So far, it's NSX 1, TRTW 0 in our search for our next car.
I examined the latest Corvettes today. The C6 in plain Jane form as a coupe with only 430hp, and a Z06 with something ridiculous like 550 or 600 hp. I lost count, they went by so fast.
The cockpit. My notes include the word 'snug' four times I see. Never tight, but... Well, like this: Picture the best-fitting suit (or as your needs dictate, little black dress) that you ever owned. Drapes well there, fits here like a second skin, and... well, you remember. Picture it again, feel it... Now would you wear that every day on all occasions? Would you do the laundry in it? Would you neck in it?
That's how the C6 felt to me. Fit like a glove, but I don't wear gloves on all occasions. I need a little more breathing room when I'm not on a race track. I could not quite duplicate the sensation by putting recaro race seats in an NSX. The NSX always feels like you're in a fighter cockpit. (Speaking as a pilot who's flown jets, not just a reader of marketing literature.) Visibility everywhere, excellent sight lines and lots of other things you take for granted if you never get in other cars. Notably, your arms as well as your eyes are free to move around as necessary to operate this, check that, and so forth.
The Corvette felt like I was strapped in a well-fitted seat, but then they lowered the seat four inches too far and put bolsters under each arm so they had limited motion. Not uncomfortable precisely, but. Not claustrophobic either, but definitely trending in that direction. A good cockpit design makes you feel like you're out there in open air and you just happen to have 40,000 pounds of jet strapped to your butt. Or uh... 1400 kg of fast aluminum.
Of course, you must allow for my being six feet and 200 pounds. Someone like Cindy at five feet and 100 pounds would not find the Corvette fitting so well, but she might find it claustrophic. You don't move around in it is what I'm trying to convey. In terms of fit, I wouldn't mind having it as a special occasion car, but of course for that purpose the bottom line is what my doctor said: "Well, when all is said and done, it's just a Corvette." So how special is the occasion going to be made to feel? For such purposes an over-used but well-polished Ferrari meets the need. Cheap, but looks fine. The rest of the time drive a silver Festiva. For the track, get a Formula Ford which will blow off a Corvette any time. (Mine did 0-80 in 4 seconds. Or less, depending on how it was geared for a particular track.)
In engineering terms instead of emotional, the C6 feels very tight, like they finished putting it together, which could not be said of the earlier models I've driven. With those, you kept wondering whether that odd rattle might be some extra parts they hadn't time to bolt on, so they tossed them in the trunk. The trunk you couldn't find, so they must have forgotten and sewn it shut.
Of course, this one had less than two hundred miles on it, but even one so young was not this well put together in the old days. Good point in its favor, though not a stand up and cheer sort of thing since our NSX at 145,000 miles felt the same way.
Very muscular of course. Just what you expect of a big healthy V8. Gobs of torque from idle up. The NSX is much more torquey down low than other exotics, but it doesn't really come to the party until you hit about four thousand and it wakes up at five and roars like a T-Rex who just found out about this sex business that the mammals have been keeping secret. This car with the smaller coupe engine still has twice the displacement. That great hulking V8 rumbles and mutters like a bear from idle on. Doesn't make it faster, since no one chases a lap time using low rpm. Just a difference in personality. I'm not sure Cindy would enjoy riding in a car that is like sitting on a subwoofer. I'm not sure I would. Not absent the overriding sensation of being behind the wheel of a monster fast car. This was especially the case with the Z06. It is what we used to call a stoplight delight. Pull up to any light on the boulevard and everybody for a hundred yards knows a Vette is sitting there without looking. Some of them hold their breath feeling the exhaust in their rib cage and their bowel and waiting for the inevitable burn-out. Great fun. Once in a while. Not in a daily driver though.
It boils down to this. Given a choice of one of the low mileage NSX's on offer or a new Corvette with a virgin warranty certificate, I would take the NSX. Not an indictment of the Corvette, which I'd recommend to many people with different needs. Just the balance of trade-offs in our life.
One down, three to go. (Well, seven if we count all three models of Porsche and two of Audi, which is arguable.)
