Z06 Corvette and before you bag me!

[Bruceynz]

Hi guys,

You guys are lucky in USA and Canada, you get all the USA cars but in NZ we are pretty limited. So don't pay me out!

My friend bought over his 2001 Z06 he just recently imported from the USA and got road legal in NZ. I don't care how true mopar you are but the enemy is making fast cars!! It's had cold air intake fitted and few other bolt ons. No crap its insanely fast!! Its less than 4 seconds to 60mph!! This is all in a road car!! Stop, man it can haul up fast!! Don't care what you say the enemy is making one slick machine! Still like my old mopar but motor head tech has come so far!!

All that said and done corvette is to small and low for me! Hard to get out of and limited leg room! For comfort it scores a zero for performance it scores a 10 out of 10.

See you
Bruce

 

[kkritsilas]

I know you probably don't see them down there, but a Hellcat Charger (4 door sedan with a ton of room) or a Hellcat Challenger will leave a Corvette like the Corvette is tied to a tree stump. This is no joke. 707 HP worth of no joke. Corvette is lighter, yes. It may handle better (but the Hellcats also have a reworked suspension and brakes). Aerodynamically, they have a lot of frontal area; doesn't matter; they still do over 200 MPH (yes, miles). New, the are a little bit cheaper than a Corvette. They are just fast coupes/sedans.

The real Corvette competitor is the Viper. Also a seriously fast car. Akk 10 angry cylinders of it. Will most likely outrun a Corvette as well, only thing is, they may not be produced anymore due ot slow sales.

None of this is to mean that the Corvette is slow by any means. It just means that there are faster cars out there, without the comprimises of the Corvette.

 

[Aspen500]

I have nothing against other makes of cars, just wouldn't buy one with maybe 1 or 2 exceptions.
I agree, maybe 25 years ago wasn't so bad, but now getting in and out of a Corvette or certain other cars (an Audi R8 comes to mind, and back, and knees, and head when you bang it on the roof....) isn't exactly a painless process, lol. My body doesn't want to bend and flex like it once did Getting old(er) sucks.

 

[Jack Meoff]

A Hellcat would hand that thing it's ass.

 

[7T8 Custom]

And try and seat 3 or more people in a Vette. I`d take a Hellcat any day.

 

[Bruceynz]

no a naturally aspirated Hellcat will kick a naturally aspirated vette into the dust?

 

[Jack Meoff]

From what I've read.....a 2015 Hellcat Charger has a 0-60 of 2.9 seconds and will do a quarter mile in just over 10 seconds on street tires.

The 8 speed automatic 2015 Z06 is pretty close for the 0-60 but the Hellcat is a squeak faster in the quarter.

Obviously this all depends on the driver too. The Hellcat is 707 hp right out of the box.

 

[Aspen500]

They're both fast, along with the hot rod Camaro, and Mustang models and quite a few other cars out there.
Just think back 25 or 30 years when a 10 second car was basically unstreetable and got 3 mpg if you did manage to drive it on the street. Now they can run that off the floor, sit in traffic all day and pull down half ass decent mpg's,,,,,,,if you keep your foot out of it as much as possible that is.

As much as we don't want to admit it, the average family type car nowdays could keep up with a '60's or early '70's muscle car or worse, beat them. I mean bone stock off the dealer lot. A Kia Optima runs the 1/4 in the low 14's as an example. In my work, I drive all sorts of newer vehicles and some of them will surprise the hell out of you when you tromp the pedal. Some won't of course. The 2010 Toyota RAV4 I drove a couple months ago with a 4 cyl and all wheel drive, was one of the biggest pooches I've driven since a 4 cyl automatic Mustang II back in the early '80's or worse yet a 1983 Ranger S 2.0L . So slow they're dangerous, seriously.

 

[rcmaniac791]

not only does dodge have the hellcat, but don't forget about the viper. I know it's not as powerful, but that V-10 sounds so sweet. I've also heard that the V10 is also LA V8-derived.....

