And since the best sports cars deserve only the best of care, the 2015 Corvette Stingray comes standard with Chevrolet Complete Care† that offers 2 years or 24,000 miles† of scheduled maintenance, roadside assistance and more.
Well that didn’t take long. One of the first 2015 Corvette C7 Z06s delivered to a customer is now modified. You’ll likely recall the video we posted just a few days ago of a brand-new Z06 lighting up its tires in a dealership parking lot. Well the owner, Vengeance Racing, has completed its first tune on the Vette’s 6.2-liter, supercharged V-8.
The racing shop located outside Atlanta, GA fitted the car with a high-flow cold-air intake system, swapped out the supercharger’s pulley for a larger one, and programmed in its own ECU tune. The results are pretty impressive.
The base dyno run reveals the car makes 587 horsepower and 611 pound-feet of torque at the rear wheels. That’s not too far off the 650 horse and 650 pound-feet at the crank promised by GM. After swapping in some minimal parts, the Vette gained another 75 horsepower and 60 pound-feet of torque.
The new specs sit at 660 horsepower and 663 pound-feet of torque.
Keep in mind those modifications were made without any internal engine work — just a different air intake and a pulley swap, both of which are bolt-on applications. An ECU tune is usually a plug-and-play operation, but Vengeance did have to develop the tune itself.
Fortunately, everything else about the $1725 transmission is better executed. We recorded the same 3.7-second 0-to-60-mph time in this convertible as we did in a 2014 model with the six-speed automatic; by 80 mph, the newer Vette begins to pull away, and by 150 mph, it edges out a 0.7-second lead thanks at least partly to quicker shift times. The transmission’s logic and broad ratio spread elevate the self-shifting Corvette experience toward Porsche PDK dual-clutch-automatic levels of satisfaction. Weather, Eco, Tour (default), Sport, and Track modes offer drivers a spectrum of behaviors. In Track, the 460-hp V-8’s lightning-quick throttle response and the electrically boosted steering’s heightened alertness blend wonderfully with the transmission’s rev-matched downshifts and redline upshifts. Clear the red mist by switching to Tour or Eco, and the 8L90 works with a preponderance of civility.
The EPA says that while the 2015 Vette with the eight-speed nets the same 16-mpg rating in the city cycle as the 2014 model, the highway number rises by 1 mpg to 29. This test car’s participation in our brutal 10Best testing stifled fuel economy to a dismal 12 mpg, but we’re confident that with normal use, it could better the 18 mpg we recorded with the old transmission.
The Corvette Z06 is now the baddest Vette ever made. Sporting 650 horsepower and 650 pound-feet of torque right from the factory, the Z06 hits 60 mph in just 2.95 seconds when equipped with the new eight-speed automatic transmission. The seven-speed manual gets the job done in 3.2 seconds. The quarter mile comes in at 10.95 seconds and 11.2 seconds, respectively.
Besides the supercharged, 6.2-liter V-8, the Vette also has tenacious cornering abilities thanks to its lightweight design, active aerodynamics providing downforce, and its sticky Michelin Pilot Super Sport 2 tires.
Pricing for the Z06 starts at $78,995 and goes north with options
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