Transcription
We all know that there are cheap cars and there are expensive cars, but sometimes there are cars that could be both. So today, we're going to go look at one car that its models put it at three drastically different price points. And since this is the first episode of the series where it's not my cars, we're going to do a car that I've always wanted, the C6 Corvette.
Even if you know nothing about cars, you know what a Corvette is. And if you do know about cars, then you know there's probably not a single vehicle that's more synonymous with America than a Corvette. And to me, I think the pinnacle of the Corvette lineage is the C6, the sixth generation.
New Balance's jean shorts and car merch are cool now, but if you weren't wearing that non-ironically like five years ago, then you probably loved Corvettes since they were introduced in 1953. But if not, you probably didn't care about them until about the C5, the fifth generation, which is when they started to actually become a good sports car. I said what I said. The C4 and before that, just not really.
And even if you didn't like the C5, what you did like and probably cared about was the engine it came with, the LS1. It was an all-aluminum small-block V8 that made about 400 horsepower. This motor was legendary, and Chevrolet saw the affinity the entire car community had towards it and started putting it in everything. They put it in coupes like the Camaro, the Firebird, and the GTO. They also put it in sedans with the CTS-V, and then they put it in an SUV, the Trailblazer SS. It's sort of like FCA just looked at what Chevy did in the early 2000s, took that model for the Hellcats, except for back then we weren't doing takeovers with them. Maybe Chevy did it slightly better or worse, I don't know.
The C6 Corvette was made from 2005 to 2013, and Chevy made a lot of them. They made 215,000 Corvettes. To put that into perspective, BMW made 57,000 BMW M3s in the same time period. That's an incredible amount of cars. It was meant to be a sports car for the normal people. It packaged exotic looks, high horsepower, good handling, practicality, and good reliability for a somewhat affordable price tag. So it's no shock that it was a hit in America. Since Chevy was absolutely slaying on track with the C6.R, which took its class wins at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 2007, '08, and '10, they decided they had to offer way more than just a base model Corvette, which is why it comes in a variety of different packages to serve pretty much any type of individual. And now there's Corvettes at pretty much every price point, ranging from low to high. So today, we're going to go look at them and drive them, and then we're going to compare them and see which one I think is most worth it at the current car market. Let's go.
So, we got to start off with a base model, which is already pretty funny to say considering it's a base model Corvette. You get to start with a Corvette, so you're already up there. But this was a car for the people, and it offered a lot of stuff for a pretty reasonable price. The MSRP when this car was new was $47,000, but a good condition manual C6 could be had for right around the $20,000 price point. That's incredible because if you were to take a second and list out all of the things you want out of your project car, the C6 has that pretty much stock. It's got 400 horsepower, it's got a six-speed, it's got multi-piston big brakes, it looks fast, and it handles well, and it's all right around 3,000 pounds. So it's pretty much exactly what you want out of the sweet spot of a performance car. Put enough of me talking. Let's grab the owner.
What up? Hey, how's it going? Good. This is my friend Sonia, and this is her C6 Corvette. It is, this is my 2005 uh base model C6, and currently, it's my daily. Nice. This is a great practical daily driver. It's not so bad. You got a big trunk, it's comfy, it's sort of a hatchback, right? It's a good time. You have another car? I do, a 2017 GTR, and I was feeling a little bad about putting some miles on it. For a 2017, it's got like 65,000 miles. Damn. Too much. Your Corvette beater? Yes, that's a good way to have it. What's done to it? I know it can't be 100% stock. It's pretty close. I wanted to keep it pretty stock, but, uh, right from the factory, it sounds a little dorky, not gonna lie. So I got a valved exhaust off a 2008 Corvette and I got the mild to wild kit, and then I just left it open because it sounds, sounds better that way. That's great. You've had a lot of self-restraint in keeping it stock because the aftermarket for this car is like incredible. It goes crazy. But besides that, I just put a Corsa X-pipe on it, uh, engine mounts, transmission mounts, Morimoto lights, Mishimoto radiator, the basics. That's about it. How many miles are on it? 23,000. 25,000. My God, it's like a baby. I bought it at 13,000, which is wild for 2005. I couldn't resist. Pretty nuts. Has it been reliable so far? There's so many things that were wrong with it when I first bought it, but first year problems, always have it. But also, it's old now. I mean, it's 20 years old. 20 years old, so I don't blame it. Yeah, I'm falling apart too. Only slightly older. I feel it. First year, there's definitely some fun quirks. So I can't wait for you to take it out. Okay. Yeah, let's get out on the road.