 

[Aspen500]

The Viper V-10 is based on the V-10 truck engine which was more or less a 5.9 Magnum with 2 more cylinders. At least that's my understanding.
Could you imagine if they had ever put a supercharger on the Viper engine? Yowza!

Probably the fastest accelerating car I ever had the chance to drive would be when I was still at the Audi dealer. It was a 2004 Audi RS6 which is a twin turbo, intercooled 4.2L V-8. On a road test, turned onto an on ramp that happens to be very long and fairly steep. Floored it and,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,holy bleep! Before I knew it, I glanced at the speedo and it showed 100 mph. Ooops. Quickly slowed to 65 but man what a rush! The sound was awesome too. Come to think of it, the sleeper of the day was the 2006(?) Audi S8 with the 525hp V-10. Deceptively quick and with the way the exhaust headers paired the cylinders, it sounded more like a V-8 than V-10 and that sound was amazing. Then there were the R8's, especially the 550 hp V-10 version. Did the predelivery set up on a V-10 Spyder and one of the steps on the PDI sheet was "Verify engine performance" and another step instructed to do full throttle from a standing start. OK, if I must! Like being launched out of a cannon. Things like that were the ONLY good part about being an Audi tech at a dealer. Otherwise it sucked so bad. Worst 5 1/2 years of my life but I digress.
Before the Ford dealer I worked at for 21 years closed suddenly one day in 2007,(which is how I ended up at the Audi dealer, needed a job and they had an opening) worked on one customers Saleen Mustang's all the time doing modifications, etc. He had at least 5 of them. One was used at Road America with a cage, etc. Don't remember what year other than it was an SN95 chassis and SOHC 4.6L. I installed a supercharger kit at one point. Talk about fast! Break the sticky tires loose in 3rd gear from 40 mph. It was so loud though. I mean it sounded nice,,,,,,for a race car, but always got nervous test driving it. There were long tube headers, no cats and things from Borla that could loosely be called "mufflers". It was licensed and "road legal" but still. The owner told me numerous times, "when you're done, go drive it like you stole it". "If it's going to break, I want it to break now and not at the track". I had no choice but to do as he said, the customer is always right

 

[kkritsilas]

no a naturally aspirated Hellcat will kick a naturally aspirated vette into the dust?

Hellcats, by definition have a supercharger. Can't buy a Hellcat without one. Even at 707 HP, the Hellcat engine is capable of a lot more. Cooling system is designed to allow a Hellcat to run on an open racetrack all day with no problem. Same with the brakes, suspension, and intercooler that is downstream of the supercharger. Block is a beefed up Gen III Hemi. Transmissions are six speed manual or eight speed automatic, both alos beefed up to take the power.

Comparison is valid due to price point. Corvette looks swoopy, is lighter, and probably handles somewhat better. Hellcats are really, really fast everyday cars in that they have room for a family, a good sized trunk, are not at all out of the question for anything you would do with a daily driver type car, unlike a Corvette.

 

[SirRalliart]

Well, all day is a stretch. As I recall, they said it could easily handle a 20 minute stint on a road course. But, remember it will go through a tank of gas in 15 minutes at WOT!!

My question is, how does NASCAR get 850HP out of a relatively small engine, naturally aspirated, that lasts for a 4 hour stint?!?!

 

[kkritsilas]

It will go all day, it is not a stretch, you just need to refuel it. One of the Mopar magazines had an interview with the engineer in charge of the Hellcat's engine. One of the aims of the engineering group is that power did NOT fall off after a lap or two; they spent a lot of time sizing the cooling system and the intercooler so that it would run big power for hours on end. Chassis guys didn't want to be the weak link, so they reworked the brakes and shocks to work at high speed for a long time as well.

