It’s brilliant! Famous gas-guzzling muscle cars re-engineered into modern, fuel-sipping designs that can get 3 times the efficiency of their descendants. Dodge did it with the Charger, Ford with the Mustang and now – perhaps the most famous muscle car of them all – a brand new 2014 Corvette Stingray will soon be released.
After getting caught with their pants down on the fuel efficiency front – when crude prices spiked to over $140 per barrel with commensurate gasoline prices increases right before the Great Recession – the US auto industry continues making a comeback.
“The first Stingray model in 1963 maybe got 10 mpg if you were driving nicely,” Chevrolet Head of Consumer Affairs James Bell recently told Breaking Energy. “And emissions are vastly cleaned up on the new model,” he said.
Advances in engine and materials technology allow the 2014 Stingray to achieve 29 mpg highway with a 6.2 liter V8 motor that puts out 455 horsepower. Specifically, the use of aluminum and carbon fiber material reduces weight and thus fuel consumption.
Direct injection rather than carburation, along with adjustable valves allow fuel to burn more efficiently, said Bell. The car also features displacement control which can turn off some of the cylinders when cruising to help reduce fuel consumption.
The new Corvette’s aerodynamics are greatly improved, with several strategically-placed vents that help cool the radiator, differential, transmission and brakes, while reducing air pressure in the wheel wells. The reduced drag increases fuel efficiency.
“We look at this car and the new Porsche 911 as poster children of the new auto industry,” Bell said, adding that miles per gallon continue coming down while technology cruises ahead.
Indeed, rapidly advancing internal combustion engine technology that drastically improves fuel efficiency and reduces emissions sometimes challenges the logic behind alternative fuels that often have less energy density compared to gasoline and can emit comparable levels of greenhouse gas emissions when full production lifecycle analysis is taken into account.
And speaking of maximizing technology, while Bell did not make any announcements regarding the new Stingray, he did point out that many similar brands are announcing the introduction of hybrid models. Perhaps a hybrid Stingray is on the horizon.