All right, the base C6. Hell yeah. Right off the bat, sounds cool. This car has got a modified exhaust, of course, it's going to sound a bit better than a stock one. So once you get into the C6, you realize immediately that this car feels special. The ergonomics of the interior, the way everything fits, the way you sit in it, it feels like a sports car. If you know Corvettes and you've been aware of them, you know that the interior quality isn't the greatest. Lot of plastic, a lot of hard materials that look nice but don't really feel premium in any way. But it's a way that they've probably used to keep the cost down on these cars. This is an absolutely massive steering wheel. We are here at Angeles Crest National Forest, one of my favorite roads. It's a pretty busy afternoon, so lots of cars out here, but we're just chilling anyways. The base C6 comes with an LS2. It's a 6.2 liter wet-sump small-block V8. Wet-sump is basically a fancy way of saying like every other engine with an oil pan, because the Z06 and some of the other higher-end cars come with a dry-sump oiling system. You just say it to sound fancy. The steering's fairly sharp. It's a little dead on center, but it has really good handling characteristics because it has a dual wishbone front suspension setup, like you could find in the new 992 GT3. The car really hides its size well. I think the way you sit in the cabin makes it feel like it's a really long car, but it feels small on the road. And the view you get out of the hood is the similar feeling that I get in a 911 or in the 360. It's just, it's so unique and so cool looking. I mean, it's plenty fast. I think you'd be hard-pressed to find a better deal for that $20 to $22,500 price range for a car that you can then modify, because I think with some modifications, this thing could feel savage. A bucket seat, a smaller steering wheel, a more aggressive alignment, maybe some suspension upgrades, this thing could absolutely rip. So I'm excited to go drive some of the other cars because to me, this is already pretty damn good.
I want to give a big thank you to everyone who purchased something at Driver's Era, and for all you guys that missed out, letting you know that we are restocking because this is going to be our always-on product. But we're working on some really fun drops in the future around some really interesting capsules. Right, a lot of you guys were asking for merch, and I didn't want to start just like a YouTube apparel brand. So Ron and I partnered together to do something that we're really excited about, and we're cooking up a lot of really fun things. So I want you to stay tuned.
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I'm going to... make. And right in the middle, we have this, the Grand Sport. The bargain of the C6 lineup. It's basically a Z06 with a $10,000 discount. And if you know me from the Hoonigan days, you got to know the owner of this car. Let's go find them. Most likely situation to find this guy wrenching on a big block here. Let me get this mic. Let's do this. Damn thing here. This thing running? Yeah, running. Don't be pulling your shirt up on my my channel. This is Zach Shop. He does a lot of cool stuff here on his YouTube channel. Make sure to go check him out. I'm going to drag him outside. And also look at this, the Mustang from the Speakeasy. Mr. Roma. Yeah, Ron has had this Mustang for years. I've known Ron for like seven years now. I've seen it drive two different times, maybe three. One time it definitely broke down on us by overheating. I couldn't let him let this thing die. Got his ass working on it, and this thing is going to be running in like three hours for like eight months. Zach is one of my good friends. I've known this guy for about a decade now. He's also the biggest bully I know, but in the best ways. He's kind of like the older brother that'll make fun of you and beat you up until you get all of your stuff accomplished. I just want to see people win, baby. I appreciate you for that. Well, thank you, man. So, what do you got here? All right, so this is my 2010 Corvette Grand Sport. And if the jabronies over here would shut the up, please Jesus Christ. This is literally just like, all time. This is my reasonable, responsible daily that, uh, I drive in Los Angeles. This is Zach's only practical daily driver. The truck you saw inside was his other daily driver, and I've never seen this guy drive anything that you didn't measure fuel economy in feet. This is his take on like a practical daily driver, and it really is. I mean, like C6 Corvette is awesome. You can actually do a lot with it, and they actually get really good gas mileage. For me, it's