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.
Picked up my 2021 in Jan. Love driving the car but i am a little disappointed in the amount of road noise. I have a 3lt, z51 coupe with the see-thru top. I wonder if the thin plastic top amplifies the road noise when compared to the standard top. Has anybody compared the 2 types of tops back/to/back to see if there is an appreciable difference in road noise? While i like the roar of the engine i am not crazy about the drone when just cruising down the highway.
Well, I have had mine for nearly 3 days now. I haven't noticed much drone, however, I have only been on the Interstate for about 4 miles. I do have a solid top though.
3LT, Z51
Interesting thing, I had a 6-28 TPW and I drove it home this past Saturday from the dealer.
(We are about 150 Miles from Bowling Green)
Picked up my 2021 in Jan. Love driving the car but i am a little disappointed in the amount of road noise. I have a 3lt, z51 coupe with the see-thru top. I wonder if the thin plastic top amplifies the road noise when compared to the standard top. Has anybody compared the 2 types of tops back/to/back to see if there is an appreciable difference in road noise? While i like the roar of the engine i am not crazy about the drone when just cruising down the highway.
thanks
I have a 3LT HTC. I find that the road noise is substantially higher on concrete highways than asphalt ones. I assume that the run flat tires contribute to the enhanced tire whine.
Hmm, have had my 2020 Z51 for going on 10 months. Quietest Vette I have had, certainly MUCH quieter than my 2014 Z51 and 2017 Grand Sport coupes. They were so loud wife did not want to ride in them. She has ridden more in the C8 that ~7 years with my C7s.
I use her example as when she is in the car have to drive with the radio off. She has commented on how quite it is. When I drive, usually by myself, the sound system starts playing as soon as the car starts and is seldom off. Needed in the C7s to drown out road and tires noise! Plays in shuffle mode >1000 songs I have on a thumb drive. In fact this morning just updated that thumb drive with a couple of hundred more songs. Sill driving with the 12 month free Sirius. But it will end and back to my flush mount thumb drive in the USB port in the console.
Even Tadge (the Executive Chief Corvette Engineer) admitted the worked so hard to eliminate engine noise you don't hear the "good sounds" like intake and exhaust. He said the routed the air intake closer to the thin side window glass by your ear versus the glass behind the cabin that is 9 mm think to block sound. Said they found that when examining a Ferrari ME. It's 2 1/2 times thicker that the windshield. Yep, in fact IMO (and many others) perhaps too quite! It is a sports car!
If fact looked for that intake passage Tadge discussed when I installed my low restriction air filter. Pic below shows what he described. As many complain, can't hear the NPP as much as in the C7s!
Picked up my 2021 in Jan. Love driving the car but i am a little disappointed in the amount of road noise. I have a 3lt, z51 coupe with the see-thru top. I wonder if the thin plastic top amplifies the road noise when compared to the standard top. Has anybody compared the 2 types of tops back/to/back to see if there is an appreciable difference in road noise? While i like the roar of the engine i am not crazy about the drone when just cruising down the highway.
Everything in automotive design is a compromise between two or more opposing factors. - Quiet tire tread vs handling tire tread. - Noise canceling insulation and designed features built into the car vs cost and an increase in mass. - My wife is smart; she has a doctorate, but she doesn't know a battery charger from a supercharger (hyperbole). - Driving the C8 for the first time and after only 2-3 miles, she said, "This Corvette is so much quieter than our old one". - Our old one was a C7 Z51.
Suggestion: You could change the tires to a quieter all season design. - Do your research and select a tire that was tested and verified to be quiet.
I have a solid roof and non Z51 and my car has zero drone at any speed. The tires are quiet but can be noisy on certain surfaces as mentioned above. The high performance tires are just a tad more noisy than the all seasons. My car is actually too quiet cruising and under mild acceleration. Sounds beautiful when I'm on it.
My only issue with road noise is that the tires seem to be very noisy on certain roads. Interstates seem to have some large areas where the road has been patched. These seem to be much noisier than the original paving.
Picked up my 2021 in Jan. Love driving the car but i am a little disappointed in the amount of road noise. I have a 3lt, z51 coupe with the see-thru top. I wonder if the thin plastic top amplifies the road noise when compared to the standard top. Has anybody compared the 2 types of tops back/to/back to see if there is an appreciable difference in road noise? While i like the roar of the engine i am not crazy about the drone when just cruising down the highway.
Of all the cars we've had both the wife and I have noticed that the wider the tires are the more sensitive the car is to road noise with pavement changes. My "classic" 1990 Ford van and my C1 both have tall narrow tires and it's hard to hear pavement changes. Our C8 goes from dead quiet to having to yell inside depending on what we're riding on.
just tire noise- sounds like maybe the all seasons might help but if the people that responded have the hard top then it sounds like they are pleased with the acoustics. I need to borrow a hard top and compare.
I have both roofs and don’t notice any notable difference in road noise between the two… I also agree that it IS noticeably quieter than my similarly equipped C7.
Picked up my 2021 in Jan. Love driving the car but i am a little disappointed in the amount of road noise. I have a 3lt, z51 coupe with the see-thru top. I wonder if the thin plastic top amplifies the road noise when compared to the standard top. Has anybody compared the 2 types of tops back/to/back to see if there is an appreciable difference in road noise? While i like the roar of the engine i am not crazy about the drone when just cruising down the highway.
thanks
For background what kind of car are you coming from? Have you owned a vette or other similar sport car?
I have a non Z51 with the all season tires, I still get a lot of road noise. I don’t think changing tires will completely solve your noise problem, I think it’s just the nature of the beast. We wear Bose noise canceling ear buds for long trips, as background noise is fatiguing for us over time. It apparently doesn’t bother a lot of people, we are more sensitive to it I guess.
I have both roofs and don’t notice any notable difference in road noise between the two… I also agree that it IS noticeably quieter than my similarly equipped C7.
Same here, both roofs and I don't notice a difference between the two.
For background what kind of car are you coming from? Have you owned a vette or other similar sport car?
Hey Walter, I guess my most recent comparable car was my wife's f type coupe. It was horrible - you couldn't drive at highway speeds and carry on a conversation without raising your voice. I still love the vet and i have a radical race car and instruct in exotics all the time so i love the roar of speed but not crazy about the drone of tires when cruising. Must be the tires (or our crappy concrete roads) but i am surprised people talk about how quiet it is when it is louder than my ecodiesel ram at high way speeds.
thanks guys - i hate to throw $ at possible solutions if they wont improve this small issue. First world problem - still huge fan of the car - i pinch myself everyday.
Hey Walter, I guess my most recent comparable car was my wife's f type coupe. It was horrible - you couldn't drive at highway speeds and carry on a conversation without raising your voice. I still love the vet and i have a radical race car and instruct in exotics all the time so i love the roar of speed but not crazy about the drone of tires when cruising. Must be the tires (or our crappy concrete roads) but i am surprised people talk about how quiet it is when it is louder than my ecodiesel ram at high way speeds.
drive fast - be safe
I will say there are some roads that are grooved or whatever and are louder. This is the quietest modern vette, but I guess how quiet is up to each owner. Play louder music😉
road noise
