The London Concours held at the the Honourable Artillery Company (HAC) is one of the highlights of my automotive calendar.
The line-up of cars at this event is always spectacular and the classes they are divided into are always interesting. This year was no exception and so to give the cars in the classes the screen time they deserve, I’ve decided to split my content from this year’s show into multiple parts.
The last post was covering the ‘Carnaby Street’ class which you can read about here: https://motorsportformentalhealth.com/2024/06/20/london-concours-2024-carnaby-street
Today we’ll be celebrating the Chevrolet Corvette from the C1, introduced in 1953, to the C8 which arrived on the scene in 2019.
Following the Second World War, a lot of American servicemen were bringing home European sports cars. Harley Earl, head of GM’s Styling Section, saw the gap in the market for an American made, affordable sports car. Thus, the C1 was born.
The first C1s were equipped with a modified Blue Flame straight six mated to a two speed Powerglide automatic found in other Chevrolet cars which was considered “lackluster” compared to its European competitors. The fibreglass bodies for the early Corvettes were also mostly finished by hand, which meant quality and weatherproofing were something that could be judged on a car to car basis.
Chevrolet were going to scrap the Corvette, but in 1954 Ford introduced the Thunderbird, which was more of a GT car than a sports car, but gave Chevrolet a bit of an incentive to keep refining the C1.
Then in 1955 the Corvette got it’s wings. Chevrolet introduced a 195hp small block V8 which could be mated to a 3 speed manual which really brought the platform to life!
In 1957 the ‘Fuelie’ was introduced. Rochester Products Division fitted a mechanical fuel injection system to the new 4.6L V8 which let the engine produce 290hp at 6200rpm (which I’d say is still pretty quick even by today’s standards, given the car’s weight).
The car came with a four speed manual and “positrac” limited slip differential.
The Fuelie package was incredibly expensive though so not a huge amount were made.
This one is finished in Cascade Green which I don’t think I’ve seen before. It suits the car!
The C2 followed in 1963.
The C2 had a split rear window are a art-decoesque boat tail, which designer Bill Mitchell said was inspired by the Bugatti Type 57SC Atlantic.
The C3 was introduced in 1968.
The C3 was based off of a concept (by aforementioned Bill Mitchell) called the Mako Shark II. I can definitely see the shark nose shaping at the front.
The 1983-1996 C4 was a huge advancement over the C3. Older Corvettes were built ‘body on frame’, like a lot of the pre-war cars that I like to write about here. Traditionally a car builder were make a ladder type chassis which all the running gear, suspension and steering would be mounted onto, then the body is placed on top of that.
Body on frame construction has its merits and is still used today on a lot of pickup trucks and off-road vehicles, but Corvette’s European competitors would have been building much lighter, better handling unibodied cars (where the body and chassis are one piece) long before the 1980s when the C4 came along.
The C4 was built as a hybrid between the unibody and body on frame which GM called “uniframe” (Y platform). The windscreen frame and loop you see behind the doors on the C4 was a part of the chassis which gave the car a lot more rigidity and allowed the body to be made of really light materials as it wasn’t structurally critical to the car.
The suspension was also partly developed by Lotus, who in the early 1980s were in a lot of financial trouble due to ties with the DeLorean scandal, and GM were sort of eyeing them up. GM would buy a majority share in Lotus but that was after the C4 came about.
The C5, C6 and C7 are really the generations of Corvette that I love. The yellow Corvettes that dominated endurance racing in the 2000s were in a lot of the video games that I grew up playing.
From a technical standpoint the biggest change from the C4 to C5 was the gearbox being moved to the rear for better weight distribution.
Then in 2019 came, in my opinion, the most exciting car of past decade – the C8.
The C8 is mid engined and rear wheel drive with a dual clutch style transmission. The Z51 Stingray as pictured makes 495bhp, will do 0-60 in 2.9 seconds and will reach a top speed of 191mph. It’s available in right hand drive for us here in the U.K.
The thing that excites me most about these is the price. If you were to buy a C8 brand new in the U.K it will cost you just under £100,000, which is a lot of money for the likes of little old me, but is over half the price of the equivalent Ferrari, the F8 Tributo!
That opens what is effectively supercar ownership to a lot more people which is what the Corvette ethos has always been – a more accessible alternative to a European sports car.
Thanks for reading! There are still a few more classes of the London Concours for me to cover, so if you would like to stay up to date with all my blog posts please subscribe to the blog via email (from the box at the bottom of the page).
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