incredible gas mileage. Even as this thing sits with a cam and heads, basically straight open exhaust, it still gets like 25 to the gallon on the highway, 10, 12 around town if you're, you know, hot-dogging it, as you do. Because you got to, you know. What made you buy a Grand Sport over a Z06? The Grand Sport is the most underrated model in the lineup. And if you get one with a six-speed, you basically get a dry-sumped LS3 with a forged bottom end, and you get all the Z06 parts like the Z06 diff, trans, the wide body, you get the brakes, you just have a steel frame. So it's like, I think it's like 100 pounds heavier, which isn't bad. But you get a removable top, exactly. You know what I mean? Like, let that thing breathe, baby. So, what do you got done to this thing? Because of course, it's not stock. Yeah, I mean, I'm known for chop, obviously. I have my own camshaft line from Texas Speed, BFD cams. Well, go, go get yourself one if you got an LS, it'll sell itself once he starts it up, because it's the best part of this car. Yeah, so it's really mild exterior-wise. Left it alone. I, when I bought it, the dude had this carbon hood on it, which like, I'm not a huge fan of, but I will say it does let a lot of heat out. And then it looks pretty low. Yeah. Well, so it's lowered on stock bolts. This is a great time for a cutaway to like an old-timey like horse and carriage buggy, 'cause that's exactly where this shits from. The work of many men, early models weren't built for speed. It sits really nice. Yeah, it's like, you know, it's, it's good, and it, it works for what you need to do. And you could see the huge front brakes on this, which is really cool. These are straight off the Z06, so you got a big six-piston caliper up front. It does stop. It's like throwing an anchor out. We threw some wheels on it, had some custom Rotiforms made, three-piece. Had to go with the gold accents, dude. 275 up front. It's a big old tire. What do you run out back? 325, uh, 30 in the rear, 19. Well, let's pop the hood. Let's see what's under this thing. This is where all the magic happens. This is what makes a Corvette a car that's worth buying. The chassis is great, handles well, racing prestige, but really, really it's 'cause the hood goes like this. You can't have doors that go like this, you have to have a hood that goes like that. Next best thing from the exterior, basically stock looking, right? K&N intake, you see obviously, you can see the long tube. It's got inch and 7/8 long tubes, and it's got a little Mighty Mouse catch can. All the other work is internal. So I've got my Texas Speed BFD LS3 chop monster camshaft. I've got some really nice link bar lifters from Katech. It's got Manley push rods. I did a trunnion upgrade from CH for the, uh, rockers. It does have heads, so it's got PRC 260cc LS3 heads that are ported. So it's pretty much a full top-end build, but the bottom end is completely stock. On an absolutely perfect day at sea level, I'm talking like 60 degrees, dead ass at sea level, right next to the ocean, did 550 at the tire, and then 535 foot-pounds, right next to the ocean. You could catch the bass from the dyno, straight up. We're deep sea fishing right off the dyno. Honestly, like a realistic setting, it's probably like right around like 535. That's usually strong. That's really strong. It's like perfect for a street car, especially for this, 'cause the weight distribution and it's not heavy. They're only like 3,000 pounds. It, it's great. Is there much of a more benefit going from the LS3 offered in this to the LS7 offered in the Z06? I would say yes, but then there's some problems too. LS7, you got a couple cool things. One, forged crank, it's dry sump, obviously. This same thing, but LS7 has titanium connecting rods, which is sick. Hot boy. It also has titanium intake valves, and the LS7 heads flow incredibly good, right? Let's say like, okay, so my LS7 cam, no head work, just basically everything else stock, there's like a 70 horsepower difference. Whoa. Okay. So what's the downside of an LS7 car? Okay, the one problem with the LS7s is they change their manufacturing for the heads, and then they drop valves all the time. If you get one that doesn't have the heads fixed, you're kind of like rolling the dice on a ticking time bomb. And then an LS7, because it has all that spicy titanium stuff inside, is tremendously expensive. Whereas this LS3 is, are a bit more common. Yeah, it's kind of the way to go. I mean, like, if, if you're just trying to beat the dog out of it or you want to put a blower on them, these are great for it. All right, well, let's go take this thing out and see how it drives. Okay. All right.
