Category: C1 Corvettes

1957 Fuel-Injected Corvette: Detroit’s First Fuelie

Published on by Scott

An American Auto Exotic – ‘50s Style!

1957 Fuel-Injected Corvette – An American Classic

Today, fuel-injection is no big deal. But lets roll back the clock at least 60 years. The first successful mechanical application of gasoline F-I was in the V-12 engines used in the WW II Messerschmitt Bf 109 airplane. After the war, Mercedes-Benz used direct-injection in their W. 196 Grand Prix racer, the 300 SLR racing car, and 300 SL sports car. Mercedes-Benz used a “timed direct-port injection” that was very efficient, but complex and expensive.

In the early ‘50s, the world of sports cars was pioneered by European car makers. Fortunately for us, one of the most powerful and influential designers in Detroit had the sports car bug. GM’s Harley Earl envisioned an American sports car and most of us are familiar with the beauty queen turned street brawler Corvette story. As fate would have it, Chevrolet chief engineer, Ed Cole hired another key player, a man with sports car engineering and racing experience – Zora Arkus-Duntov. Fortunately, GM had an engineer that understood the complexities of F-I, one John Dolza from the Rochester Division.

Continue reading “1957 Fuel-Injected Corvette: Detroit’s First Fuelie” →

Fun Corvette CDs For The Holidays

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The Annual Holiday Challenge For Corvette People Begins!

As the holidays approach, we often have the same challenge with our Corvette friends – “What do you get your favorite Corvette person that they don’t already have???” Well, we might be able to help you out.

We have added three new Corvette CDs and 15 Chevrolet CDs to our Illustrated Corvette Series website. For this post, I’ll just cover the Corvette CDs that are priced to be perfect stocking stuffers.

2011 Corvette Anthology CD

The “2011 Corvette Anthology” is an Official GM LIcensed product and is a digital encyclopedia of Corvette information and fun for Vette lovers of all ages and owners of Corvettes from 1953 to 2011. This CD has over 1,800 photos, hundreds of graphics, and 56 videos and Corvette TV commercials. My “Illustrated Corvette Series” is also on the CD! The CD has statistics and options for the entire lineage of Corvettes. There’s also an option to print out the entire CD as a book! Plus, the CD comes with a brilliant screen saver for PCs. Just $19.95, plus $5.00 for shipping and handling. Continue reading “Fun Corvette CDs For The Holidays” →

Bill Pierceall’s 612,000-Mile 1960 Corvette!

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Hot Rod ’60 Corvette does America’s Four Corners

Pretty HOT-looking for a 50-year old babe! I’ll bet that Hemingway never drove anything like this!

Before The Corvette Report was a full-fledged blog, it was a monthly email newsletter. A regular feature of the newsletter was titled “Let’s Play Corvette Odd-Ball! Quirky Vette Factoids” In the October 2008 newsletter I posed the question, “What’s the highest mileage Corvette on record?” With a little help from former VETTE Magazine assistant editor, John Nelson, I reported on a VERY high-mileage Vette, owned by Bill Pierceall.

As of the 2008 report based on the June 2001 story in VETTE, Bill’s updated ‘60 Corvette had just over 500,000 miles on the odometer. In the ‘90s the car had been updated with a completely new ‘96 Grand Sport suspension and LT4 engine. The back end of the car had been widened 3-inches per side to cover the wide GS rear tires, dechromed of the side cove trim and the front fender top trim, and then painted pearl blue. I won’t retell the story, but you can check out the VetteWeb post with this link…

http://www.vetteweb.com/features/vet0601a2_1960_chevy_corvette_convertible/index.html <– there’s a typo on this page. The story is from 2001, not 2009.

The 2,900-pound machine is good for a 162-mph ride, limited by the C1’s aerodynamics and what Bill calls “the pucker factor.” (I think most of us can relate to that). Pierceall obviously followed Duntov’s instructions to the letter, to all Corvette owners to “Drive and ENJOY their Corvette!,” and then some! Continue reading “Bill Pierceall’s 612,000-Mile 1960 Corvette!” →

Million Dollar Gulf One Corvette Racers-Pt One

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Gulf Oil ’62 Corvette Racer “The Most Successful C1 Racer?”

Million Dollar Classic Corvette Racers – Intro to Part One and Two.

ICS #153 1962 Corvette Gulf One Racer

Race cars, for all their glory, often times are quickly forgotten as a result of faster, more modern, more outrageous race cars. Corvettes are just the same. By the end of the first generation of live-axle Corvettes, Chevrolet’s fiberglass sports car had become a solid competitor in sports car racing. When the C2 ‘63 Z06 Corvette Sting Ray racers were unleashed, there was a mad dash to the new independent suspension car. The Fuelie Sting Rays yielded to the big-block Vettes, and the adventure just rolled on. Continue reading “Million Dollar Gulf One Corvette Racers-Pt One” →