Flybrian

Fun? Brand-new? Around $20,000? D'uh... Do I have to do all the thinking around here?? Seriously, nice choice on going with the sedan. I'm sure you'll enjoy many miles with her!

Names are nice. Why not names?

Callaway C16 When even a Corvette isn’t enough, call Reeves By MARK VAUGHN Link to Original Article @ AutoWeek | Published 03/16/07, 9:33 am et 2007 CALLAWAY C16 CHEVROLET CORVETTE AVAILABLE: Now PRICE: $120,000 base, $192,000 as tested DRIVETRAIN: 6.0-liter, 616-hp, 582-lb-ft supercharged V8; rwd, six-speed manual CURB WEIGHT: 3375 lbs 0 TO 60 MPH: 3.3 sec (mfr.) FUEL ECONOMY (EPA COMBINED): 22.5 mpg What could a Corvette owner want that’s not already in the fabulously fast standard-issue General Motors Chevrolet product? Fer cryin’ out loud, the thing’s already got 400 hp in base trim and a whompin’ 505 hp as a Z06. And since it weighs just a little more than 3000 pounds wet, it can spank the decals off almost anything that lines up against it. What more could any sensible Corvette luster seek? More everything, that’s what. Callaway has been giving Corvette owners just what they love and lust after for 20 years, and non-Corvettes for another 10 years before that. Reeves Callaway started in his garage in Connecticut in 1977, making turbochargers for various performance cars. Then, in the late ’80s, a particularly well-done Alfa supercharger caught the eye of Corvette chief engineer Dave McLellan. That led to the fearsome twin-turbo Callaway Corvettes of 1987-91, including the all-conquering, 254-mph, twin-turbo Sledge Hammer. From that slobbering beast came the SuperNatural LT1-based naturally aspirated Corvettes (AW, Jan. 25, 1993), followed by the C12 homologation cars that allowed Callaways to race at Le Mans and now this, the C16. The 16 in its name does not refer to cylinders, as many people who saw our test car assumed, but to the car’s spot in Callaway history. This is the 16th project to come out of the Old Lyme, Connecticut-based supercar maker. Given the marque’s powerful history, this one is a somewhat more subdued version, if you can use the word “subdued” in the same sentence as “616 hp.” The heart of the Callaway conversion is an Eaton/Magnuson roots-type supercharger that bolts nicely on top of the 6.0-liter aluminum V8 Chevrolet engine (a kit for the 7.0-liter Z06 is in the works). The engine has the same 4.00-inch by 3.62-inch bore and stroke, and it wasn’t necessary to change the compression ratio. Callaway also adds higher-flow injectors. That gets horsepower up to 560 at 6200 rpm and torque to 500 lb-ft at 4750 rpm. That’s for the base C16, which you could glibly call C16 Lite. But the base C16’s 560 hp is probably not going to be enough, is it? So Callaway has an option package that adds unique cylinder heads, larger intake and exhaust valves and Callaway-specific rocker arms and pushrods, all of which bring power up to 616 hp at 6200 rpm and torque to 582 lb-ft at 4750 rpm. It’s not at all unmanageable. With only 7.5 psi of boost max, Callaway didn’t even have to rebuild the bottom end of the motor. “It’s not a big stress on the components,” said Pete Callaway. Yes, there’s a Pete Callaway, son of Reeves. He started working in his dad’s shop at age 11 and is now West Coast rep for Callaway Engineering, setting up Chevrolet dealers to service and sell C16s. Like his dad, he is tall, polite, soft-spoken and knowledgeable, not at all what you’d expect of a “tuner” proffering 616 hp of anything. He gave us a walkaround of the car outside the Callaway family compound deep in the heart of Orange County. “The C12 was the total package. You could only get one trim level, and that had everything on it,” he said. “With the C16, you can do just the brakes or just the suspension or whatever you’d like. The C16 is essentially a menu for all the components.” There are a lot of components. For brakes, you can leave the standard Z51 four-piston calipers that GM puts on Corvettes, or you can upgrade to Callaway six-piston front and four-piston rear grabbing 355-mm by 32-mm discs. The suspension is a collaborative effort with Eibach. You still have the SLA upper and lower A-arms and transverse leaf springs, but Callaway added double digressive shocks and Eibach springs. The dampers adjust 10 ways for jounce and 10 ways for rebound, allowing you to come up with a track setting and a commuter setting, for instance. Ride height adjusts more than 2 inches. “We bring the spring rate up a little bit,” said Callaway. Our test car rode on Michelin Pilot Sport 275/30ZR-19s front and 325/25ZR-20s rear, mounted on Dymag wheels with magnesium centers and carbon fiber outers. Callaway is working with Yokohama on a 345/25 for the rears that should be available in early 2008. The entire car is wrapped in the wild Tangelo from House of Kolor fiberglass bodywork you see here, though you don’t have to get orange. The only original exterior parts are the roof, decklid and mirrors. Everything else is all Callaway, from the big hood bulge to the uniquely subtle strakes that form faux C-pillars in back. On the road, the C16 immediately feels even tighter, stronger and faster than a stock Corvette. It’s everything buyers love about that car and more. While roll, dive and squat are mighty hard to sense in a standard Vette, they’re almost entirely absent in a Callaway. And yet the extra power and torque are there anywhere on the tach, especially from launch. Our car had the optional racing seat, awkward to get into but one of the most comfortable and secure buckets we’ve ever sat in. Just as with the regular Corvettes, this one was easy to drive in typically lousy commuter traffic, even easier since the one-to-four shift lockout had been disconnected mysteriously in our car. It would have been fun to tabulate lap times back-to-back between our 616-hp C16 and a Z06 straight from Bowling Green. But a tough schedule meant only a single afternoon in the Callaway and no time for a Corvette loaner from Chevrolet. We have no doubt the C16 would hold the edge, but it sure would have been a fun day finding out. If you own a Z06, we suggest buying one of these, too. Then send us your results. Callaway is taking orders now and needs about two or three months’ lead time. Order now (www.callawaycars.com), and yours should be ready for track days once spring rolls around. Prices are about $190,000 total for a fully loaded honker. Link to More Info and Photos @ Callaway