I examined the latest Corvettes today. The C6 in plain Jane form as a coupe with only 430hp, and a Z06 with something ridiculous like 550 or 600 hp. I lost count, they went by so fast.
The cockpit. My notes include the word 'snug' four times I see. Never tight, but... Well, like this: Picture the best-fitting suit (or as your needs dictate, little black dress) that you ever owned. Drapes well there, fits here like a second skin, and... well, you remember. Picture it again, feel it... Now would you wear that every day on all occasions? Would you do the laundry in it? Would you neck in it?
That's how the C6 felt to me. Fit like a glove, but I don't wear gloves on all occasions. I need a little more breathing room when I'm not on a race track. I could not quite duplicate the sensation by putting recaro race seats in an NSX. The NSX always feels like you're in a fighter cockpit. (Speaking as a pilot who's flown jets, not just a reader of marketing literature.) Visibility everywhere, excellent sight lines and lots of other things you take for granted if you never get in other cars. Notably, your arms as well as your eyes are free to move around as necessary to operate this, check that, and so forth.
The Corvette felt like I was strapped in a well-fitted seat, but then they lowered the seat four inches too far and put bolsters under each arm so they had limited motion. Not uncomfortable precisely, but. Not claustrophobic either, but definitely trending in that direction. A good cockpit design makes you feel like you're out there in open air and you just happen to have 40,000 pounds of jet strapped to your butt. Or uh... 1400 kg of fast aluminum.
Of course, you must allow for my being six feet and 200 pounds. Someone like Cindy at five feet and 100 pounds would not find the Corvette fitting so well, but she might find it claustrophic. You don't move around in it is what I'm trying to convey. In terms of fit, I wouldn't mind having it as a special occasion car, but of course for that purpose the bottom line is what my doctor said: "Well, when all is said and done, it's just a Corvette." So how special is the occasion going to be made to feel? For such purposes an over-used but well-polished Ferrari meets the need. Cheap, but looks fine. The rest of the time drive a silver Festiva. For the track, get a Formula Ford which will blow off a Corvette any time. (Mine did 0-80 in 4 seconds. Or less, depending on how it was geared for a particular track.)
In engineering terms instead of emotional, the C6 feels very tight, like they finished putting it together, which could not be said of the earlier models I've driven. With those, you kept wondering whether that odd rattle might be some extra parts they hadn't time to bolt on, so they tossed them in the trunk. The trunk you couldn't find, so they must have forgotten and sewn it shut.
Of course, this one had less than two hundred miles on it, but even one so young was not this well put together in the old days. Good point in its favor, though not a stand up and cheer sort of thing since our NSX at 145,000 miles felt the same way.
Very muscular of course. Just what you expect of a big healthy V8. Gobs of torque from idle up. The NSX is much more torquey down low than other exotics, but it doesn't really come to the party until you hit about four thousand and it wakes up at five and roars like a T-Rex who just found out about this sex business that the mammals have been keeping secret. This car with the smaller coupe engine still has twice the displacement. That great hulking V8 rumbles and mutters like a bear from idle on. Doesn't make it faster, since no one chases a lap time using low rpm. Just a difference in personality. I'm not sure Cindy would enjoy riding in a car that is like sitting on a subwoofer. I'm not sure I would. Not absent the overriding sensation of being behind the wheel of a monster fast car. This was especially the case with the Z06. It is what we used to call a stoplight delight. Pull up to any light on the boulevard and everybody for a hundred yards knows a Vette is sitting there without looking. Some of them hold their breath feeling the exhaust in their rib cage and their bowel and waiting for the inevitable burn-out. Great fun. Once in a while. Not in a daily driver though.
It boils down to this. Given a choice of one of the low mileage NSX's on offer or a new Corvette with a virgin warranty certificate, I would take the NSX. Not an indictment of the Corvette, which I'd recommend to many people with different needs. Just the balance of trade-offs in our life.
One down, three to go. (Well, seven if we count all three models of Porsche and two of Audi, which is arguable.)