This is a, it's really weird being on this side of the... car. C6 Grand Sport. Yeah, so the Grand Sport really feels pretty similar to the base C6 on the inside. Couple small changes, but overall, no, it's very familiar. Same trash. It's a really comfortable car, but the American build quality in here, this is sort of the era where it's a little bit better than the C5. C5 is straight up suburban. Yeah. My favorite part about this car is just feeling like your DNH heart just cruising around. Exactly. It's got so much low-end torque, it's kind of crazy. Like, it makes it for a really fun around-town experience. Exactly. You can have like a pretty like quote-unquote big cam and like you don't lose all your low end. The only, yeah, yeah, like it's just got so much power at like every point in the rev range. The pedals are positioned really nice, so you can do like nice matev heel-toes. Man, I like this. I have wanted a C6 Corvette for so long. I owned a C5 Z06 for a hot minute, but it was the crummiest Z06 one could ever buy, so I didn't get a good experience. And I've always wanted a C6. The C6 generation is sort of when they, I think the exterior became a little bit better looking, the interior became better looking, like it became a better car. And it's not just like a janky like plastic just falling apart. The inside, it's a do-it-all car. I mean, you can track these, you can daily them comfortably, and you can do like, you can drift them like great. I mean, these are finally becoming cars that like people are making into drift cars and stuff because you get such a complete package right out of the box. Oh yeah, I'm surprised at how civil this car is considering how it sounds. I figured this thing would be a complete disaster to drive. No, it's not that bad. God damn, it sounds so good. Yeah. Oh, dude, you got 2,000 more RPM. Why you don't be nice? This thing is sick though. It feels really nice. Give it the F sauce. This thing scoops and it feels nice. The transmission is so good, like it just has that perfect mechanical like smash feeling where it's not like buttery smooth, but it's also not vague. Also really shocked at how well this thing put down the power. First into second gear, if you don't like power shift it, it'll put all the power down, which makes it feel so much faster than it could just blow the tires off. 500 horsepower, 3,000 pounds, it's like just at the ragged edge of overpowering the chassis, you know? Because if you were to put 700 at this car, it starts to get unfun. Like I've driven some ZR1s where I'm like, dude, this is like completely unusable. Yeah, when you just hit it in second, it just blows it to rev limiter. Like this is at that really sweet spot that's like fun and fast, but not like un-. Yeah, dude, this is sick. Thank you so much for letting me drive your car. Finally. Anytime. Anytime. Hell yeah. You guys want to see more of Zach's stuff and all the crazy builds he's got going on, go check out his YouTube. It's Mr. Zachary. I'll link it below. He's doing some cool stuff, a lot different than what I'm doing, so maybe you'll enjoy it. Go check it out.
It's the top dog of the Corvettes, the ZR1. It's a car that I've always lusted over, and I've never even been inside of it. It is the craziest Corvette they've ever made. At this point, it's a 6.2 liter supercharged LS9 engine, and it has carbon fiber everywhere. The roof, the body, even the brakes. And it's got a clear portion of the hood just so you could see the engine. But this came a long way from the base C6 Corvette. It's got a lot of upgrades, so let me walk you through them. The ZR1 actually started in the C3 Corvette, but it was only an option package. And then in the C4, it became its own model. I thought it was kind of lackluster. It had a 375 horsepower LT5 engine. I didn't think it was that special. It skipped the C5 generation, but then for the C6, they went all out. And Chevy was pretty generous. They made nearly 4,700 of these cars, which is why they're still sort of attainable. This car right here is for sale at O'Brien for under $90,000. But ZR1s in general sort of hover around that $80 to $100,000 price range, which is a lot, but you get a lot of car for the money. So I'm really excited to see, is this thing worth up to five times more than a base C6? Let's find out.
