The Chevrolet Corvette Grand Sport meets the Ford Mustang Shelby GT350 and everyone's the better for it.
In early 2009, when GM and Ford were stumbling toward uncertainty and the Detroit auto show had all the glitz of an insurance convention, no one could have imagined that the Motor City would ever again produce cars like the GT350 and the Grand Sport. But it’s well known that car companies can be at their best when they’re anxious about keeping the lights on. Both of these cars came from a hunger to prove that world-class virtue can be more than marketing talking points. And so, eight years after the doom and gloom, we have these two unimaginably good V-8 machines and a $64,000 question.
Believing that there’d only be space for one of these cars on the list, our staff was divided, with the GT350’s backers on one side and the Grand Sport’s on the other. In the final summation, each car had the votes to clinch its spot, but the rift helped us arrive at a deeper understanding of both.
“IT’S NOT JUST ITS INSANE PERFORMANCE FOR THE PRICE, BUT THAT A CORVETTE IS OBTAINABLE–YOU CAN JUST WALK INTO A DEALERSHIP AND BUY ONE. TRY DOING THAT WITH A SUPERCAR.” —DAVID BEARD, ASSISTANT TECHNICAL EDITOR
Last year, the Corvette missed the 10Best cut after the C7’s two-year run. Perhaps the intoxicating influence of the 650-hp Z06 would have helped the Corvette gain enough votes for another year, yet by then GM had raised the price above our $80,000 cap. Enter the Grand Sport, which mates the regular Corvette powertrain to the chassis of the mighty Z06 while avoiding a major price increase. You can park a GS in your driveway for as little as $66,445, exactly $10,000 more than the base car and nearly $15,000 less than the Z06.
To keep the price semi-attainable, the Grand Sport uses the Corvette’s naturally aspirated small-block V-8. A dry-sump 6.2-liter unit with 460 horsepower, this pushrod engine spins to its 6600-rpm rev limiter with ferocity. It has gobs of power. Every stomp on the accelerator requires you to take in a lungful of air to counteract the shove of the V-8’s fierce torque and instant response. Celebrate it. Hear it transform organic molecules into motion, warmth, and smooth purrs. It’s a welcome reprieve from a world turning to narcoleptic turbo fours that refuse to redline.
No one wrote a single paean to the Z06’s absent supercharger because no one missed it. It’s telling that no staffer suggested that the Grand Sport could use more horsepower. With a seven-speed manual, 60 mph is only 3.9 seconds away and the quarter comes up in 12.3 seconds at 117 mph. A pull through the first two gears is all that’s necessary to understand how and why Chevrolet has built more than 10 million small-blocks. Effortless power is as persuasive today as it was in 1955.
Ford’s take on the modern V-8 has four cams and 32 valves, and it revs to an implausible 8250 rpm. This engine completely transforms the Mustang. And while no one will mistake the GT350’s V-8 for crooner Michael Bublé, we have to acknowledge that it’s coarse by design. Testing director Don Sherman called it “two 2.6-liter four-cylinder engines with no balance shafts but a common crankshaft.” The car’s most vocal detractor continued: “Hanging six tuned mass dampers under the car is not effective at turning this 8250-rpm Voodoo into a smooth, sweet V-8.”
“I HAVE NO BUSINESS DRIVING THIS ON THE STREET, BUT NEITHER DOES ANYONE ELSE.” —JEFF SABATINI, FEATURES EDITOR
We all heard it: The GT350 busts through its first two gears quickly enough that the raspy moans it makes at low revs are fleeting spine tinglers. Running to 60 mph takes only 4.3 seconds. But rev it out in higher gears, and the engine sounds as if it’s munching on itself, ready to rocket some pistons through the hood. None of that comes through the exhaust, however. From outside, the GT350 sounds the way a Jackson Pollock painting looks. It’s a splattering of sound—fiery, shocking, angry, and somehow perfect.
Below 4000 rpm, the GT350 lacks the Corvette’s deep well of torque. Swing the needle past 8000 rpm and tap the 526 horsepower, though, and it’s hard not to think that maybe that Chevy V-8 belongs in a pickup. Double the GT350’s $56,770 price, and there’s still nothing as exotic as this Romeo, Michigan–built engine.