And the winners are... 1st Place SilverSS/SC (49pts) 2nd Place Dwightlool (24pts) 3rd Place GMan (23pts) 4th Place Burns (21pts) 5th - NOS2006 - (11pts) 6th - RJBartrop - (7pts) 7th - MarioBro88 - (2pts) 8th - Peugoet_206 - (1pt) 9th(t) - Spacecowboy - (0pts) 9th(t) - MRDETROITMETAL - (0pts) 9th(t) - MRDETROITMETAL - (0pts) Talk about a come-from-nowhere victory! Congratulations to SilverSS/SC for his first 1st place finish in his very first competition entry! No doubt we hope to see you around in our future competitions. Special recognition to Dwightlooi for his extremely comprehensive and top-notch presentation. Sure you didn't steal that from an internal document? Special welcome to Spacecowboy his first contest entry - hope to see you back for more. Congratulations to all and thank you to all who entered. Our latest competition to bring a dead GM nameplate back to life has until Thursday for entires. I'm sure we all miss a specific car - the Eldorado, the Astro, the Chevelle, the Grand National; well, time to bring it back! The 1st-place winner receives a GM-related prize as well as having their concept featured on the Cheers and Gears homepage and Design Showcase! Check out the Showcase for all out past winners. Congrats and thanks again!

About five more days left on this one, guys. Get those entires in!

Aww, make it a bit more foolish than that. No re-entries

And the winners are... 1st place - NOS2006 - 12pts 2nd place - Camaroman22 - 8pts 3rd place(t) - -Camaro- - 7pts 3rd place(t) - Skip0110 - 7pts 4th - MariBro88 - 4pts 5th - Camaroman22 - 2pts 6th - MRDETROITMETAL - 0pts Congratulations to NOS2006 for his first place win in our Chrysler Buyout competition! Very interesting entries all around, but unfortunately few votes. If you have a favorite, please show that you do and vote for them next time! In any case, good to see some creativity expressed here. Speaking of creativity, the deadline on our Pontiac G8 Competition has been extended to Wednesday, March 21st. I know some people want to see more of a 'Pontiac' face on the G8, so why not make it reality? GTO, anyone? You have 'till Wednesday to bring your dream to our screens. Afterwards, its that time of year again. Time for our annual April Fool's Competition! Let's see how crazy we can get with GM's new lineup! Deadline for that is (appropriately) April 1st, so get your designs in!

Welcome to Choppin' Competition #38! Time for some more seasonal fun! Your task this time is to take any current General Motors product and alter in any fashion you'd like to make it foolish. What's foolish you ask? Anything. A mud-bogger Astra, a Lucerne in General Lee colors, a Hello Kitty Yukon XL, the Aztek. Just kidding about the Aztek; its not a current product. Besides, clearly someone took your idea. Please use a current GM vehicle as the base pic for your entry. Some Picture Sources... -Autodeadline* -Autoblog -CarPhotoSite -Netcarshow Size guidelines remain at 800x600, so please size your entry accordingly. Please do not submit your images as Bitmap (.bmp) files. The winner will recieve a GM-related prize from C&G! Deadline is Sunday, April 1st @ 11:59PM your local time. Good luck and have fun! *Instructions for accessing high-resolution images through AutoDeadline: Replace the bold, orange section of the URL... (http://gm.wieck.com/forms/gm/*query?silverado&Source=all) ...with the make/model/etc you're searching for. Replacing 'silverado' with 'lesabre' will bring up downloadable hi-res images of the Buick LeSabre.

