The rumour mill has been churning out details about a mid-engined corvette for some time now and to be honest, I was never all that excited about it. Now having seen it, I’m relieved to confirm my feelings were well founded because (best american accent) god damn it’s ugly.
The Americans aren’t renowned for building the most attractive looking things and on the whole, their automotive design is no exception. Unless you want a relatively simple, boxing but admittedly aggressive design; there’s very little the American market can offer you.
I hate to say it, but there lack of experience shows with Corvette’s first foray into the mid-engined scene. The sharp lines are in plentiful supply, but they don’t seem to flow from front to back and the overall proportions and stance seem awkward at best, fuck ugly at worst.
Looks aside, it seems like a fairly interesting proposition. The motor may be in a different place to normal, but it’s an evolution of Corvette’s 6.2-litre push-rod V8. It produces 488bhp and 470lb ft of torque. Coupled to an eight-speed DCT box will propel this ugly beast to 62 in under three seconds.
Chevy claims that although ugly (not their words), their first mid-engined motor produces 180kg of downforce thanks in part to the front splitter and wing. There’s an electronically controlled rear diff and magnetic suspension. This then promises to be much more than a hot-rod with the engine in the wrong place. It’s a proper supercar.
To keep costs down, the chassis is a more old-school aluminium (a-loo-min-um) construction. No fancy carbon shell, but prices start at $60,000 and rather excitingly (so I’m told) it will be available this side of the pond RHD.