The 2024 Chevrolet Corvette E-Ray.Jeremy Sinek/The Globe and Mail
If you’re a petrolhead purist who screamed “blasphemy!” when the new 2020 C8 Corvette moved the engine to the middle and killed off the manual transmission, prepare to be outraged anew. The 2024 E-Ray version adds newfangled electrification and all-wheel drive to create what Chevrolet calls eAWD.
As hybrids go, it’s pretty simple. A front electric motor supplies 160 horsepower and 125 lb-ft of torque to the front wheels to supplement the 495 horsepower and 470 lb-ft deployed to the rear wheels by the mid-mounted V8. The electric motor is juiced by a 1.9-kilowatt-hour battery nestled in the tunnel between the front seats.
It’s not a plug-in hybrid, but the battery recharges quickly in routine driving. As well, an all-electric Stealth mode is pitched by Chevrolet as a way to tip-toe in and out of your ‘hood without disturbing the neighbours. That’s right: a front-wheel-drive Corvette EV.
Perhaps a better term for Stealth mode might be “walking on eggshells” mode. It’s only good for a few kilometres, and only if you fervently feather-foot the throttle. Chevrolet says it tops out at 72 kilometres an hour, but despite my best efforts, the gas engine fired up sooner than that.
Alternatively, and more to the point, you can select Charge+ mode to keep the battery fully charged for maximum performance on the track.
Clearly the E-Ray isn’t trying to be a 300-kilometres-an-hour Prius. Fuel consumption has barely changed compared with a regular Corvette. In the city, the E-Ray uses 15.1 litres of fuel per 100 kilometres versus 15 for the regular Corvette. On the highway, it’s 9.7 versus 9.4. A wider body and bigger tires, shared with the Z06, probably explain the highway penalty. But it’s still frugal for a hyperfast supercar.
What the eAWD does is make an already fast car even faster: Car and Driver track testing showed the E-Ray reached 60 miles an hour (96 kilometres an hour) in just 2.5 seconds, compared with 2.8 for the regular version. Best of all, E-Ray builds further on the attribute that already elevates the regular Corvette among its peers – the sheer real-world, daily-driver usability of its performance.
Most modern gas-powered hypercars combine all-wheel-drive with lag-afflicted turbocharged engines. The resulting surplus of traction over low-end torque means their gut-wrenching sub-three-second test-track times require brutal techniques that have no place on public roads. They’re not usable.
The dash of the hybrid 2024 Chevrolet Corvette E-Ray, which can accelerate to 60 miles an hour in 2.5 seconds.Jeremy Sinek/The Globe and Mail
The Corvette, however, still has a large-displacement naturally aspirated V8. And big displacement means big torque – right now, no waiting. With sticky tires and a rearward weight distribution, that wealth of torque from idle speed upward can fling the mid-engined Corvette forward with a simple prod of your right foot.
Besides the traditional 0-60 benchmark, Car and Driver has another track test that quantifies real-world acceleration feel: 5 to 60 miles an hour from a rolling start. The results are telling. Even a base Corvette is quicker in the 5-60 test (3.5 seconds versus 3.7) than the three-times-the-price Porsche 911 Turbo S that beats Corvette in the high-drama 0-60 lunge (2.2 seconds).
Now the E-Ray comes along and shrinks the Corvette’s deficit from 0-60 (2.5 seconds) and extends its advantage in the 5-60 test (3.1 versus 3.7).
Consider, too, that Car and Driver track testing is on dry, clean pavement. My E-Ray test drive in rural Michigan includes back roads that are wet and strewn with fallen leaves. With no traffic around, I bring the E-Ray to a full stop on a short straightaway, and then floor it. No scrabbling for traction, no fishtailing, it just hunkers down and it’s outta there.
Depending on mood and drive mode, the Corvette can be benign or beastly. The default Tour mode makes it an amiable daily-driver companion, now with the advantage of all-wheel drive (the standard Michelin footwear, incidentally, is all-season). The ride is remarkably supple over pocked pavement (GM’s magnetic ride suspension is standard on the E-Ray), it’s effortless to steer and transmission shifts are silken; the engine is creamy smooth, too, albeit lacking much classic V8 woofle.
There’s too much road noise to ever call the cabin quiet, even in Stealth (EV) mode, but the E-Ray makes up for it with panoramic visibility (except to the rear, for which a rear camera mirror is available) and, at least for my tastes and body type, the availability of a perfect posture at the wheel.
There’s no call for Track mode on our test route, but even the supposedly in-between Sport mode triggers a marked change in attitude – more so, it seems, than we remember on the original C8 Corvette. Steering effort heavies up markedly, the ride stiffens to the point of jittery, the engine sound gets angrier and I’m reminded that carbon-ceramic brakes are standard.
If there was a track nearby and the Corvette was a canine, it would be pulling at the leash to go there.
Most performance cars these days have multiple drive modes, but Corvette’s sheer bandwidth already makes it two cars for the price of one. Now the E-Ray stretches even further that bandwidth between benign daily driver and hard-core track tool. Its $138,799 starting price is a sizable leap from the base Corvette, which starts at less than $90,000, but for that you’re getting even more car for the money.
Tech specs
2024 Chevrolet Corvette E-Ray
- Base price/as tested: $138,799/$158,149
- Powertrain: 6.2-litre, 495-horsepower mid-mounted V8 with a 120-kilowatt front-mounted electric motor
- Transmission/drive: Eight-speed dual-clutch automated/eAWD
- Fuel consumption (litres per 100 kilometres): 15.1 city/9.7 highway
- Alternatives: Aston Martin Vantage, Audi R8, Ferrari 296 GTB, Lamborghini Huracan, Mercedes-Benz SL-Class, Porsche 911
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