Bee Jay

Why is the C8 Z06 so heavy?

Some of you know me from the C3 forum, where I reduced the weight of my C3 Corvette from 3600 lbs., to only 2940 lbs., before I added a sound system and a normal sized battery to power it. It now weighs 3000 lbs. I own three Corvettes, (including a C8) two Porsches, and a Ferrari, and I autocross them all. On the autocross track, weight, or the lack thereof, is king. Electronic controls, ABS, Traction Control, PSM, etc, is Queen, and horsepower is a very nice to have. My opinion.

The C5 Z06 was only 3118 lbs. with titanium exhaust and fiberglass body, and it competes quite well at Corvette and Porsche venues. The C6 Z06 was 3530 lbs. with a carbon fiber hood and aluminum frame. The C7 Z06 was 3560 lbs with an aluminum frame and supercharger. The C8 Z06 has an aluminum frame, alloy block, various bits of carbon fiber, (wheels, brakes, and wings), and a composite body, and comes in at 3721 lbs. The Z06 HTC is 3846 lbs. the heaviest Z06 yet.

In comparison, In comparison, the 911 GT3 is 3164 lbs, the Lambo Hurricane is 3419 lbs, the Mc Claren GT is 3384 lbs., the Ferrari 488 is 3362 lbs.,and the Ferrari F8 Tributo is 3164 lbs. My heroes over at Lotus build the Evora at only 3075 lbs, with a back seat! (albeit for leg amputated toddlers only)

Why is the C8 Z06 so heavy? Why does it weigh so much more than its traditional competition, the 911 GT3? Or more than the 458 and 488 Ferrari's. I recently read an article where an entire metal body was replaced with carbon fiber, and the car lost 400lbs. What can GM do to lose some heft, and what can I do to lose some heft once I take delivery.

On the other hand, the V12, four turbo Bugatti Chiron weighs 4400 lbs.

Higgs Boson

https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums...post1606112081
Real weights vs advertised weights

All cars are heavy today, you can thank your EPA and DOT keeping your air clean and occupants safer. Cars are stiffer and quieter, more complex with computer networks inside them, really 1000 reasons why cars today are generally 600 lbs heavier than 20 years ago.

Nitro-C5

The Z06 competes favorably with super cars (and actually beats several on the track) so GM purposely added 400lbs of ballast to the car just so it would not completely embarrass cars costing 2,3 and 4X as much!

On a serious note, no one is a fan of the car being over 3,600lbs but also we need to understand that the basic mold of this car has to accommodate the C8, C8 Z51, Z06, Z07, Eray, and maybe the ZR1 and/or Zora. It is just a trade off. Do you want to have room in the cabin, do you want to haul golf clubs, do you want enough cooling so you can track all day without overheating, do you want all the bells and whistles and amities, safety equipment that come with all modern cars??... if so every bit of that adds weight. This has been stated on this forum numerous time (including by myself) that we wish they would have built a stripped down light weight version with very little amenities that was 100% track focused (and could still be bought by the general public). That said as much crap as we all give GM they are really not that stupid. A stripped down race car is what people SAY they want but in reality they don't sell near the volume that would make it financially beneficial to GM.

AzDave47

OP, You are way off on your C6 weight. OEM from the factory it was less than 3200#, not 3530#. My 2LZ with harness bar (I do road courses and other events), 2-piece rotors and non-ZP tires is down under 3150#. It has a fixed roof, no T-top or removable roof..

The C8Z is heavy due to all the amenities and safety gear and the chassis is designed to handle the E-Ray batteries and be stiff enough to handle big power from the ZR1 and likely hybrid Zora. The chassis strength and weight was designed to have the removable roof section on the coupe and also handle the HTC

NEVERL8

Some marketing guru said you have to be able to carry two golf bags in the rear. Hence at least a half a foot longer and at least hundred pounds heavier, probably more on both numbers.

stevebz06

There are competing camps within the Corvette group: one camp is composed of a bunch of racers and they think like you, and the result is a chassis which is pretty light weight. Then, you have the luxury barge group who spend all their waking hours trying to fit more convenience and luxury features into every nook and cranny which takes a fairly light car and makes it heavier than hell. I place part of the blame on owners who constantly look for new features to stuff into their cars, and GM seems to listen to them more than they do the racers. GM could listen to both, IMO. There was a time when you could delete radios and heaters on the order form.

