I have friends who question why I’ve always owned and maintained two cars since 2005. The answer is very simple: I want one daily driver and one toy, and may the roles of those two cars never meet and line up. Asking one car to do everything that you want a vehicle to do is a tall order. Think about it: on one hand you want fun, exciting, killer to look at and enough power to silence thunder. But on the other hand you want livable gas mileage, comfort, aerodynamic efficiency, and reliability. Now ask yourself, truthfully…what car meets all of those requirements? The correct answer is, “none”. Every car you try to review will have some kind of compromise to deal with. But there are certain cars that come close to meeting the requirements and surprisingly, this 1996 Corvette is such a car.
Here’s the justification: if you are reading this blog, the performance side of the house is going to be a heavier priority than the appliance car side. The C4 is so grossly underrated as an option it’s not even funny anymore. No, it’s not as poised and polished as a C5 or newer, but it’s old-school small-block Chevrolet power, independent suspension all the way around, and two seats, the program the Corvette has ran since the mid-fifties and for the majority of it’s existence. It’ll handle, it’ll run well enough (350 horsepower from a recently installed Goodwrench 350 crate engine should be enough, right?) and if you keep your foot out of it, you should even see respectable fuel economy. It won’t be 30 MPG like a late-model Stingray, but if you’ve got five grand burning a hole in your pocket and want to relegate that Corolla to rainy, crappy days, here’s an option!
Since these only cane with 300hp, doubt it’s putting out 350 unless some work has been done.
Definitely a clean car for the money.
As far as I’m concerned, fourth-gen Corvettes, Camaros and Firebirds were all ugly…no thanks…