Corvette Wind-Tunnel Testing - Aero Evolution

If America has an iconic supercar, it has to be the Corvette. Yes, there are other candidates, but none seem to be able to withstand comparison. The Viper comes close but is still just a bit too rough around the edges. Ford's GT40 hasn't been produced for 40 years, and production of the modern GT didn't last but two. The Saleen S7 is still so exotic that only the most obsessed car nuts have ever heard of it. And the Camaro and Mustang are beloved but fall short of the Corvette in terms of performance and power.

The truest test that the Corvette is America's greatest sports car is simply to take a look at its mythic status. Ever since Zora Arkus-Duntov got his way and crammed a V-8 into the fiberglass-bodied two-seater in 1955, the Corvette has generated a mythology that no other American car can match. Yes, there have been issues like cheap plastic interior components, creaks and rattles, and the doldrums that were the '70s, but every long-lived car has its growing pains. But something, somewhere along the way has clicked with the American public. Maybe it's the unique styling or the fantastic lineup of great engines that have been found between the fenders. Whatever it is, the Corvette is still a car that just about any grandmother that doesn't know a camshaft from canola oil can identify. It's also the car that most of us mooned over as teenagers. Oh, and hey, it's a very unscientific fact that a Corvette can help an average guy get a date with the pretty girls. God bless America.

With that in mind, we were very interested when we learned that Gary Eaker, owner of two of the few public wind tunnels in America, was willing to run a few Vettes through one of his facilities for us. Eaker's first wind tunnel, the AeroDYN facility in Mooresville, North Carolina, stays booked up with Sprint Cup race teams, so he recently built a smaller tunnel-dubbed "A2"-right beside of it. Although NASCAR teams also use it, Eaker says its primary purpose is for more budget-minded racers-everyone from Saturday-night oval trackers, to drag racers, to land speed racers. (For more information, check out www.a2wt.com.) On off days, he'll even host something completely out there, like comparing every generation of Corvette back-to-back-to-back.

The Tests
Dave Salazar, A2's general manager, and Tunnel Operator/Technician Bob Smith handled all the nuts and bolts of running eight Corvettes through the tunnel in a span of two hectic days, making sure that all the results were comparable. They also handled the time-consuming chore of lining up the cars for the tests.

The tests for all cars (called "blows" in wind-tunnel jargon) were performed at 85 mph thanks to four fans and 640 hp worth of electric motors pulling air across the cars. The A2 tunnel also uses a special floor in the test section to simulate the aerodynamic effect of the road surface moving underneath the car. In case you doubt these guys take their job seriously, they also made the effort to set the air pressure at 30 psi in every tire on every car that rolled through the tunnel. Finally, each car was tested in three different configurations: empty, with two passengers to simulate a more realistic road-going attitude with weight in the seats, and with two passengers and the headlights exposed (if applicable).

Generation One
The first generation of the Corvette, the C1, was manufactured from 1953 until 1962. Our test car was a '62 all-original Corvette owned by Ben Horack. This first-generation model had the removable hardtop, which was in place for the tests. The C1 was also unique among Corvettes-until the C6 showed up-because it has fixed headlamps that can't be hidden away when not in use.