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Saw this on the cover of a magazine. Love the graphics and paint.

My brother had one of these, we drove it to the 1996 Corvettes at Carlisle show.

I've always wanted one of these.

Just one more Corvette Pace Car. Can anyone tell me the year I missed?



F.

There are but two Corvettes that ever really interested me. The first was the Corvette Grand Sport model, a purely racing version, from the early 1960s and the later four camshaft version that GM actively killed. I think that the latter was called the ZL-1 and was built in the late 1980s but no sooner had they gotten it into production than they brought out the standard Corvette with the same body modifications and raised the power of the Mouse Motor in the high performance versions to equal or better the output of the four cam versions. And the pushrod versions cost a lot less.

Here you go Hugh. Doing what it was meant to do.

Okay give up? 1998 is one I left out.

I just remembered that my brother-in-law has a 1976 Pace Car Corvette up on blocks. I believe that I have seen it running exactly once in the about 15 or so years that he has owned it.

78 was the pace car year. I own a 1976.
It's a simple 350 engine. Not hard to get going or keep going.
He must just be interested in other things.

The Pace car in 78 was selling way above list price as people picked them up as a future collectible. There are more low mileage varieties around than high mileage ones. GM never set production limits so the high collector prices never happened.

F.

An infatuation. A love. A bad habit???An Indulgence?

Well, i don't know for sure.

I was blessed with an indulgent Father--and with a successful and simililarly indulgent Wife (thank God).

So, into Corvette Tales we go:

My first, a 327ci 350 hp 1965 Fastback (mass plate 68500), was a great ride (Silver Blue.) The small block was perfect in ideal at this time, but no one really knew how to to tune the dern thing.

I was at College and the School allowed no cars for underclassmen on Campus.

But, when I was home my roomate, sho attached himself to my family like a limpet for four years by dating my Sister (god rest her) asked to take 'Vette No. One to Boston to see "The man of la mancha" aand park my pet at a parking lot.

I said no. Eventually I was bludgeoned in to allowing this outrage by my father's promsie to g"get me a new one" in the event of any mishap.

I really didn't WANT a new one!!!

But, at the time of the closing of the show I received a phone call from my Roomie:

"Hi John"
"Hi Dave"
"Uhhhhh-a bit of a problem here-----"

"What kind of problem!!!!!"

"Well-it's like this---ahhh--it's gone-------"

My Father then walked in and asked me who was on the phone (poor guy-i miss him) and I said:

"My new Corvette!!!!"

The new one was a Big block 435hp 427 ci Monster. I was in love.

Dad never blinked an eye about honoring his promise!!!! Of course there were a few ruff edges:

No AC in the Big Block.

Thieves off its predecessor when apprehended with drugs in car maintained (of course) that the drugs were in the car when they stole it~~~~~!!!!

Nobody bought that.

More later.

J

Two college stories:

I was at American University in Washington, DC, in the Fall of 1962 and one of the guys on campus was the son of a Long Island Chevy dealer. One day, a semi truck appeared parked on one of the streets just off-campus. It caused something of a ruckus as the streets ran through the extremely expensive and restricted neighborhood of Spring Valley, but that was worked out and the truck sat there for about 3 days until the official unveiling of the 1963 Corvette, the first of the Sting Rays. At that point, the truck driver unloaded a brand new split-window coupe with New York tags. That guy was the envy of the campus!

I had another friend whose parents had more money than good sense and, in 1965, bought him a 427SC Cobra. This was the version of the 427 Cobra that was built for racing, but they had to build a certain number in order to qualify it for production racing with the 427 cid stock car engine. This was the engine with solid lifters, high performance camshaft, already ported and polished intake and exhaust ports, two four-barrel Holley carburetors, and tuned tubular steel exhaust headers leading to outside collector pipes. In the street legal versions, they put glass-pack mufflers inside the collector pipes just as they do on the Dodge Vipers. The engine was advertised as having 425 hp, but it was rather more like 500 - 550 hp. That in a car that weighed about 2600 pounds! I never got a chance to drive it as one of the restrictions that his parents did put on it was that none of his friends drive it. But, God almighty, what a car!! It was noisy and rough, but it was indecently FAST! He used to blow 427 Corvettes into the weeds with great regularity. He and the car actually made to graduation and I lost track of both of them at that point.

Chevy in 1963 had a 1900 lb Corvette with a 377 aluminum block making 550 horse nicknamed the "Cobra Killer". GM shut down this car before it got past 5 produced, well below the 100 needed to qualify. The few that competed without factory support did real well.

Keep in mind I consider the Corvette it's own car company. They have their own factory after all. I think GM vehicles are junk after my latest Trailblazer.

F.

A little fun on the autobahn in a Z06.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JbJGrGPZE3g

f.Channell wrote:Chevy in 1963 had a 1900 lb Corvette with a 377 aluminum block making 550 horse nicknamed the "Cobra Killer". GM shut down this car before it got past 5 produced, well below the 100 needed to qualify. The few that competed without factory support did real well.

That was the famed "Grand Sport" model that I mentioned earlier and they weren't entirely without factory support. If you're interested, I suggest that you buy a copy of Chevrolet=Racing...: Fourteen Years of Raucous Silence by Paul Van Valkenburgh
http://www.amazon.com/Chevrolet-Racing- ... 562&sr=1-1

He was an engineer for Chevrolet during that period and had been delegated to, among others, Jim Hall's Chaparral effort, Roger Penske's Camaro TransAm effort, and some others. Let's just say that Chevy got around that corporate policy as did Pontiac. Did you really think that the Royal Oak Bobcat GTO's weren't the product of Pontiac's R&D? The Corvette that really got castrated by the policy was the 1957 Super Sport that Zora Arkus-Duntov was developing to run in the international endurance races such as Sebring and Le Mans, but the AMA policy that resulted from the terrible Le Mans accident in 1955 killed the project. Bill Mitchell eventually got the chassis, rebodied it, and named it the "Sting Ray" under which name it was shown aroiund the auto show circuit and then raced as a C Modified Special in SCCA races by the flying dentist, Dr. Dick Thompson. He had a good bit of success with it, too. And we all know what resulted from it.

[quoteKeep in mind I consider the Corvette it's own car company. They have their own factory after all. I think GM vehicles are junk after my latest Trailblazer.

F.[/quote]
Actually, the Corvette folks have had to follow the orders from Chevrolet Division pretty closely, as shown by the ZL-1 debacle. You must remember that Corvette is Chevy's "Halo Car." They get away with a lot, but they also must be very clearly identified as "Chevrolet" in order for that halo effect to work.

BTW, IIRC, wasn't that 377 CID engine for the Grand Sport a prototype for the eventual 396 cid "Porcupine Head" engine of the late 1960s?