1995 Corvette ZR1
Source: Wikimedia
The C4 version of the Corvette was a car designed for the times. It wanted to bring the Corvette into the modern era and it did so with an absolute boom. Any Corvette with a Z attached to the name is meant to be something special. The ZR1 throughout the C4 series was an upgrade of over 50% horsepower from the base 250hp engine. The power continued to increase as the model years went on thanks to extra tinkering from Lotus.
Joint Ventures
The ZR1 features weren’t designed by Chevrolet alone. Chevrolet realized that they could engineer an even better car if they worked together with some other experts. Enter Lotus. Lotus is well known for incredible engineering. They may have been struggling to produce a car that could run for more than 14 minutes before breaking down, but those 14 minutes were going to be entertaining. So Lotus worked together with Chevrolet. They had been purchased by General Motors several years earlier and as their technological expertise was there to be used.
Source: Wikimedia
As such, the Corvette ended up with a 5.7L V8 just teeming with power. Lotus’ addition was 32 valves and a different air management system. The air management system allowed the engine to deliver the power over a larger period of time. This meant the Corvette absolutely flew anytime you put the accelerator down. Lotus also worked on the handling to help ensure the Corvette could go into a corner with some belief that it was going to come out the other side.
Performance-Based
The ZR-1 was a bolt of lightning. It clocked a 0-60 time at only 4.4 seconds. It was capable of doing over 180 mph as a top speed. While those aren’t as impressive for a high-end sports car now, remember this was 20 to 25 years ago! It actually competed in a large number of endurance tests at tracks and managed to set world records for stock unmodded vehicles.
