Ever hear the fable about the Emperor's New Clothes?

The Vette is a good car, but it serves no good to overlook the problems and pretend it's better than it is. The market is either very weak, or the C6 doesn't appeal to many as is evidenced by GMS being available so early in the model run, and scores of left over 05's being sold at invoice. People that bought at MSRP are seeing $10K drops as soon as the car leaves the lot. This car needs improvements to broaden its appeal. If it becomes a better car, that helps everyone.

This car deserves a paint job that would rival at least a Corolla, brakes that are as quiet as Kia Sophia, and well you know the list.

So keep on pretending the Emperor's new clothes look great, but the rest of us want to do something about it. :o

 

Yes, Dave Hill and his team did a great job. However, there is always room for improvement. "You can please some of the people some time but not all of the people all of the time" I guess it's the same with Corvettes & this forum

 

The Vette is not perfect. It was not designed and made by perfect people.

For all these folk who complain, and talk about "Emperor's clothes" and such, no one put a gun to your head and made you buy a C6.

Why not just rid of it and get something better? Go ahead and find a better sports car value.

To borrow a quote from Lee Iacocca........if you can find a better car, buy it.

You can. Buy something else. Like a Mustang. Or better yet, you can "see the less expensive 350Z for how to do these things right".

Go ahead. Offer to trade your C6 Vette head up for a 350Z or a Mustang and hardly any owner of either of those cars would turn you down.

 

Not sure what color your C6 is or if you even own one but I can tell you my Mag Red looks better than any Corolla that I have ever seen, also GM replaced my Z51 brake pads and they are as quiet as a church mouse. I am sure GM will continue to improve the C6 as it just went into year two. Not even a Corolla or Kia Sophia is perfect the initial year or even in the years to follow.
Remember there is only so much money in the kitty to work with so we all can't have everything that we would like. As to the Emperor's new clothes, I believe the C6 looks better than the Porsche and rivals the Ferrari's.
I read a thread last week that the C6 made the top 10 list for best 2005 automobiles and resale value.



Again - Thanks GM and Dave Hill for the great car!

 

The "habitual complaining" is someting that really got bad with the C5. Arguably one of the best sports car values ever. People complainig about all sorts of little things that a lot of times boiled down to personal preference and not overall quality.

When you go to the plant and the Museum and look at the effort that the folks on the line put forth, the efforts that Dave Hill and the rest have made to give us the best car that they could at an affordable price......

Listening to people gripe about keyless start and sound systems is laughable.

Hardly a day goes by......dare I say, never a day goes by, that we don't see posts like this one http://forums.corvetteforum.com/show...83&forum_id=74

and this one

http://forums.corvetteforum.com/show...74&forum_id=74
where someone is elated over their new purchase of a C6. Especially coming from a C4 or C5. Fortunately these type posts outnumber the other "habitual complainer" type posts.

 

Went to Bowling Green Labor Day weekend for the Museum's 11th Anniversary and had a blast! Was fortunate to have a special plant tour on Friday and enjoyed seminars at the Museum which were hosted by Dave Hill and his engineers.

 

Y'know - concerning the post above - I'm not so sure this is true. My Audi A8L - a genuinely fabulous car - is going to go into the shop again for the umpteenth time this year. This time a bolt in trunk hinge has come off; last time it was for the sunroof failing; I even had a battery problem at 10,000 miles!! (sound familiar?). I don't think price has a damn thing to do with it. It's just what an individual organizaiton pays attention to. Also, I'm on the sideline waiting for a 2006 A6 in the spring. I'm leery of the first model year of any car - even one as studied as the vette.

 

I'll bet it was a blast and will be a memory for a lifetime


I am a Southerner, but I live in Western PA. WHENEVER I drive home, I make it a point to stop at the Museum and roll by the plant to see the cars being tested, and the ones on the lot.

If I make it in time, and I haven't for the last several trips home now, I'll do the plant tour but I usually hit Bowling Green too late. And you need reservations now.

I was at the Museum for the 50th celebrations and was just there in early August of this year, where I saw the Z06s on the grounds of the plant, rolling on the testing road, and a few of them even on the road near the Shell station. They were something to see. Quite a special car that "has no clothes."

When you stop and think that a world class automobile, a vehicle on par with other cars costing much more, a vehicle with this pedigree, is made right here in the USA, in a small simple town like Bowling Green Kentucky, it really gives you a sense of immense pride

 

This is my experience too!