Higgs Boson

50 years ago...

Nobody wants a luxury barge but nobody BUYS stripped out race cars with license plates, those are romantic memories only. If you are a "racer" you can either strip the weight out yourself, or do what actual race car drivers do which is start from the ground up rather than buy a new car off the showroom. GM is trying to make money and to do that they calculate where the curvy line is highest over the X- Axis labeled "Weight."

Racer X

Just false. Go look under the trunk of a C8 and tell us how to shorten the C8 by 6" without putting the transaxle in danger getting damaged in every rear end collision. Put the Targa top in the trunk of a C8 coupe and tell hoe they shorten the trunk by 6" top to bottom.

AzDave47

You could delete the targa top like they did in the C6Z (fixed roof), but there is only 2" of open space between the rear of the transaxle and the protective crush space. AT MOST, without redesigning the transaxle, Chevy would have saved 2" even if they eliminated the two golf bags criteria and holding the targa top. My targa top will probably never come off, just like I never yearned to take the top off my C6Z..

Racer X

Why is your C3 so heavy at 3000 pounds? My Lotus Elise was right at 2000 pounds. And it was probably quicker than your C3 stock. It had manual seats that did not even recline, no console, half a dash, it was very tiny. It makes a Mini look big.

If you want to know why cars are heavier, go measure them. The C8 has a longer wheelbase, wider track, longer length, wider width. Heavier seats, more insulation stiffer chassis, more amenities, more speakers, more of everything. I had a 2001 Z06, my C8 HTC is far more luxurious, and bigger, and faster, and quicker, and stiffer.

It is heaver because the vast majority of of people want things that make them heavier.

Nitro-C5

Yup and Yup As I said before although we all want to think we are smarter than GM they know exactly what they are doing to sell the most amount of cars. A stripped out Racer would sell...by the dozens...

Panfish

I’ve never associated my pleasure of driving my C8 with more or less weight, at least not on the street.

Red Mist Rulz

Look under the trunk. See what's there? Yeah, the transaxle and exhaust. I'd be surprised if you could shave 3 inches off the lenght of the car. And if you did, you'd hae to leave the targo top at home if you want to drive open air. It COULD be made narrower behind the wheels, but not really any shorter.

And lots of us use the C8 as more than a weekend toy, and are happy to have the luggage capacity.

As for the OP's question, what are the prices of most of those lighter cars? GM mass produces the car, and the chassis has to be cost effective at the Stingray price point. Ferrari and Lambo can afford to use a lot more CF and magnesium when they're selling cars for twice to 5 times the price.

And please don't crash your C3 in front end collision, or have someone ram you from the side in their 6000 lb SUV. Unlike the C8, it wouldn't meet any of today's crash standards.

And those (bolded) are the ones that understand who buys Corvettes. I'd be surprised if 5% of C8 will ever get closer to a racetrack than the highway going past, and maybe 1% see more than an HPDE once or twice a year. GM would probably sell 15 cars with the radio and heater delete (which might save all of 25 pounds.

Nond of the mandated safetry and emissions equipment can be deleted, and that adds far more weight than all the convenience features. Side impact protection, air bags, crush zones. ABS. The seats ARE darned heavy, but they also don't wallow around and flex light a folding lawn chair like the pre-C7 seats did. For that matter, neither does the frame. You could take all the motors and gears out of the seats, and maybe save 15-20 pounds each, but that's still not much weight saving, and a power seat delete option wouldn't appeal to more than 1% of buyers.

if a racer wants a lightweight car to race, there are other, better choices. For someone who drives on the street 99% of the time, the Corvette is the compromise that sells. And let's not forget, GM is in business to sell a lot of cars to a lot of people, not a very few cars to a very small market.

combatninja

Those modern contemporaries you listed come in at least 60% more expensive on the base price than a C8 Z06. I threw out the Evora since it is a) out of production and b) not a serious competitor to any of those cars. It used a Toyota V6 for God's sake. The Porsche is the cheapest of the remaining cars but still costs way, way more than a Z06. That's one big reason why it weighs more. Adding lightness costs money. Lots of it. Not sure what exact spec of Z06 you cited for your weight of 3721 lbs but multiple magazines have tested Z07s at 3666 lbs or so, not to shabby for a car that is still available for $40,000 less than that zero option GT3.

