This summer, we are talking “Generations”. Every week we’ve highlighted another Generation of Corvette. We have pictures, videos, and some great reading material on each Generation of Corvette. In this post, we look at the C6.
C6: Power Player (2005-’13) Rather than start over with a clean slate, Chevrolet’s engineers decided to take the best aspects of the C5 and build upon them. The idea was to create a car that does more things well than performance cars costing two or three times the price. The chief goal for the new Corvette was to improve its refinement and performance while addressing every notable imperfection of the previous generation.
At first glance, the 2005 Corvette is little more than a styling refresh; dig deeper, though, and the C6 is much more. Exposed headlamps, not seen on a Corvette since 1962, combine with a lean grille to create a distinctive “face.” Addressing complaints of the C5’s thick tail, the backside was slimmed down so as not to appear as disproportionate as before. In profile, the sharply cut lines that trail away from the side vents look borrowed from the Dodge Viper, yet the overall look still says Corvette — even more so than the C5.
For the first time since 1968, an engine with 350 cubic inches (5.7 liters) of displacement was offered under the Corvette’s hood as the C6 used a new 6.0-liter “LS2” V8 as its sole power plant. Output came in at 400 hp and 400 pound-feet of torque, providing performance on par with the best from Italy and Germany. According to Chevrolet, the Corvette could rush from zero to 60 mph in an adrenaline-pumping 4.2 seconds, continuing on to a top speed of 186 mph. In Edmunds.com’s first test, a 2005 coupe equipped with the standard six-speed manual reached 60 mph in 4.8 seconds and blitzed the quarter-mile in 12.9 seconds at 109.1 mph.
For 2006 the C6 generation was treated to a serious upgrade with the addition of a newly optional six-speed automatic transmission on regular Corvettes. But more gloriously, this was also the year the Z06 returned running aluminum frame rails, an aggressively tuned suspension and oversize tires and fortified with a new 7.0-liter “LS7” version of GM’s small-block V8 rated at an otherworldly 505 hp.
“It’s probably pathetic to talk about going on a date with a car instead of a human being,” wrote Erin Riches in Edmunds’ first test of the fresh Z06, “but the Corvette Z06 is anything but a cold, dead hunk of metal and plastic. In fact, it’s more alive than many of the men I see at the gym, straining (oftentimes loudly) to pump some bulges into arms rendered slack by life at the office. Without question, that vitality comes from the size XL V8 under its hood, a V8 so rich in torque that the center console plastic is burning hot within an hour. And of course every upshift tamps you down into the seat, because the Z06 is one of those touchy-feely kinds of dates.”
For the record, the 2006 version of the Z06 catapulted from zero to 60 mph in 4.5 seconds and shattered the quarter-mile in 12.2 seconds at a truly astonishing 120.2 mph. The carryover 2007 edition bettered those numbers with 4.1-second 0-60 clocking and a quarter-mile run in 12.0 seconds flat at 121.8 mph. Utterly, blisteringly, ridiculously quick.
After a carryover year in 2007, the 2008 edition of the Corvette appeared equipped with a new 6.2-liter “LS3” version of the small-block V8 aboard rated at 430 hp. Now even the cheapest Corvette (the base coupe with a six-speed manual transmission) ripped to 60 mph in just 4.5 seconds and tore down the quarter-mile in 12.2 seconds at 114.8 mph. That’s dang near ludicrous. And there was more ludicrousness to come in 2009. Supercharged ludicrousness.
The reincarnated ZR1 arrived for 2009 equipped with the LS9 version of the 6.2-liter V8 that featured a belt-driven supercharger atop it, pumping total output to 638 hp. That’s 38 hp beyond four times what the first Corvette’s engine was rated at. And naturally it made the ZR1 the quickest and fastest Corvette ever…by far.
“Brute force,” Josh Jacquot wrote in the first test of the new ZR1, “a quality we can’t help but assign to any car generating 638 hp, is by definition anything but subtle. Yet the 2009 Chevy Corvette ZR1 manages at once to be both brutally quick and remarkably mild-mannered. Its quarter-mile acceleration is quicker than any production car we’ve ever tested, its chassis is benign but highly capable and its carbon-ceramic brakes are mind-bending in their effectiveness. This new ‘Vette offers an unlikely combination of performance and real-world usability that we’re proud to experience in an American car.”
In testing, the ZR1 slammed to 60 mph in 3.8 seconds and consumed the quarter-mile in one big 11.5-second gulp at 128.3 mph. Remember, the first Corvette needed 11.5 seconds to reach 60 mph and this one does a whole quarter-mile in the same time while steaming more than twice as fast. Amazing.
Yet another variation on the Corvette theme arrived in the form of the 2010 Grand Sport. Available as both a coupe and convertible, the Grand Sport effectively replaced the Z51 performance package option and added in wider bodywork, wider tires and a dry-sump oiling system on models equipped with a manual transmission.
A “Carbon Edition” of the Z06 became available for 2011. It included a carbon-fiber hood to knock weight down and more aerodynamic body bits. Only 500 were made.
A “Centennial Edition” of the Corvette was produced for 2012 that celebrated Chevrolet’s 100 years making cars.
In 2013 there was the 427 Convertible that mixed the Z06’s 505-hp 7.0-liter engine with the drop-top body. And finally, with the Corvette at 60, in 2013 there was also a 60th-anniversary version of the 427 Convertible.
And with that, the C6 passed from this world.
Content (except pictures and video): Edmunds