 

This is a forum for discussions/likes/dislikes about the C6 Corvette. If those run towards the griping end of the specturm, so be it. This is the place for such a thing. I own an 05 C6, and I've had issues. I'm okay with that, but I have a second car. I could see how someone without a dealership that cares nearby, could be frustrated. It's okay. A website containing nothing but glassy-eyed followers of Dave and GM worshipers would get a tad tiresome after awhile.

 

As would a forum of whiners as I think you would agree.


I can go along with legitimate complaints, ie something does not work as it should. But complaining about steering wheel stalks, sound systems steering wheels, and cruise control buttons is a bit over the top I think.

 

Actually, I own, or have owned, several cars with particular features that are better than the same features in the C6. I gave the example of the steering feel and stalk controls of the 350Z, a cheaper car. The Infinity sound system in my Dodge RAM is better than the Bose in the C6, and at half the option price of the Bose. Nearly every manual sporty car shifts better than the C6. My old Camaro did, my 350Z did. Etc. It is sad that your C5 driving friends find the C6 shifter better, because what that says is that the C5 was really wretched.

The C6 is a nice car, but it could have been much nicer if GM had implemented these things properly. Now if Nissan, Dodge, and Ford can implement these things correctly in cheaper cars and trucks, if GM could do it in older Camaros, we know GM could have done it in the C6 without raising prices. The whole notion that it would cost lots more to make our car better is false. The designers and engineers made some bad choices, in several cases choices that would have better been served by less expensive systems. I like my Corvette, but I'd like it a lot better if those choices had been different.

 

Since I have no problem with the Bose system in my C6, and like it just fine, nor do I have a problem with the way my car shifts, I am quite satisfied with my car. It is one of the best vehicles I have ever owned and I have owned a lot. Foreign and domestic.

A few, if not a lot, of your complaints.... center around personal preference. These include, but are not limited to, keyless start, steering wheel controls, steering wheel stalk, choice of sound system..... They were not building a car personalized for you and only you. These are not necessarily "faults" in the vehicle. Just features which are not to your liking.

When people complain about these features of the car, and how they don't fit into their "personal preference".... I ask why did you not buy something else? Why suffer with it?

I mean, you want a key, you wanted a different steering wheel, you wanted an unavailable sound system, you wanted a pinned crank pulley, you wanted cruise control on the steering wheel, you wanted steering similar to the 350Z, you wanted a different shifter, does that about cover it?

How did you end up with a Vette?

Decisions were made with regard to the C6 that may not adhere to your personal tastes but may be just the ticket for someone else.

I could pick nits all day long about any possession I own and ultimately I would find some "fault," real or imagined, with each and every one..

However the designers and engineers made considerably more good choices than bad choices IMO and thats why I drive a Vette.

 

Hey, I'm happy The C6 has been everything and more I thought it would be.

 

Less expensive cars?
And the overall performance of these so called less expensive cars stacks up against the C6 in what way?
You can have your steering wheel controls and better stereo along with the high 13, 14, 15 second quarter mile times that come with them...I'll take the finest performance car value/bargain ever made and sacrifice those other few things for the comfort, style and world class performance it consistently delivers in return.

 

Less expensive cars?
And the overall performance of these so called less expensive cars stacks up against the C6 in what way? It's NOT like the money saved in one area wasn't immediately applied to another (aka: power/handling/braking/comfort etc.)
You can have your steering wheel controls and better stereo along with the high 13, 14, 15 second quarter mile times that come with them...I'll take the finest performance car value/bargain ever made and sacrifice those other few things for the comfort, style and world class performance it consistently delivers in return.

 

The Vette is a great car for the money and you can't get better performance for the buck. However, that being said, GM has to save money in other areas and that is evidenced in the interior and orange peel paint. I have also had Toyota trucks since the mid 70's and can honestly say I have never had to return to the dealer for service on any of them, I can't say that for my Vettes.

Even with these short-comings I truly love the car. I bought my first Vette new at age 21 in November '71 and have had one ever since. My '05 is my 6th Vette, which I only drive on weekends and I look forward to the experience every time. Would love to have a Z06, but I don't want a car payment so I will wait a couple of years (matbe not after I drive TOME's in a couple of weeks).

I think that discussing the good and the bad is is one of the valuable things about this forum and I for one appreciate all the veiws.

Thanks to all who have provided constructive comments and criticism to forum members and especially to GM forum monitors.

 

Yes, less expensive cars, with less expensive stereos and less expensive steering wheels and less expensive control stalks and less expensive shifters, etc, etc, etc.The point is, it doesn't take more money to solve many of the shortcomings of the C6, it just takes slightly different design and engineering decisions. Other companies, even other divisions of GM, can do it without breaking the bank. There's no reason the Corvette team can't do it too.

