C5: 97-04 = 8 years of production.

So you might assume the C6 will run from 2005-2012

But I read an article where one of the product designers was hinting at potentially decreasing the product cycle of the Vette, which IMO makes perfect sense since in this day and age the time and cost involved in make a car go from scratch to production is much lower and shorter than before, and that of course helps marketability toward the end of the product run when things are getting long in the tooth and the competition has made great strides.

So the question I have is - is there any more info on this 'hint', and if so, what model year would you estimate we'd see the C7?

For a while people were hinting the electromagnetically actuated valves would be something we could see on the C6 or at the very least the C6 Z06, but it appears that wasn't an option. Any idea if GM is still working on this as a possibility for the C7 or have they moved on to other ideas for now?

 

Umm I don't know what you are smoking but it takes money to go from scratch to production and it takes mountains of more money to do it faster. Developing a new structure, especially one that will outdo the C6 Y-body, is not going to be either cheap or quick. The C5 structure took like 5-6 years to do and the C6 structure is just an improvement over that. The C6 Z06 aluminum structure likely added a few tens of millions of dollars to the C6 program's cost, though with 1/5 of production being Z06s and at $70K a pop it will likely pay off.

To answer the question I expect a refresh or MCE around 2009 or so and then it should get totally redone around 2013.

I doubt we will see electromag actuated valves within the next 10 years. I do think a 3 valve head is in the cards. After that I think GM would revise the Gen V V8 to use 2 cams in block and have dual VVT along with DI which could make HUGE power everywhere across the powerband.

 

Guess it depends if the C7 will be an "evolution" of the C6.. or if it will be a total clean sheet redesign.

 

IMO, a clean sheet design. You can only keep the C5/C6 going for so long.

I agree with you on the actuated valves. If you are going to put 2 cams in block you might as well go with DOHC. I think that dual VVT would be easier on a DOHC than in the block. Can anybody remember if the XV8 engine had VVT? Just checked, only the intake cam had a cam phaser (VVT).

My guess is that the GEN V will be an evolution of the GEN IV but with DI.

 

What am I smoking? Is it really necessary to start off flaming right off the bat just because you don't like me? Especially making a comment feigning a supposed lack of intelligence on my part when you know that's not the case?

Do you understand the words 'lower' and 'shorter' when in reference to design cost and design time as compared to years before?

Technology is allowing design cycles to become economically, feasably shorter for most car companies these days, and competition is forcing them to take advantage of that rather than save a buck by continuing the current longer cycles.

 

I don't know. I think that long life cycle of each helps spread costs over the years better and keeps the Corvette able to be at the price point it's at. Constantly revising everything costs a lot of money and that money has got to come from somewhere (i.e. consumer).

 

i don't know what your smoking if you honestly don't think the evolution of technology hasn't made the car design business even slightly less costly or shorter in relation to new challenges, IE: its much cheaper to crash test the new crash test standards over and over and over in a computer than in real life.

 

To counter that, testing is probably much more rigorous. I'm not sure if its cheaper or what, maybe RP, IREngineer or Pacer can give us some facts on that.

 

I would suspect that dollar for dollar it's not cheaper, but relative to current day selling price, inflation and so on it probably is. Quicker from drawing board to production? That one is a no brainer if you've been watching the history of the automotive refresh cycle over the last couple decades. They keep getting shorter and shorter and cite technology as the reason they are able to.

 

As much as I'd personally love to see GM roll out a camless, electromagnetic valvetrain, I just don't see it happening anytime soon. Witness how long it's taken for GM to bring technologies to the street: when was the first time you heard about variable displacement? 6-speed transmissions? 3-valve heads? hybrids? GM's press is seems to be about 3 years ahead of GM production. I thought that 3-valve heads would be a no-brainer. Different cyl. head, a seperate rocker/child-actuator assembly, the valve itself and a change in software to make use of it. And where is it? Rumor has it that GM's bean-counters have been holding it up. Shame, shame! Especially when you factor in how many pushrods (3.5l, 3.9l, 4.8l, 5.3l, 6.0l, 6.2l, 7.0l, 8.1l) that can make use of it to develop more power and better efficiency! Now, if that's the case for something as "simple" and a 3-valve head, and you've haven't so much as heard of GM talking about camless valvetrains, then I sincerely doubt that it's coming anytime soon.

 

There was that article where the people involved where said to be already talking about the C7.


They where also talking about how it could go hybrid or AWD, bad ideas if you ask me. Unless the market and technology changes drastically in the C6s lifetime.

 

Much more rigorous -- more federal standards in terms of safety and emissions-- even state standards when it comes to emissions.

A new one's coming. Can't say more than that.

 

I've heard that the "Blue Devil" could possibly be based on the architecture for the C7...The latest rumor I heard is that the C6 will have a very short lifespan

 

I doubt any hybrid or AWD system would go onto the Vette. I can see it getting new tech that would help performance or decrease weight but fuel economy usually isnt on anyone's agenda when buying a Corvette (even though it does get kickass mileage for a V8)

 

Hybrid systems seem like they have the ability to add quite a punch to low end torque... like the lower the RPM the better. I wonder if somebody might use that to their advantage but instead of trying to gather any fuel economy from it and saddle the car down with heavy high storage battery packs, they'd just use a couple of small batteries, or heck, maybe just capacitors for that matter, so that every time you hit the brakes you recharged the car's capacitors and got some extra juice off the line?