New learning curve

[Plasboy]

Imagine everyone will have to learn how to drive a mid engine now. Sure they have their own idiosyncrasies. New learning curve for the owners and the Spring Mountain staff.

[Bikerjulio]

Looking at all the videos I have to say the car looks well planted with decent handling (and a skilled driver).

Mid-engined cars may have a lower polar moment of inertia, which in practical terms means that turn-in is noticeably improved, steering quicker and more sensitive. The downside is that once the back end lets go, the car will rotate more quickly. So the tire widths and suspension will be set up biased to understeer, and hopefully, the rear end tamed. Plus some active handling aids I'd expect.

A particularly nasty example of a mid-engined car was my first year, first gen, Toyota MR2. Steering fabulous,the first thing I noticed, but the car was twitchy and prone to snap spins if the rear became unsettled while cornering. Toyota gradually improved things, but IMO that first car should never have been released the way it was. I was lucky to survive several spins without damage.

[JB]

todays electronic systems such as ptm will negate any concerns of decade old rear mid engine vehicles seamlessly.

all the benefits of rear mid engine sports cars and none of the potiential issues for a street car in less than professional drivers.

take that to the bank.

[VH1]

Electronics not withstanding, the basic mechanical set up will have to be right. Hopefully that is what they are concentrating on during the track testing. From my experience setting up my 370Z, the toe/camber/caster settings in concert with the right weight balance is the key to a good handling car. My rear drive 370Z definitely takes a different approach to corner entry and exit compared to the ME. Hopefully Ron Fellows gets a few of the ME's early in production so I can go try them out and get some professional instructions.

[John]

Not to worry. Spring Mountain got a large group of ZR1’s early, and will similar get ME’s early. They will be more than ready to receive us when we arrive there. Tonight at the end of our Corvette club meeting, three of us were talking about how we are similarly, and definitely, heading off to SMMR as soon as we become initially familiarized with our ME’s.

As to your cogent comments about its handling, I think we are all very impressed with how well it is running the ‘Ring considering that there is tens of thousands of track and road testing milea still ahead, along with further refining of it suspension, steering, eLSD, computer systems, and its final version of its Michelins yet to be implemented.

[Shadow]

Spring Mountain ahead for me too.

[JB]

Im old school whereby i too remember rear engine and rear mid engine sports cars had to be by the manufacturers dialed in a lot understeer to keep inexperienced drivers from getting in over their heads...

it was ironic for years that the rear mid engine cars were designed to understeer earlier than many front engine sports cars to keep the legal departments of manufacturers happy....maybe it was the fear of corvair type publicity that keep manufacturers dialing in understeer ...and of course at the limit snap oversteer could be a possibility as described above in the forst gen Toyota MR2...

i really do believe the technology today has allowed not only rear mid engine layouts to be explored but also the advances in hp itself.

even front engine rear drive sports cars were pretty much limited to 350 hp until active handling came about.

once active handling became available hp could rise dramatically and the corporate liability lawyers were kept in check.

heading to the track such as spring mountain will be a blast for those who have the free time to have such fun.

[LightningBolt]

A particularly nasty example of a mid-engined car was my first year, first gen, Toyota MR2. Steering fabulous,the first thing I noticed, but the car was twitchy and prone to snap spins if the rear became unsettled while cornering. Toyota gradually improved things, but IMO that first car should never have been released the way it was. I was lucky to survive several spins without damage.

I also had a MR2 1984 or 85. You must be correct about Toyota improving bad handling charismatics as I never experienced any of those issues. It wasn't fast but it sure was fun!

[tooold2race]

As soon as I get my VIN I will be making my reservation at Spring Mountain. That was a great experience. I have friends that have been back 3 and 4 times..... They keep finding it more and more difficult to get the smile off their face when they get home. I assume its from their 'track' experience!

[JB]

Back as a kid in the late 1970s this was my mid engine sports car.

It was a lancia scorpion that i had turbocharged, larger webers, forged pistons, nimonic valves, alchohol water injection, konis, bwa wheels...it was a blast back then.

stock it was slow but modified as it was ..it was awesome. I keep that ride for many years...way over a decade. I put on hundreds of thousands of miles....

keeping that car running was one of the reasons i now love corvettes..

the durability of corvette engineering is amazing. Their 300k mile validation process cant be beat. Sure corvettes sometimes need repair but very rarely do they leave you stranded when left near stock form...

gm engineers know who their customer base is and what their expectations from a service and repair standpoint..

the eurpeans just make their vehicles come across as finely engineered...but from a repair and maintance standpojnt..no one beats gm in my opinion.

[JB]

[Ateupjoe]

Well if I have to learn how I guess I will just suck it up and learn it. After all, I learned a clutch manual, a steering wheel column clutch, a motorcycle clutch and my all time favorite hot wiring a VW bug using a very long screwdriver crossing the starter posts! Ok one more.....pushing the bug down hill and hopping in to pop the clutch. Wait.....my ex father in law showed me how to no clutch shift one of the many bugs I had back then too.

[OnPoint]

It will change how one approaches trail braking into a corner, and it will change how early one can transition back to throttle at apex. I have no doubt PTM advancements will be seen as well, but the trail braking adjustment will still be needed. I think we'll also see pre-turn braking enhancement due to better braking balance, which will aid the adjustment to trail braking.

[PaulChristian]

I am more worried about the leaning curve for the Chevy engineers. As I insinuated in a previous thread, this mid engine should make us better drivers. However, on the engineering side, consider that the C7 was the culmination of decades of refinement of the FE configuration. Conversely, the C8 is rear mid engine generation 1...let’s hope the engineers can hit the deck running. How will this compete against a 911 which benefits from decades of refinement? I am sure it will compete on the track as corvette has always done, but how will reliability compare?

[John]

Good points. Perhaps we already see Corvette engineers gearing up based on these three isolated things/events.

1) At last week’s NCM 24th Anniversary Event, Board Member Les Wong said that the C7.R will be the car they race next year (giving the C8.R another year of testing and development before it openly competes for a full season);

2) The C8.R has already been to VIR and Road America (and could have been to many more we do not know about) — and of course that is in addition to who knows how many miles of Milford Prooving Ground and Yuma testing for both the C8.R and for the 2020 ME.

3) GM’s taking four ME’s to the ‘Ring. That is twice what they typically take.