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This weekend, I took delivery of my new Corvette. Some may recall that I wrote up my first impressions of driving a Corvette when I rented one for a day last spring. Here is that write up if you haven't seen it before. Obviously, I liked it enough to buy one!
I worked with Mike Little at Boardwalk Chevrolet in Redwood City, CA. The experience was low key and there were no surprises. I got a reasonable deal on the car but not at the level of the big east coast dealers. This was fine -- I didn't want to deal with a long distance purchase and I think setting up a relationship with a local dealer has benefits.
Although I am sure I could have gotten an even better deal off the lot, I decided I really wanted to order a car. If I am going to spend this kind of money on a car, I may as well make sure it is exactly what I want. In addition, it was fun to sit down and mull over the possibilites. Without further ado, below are the specs for my new car.
MECHANICALS
Stingray narrow body with Z51 Package
Magnetic Selective Ride Control (MSRC)
7-Speed Manual Transmission
EXTERIOR APPEARANCE
Long Beach Red Metallic Tintcoat
Satin black hood stinger stripe
Machined aluminum black 5-split spoke wheels
Brake calipers in black
Chrome badging
INTERIOR APPEARANCE
3LT trim level with all of the goodies
Regular GT seats (not competition)
Grey NAPA leather seats and interior trim
Carbon fiber instrument panel (an extravagance)
Carbon fiber roof in body color
ORDER TIME LINE
I know that when I ordered a car, I wondered how long it would really take (especially delivery to California). For the curious, here is the time line for my order and delivery:
April 20, 2019: Deposit paid and order given to dealer
April 29, 2019: Order accepted by GM
May 20, 2019: Scheduled build date
May 25, 2019: Build completed
June 4, 2019: Car shipped to Fairfax, KS to catch a train
June 13, 2019: Car unloaded at train depot in Milpitas, CA
July 5, 2019: Shipped to dealer from train depot (it spent a long time there for some reason)
July 6, 2019: I accepted delivery from dealer
The car was delivered with 3 miles on the odometer. I don't plan to write up any first impressions until the car is out of break in and I have had plenty of time with it. Time I will have: this is a daily driver. It is not only a daily driver, I have decided that this is going to be an only car. Kind of like my RX-7 back in the day.
PHOTOS
Now what you have all been waiting for: pictures of the new car.
Long beach red is tricky to photograph. In brighter light, it is more red. In less light, it is more bronze like. These were taken mostly sunny skies with some overcast. I really like light colored interiors. Especially in relatively small cabins. Not shown: the headliner is also a grey in a diamond pattern.
Beautiful! A wise color choice. As the Mazda IMSA racers demonstrated with 1-2 finishes in races both this past weekend and the race before it; LBR IS the fastest color!
Last edited by SilverGhost; 07-08-2019 at 09:55 AM.
Very nice color combo! I too ordered mine from the factory because I wanted a unique color combo that I know I would never find on the lot (Torch Red with gray interior) Here's to many many years of fun with it!
Welcome to the cult!! That LBR looks great. Not so sure about the grey interior.....I prefer black.......but what matters is that YOU got the exact car that YOU wanted.
I factory-ordered my Torch Red 2017 Stingray (non-Z51) with the 7spd manual, black interior, black trim and black wheels. It is not perfect, but is perfect for me.
Congrats and enjoy it. Nice write up, and I followed your other thread where you gave your impressions from renting one. Have fun with this one, it's yours.
07-07-2019, 06:59 PM
Freshly ordered new Corvette has landed
