Dave's 1st Corvette

2) Most parking lots, including where I work, have a small concrete barrier several inches high at the front end. I have never before owned a car that is so low to the ground. Our C5 Corvettes have a downward protruding air dam that scrapes these, which for me is more of an embarrassment if somebody is nearby.

Does anyone have any parking technique recommendations to facilitate stopping short of the concrete barrier? Perhaps the Heads Up Display location relative to the street, can be used in some fashion to guide me?

Any advice would be welcome, except for "Just be more careful and don't scrape your car, moron!"

Vetteman Jack

The front air dams are just made of plastic and are really designed to be flexible should any scraping occur. With the car being so low, it's hard not to scrape the air dam at some point and when it gets to looking bad, they are not all that expensive to replace. One technique that you can use is to approach the object at an angle - sometimes that minimizes the amount of contact the air dam will have and thereby reduce the scraping noise.

dadaroo

The technique to go over low clearance areas and bumps is to do it at an angle.

GCG

Welcome aboard!

Two suggestions in order of difficulty (although none of them require considerable effort):

1) Fangs

2) Curb Alert

I installed both of them and I'm very satisfied.

73Corvette

I took the side dams OFF and trimmed the middle one about 2"... NO my car doesn't over heat...

zachaeous

I would just start stopping short when pulling up to concrete barriers. You will soon learn where your front end is when parking. Enjoy your new ride!

Rico7142

Like a few have mentioned, approach from an angle slowly.

Crussader

Go old school. Park backwards.

imgn tht

this ^^^^

The front end is longer than you think. Learn to stop sooner and it's a free mod. I'll sometimes use the reflection in the car next to me to help see when I am getting close.

JETninja

All of my cars are lowered, and I always back into parking spots. If someone has to wait, too bad. It is safer pulling out since you have much better vision when pulling out. My Son's do the same thing, only the Wife is stubborn and doesn't back in.

I do have fangs installed, more for protection on the occasional mega high speed bump....

sirdano

Everytime I come out of my driveway I scrape the air dam. Really nothing can be done unless I move

tbrent

Back in if you can.

Angled approach.

If I were to get to close pulling in one of these parking spots I'd hit my bumper I've gotten pretty good at gauging distance as I can't afford constant bumper replacement and I can't imagine raising her back up

73Corvette

Yes... you can take them off

Dave's 1st Corvette

I reviewed the Curb Alert web site and I do like it. That would be a nice weekend project for me in December once it cools down here in Miami.

Cannot always back in, here in Miami. Parking spaces tend to be very narrow, and frankly I'm not that good at backing in to spaces that are wide.

I'd have to position the Curb Alert sensor in the rear of the car!

73Corvette

The curb alert may help with not pulling up too close to barriers, but it's NOT going to help with the AIR DAMS rubbing when your going thru a dip or going up an incline that's fairly steep... again removing the side dams and trimming the middle dam is a viable option if you don't want them scraping... adding the fangs is also a good idea.
IF your driving your car 150 MPH then you might want to reinstall the side air dams to keep the air drag off of your front tires and reduce lift under the car... other wise they DO NOTHING else for your cars performance for normal driving... trimming the middle air dam hasn't added 1 degree to the operating temps of our car... just sayin.

flynbyu2

If you'd be interested in a brand new, still in package set of C5 Fangs, I have a spare set.
I bought 2 sets thinking I'd ruin my 1st set pretty quickly but the dam things are incredibly durable.

Deneb

Add extra psi.

flynbyu2

Not sure what happened to the OP, but I do have a brand new, still in the package set of Fangs that will be posted later today in the C5 Parts for Sale section.

$45 shipped anywhere in the US.

PM me and save me the trouble of listing them...

flynbyu2

My Fangs sold to a CF member but they are still the best option out there.

Pick up a set...you won't be sorry.

ttiros

I agree!!