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Don't know if any of you guys saw the new Star Trek movie, but it was excellent, and I highly recommend anyone to see it. Part of the movie shows a young Kirk (11yrs old), ditching a vintage Corvette.
Not sure of the model, but it looked like from the late 60's. Maybe some of you experts can give me a year?
The Lesson: Inertia, and Skidding in a Corvette
In the fast-paced, quick-cutting scene, a pre-teen Captain Kirk peeks over the steering wheel of a vintage Corvette as he heads towards a cliff, driving on a dirt road. As he nears the edge, going 80 mph, he downshifts from fourth to second gear, locking the rear wheels. With a quick turn of the steering wheel, he slides out. So far, so good, says Andy Gill, a long-time stuntman who has worked on Talledega Nights and Death Race. Downshifting and turning would get a Corvette into an unstoppable skid.
With the car in a spin, the inertia kicks in. If you're heading 80 mph and start skidding, the rotation of the vehicle will hold you in the car with plenty of g-force, the measure of an object's acceleration relative to gravity, Gill says. This would be enough to keep any man in his seat. So when the young, small Kirk opens the doors and bails out of the Corvette, the scene gets less realistic. "The hard part is going sideways," says Gill, who has never seen a side door bailout pulled off by any stunt man. "When you pitch the car sideways—the g-forces are what is going to make it near impossible to open the door."
I felt the young Kirk should have been dragged down the canyon (pre-construction site) for committing such a heresy. I did enjoy the movie very much. Being a long time die-hard fan I was able to drop the force fields and accepted the movie wholeheartedly.
And as far as realism goes I have to use some select quotes from Firefly:
Wash: Psychic, though? That sounds like something out of science fiction.
Zoe: We live in a spaceship, dear.
Wash: So?
It's a 1963, 64, 65 or 66. Hard to tell as these 4 years looked the same. It can't be a 67 as there's no reverse light above the license plate.
I didn't see the movie yet, but I'd bet this car didn't fly off the cliff. Special effects did that.
Its hard to see but the side grills don't look like the ones from a 63 or 64 they are different then 65 66 67. They might of really drove it off the cliff a 66 beater in need of complete resto might be worth 50K that is nothing to a big budget movie
Last edited by floridamale; May 19, 2009 at 03:41 PM.
Its a '66. Its the only year where the inner taillights were all white. '65 had white on the inner part of the inner taillights and red surrounding them, and '67 had all four red and a white light bar above the license plate.
edit: I think '63-'65 had all four taillights red with no white now that I think about it, but I know '66 had the white inners..
Its a '66. Its the only year where the inner taillights were all white. '65 had white on the inner part of the inner taillights and red surrounding them, and '67 had all four red and a white light bar above the license plate.
63 to 66 the inner lights were clear lenses, optional reverse lights. The side vents on the front fenders are 2 horizontal vents (non functional) for 63 and 64. 65 and 66 had 3 open vertical vents. 67 had a box type vent with I think 7 fins in it.
Yep, they could have taken a beater, made it run and put a quick paint job on it and flew it over the hill. I don't like to think they did that though. That would be just plain wrong.
I like how you guys are more worried about the car having gone over a cliff then the actor pretending to drive it almost dying performing the stunt.
You mean jumping out of a still car in front of a green screen ontop of a giant air mattress? I'm sure the actor is just fine...along with the car. Still sad to think of a vette going over a cliff.