Z06 Fahrbericht in Corvette Magazine

[CR555]

https://www.corvette-mag.com/art1/art1p1.html

The Time of the Giants

For 2006, Chevrolet offers a GT that combines the C6's everyday civility with output approaching an ALMS competition car's. Richard Prince takes to the streets and the track in the fastest Corvette ever made.

Back in November '04, at this car's initial introduction, Dave Hill said, "With regard to performance, we think the new Z06 compares very favorably with other vehicles in its segment." He was smiling at the time.

After driving several Z06s and various competitors on twisting public roads and at Virginia International Raceway I'm here to assure you that, not surprisingly, the chief engineer was understating things more than a little. The new Z06 is a masterwork of performance, posting stats that put it amongst the top half-dozen fastest street cars of all time. But that's hardly a surprise anymore: The surprise, if there really is one, is that beyond the gut-wrenching acceleration, brutal cornering, brick-wall braking, and towering top speed of this car is a GT you can really and truly live with day in and day out. It idles perfectly, runs cool, shifts happily, is content to meander its way through typical commuter traffic, and the highway mileage is into the upper 20s. (Only two cars with 400 or more bhp don't pay federal gas-guzzler tax: the Corvette and Corvette Z06.)

Added to this overall functionality is a base price of $65,800 and a full-boat-loaded sticker around $72K. That's not chump change, certainly, but it's well within the reach of non-millionaires, which you can't say for any other mass-produced car even approaching this level of performance and quality.

Despite all the civility, there's still little chance you'll forget the true goal of the Z06: To move one or two people from here to there really, really fast. Nothing drives this point home better than doing hot laps around VIR, a 3.27-mile collection of glorious twists and turns.

Depress the smooth (and surprisingly light) clutch, push the starter button, and seven liters of smallblock rumble envelope you in a comforting blanket. The official rating of this engine, which is individually hand-assembled at the GM Performance Build Center in Wixom, is 505 horsepower at 6300 rpm and 470 lbs-ft of torque at 4800. Those figures are undeniably huge, and a few short years ago they would've been unprecedented. The same isn't true anymore: Everyone from Mercedes, Bentley, Porsche, Maserati, BMW, and Ferrari to lowly Ford and Dodge are in the 500+ club today. Yet while peak power is certainly important, the LS7's raw numbers are only one, and not the most important, part of its story.

Far more impressive from the driver's perspective is the incredibly broad powerband that accompanies them, thanks in large measure to a time-tested combination of big displacement fed by natural aspiration. The LS7 gives incredible thrust at every point over 2000 rpm, and the sweetest part of the sweet spot comes in the 4000-6500 range, where the tiniest flex of the right foot translates to instantaneous, cheek-flattening acceleration. From there, the rush doesn't stop until the fuel shutoff kicks in at 7100.

A multitude of mechanical blessings, from CNC-ported heads to high-flowing tunnel intakes and arm-sized three-inch exhaust tubing, assist in this gutsy delivery. Still, when all is said and done it's those 427 cubic inches that are really dishing out the car's instant, continuous thrust.

The power flows through a strengthened drivetrain to massive 325/30ZR19 rear tires, the latest version of Goodyear's run-flat EMT F1 Supercar line. Despite being so huge and sticky these tend to light up at will, so a dose of restraint is warranted with each application of full throttle. Even at that, speed tends to build up so quickly you're still getting stuffed into the seatback when VIR's first turn calls off the dogs. Thanks to the excellent grip and massive six-piston front, four-piston rear brakes, that moment comes later with the Z06 than even the 2006 Z51, a car that's hardly a slouch in itself. Fortunately, the 14- and 13.4-inch rotors are vented, crossdrilled, and cooled by intricate but effective ducting. Brake fade is virtually non-existent under the most brutal conditions.

With the car's electronic Delphi overlords put to sleep, increasing-radius corners can be powered out of delightfully, the Z06 making full use of its muscle to set up a giggle-inducing balance of drift and acceleration. On tighter arcs such as Turn Four (the appropriately named Left Hook), more judicious throttle is warranted lest you squander the car's composure before entering the 5A-6A (also known as The Snake). With the throttle wide open and small flicks of the wheel clipping the apexes on both sides, the Z06 rockets through this section with minimal roll and no letup in acceleration. This stability is even more obvious in VIR's high-speed, ascending Esses: Even when you intentionally throw in jerky steering inputs, the body remains composed and the chassis' recovery is immediate.