Maybe you're looking at this all wrong. Somewhere there's a brand new GT3 owner getting savaged on a Porsche forum because he dared ask how the Z06 manages to be faster on a track while costing 35% less than his car. The recently released Lightning Lap results are probably being pored over. No doubt the discussion will soon veer into sermons on stitching alignment and pedigree any second now.

The Z06 is still a monumental achievement and totally unexpected with that crazy bespoke engine in 2023 as we are about to descend into electrified, automated automotive hell. With the runaway success of the basic C8, GM didn't really need to build this thing, at least not in its current form. It would've been a lot easier and cheaper to bolt a blower on the LT2 and call it a day. Instead they penned a love letter to petrol. Like all great romances, they are predicated on seeing the virtues, not the vices. Enjoy the car for what it is, don't lament what it never could've been.

Bee Jay

Please, I love my C8, and will love my Z06 C8. I am not being negative. I only asked why the C8 is so heavy compared to other V8 mid engine, or rear engine, cars. The Porsche, Ferrari, and McClaren are not stripped down, zero option, racers. GM did a great job on the C8, I only wish it weighed more like a C5 Z06. There are more of us racing our cars than you think. The C8 is heavier by far than the competition, and yes it is cheaper by far too.

combatninja

The only way that a mid-engined V8 supercar in the year 2023 is going to weigh the same as its predecessor from 25 years ago is if it has a carbon fiber monocoque. Instant $225,000+ base MSRP.

ZRacerLE

Just need the government to ban track cars under 3600lbs. Done. California, I'm looking at you...

Tpup

Where did the 3721 lbs come from?

Chevy says "base curb weight" is 3,500lbs and one magazine reported 3,434 with CF wheels.

I agree it's heavy but using the 991.2 GT3 as a comparison it's 8 inches longer and 7 inches wider (1 inch lower)...

stevebz06

If you are doing something like competing in SCCA or NCCC autocross, and I'm pretty sure more people do this than build race cars and hit the track, and you compete in stock classes, and again I'd bet money that more people are doing this than modifying a stock car, you are not allowed the kind of modifications you're talking about. The rules pretty much restrict you to keeping the equipment that came on your car. I had a C5 that almost never touched a street because it lived on a trailer. I noticed after a while that my radio had quit working. I was sorely tempted to tear it out, but I couldn't do it because the rules didn't allow it.

There is a market for stripped down stock cars for people like me. How big of a market, I don't know, but I'd see a lot of cars on weekends that were used almost exclusively for autocross and sometimes track events, so if Chevrolet offered a car that was substantially lighter than the usual fare, I imagine that they would sell a fair number of them.

Bee Jay

OK, I was off a little!
How much does a 2023 C8 zo6 weigh?
With the optional carbon fiber wheels, the curb weight of the Z06 is an impressive 3,434 pounds comparable to or better than a 2022 992 Porsche 911 GTS Cabriolet. This allows the Z06 to aggressively reach 0-to-60 MPH in about 2.6 seconds.
But I was referencing this:
Per Corvette Blogger who was gifted an internal weight chart referencing the C8 Z06’s weight ratings, we now know the lightest version of the 2023 Corvette Z06 has a curb weight of 3,721 pounds, and a gross vehicle weight of 4,021 pounds. For gross vehicle weight, a 300 pound add-on is required by the EPA to take into account a driver, passenger and cargo. As for the convertible, the maxed out weight sits at 4,146 pounds or 3,846 pounds dry.