When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
You'll have to provide some relevant information to get an answer that applies to you.
What do you want to change?
What do you hope to improve?
What do you hope to avoid?
Is $$$ or downtime relevant to you?
Are you considering keeping the same car and just swapping the transmission or are you considering swapping the entire car for one that has the other transmission?
Do you prefer one or the other and why?
I converted a 1969 Chevelle from an automatic to a 4 speed car (clutch pedal, linkage, bell housing , flywheel, clutch, floor pan mod, etc). Your not going to do that on a C7 Corvette.
Does it make any sense to swap out a A8 for a M7 in a 2017 Grand Sport?
I've done some manual conversions on other vehicles. It is cheaper/faster to sell the A8 car to buy an M7 car. I'd only suggest conversions if the car was never available in a manual or the price difference is large enough. E46 or E60 with the crummy SMG come to mind.
If you track the vehicle on weekends but not too frequently (not squeezing every ounce of skill from your abilities), I would stay with the A8. GM perfected the programmed shifting when driven in "anger" on track. Just leave it in "D", keep your left foot on the dead pedal and let the good times roll. Now, if you want to really work on improving skill on the track or if just for the desire of shifting a manual, I agree with others. Trade the vehicle for a manual.
Just adding another data point. I did have an A8 for a few years. Took the Spring Mountain training on an A8 too. It was great. You shift manually during the course, but you do get a sense of security knowing that you can't over rev. While you can't over rev the M7 in acceleration, you can still screw up a downshift. There is so much else to think about as you go around the course, it was nice to have both hands on the wheel and paddle shift. Of course, I was/am a rookie at tracking a car.
But for driving around town and our really nice back roads, I decided to go back to the M7. For me it was a good choice.
I did it on a 1964.5 Mustang. There was an owner of1965 Mustang 4 speed that wanted an auto for his wife. It worked out but I was surprised to find out that the factory changed the bell housing between 64 and 65 so I had to swap the engine as well. I was 18 and I would have crawled across burning coals to get that four speed. It seems that it would be WAY more complicated on Corvette.
It's not just the mechanical parts....it's also the computer hardware and software and likely a wiring harness or two. You'll want to do a Lot of research because it would sure suck to do all that work and get the mechanical aspects working only to find out you need to do some programming.
Another member swapped a GS M7 for a Z06 M7 transmission and even that programming wasn't straight forward.
