Harlan Charles: Mass Reduction a Balancing Act for the Corvette Team

Weight Watchers doesn’t have anything on today’s carmakers, including Chevrolet and its popular new Corvette.

With fuel prices on the rise and emission standards growing tougher by the day, carmakers are doing all they can to slice as much weight off their vehicles as possible to meet the new regulations and save consumers money on gas.

Among the leaders of this industry-wide move is the seventh-generation Stingray.

“It’s a balancing act,” Harlan Charles admits. “We talk about mass reduction every single day.”

All that talk – and subsequent action – paid off big time for the C7 Corvette, which finished up weighing 25 grams less than a much inferior 1981 Corvette.

That may not sound like much, but consider that the classic Corvette didn’t have impact protection beams, airbags, anti-lock brakes, or GPS navigation. The ’81 did have a four-speed transmission but its engine made just 195 horsepower. Consider that the 2014 Stingray is much safer, has an eight-speed paddle shift transmission, and generates 460 horsepower, while getting more than double the gas mileage of the ’81.

That balancing act that Charles referred to came into play frequently while the C7 was being designed. While engineers were able to slice 45 kilograms from the frame and 17 from the body panels, winding up some 68 kilograms lighter than the C6, they then had to turn around and add back weight – 9 kilograms for new structural safety requirements, 5 kilograms for an extra ratio in the transmission, 7.8 kilograms for improved seats, 14.2 kilograms for the new infotainment system, and 7.7 for interior appointments and safety features.

“A lot of work went into putting everything into the car and keeping it light,” Charles says. “But the end result speaks for itself. You get a supercar that does 29 mpg on the highway.”

And if you think all this weight-watching is something new, take a look at what Lotus founder Colin Chapman was doing back in the 1950s!

He was obsessed back then with making the lightest cars in the world, so much so that he removed rivets, sliced suspension arms to cut their weight, and made engines that served as power sources and structural supports.

Today’s carmakers are just as obsessed as Chapman, perhaps even moreso.

“It’s a major priority,” says Ruben Archilla, manager of research and development at Mazda USA. “Every gram counts.”

Don’t expect this weight consciousness to go away, either.

“There’s a lot that you have to put in,” says Charles. “But you can never stop thinking light. That’s how it is now.”

Source:
theglobeandmail.com

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