Long-time car writer Larry Tebo, who once believed the automotive sun rose and set across the Atlantic, sees the light and reconsiders an American sports machine that never got the due it deserved.
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I have been on a journey of discovery for five or six years now. Like several of my friends, relatives, and colleagues, I suppose I'm getting older, and with age has come a great deal of thought and observation about how the world around me is changing. I've reconsidered all that I thought I knew so well about the world of automobiles, and automotive wonderfulness. I've gone back and read magazine articles and book chapters--even entire books--that I'd overlooked because I just couldn't be bothered with American cars.
What I've come away with has been a revelation to me personally, resulting in a complete one-eighty in my attitude toward automobiles in general. Anyone who discusses automobiles with me knows this already: I've been something of a one-man cheering squad for "Team America" the last few years. I guess it's the "zeal of the newly converted." The story that follows is one example of the kind of illustrious accomplishments by American automakers that I had completely ignored for most of my life.
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The Europeans utterly dominated the world of international motor sports in the years immediately following World War II. Jaguar, Maserati, and Mercedes-Benz, in particular, were the "800-pound gorillas" of sports car and Formula One racing. The only racing cars that could even hope to compete with those produced by the German giants were built by other European makers, like Aston Martin. It was also during the late Fifties that Ferrari established its reputation with the 250 Series that endures to the present day. When it came to international motor sports, the Americans were MIA.
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But wait--not so fast! General Motors had admittedly been a "wallflower" on the motor sports scene since its beginnings in 1908. GM and racing were like chalk and cheese. This all changed in the 1950s--in a pretty sudden and spectacular way, no less. Certain key people in top positions at GM, young engineering types with big ideas, came along with different notions about GM's approach to racing. Edward Cole, the brilliant engineer who rose to GM's presidency in later life, was in charge of the Chevrolet Division in the early Fifties. In that position, he battled the top GM brass over whether or not to cancel the slow-selling Corvette during its early, awkward years. The Corvette was "neither fish nor fowl" at first, with a heavy chassis and a doggy six-cylinder power train. When Cole got his brainchild--the revolutionary small-block Chevrolet V8 engine--into production in 1955, the Corvette suddenly became a genuine high-performance automobile, with a high-revving, lightweight, free-breathing powerplant that could take on just about anything.
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Cole was a progressive executive when it came to "the product." He envisioned Chevrolet as the maker of champion racing cars--whether on the NASCAR tracks with Chevy's sedans, or on the sports car racing circuits with the Corvette. Cole required talented and motivated engineers to achieve this goal, however. So he hired two of the best: Zora Arkus Duntov, a Belgian-born Russian, came on board to run the rapidly expanding Corvette program, and John Z. DeLorean (yes, the same as the car) was brought over from Packard, then in its death throes, as Chevrolet's engineering chief. Cole persuaded the GM bean counters that an all-out racing program for the Corvette would benefit the company. It was an uphill battle at first, but the program was soon to pay back big dividends as the Corvette evolved into "America's Sports Car," a title it holds to this very day.
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Duntov and DeLorean put together a team that designed and constructed one of the most exotic and impressive racing automobiles of the 1950s, or of any era for that matter... the Corvette SS of 1957. This machine was a genuine "sports prototype" racing automobile; its only feature similar to the production street Corvette was a facsimile front "sharktooth" grille, cast from magnesium for less weight. Otherwise, this car was all-out and relentlessly exotic, designed to beat the best the world had to offer.
The engineers began with a tubular space-frame chassis (which reflected the thinking that the Mercedes Benz designers were using successfully on their SL and SLR racing cars) combined with a body of ultra-light alloys. The wheels were the most high tech of their time: extremely lightweight Halibrand magnesium alloy. The brakes were huge, generously cooled drums mounted inboard (again, similar to Mercedes Benz practice of the time), and the suspension was fully independent.
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The power source was the center of attention, though. The basically stock-block 283-cubic-inch V8 was completely reconfigured for maximum output and durability at high revs, equipped with an advanced electronic fuel-injection system designed by Delco Electronics. (The only other fuel-injected racing cars at the time were from Mercedes Benz, and they were mechanically actuated instead of electronic.) The engine was mounted far back in the chassis (a front mid-engined configuration) for good front-to-rear balance. It produced something like 450 horsepower, a prodigious amount at that time for a sports racing automobile. The front and rear of the body hinged fully away from the chassis for easy access and repairs, and the whole thing was wrapped in an aerodynamically sound skin--really quite sexy-looking in a bold, American-style manner.
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The Corvette SS had a short career, but a notable one. At the 12 Hours of Sebring in 1957, Juan Manuel Fangio, the maestro himself, drove the Corvette SS in its racing debut to the lead. He dominated the race until a few hours before the checkered flag, when a suspension upright fractured and ended his bid. Shortly after Sebring (and to the great chagrin of Chevrolet's now very excited and energized racing personnel), General Motors, along with Ford, Chrysler, and the other American automakers signed the Association of Automobile Manufacturers' ban on factory participation in auto racing of any kind. And thus did the Corvette SS become an instant museum piece at the very moment of its newfound greatness. It's interesting to imagine how the Corvette SS might have fared at the 1957 running of LeMans against the Ferraris, Jaguars, and Aston Martins. The vehicle had everything necessary to win outright, that's for sure. The Corvette SS is truly one of the all-time great automobiles.
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One footnote to the Corvette SS story: In 1959, two years after the car was retired, GM's new director of design, Bill Mitchell, and his protégé Larry Shinoda had the SS rebodied and renamed the Sting Ray. The result was a long-lead preview of what the 1963 Corvette Sting Ray would eventually look like. Mitchell reportedly had the car rendered street legal and drove it as his personal car for some time. Quite a guy. Quite a car.
As a former Euro-snob, I was aware of the Corvette SS in a vague way, but I had never bothered to learn more about the car because it wasn't cool to do so. I feel just the opposite today. I can't learn enough about these magnificent American automobiles, and I hope to spark a bit of new (or sometimes renewed) interest in them among others. These vehicles are worth our attention and admiration. Doing so takes nothing away from the Europeans, whose vehicles are still world-class examples of automotive engineering. Yet how nice to round out the automotive picture with "the rest of the story," as the late Paul Harvey used to say.
Editor's Note: Photos three through eight are from the General Motors' archives. For downloadable, high-resolution versions of the images from the General Motors' archives, visit the Automotive Traveler image gallery.
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