Actually, it is exactly like the money wasn't spent in other ways. They spend twice as much for the Bose name as Dodge does for the Infinity name, but they get a worse stereo. They spend more for Magnasteer than Nissan spends for the whole steering system of the 350Z, and get a numb steering feel that would embarrass a Ford Crown Victoria driver. Etc.

That's exactly the attitude I'm railing against. There is no reason, none, zip, nada, that a good stereo should cost more or weigh more than the mediocre Bose that comes in the car. The proof is that cheaper Infinity system in my Dodge pickup. There is no reason that the simple, ergonomic, steering wheel and stalks of the 350Z should cost more or weigh more than the abominations we got in the 05 C6. None, zip, nada. We got them because the designers and engineers at Corvette made bad choices, and not because they were trying to save money to pour into the drivetrain and suspension. We know that because they didn't save money with those things. If those choices had any impact on performance, it was a negative one because they wasted too much money on inferior solutions, thus leaving less money to spend on the drivetrain and suspension.

Just look at all the extra modules and wiring needed to implement the keyless start. Can you honestly say that saved money over a $2 keylock? That system has to add at least $300 to the manufacturing cost of the car, $300 that didn't go into the engine, transmission, or suspension. We won't even get into the frustration and service calls the system has caused.

Or, in a more positive direction, lots of people complained about the "cheap looking" center console in the 05 C6, so GM changed it to a slightly darker color. You don't hear those "cheap looking" complaints much anymore. It cost them nothing but customers are happier.

There are many things they did get right in the C6. It is powerful, fast, quiet, has great seats, wonderful headlights, looks fantastic, etc. But to claim you'd have to trade any of those things away in order to fix the few things that are wrong is just misleading in the extreme.

 

shopdog, sounds like you're mad at or just plain irratated at a lot of us for being happy with the car. Just ignore us.

I'm under the belief that Chevrolet used the parts bin for many of the issues you're concerned with and by using the parts bin it kept the R&D, fabrications and assembly costs down. If I'm wrong, others will point that out. But even if I'm wrong, I really don't get why some folks are so upset with the steering wheel, the stereo, the leather seats and what ever else it is that is irratating you. I've had a 79 C3 for years and love that car, never was tempted by the C4 and the C5 but when I saw the C6, I know I would eventually get a new vette. We bought a vert for the wife about 4 months ago and we are extremely happy with the vert. Everything we could have asked for and more. Maybe our expections were not as high as you believe they should be, because we're not displeased with anything about the car.

The vert is by far the most expensive car I have ever bought. I still wonder if I really can afford it. We like the stereo just fine (1SA) although we wish we could have gotten Sirius (still looking for a good after market solution). We don't ever think about the steering wheel. We're **** about putting it in reverse and making sure every thing is turned off, so no dead battery yet. The only real complaint we have with the vette is sometimes getting the car into 1st and sometimes 2nd and the clutch is still a PITA. Is everything perfect, no, probably not but the is car everything my wife and I like in a car. My wife drove a 2001 Toyota MR2 spyder before the vette. A great little mid engined go cart of a car. Handled like no other car out there, I don't think you could get a car under 6 figures that handles better and it was extremely fun to drive but it had problems of it's own. It was seriously underpowered and the vvt-i engine was prone to blowing up because the pre cats would disintegrate over time and parts of them would end up in the valves causing catestrophic engine faillure. The stories about getting this fixed by Toyota are legendary. For every horror story concerning bad service for a vette, I could match it on the Spyderchat board about Toyota dealerships. And let me assure you that the fit and finish of the MR2 and the Echo that we bought my son for college is in no way better then most Chevy's I've come in contact with and not on a par with the Vette. If you want to know what a bad stereo sounds like buy a Toyota. The vette 1SA stereo is a thousand times better than what was in the MR2 and the Echo.

I guess that we are all perfectionists. We are spending a lot of money, maybe that we can't afford and need to justify everything. Nothing is perfect (I wonder if the Ferrari owner's have gripes?). For my part, I like the new C6 so much that I sold my 79 C3 and have an order in for a new 06 C6 Z51. So I guess we'll have 2 C6's in the garage.

 

To complain about just about everything is so American!

I guess people that are complaining about just about everything about the C6 never owned a C1 or C2 or C3. Now those you could find things to complain about and surprise, no one did. They we having to much fun driving the wheels off them. On the C2's that was very possible with the knockoffs.

We broke transmissions, burnt out clutches, tore up rearends. They had horrible brakes, etc. Leaks like sieves, shaked, rattled and rolled.

We loved them.

And I can find nothing to complain about with the C6.