If you grew up during the ’70s and ’80s, then you know there’s nothing much cooler than a C3 Corvette: those curvy lines, fat alloys and, of course, the strongest V8 of the day. The C3 Corvette was so cool that Luke Skywalker starred in a movie about one. Sure, the earlier Corvettes have more collector appeal and the later …
That 6-7 second 0-60 mph time for a 1975-82 Vette is a little optimistic. Road & Track got 0-60 mph in 6.7 seconds for the Porsche 911 SC, and 7.7 seconds for a Corvette of similar vintage. The last 4 barrel C3 R&T tested got 0-60 mph in 9.2 seconds!! They got 8.2 seconds with a BMW 528i around the same time. Think about that, the BMW had 169 hp from 2.8 liters, the L48 Corvette 190 hp from 5.7 liters, both with 8:1 compression and 4 on the floor. C3s from the malaise era are cool, I have loved them since they were new, but the stock level of performance was sleepy. This applied to most cars of the era. Trouble was, with a 2 way cat you had to tune the motor to pass emissions (read lean out the carb and retard the ignition system), with a 3 way cat and lambda sond exhaust oxgen sensor and fuel injection, like some of the expensive imports had, you could tune the motor for performance and let the cat converter (a fancy filter) deal with the pollutants.
Marc82 said:That 6-7 second 0-60 mph time for a 1975-82 Vette is a little optimistic. Road & Track got 0-60 mph in 6.7 seconds for the Porsche 911 SC, and 7.7 seconds for a Corvette of similar vintage. The last 4 barrel C3 R&T tested got 0-60 mph in 9.2 seconds!! They got 8.2 seconds with a BMW 528i around the same time. Think about that, the BMW had 169 hp from 2.8 liters, the L48 Corvette 190 hp from 5.7 liters, both with 8:1 compression and 4 on the floor. C3s from the malaise era are cool, I have loved them since they were new, but the stock level of performance was sleepy. This applied to most cars of the era. Trouble was, with a 2 way cat you had to tune the motor to pass emissions (read lean out the carb and retard the ignition system), with a 3 way cat and lambda sond exhaust oxgen sensor and fuel injection, like some of the expensive imports had, you could tune the motor for performance and let the cat converter (a fancy filter) deal with the pollutants.
The late 70s to 1980 optional 4 bolt main l82 made in the 220 to 230 range stock.
And for early c3 remember the 435 tripower wasn’t the top there was the l88 Holley 850 carb and more cam with 12 to 1 and 12.5 to one compression ratio. And then the zl1 aluminum 427 which only 2 official production cars were made. It had even more cam then the l88.
I've driven and worked on some C3s and they are very underwhelming in a lot of ways, but i will readily admit that they are still cool. Nuts and bolts are easy to me, so i can make a car faster and sharper and blah blah but i don't have the skillset to make something look like that, and even if i did it wouldn't have all the history attached to it that Corvette does. They're cool.
I had a 1979 red vette as a senior in hs in 1998. It was pretty much a dog even then, but was fun to drive around. Had a bit of trouble with rear end clunk, but it was a neat car. I can legitimately say that you could see the gas gauge move on that thing when you stomped it. Girls seemed to like my 1992 Celica GT-S I got later that year a lot better. This mattered to me quite a bit at the time.
But can you easily stuff an LSx and T56 in it? I ask only partly in jest...
mistanfo said:But can you easily stuff an LSx and T56 in it? I ask only partly in jest...
The l48 and l82 can be built up to make plenty of power aswell.
You know... I have a love / hate relationship with these cars. Love how they can be made to look WILD with some of the IMSA inspired widebody kits. Hate that they devolved into such a turd in the 70's, they talk the talk but then get walked away from by most sporting cars made in the decades since.
That said, those early C3's, with the more restrained styling? Really love those.
iron vortec heads cam , performance intake ,msd, used supercharger , scrap metal bolts , tubing , bam .much more cubic fun units pretty cheaply , if spendy add a gearvendors , rear gear change , and get pretty good mileage too or a used 200 4r with a shift kit . these are like sports car mustang 5.0's build it any way ya want . My bro in law picked up an automatic 1979 for 1500$ needs floor pan repair and misc little stuff . he wanted a manual but my sis refuses to learn lol.
And let’s look at amore expensive car for the period. The Ferrari 308 fuel injection smog made a grand total of 202 hp initially .
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