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Showing content with the highest reputation on 12/31/2022 in Posts
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Shelby Cobra comes and goes. Dodge Viper comes and goes. At least with the Viper, it spawned 3 generations. (I know Dodge likes to say that the Viper is 5 generations, and technically you could say it is 5 generations but technically you could also say its 3 generations too) The Acura NSX comes and goes. Its helped to be tuned by a race car driver, it goes away after 1 generation and a decade long production run. When the C3 and C4 had that kind of production run, Euro and Japanese badge snobs shat on that.... The NSX comes back a decade later but is feared to go away again... The McLaren F1 comes along. Goes away. The company then does another successor somewhat a decade later. Expands to 1- 2-3 other models. But the company now as we speak is feared to go bankrupt... Since 2020. Serious at the beginning of 2022, securing financing here and there during the course of the year including selling off some classic cars in their museums but becoming more in danger as then year closes to 2023... Audi brings out the R8 15 years ago. Shares many things with Lamborghini and their Gallardo or Huracan or whatever. Both companies spawn a new entry to be Corvette/Ferrari 458 and successors/Porsche 911 competitors. The Gallardo succesfully goes unto become the Huracana and the Huracan will live on to another successor. The R8 gets another generation but there might NOT BE a 3rd gen DESPITE its corporate brother being succesful... The 911, was ALMOST replaced in the 1970s. It was NOT a successful sports car in the market place. It had a cult following IN the 1970s, but it was NOT enough. The replacement was supposed to be the 928. It WAS a Corvette formula car. BECAUSE the 911 had a cult following, Porsche stuck around with it selling BOTH the 911 and the 928 side by side. The saviour of the 911 WAS the 959 that injected new technologies into the car invigorating new interest into the 911 AWAY from such new entries as an NSX or Viper or F355 and Testarossa and even the McLaren F1. Porsche also done 911 GT2s in the mid-1990s that carried the torch fromm the 959 link to the 911... But the company Porsche was in dire need of a bread and butter car. Long story short, the 928 went away. A decade later, Porsche tries its hand in yet another Corvette business type of venture in the Boxster/Cayman. It succeeds with that BECAUSE Porsche also does SUVs... The Corvette at this time was looong in the tooth with the C4. The ZR1 was NOT a succesful car. But it survived somehow. Even if Corvette went unto a C5, BECAUSE the C4 held unto soooo long, the C5 was in danger of being laughed at out of existance. It held on. It spwaned a C6. Eurobadge snobs laughed at the C6 as much as they laughed at the C5. They had no reason to. But they did. Corvette nearly died again but a C7 saw the light... At THIS point in time, Corvette was no longer at the cusp of being a supercar, the other brands had HYPERCARS... The C7 was a supercar, but Eurosnobs snubbed it for NOT being a hypercar... The C8 comes along and the same Eurosnobs try to screw with it but they really cant. The C8 really has no faults to discredit it. There are no Malibu steering wheels to laugh at. No composite reverse leaf springs to denounce. its even got a flat plane crank V8 producing the MOST horsepower of ANY NATURALLY ASPIRATED V8 before it. besting Mercedes, Ferrari, Ford, Chrysler, Audi, BMW and every other V8 manufacturer... Some Eurosnobs cant fathom that and say its a Ferarri copy cat. Some say that because Corvette went that-a-way, that it means that Corvette faithfull are hypocrites because they have defended GM and Corvette to stay pushrod... RIGHT, SMK???!!! Yet a pushrod V8 Corvette is STILL offered and is STILL a beast of a machine ALL for JUST 60 000 dollars. Hot Rodders make THAT pushrodded Corvette into a hypercar killer anyway... The Corvette is a testament, despite on the brink of being canceled SEVERAL times in its existence itself, on how difficult it is to be a sports car and live. The Corvette is 70 years old. Will a C9 be available? I could say with 100% CERTAINTY that a C9 WILL be available to us. BECAUSE the C8 is a success in the market place today. Right now. But will a C10 be a thing? Im not so sure... We are not there yet to know. Its a fragile niche... Cadillac to spawn a car above a Corvette will just fail. Because it does not have the cred to have such a car. Lexus failed. Acura failed. Corvette IS such a car to begin with. Nothing else needs to be said.1 point
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Yes the Corvette is engineered to hit a price point, so that have that covered, but what if there were no price point? What if you could take Cadillac Celestiq interior and make a 2 seat coupe out of carbon fiber and put 4 EV motors in it for 1600 hp for example. Mercedes is working on a 480 hp electric motor that weighs half their current ev motor and they can put 1 at each wheel vs 1 on each axle. So 1,920 hp is possible with the same weight of an EQS dual motor set up. Cadillac could build that, might cost a million dollars but who cares, you do it just to push the envelope of what's possible. Bugatti reportedly lost $6 million per car on the Veyron, but Volkswagen still built it knowing they'd lose money just to push the engineering boundaries. Now they made money on the Chiron. Just like VW probably lost money on the Phaeton but that work paved the way for the A8, Continental GT and Flying Spur which made money. GM could make a hyper car that is really pushing 2030s tech and performance that loses money, but puts Cadillac back on the map and that trickles down to other cars 10 years from now. Correct on the Boxter/Cayman/718 being Corvette price, but not having the same performance, but the Porsche has better build quality than a Cadillac or anything at GM, and better resale value than anything at GM. Some of that money for the Porsche is going to luxury and build quality, and badge, Porsche vs Chevrolet. So it depends on what you want, if you just want and at VIR the C8 Z51 runs a 2:49 the 718 GT4 runs a 2:50.3 they aren't that far apart. I will give the newer Ford GT hyper car status since the price is high and they are more rare than the 2005 version and the GT hits 216 mph. But using VIR times as a guide the 2017 Ford GT did a 2:43 the 2018 AMG GT R did a 2:43.4 and that isn't a Black Series or Pro. The McLaren 600LT Spider, 911 GT3, 911 GT3 RS and 911 Turbo S all beat it in the following years. The Ford GT set the lap record for Car and Driver Lightning lap in 2017, but 10 cars have since passed it, so it had the hyper car performance 5 years ago, which still makes it a hyper car for its time just like the Ferrari Enzo was 20 years ago. But I think Ford is done making the GT now anyway.-1 points
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