The famous Oak Tree Turn, one of the slower and more challenging corners in US road-racing, requires exact timing precisely because of this car's unbridled power. Get back on the gas too soon and you'll cross the wheels up at exactly the spot where you want to be smooth. The trick here is to apex calmly and a little late, which lines you up perfectly for the wide-open blast up the 4000-foot back straight. Get it right, and the Z06 will reach 160+ before you must dip into the brakes again to firm up for Turn 14. The Z51, star though it is in its own right, "only" sees about 140.

Turns 14, 14A, and 15 add up to a segment they call the Roller Coaster; running downhill and with favorable camber, the car plants itself right into the pavement here, meaning you can rip through this sequence faster than logic and physics would seem to allow. (Or at least you could, except that your brain might say yes-yes but your right foot keeps saying no-no. Face it: The Z06 is faster than you are.) From there, a quick tap on the brakes sets things up for Hog Pen, the enjoyable righthander that scrubs off just enough speed to get you back on the long front straight to start it all over.

That the Z06 feels perfectly at home on the track isn't surprising, considering that it was developed hand in hand with the C6R and refined on fast circuits from VIR to the Nürburgring. How it will behave on the street is a bigger question, as anyone who's ever driven another car of this mettle can attest. Porsche's Carrera GT, to name just one, is a sublime track machine but a depressingly balky ride out in the real world.

To examine the new Z06 in these situations I cruised through towns, blasted up stretches of Interstate, and tore across twisting country roads all up and down the hill country of Virginia and North Carolina. The verdict: In ordinary driving on smooth pavement, the Z06 is virtually indistinguishable from a standard Corvette, but over less-than-perfect roads its ride is a lot stiffer—not to the point of being uncomfortable, but enough so that there's no doubt you're in a high-performance car.

The difference is equally clear with rolling-start acceleration, the kind most often used on the street. Here the LS7-powered machine has a sizable jump on even the burly LS2 Corvette. The adrenaline rush is further enhanced by the Z06's "bi-modal" mufflers (Chevrolet-ese for good-old-fashioned cutouts). Stomp the pedal hard and these cutouts swing wide open, sending the exhaust gasses straight through without any pesky baffling. Sure, this aids performance by reducing backpressure, but let's face it—the real purpose here is that straightpipes just sound so phenomenal.

While many cars that love the predictable, controlled realm of a racetrack seem clumsy and frustrated on narrow, ambling two-lanes, the Z06 offers everything street drivers could want: fine sightlines, great balance, accurate steering, bank-solid brakes, and sophisticated chassis control systems that are willing to clean up mistakes after the fact. Even the car's hefty footprint—three inches wider than the standard Corvette, which is no prancing pixie—doesn't prevent this machine from being happily nimble and confident.

Conceivably, you may feel you need to go faster than the Z06 allows (zero to 60 in 3.7 seconds, the quarter mile in 11.7 at 125, and 198 on the top end). Fine: You'll need to spend five or ten times as much just to get started, plus Lord-knows how much for repairs and upkeep. The only other car even approaching this same balance of performance, docility, comfort, and reliability is the twin-turbo 911, a car that costs twice as much and which the Z06 handily outperforms.

What about the Dodge Viper or Ford GT? Despite its similar output, the Dodge isn't remotely this fast in practice: The Z06 leaves it gasping for air at the track, while even base Corvettes can stomp Vipers on public byways. The Ford GT makes a closer rival, with its 200-pound weight disadvantage being more or less offset by 45 additional peak horses. Still, with its balkier supercharged powerband, clumsier steering, less usable cabin and cargo layout, limited visibility, and growing reputation for serious design and assembly issues, Dearborn's twice-the-price halo car isn't in the same league either.

Few cars can claim to have no competition, and fewer still can live up to it. The '06 Corvette Z06 is an exception, I'm confident to report. For speed, comfort, utility, and sheer value, nothing else even comes close.

[JR]

Schöner Artikel!

Danke, Don.

mit genussvoll lesendem Gruß

JR