NASCAR engines are tuned for high RPM usage. 9000+ RPM is pretty standard. They build engines with the parts that can live at those RPMs, tune the intake and exhaust for those RPM levels, and spend $50-100K per engine. They won't work for the street through, they don't like running at low RPM. Same as Formula 1 engines. 1.6L Turbo V6s with about the same amount of horsepower as the NASCAR engines. Redline at 15,000 RPM; idle between 6-7000 RPM. From current estimates, between $500K-$800K each. Teams are supposed to have 5 engines a year per driver, for 20 races; they, and the driver, get penalized points and/or grid position if they use more engines for any reason other than crashes. And today's Formula 1 engines are way behind Turbo ear cars (late 1980s). 1.5L V6 (Honda, Renault) or 4 cylinders (BMW) putting out >900 HP in race trim; somewhere over 1200 HP (nobody is saying, even today, but suspected to be in the 1500 HP range) in qualifying trim. Didn't really even burn gasoline, but things like toluene/methanol/acetone/kerosene blends with a dash of real gasoline to keep the rule makers happy (similar to the concoctions used in Top Fuel). Today's F1 cars run on pump gas; granted premium pump gas sold in Europe, but still gas that can be bought by anybody.

 

[BudW]

My question is, how does NASCAR get 850HP out of a relatively small engine, naturally aspirated, that lasts for a 4 hour stint?!?!

Money.
lots and lots of money (and testing).

If they were racing "stock" (ie: off of the showroom) cars, then it wouldn't be any fun to watch, would it (no need to answer that. I mean why call it a stock car, it car is nothing like "stock")?

 

[Yellowdart69]

See if you can find, on youtube, the drag race between a Tesla and a Hellcat.

 

[Bruceynz]

Because the way electric motors work any petrol engine will struggle to keep up with a Electric vehicle! Electric motors produce max tq on stall where as petrol needs to wind up some so its just ready to launch off the line!

 

[SirRalliart]

It will go all day, it is not a stretch, you just need to refuel it. One of the Mopar magazines had an interview with the engineer in charge of the Hellcat's engine. One of the aims of the engineering group is that power did NOT fall off after a lap or two; they spent a lot of time sizing the cooling system and the intercooler so that it would run big power for hours on end. Chassis guys didn't want to be the weak link, so they reworked the brakes and shocks to work at high speed for a long time as well.

NASCAR engines are tuned for high RPM usage. 9000+ RPM is pretty standard. They build engines with the parts that can live at those RPMs, tune the intake and exhaust for those RPM levels, and spend $50-100K per engine. They won't work for the street through, they don't like running at low RPM. Same as Formula 1 engines. 1.6L Turbo V6s with about the same amount of horsepower as the NASCAR engines. Redline at 15,000 RPM; idle between 6-7000 RPM. From current estimates, between $500K-$800K each. Teams are supposed to have 5 engines a year per driver, for 20 races; they, and the driver, get penalized points and/or grid position if they use more engines for any reason other than crashes. And today's Formula 1 engines are way behind Turbo ear cars (late 1980s). 1.5L V6 (Honda, Renault) or 4 cylinders (BMW) putting out >900 HP in race trim; somewhere over 1200 HP (nobody is saying, even today, but suspected to be in the 1500 HP range) in qualifying trim. Didn't really even burn gasoline, but things like toluene/methanol/acetone/kerosene blends with a dash of real gasoline to keep the rule makers happy (similar to the concoctions used in Top Fuel). Today's F1 cars run on pump gas; granted premium pump gas sold in Europe, but still gas that can be bought by anybody.

Sorry, I should have been more clear that this was a rhetorical question.

I know what the engineers said, but having one and feeling the heft, it's no track car. I'd like to see one run at the track all day without overheating and experiencing brake fade, while weighing 4400-4600 lbs. it might be able to do that, but it is more theory vs real world experience.

Now, the Viper ACR on the other hand...

I, too, am an F1 fan and have watched ever race for the last several years.

 

[brotherGood]

Top gear did a run down an airstrip between the Cadillac cts (I think), Hellcat Charger, and tesla. When the tesla hit 150 or something like that, the lead it built up from the start got eaten away by the hellcat..which ended up winning