From a trade defecit standpoint, I'm more concerned about Airbus/EADS than I am with Toyota. Japan Airlines is the largest 747 operator in the world. They are a few years away from being an all-American fleet; of their 266 aircraft fleet, 204 of them are Boeing, 42 are McDonnell-Douglas and the remaining 20 Airbuses are soon to be replaced by thirty 787s. All-Nippon Airways (ANA), their second largest carrier, is going all-Boeing very soon. JAL recently optioned six 767-300ERs, a deal worth nearly one billion (with a B) dollars. That's 40,000 Camries. It helps even things out pretty quick.

I can just comment on my experience driving two Ram SLT Quad Cab rentals (2006, 2007) for a total of ~2000 miles in various conditions and I can't see why someone would want to drive it for long periods of time. If it had the 5-speed, you couldn't tell by the woeful economy it returned and the only V8s you can choose from on these are the 345-whatever hp Hemi or the 235hp Magnum V8, which was really fun in a Dakota, but not so much in the Ram. In fact, after driving the Ram, I don't see why more people who want to buy Dodge don't just buy a Dakota, one of which I also had for a week or so as a rental. Its more reasonably-sized, it gets better economy (the mileage I got towing a loaded trailer in the Dakota was about the same just driving the Ram), the rear seats seem just as roomy as the Ram, plus IMO it looks nicer.

Answers revealed for the interested. I did this because I was originally surprised at how damn lousy the LS460's door panel looked for the money it supposedly commands. The door lock tumbler is even painted plastic. I might do another 'shocker' soon.

MCE. And using leftover woodgrain from a Diplomat doesn't count as a MCE. Drive a Ram, then drive and F-150 - the Dodge bounces and nosedives way more. Its not really a pleasure to drive, nor is it one to get into in the first place because of its higher stepin height. A regular non 4x4 pickup does not need to sit as far up from the ground as the Ram, but it does because of the 'bad boy' stance.

lol Well, I'm extending this until WEDNESDAY, MARCH 21.

Your point is well-taken, though. What's worse is this...

I think its possible that the Chinese have a better idea of what a Buick should be than most Americans who'd rather just split their time making jokes about Depends and ignoring the brand completely.

So, which door panel looks the most luxurious and which looks the least? Rank them from most to least if you'd like. P.S. If you know what car these belong to, please don't say it now. I'm just curious if anyone else thinks the same as I do.

Well, tell the EPA that because those are the comparison numbers they give. Even taking 2007 ratings, the number of 30 city MPG+ vehicles is pretty low. Since I'm obviously more bored that a person should be... Civic Hybrid/Civic (1.8l) Yaris Fit Corolla (1.8l) MINI (1.6l) Accent (m) Rio (m) Versa Prius Camry Hybrid Vibe (m) Matrix (m) Escape/Mariner Highlander/RX400h Get an automatic Accent, Rio, Vibe, or Matrix like normal people do, and its under 30mpg. And those (along with the Versa and Toyota SUVs) are perilously close to the 30mpg cutoff anyway. Go check out the revision comparison yourself. All of those except for the four I mentioned are below 30mpg city, some well-below.

Surprisingly for its time and the fact that its a Cadillac, that car is extremely bland-looking. Probably the fact that is appliance white. Here's a real find. If you passed up buying a Corvan because it was too tall... Corvair Futura

Actually, with the new EPA ratings... Honda - 1 (Civic Hybrid) Toyota - 2 (Prius, Camry Hybrid) Ford - 1 (Escape Hybrid) Period. That's it out of every 2007 model by anyone selling anything in the United States. No Hyundai, no MINI, no Corolla, no Yaris, no Fit. Just those four.

I guess this is for the ambient lighting...but couldn't they have just said 'ambient'?

Lexus of Clearwater uses an Express van for courtesy dropoff. I always liked that.

Any more entries? Need an extension?

Seriously, no car looks funnier on the road than the Amanti. Watch one pull up next to a Town Car and set your phasers to LMAO.

Well, this makes things a little interesting in the police market. You have a Hemi Charger as a high-end interceptor, the Impala 9C1 for your lighter-duty patrol car, and the P71 Crown Vic sandwiched in the middle. Regardless, its clear that the Crown Vic will remain the king (or queen?) of police cruisers until Ford does something stupid like end production. Its a bit faster than the Impy and definitely stronger than the Charger, very well-suited to general 'utility' duty. Besides, its dirt cheap, cheaper than the cheapest 3.5l Charger. A good mix for your average department would consist of a 45/45/10 mix of Impalas, Crown Vics, and Chargers. In these times, its hard to turn down the higher economy of the 9C1 Impy since most patrol cars just drive around and idle. Again, CVs are dirt cheap while the Chargers make great pursuit (a rare situation outside of LA) and undercover (more effective) vehicles.

Jesus Christ, they bitch about every...little...thing.