C6 ZR1. So excited. This is an absolute grail car. Among the best, and stats-wise, it stacks up to anything that was in its category, and I think it punches way above its weight class, especially for what it's selling for now. First thing you notice in this car, it is a bit more premium than the lower-level C6s. It's got leather cladding all over, including the dashboard, door panels, slightly different trim, but you got the same steering wheel, pretty similar seats. These may have a slight more bolstering, but not enough to really be noteworthy. Feels very much the same. And at low throttle, low RPM, you can't really designate this car from the other models. Being that it's a supercharged V8, it doesn't need a really reckless camshaft or anything to have such a high power output. You have a really smooth drive down low. It actually makes you realize why you pay so much more for high-end sports cars versus what you can put together in your garage. It's really hard to create over 600 horsepower and a car that could do 200 mph and do 0 to 60 in 3.4 seconds and still be this composed. So I guess it's just a little shocking at how civil this car is. I don't know why, but when I think of a 600 horsepower Corvette, I think of something a little bit more like Zach, that's kind of on the ragged edge of being comfortable and practical to drive. All right, we'll do a little first gear hit. Holy crap. Speed limit here in California is 65 miles per hour, and you can just barely break that in first gear. 0 to 60 in 3.4 seconds. And I think a lot of that is probably attributed to that you don't need to do that one-two shift, although this transmission feels like it would take it. Holy crap. Having big displacement and a supercharger, you don't need to drop gears to be at super high RPM to get your power extracted out of this engine. 3,000 RPM, you floor it, and it goes. And because the gearing is so long, it may not sound that exciting on camera because it's only marginally going through the RPM, but you're picking up mile per hour so fast. My God, it puts all the power down, which is awesome. It it's amazing when you have a chassis that can handle the power. It feels so much faster when you can actually accelerate rather than blow the tires off. They've done a really good job at tuning the suspension to be able to put the power down. This thing pulls like an absolute freight train. I'm only slightly bummed that you can't really hear the blower in this car. All right, uh, look, the gearing in this car is so outrageously long. To wind out second gear, you are so far into breaking the law. This is a fun car. I guess all it'll come down to is putting some numbers behind it to see which car is actually more worth it from an non-emotional standpoint, because yeah, this is fun. Let's go, let's go wrap this up.
Oh my Lord, this thing is way too fast. How do people sell cars like this to normal people? Oh my god. Dude. So I broke these into five categories on how to score them from one to 10, 10 being the best. First one is cool. That's the most important thing when we're buying cars, right? So how cool is it to the the general public and where's the rate if you drive up to a Cars and Coffee meet? Second one is fun. How great is this car to drive? How much emotion does it provoke? It's arguably one of the most important things about the car. Third, practicality. Can you daily drive this thing? And does it get worse as it gets better, which is like what we saw in the 997 episode with the GT3 RS not being anywhere near as practical as the base car. Price, which is the price you could get it in two days. Market. How much car are you getting for the money? And the last one is something I never tell people to do, but it's invest. But I'll never recommend investing in cars, but what I'm talking about is how safe is it to buy this car at the current market rate and what do I think will happen with the future values of the car and your money? So let's get into it.
All right, so for the base car, here's how I scored it. Cool factor, I gave it a three. A Corvette is cool, but a base Corvette isn't really anything that people are going to oooh and ahhh over. Fun, I'm giving it a five. It's got a lot of power, it's got a really good feeling transmission, but the steering is sort of dead on center, and I think it needs some modifications to help give you a little bit more confidence, especially up in the mountains. Practical, I'm giving it a seven. She daily drives this car, and it's got enough cargo space to put your stuff in. It's really smooth to drive, getting parts for it is really easy and really affordable. So I think it's actually a really practical car despite being a little low-slung and only a two-seater. It's getting a seven. Price, I'm going to give this a six. You get a lot of car for your money, and I think in the current market, these cars being right around that $20,000 price point is actually a really bargain deal because whether you're going to leave it stock and have a great car or you're going to modify it and have something that's really fun that you could buy parts for for really cheap, I think it's a crazy deal. And lastly, on investment, I'm giving this a seven. And here's why: I think you get a lot of car for your money. I think that the market on these is probably bottomed out. Maybe automatic cars will continue to drop, but I think a manual C6 Corvette is going to stay right around this price point. I have to be a little conservative on that because they made so many of them, and usually what will drive prices up on cars is scarcity, and there's no scarcity in C6 Corvettes.