Painted red with big white stripes running down the center, the Grand Sport and the GT350 might as well be draped in Old Glory. Both models differ from their lesser kin with broader fenders that cover up wider tires. Neither car has many surprises inside. We’re accustomed to both, from the Corvette’s smell of polyester resin to the Mustang’s huge touchscreen and toggle switches. Ford uses standard Recaros that fit as if they’re custom-made. Chevy asks $1995 for its Competition Sport seats, but we prefer the standard chairs.
While some seats may be optional on the Grand Sport, the serious hardware—magnetorheological dampers, an electronically controlled differential, and the Z06’s larger brakes—comes standard. For the rare occasions when Michelin Pilot Super Sports aren’t enough, the track-ready Pilot Sport Cup 2 tires and carbon-ceramic brakes of the Z07 package will knock your cochlea into the creek. Even without the Z07 package, stops from 70 mph take 136 feet, and grip on the skidpad is an unbelievable 1.13 g’s. These are supercar numbers that move into the hypercar realm when the Vette is equipped with the Z07’s exotic rubber and brakes. In the real world, it’s nigh on impossible to regularly tap the Grand Sport’s potential.
A GT350R is a 1.10-g car, but the plain GT350 that Ford sent us this year has less cling, just 0.98 g. But this “low-grip” GT350 has more than enough stick to eviscerate our 13.5-mile loop. Its handling limits are approachable and usable. Perhaps you’ve seen videos of Mustangs leaving car shows with disastrous results. Chalk it up to lack of skill. If you know what you’re doing, there’s simply no treachery to this chassis (or that of any new Mustang); it does what you expect of it safely, predictably, and obediently.
Part of the appeal of the 10Best loop is that it’s as unsettling as stepping on a Hot Wheels in the dark. In short order, the lumpy and bumpy asphalt exposes chassis-tuning compromises. To get a Mustang to 0.98 g, Ford fits stiff springs and adjustable dampers and steamroller-wide rubber. The resulting ride is impossible to ignore in this setting. Deputy editor Daniel Pund, who placed the GT350 just outside his 10Best list, said: “I may have been more willing to accept the GT350’s overly stiff ride when it was the hot new thing last year. But I can’t ignore that it was actively trying to throw me off the road.”
Even with a 1.13-g chassis, the Corvette’s magnetorheological dampers and spring rates offer more compliance and a slightly calmer experience. It’s gifted—possibly too gifted—with grip and composure that can make it seem aloof. Throwing this supercar down a narrow byway like our 10Best loop requires a frustrating amount of restraint. The solution is to go faster, but what this car really needs is a track. It’s the complete opposite of a narrow-tire car like the Mazda MX-5 Miata, which slips and grips and remains engaging even at lower speeds. “Too much for the road,” became a common refrain as editor after editor stepped out of the Corvette. Life beyond 1.10 g’s is both a blessing and a curse.
For some staffers, the Grand Sport was on the bubble. Deputy online editor Dave VanderWerp called it “a little too extreme and track-oriented for something that is probably mostly used for Sunday morning, back-road drives. Megacapable, yes—see its Lightning Lap performance—but it just didn’t flow down the 10Best roads like some of the more fun cars, including the Miata, or, frankly, the Shelby GT350.”
However, senior editor Jared Gall had the opposite take: “The only reason not to put it on the list is that it is too fast and too capable to exploit on public roads. To leave it off the list would be to punish Chevrolet for making it too good.” Enough staffers agreed with Gall’s logic for the Grand Sport to secure its position on the list because, although its performance borders on being unusable, criticizing it for being a supercar means ignoring the fact that it’s the greatest performance deal available today.
The GT350 also found its spot on our 10Best roster because it is a transcendent machine that looks like a Mustang. Senior technical editor and GT350 advocate K.C. Colwell summed it up: “There are arguments for both, but the GT350 is by far the most complete car. I drove the Grand Sport and the GT350 back to back twice to come to that conclusion. The Ford is more desirable, more practical, and cheaper.” It’s okay with enough of us that the engine isn’t “easy listening.” You don’t want a car like that to make the equivalent of elevator music anyway. As unnecessary as it is wonderful, this engine transforms the Mustang into something esoteric.
If all this means that we have two V-8 cars with similar missions and pricing, so be it. We’re living in halcyon days for performance cars, and our votes reflect that. After all, the big V-8 deserves its own place next to jazz and the television sitcom as a uniquely American art form.
Source by caranddriver.com
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