T350 slower than Corvette ???

[gerjo]

Saw a (replay) of Top Gear yesterday on Dutch tv, where they tested the new Corvette. In the sprint the T350 kicked the asses of the Corvette, NSX and 911. On the track however, the Stig managed a time of around 1:27 with the Corvette which is 1 second faster than the standard setup T350, if I remember correctly. Or am I mistaken?
This is really surprising, isn't it?

[joospeed]

erm, not really that corvette is a great car, and stunning value for money. most brits would be slower than in the tvr because the vette is lhd only which takes some getting used to .. but race drivers are used to lhd so no probs there.
it's leaf spring rear end is also well located, and by all accounts very predictable when it lets go so hooligan action is there if you need it, yay!
in all it looks to me like a truly great car, and though the t350 looks prettier I can fully believe the vette is quicker.

[900T-R]

And as discussed before, the 'new' Stig times seem to be a fair bit qquicker than the ones recorded in earlier series for whatever reasons.

[Boosted LS1]

joospeed said:

erm, not really that corvette is a great car, and stunning value for money. most brits would be slower than in the tvr because the vette is lhd only which takes some getting used to .. but race drivers are used to lhd so no probs there. it's leaf spring rear end is also well located, and by all accounts very predictable when it lets go so hooligan action is there if you need it, yay! in all it looks to me like a truly great car, and though the t350 looks prettier I can fully believe the vette is quicker.

I think those leaf springs are made from carbon fibre?

Boosted.

[CiderwithCerbie]

Time to let the Stiglet (he's mot the original one anyway) loose on the T440R methinks!

[joospeed]

Boosted LS1 said:

joospeed said: erm, not really that corvette is a great car, and stunning value for money. most brits would be slower than in the tvr because the vette is lhd only which takes some getting used to .. but race drivers are used to lhd so no probs there. it's leaf spring rear end is also well located, and by all accounts very predictable when it lets go so hooligan action is there if you need it, yay! in all it looks to me like a truly great car, and though the t350 looks prettier I can fully believe the vette is quicker. I think those leaf springs are made from carbon fibre? Boosted.

it's certainly not as antiquated as biased top gear would have you believe, in fact if you completely separate the leaf spring wind up from the axle and make it lightweight it's just as good as any other spring medium i would have thought. don't know how the vette uses them, but I would imagine they've sorted the wind up and torque-lift of the r/h wheel under acceleration? the american boys could possibly tell us more, but on the face of it it appears a well set up car and fast .. yay! and makes a proper engine sound so that's another point over the T350 ...

[rev-erend]

Old fashioned leaf sprung cars (Capri, Escort) etc .. has the entire weight of the axle on the leaf springs .. thats a lot of weight.

I suspect the vette - has the diff mounted on the chassis bit like the Jag IRS set-up.

[joospeed]

a quick google suggets it's transverse leaf spring, so like a triumph spitfire then .. .. but reference to short/long arms implies independance with wishbone type geometry. good call

[gerjo]

In any case I find it quite astonishing; the Vette, with 400 bhp and, what is it, 1.500 kg beating the T350 with 350 bhp and 1.100 kg. Looking at the times it's in the same league as e.g. the EVO VII. The chassis of the Vette must be quite special (or the others are crap).

[Terminator]

This is the rear of a 1996 Corvette, but the principal's the same as on the Z06. You can see the spring in front of the diff.



Bit like my old Triumph Herald