Which brings us to the Grand Sport. And in the cool category, I gave it a five. The exterior presence of this car, not even modified in stock form, is actually a lot cooler than the base C6. The wide fenders, the bigger brakes, some of the aero components really make this car look way more aggressive and a bit more special. For fun, I'm going to give it a seven. And I'm trying to be as unbiased to the modifications as possible because even in stock form, the car with a little bit more horsepower and a little bit better brakes is going to make it a little better. So I'm wrapping it at a seven. Practical, I'm going to give it a seven also because it literally didn't make the car any different. I think if anything, Zach's car was a little less practical because of the camshaft made it a bit more finicky to take off the line and drive in traffic. But if his car had a stock cam, it would drive 100% like a base C6 with a little bit more power. Price, I'm giving it an eight. The base C6 offers a lot, then you get a Grand Sport, and you get the wide body, you get the bigger brakes, you get the better transmission with the diff. It offers a lot more for a little bit more money. So I would say the Grand Sport gets a solid eight in the price. And the last one being an investment, I would say because that the Grand Sports are quite a bit more rare and they offer a lot of upgrades to the base C6, I'm going to give it an eight. I don't see these cars dropping in price much more than they already are. I feel like they're a great bargain for what you can get, and the manual Grand Sports are going to continue to either hold their value or maybe in the future go up in value.
Which brings us to the almighty ZR1. For cool, I gave it a seven. I rarely see a ZR1 on the street, and when I do, I definitely break my neck for it. It's a really cool-looking car, it has a lot of lore to it, so I'm giving it a seven. Fun, I'm giving it an eight. I mean, this thing is ridiculous. It's so fast. The only reason why it wouldn't be a bit higher is because the gearing is a bit too long for the street, especially in any sort of like city area, and it doesn't have the sharpest steering. And inside the cabin feels very tame when you're driving it, so it's not like a mega visceral experience, but God damn, it's fun. Practicality, I'm also giving it a seven because Chevy did an incredible job at making this car way better than a base C6. It's way faster, the handling's sharper, the braking is better. It's an incredible performance car, but it's not any bit less practical than the base C6. Price, I'm giving it an eight. I think it's a really strong buy sub-$100,000 to get you a car that does all of that that well, it's pretty incredible. It is still pretty expensive, and especially with the interior build quality, it's not the most premium car, so I'm giving it an eight. Last one, investment, I'm giving it a nine. 4,700 units isn't exactly super rare, but it's a really special car, and I think they'll continue to hold their value. They sort of skyrocketed a bit during COVID and then settled back down. I think this $90 to $100,000 price point is going to be where they live, probably forever, maybe continuing to go up. So I feel like this is a really safe buy at its current price.
So in conclusion, let's look at our totals. Base C6 got a 28. I don't want it to seem like it's a bad car, it's a really good car, truly. And for the price point, if you're in the market, you want a performance car for the $20, $25,000 range, base C6 rips. The Grand Sport came in at a 36. This car's got a lot of upgrades from the factory over a base C6 for not a ton more. What you're going to put into your base C6, you're probably going to spend on getting a stock Grand Sport. So I really think it's a good deal. And then in first place with a 39 is the ZR1. I know it comes with a way higher price tag, but it retains all the practicality of a base C6 with a ton more performance, and it is just so much cooler in person. Even over the Grand Sport, you look at a ZR1 and it just looks like a really special car. I was surprised, I thought that this would land on the Grand Sport as the winner, but after driving the ZR1 and feeling just how cool it is and just how practical it could be, I was sort of blown away. That car kind of rules. So that's a wrap for the first episode of this worth it series that I've been doing that does not include my cars. I really like making these shows. Let me know in the comments what car you think I should do next, 'cause I have a couple in mind here. But for now, I'm going to go shop ZR1s.