks.

As for fitting from underneath, I've never personally examined the underside of the C4 or the C5, but I thought I recall reading (back when the C5 was new) that the new hydroformed "frame rails" were so much stiffer that they allowed Chevy to space them wide enough that they actually sit the cockpit down between them.

Here is a picture I snagged of a C5 in production, showing the unibody being lowered down onto the pre-assembled drivetrain, which I understand to be assembled on the floor below and then brought up the line on it's little trolley there. To be honest, I had a mental image of the engine coming up from below on a sort of elevator, but that was my own creation based on the story I had been told.

Clark

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by xpander4
[B]

 

I don't think I'll ever own a vette, unless I get very old and dont want shift one day, then it would be a good cheap torque monster!