by Wallace Wyss –

This design critique of the new 2020 mid-engine Corvette was made from public relations photos released July 18, 2019 by Chevrolet some of which are shown here. This is subject to revision when the author sees the car in person.

The biggest surprise is two body styles–a coupe with a retracting roof, which pulls down the roof to cover the view of the engine, and a convertible, which folds the top under a flush cover but leaves big headrest fairings.

2020 Corvette Design Analysis

Here’s the critique view-by-view:

SIDE: Cab is several inches forward. It will take some getting used to for drivers of front engined Corvettes. Big mistake to put the leading edge of the side scoops in a removable piece of plastic. Why? Because it looks cheap. And they made the scoop so wide that to replace the leading edge with a chrome aftermarket piece (which will no doubt be available within weeks…) will look too flashy.

Maybe with stainless steel, though…it could be carbon fibre–the flavor of the moment in high performance cars, but there’s already so many fake carbon fibre appliques at auto accessory shops that why make it look like it may have been covered with fake material even if it’s real carbon fibre. They show various styles of five spoke wheels. Wheels are tasteful, will not detract from the overall design by being too glitzy all on their own.

FRONT: The sneak shots before the official photos were released show a shiny bar across the front intake holes to the left and right of the min radiator intake. But the factory publicity photos show these are body colored, which emphasizes plasticness of the car. I predict aftermarket will have chrome covers for these bars in weeks. The hood and fenders have too many character lines, the big “vee” and two other lines but I think it only needed one or the other, not both.

REAR: The ’60’s styled rear spoiler is one of the biggest mistakes. It looks like a suspension bridge that was poorly engineered and sagged in the middle before it opened for traffic. Maybe they could have just had a ducktail molded into the rear deck. Or a spoiler that rises automatically when you went over a certain mph (as did the Chrysler Crossfire four cylinder version) which was very high tech not to mention James Bond-ish. How could Chrysler be more hi-tech than GM?

The rear–what would you call them—hot air exhaust vents (not for the exhaust pipes though) are tastefully not overly large. When they are too large it looks too much like look-at-me-ma-I’m-a-race car. The plastic grille in them looks cheap and this will be another area for after marketers–to come up with a metal grille to replace the plastic.

The exhaust pipes are rectangular with rounded corners, maybe they thought round ones look too old fashioned.

The taillights are disappointing, horizontal units right out of the Camaro reject pile. Why not a single round one per side, like, say, certain Ferraris? Why make an expensive car look like a mass-produced offering from the same brand that’s one third the price? Like building an expensive house but having one view of it dominated by the end of a house trailer.

The dip at the bottom of the rear window is really unfortunate. Since I didn’t see the car in person I can’t see if the area below the glass is porous, to let out hot air from the engine compartment. I would say the vee-shape at the bottom of the rear window looks too overly feminine (can we say that in the Me Too era?) The good news is that you can see the engine (but only when the targa top is still in place in the coupe). The top perimeter line of the coupe fastback window is also compromised by not having a continuous border, instead they break it into sections for a more dramatic look but it all smacks of an Egyptian influence–that same sharp jagged angularity swept the furniture and architecture world in the 1920s (after the discovery of King Tut’s tomb) but has no place on this car.

INTERIOR: Looks upscale. There better be few turns lock-to-lock considering the rectangular steering wheel. The main gauge seen through the steering wheel seems to be a tachometer, with a lot of subsidiary gauges electronically simulated on a screen to the right of the wheel. The contrasting color stitching (“French seams”) is classy.

The console looks like an unsurmountable wall between the driver’s seat and passenger seat–there’s no sliding from one sear to another to change drivers. Squeezing a lot of old fashioned manual switchgear into a narrow vertical divider to the right of the console is a surprising and interesting feature, sort of a reaction to the industry trend of late of having everything operated by touch screen, which is fine except for when your screen goes out. They are apparently going to have optional suede upholstery or a material that look like suede.

IN SUM: Good for a first try at a production mid-engined Corvette. Not great, and conservative really compared to the much more expensive Italian (and British) mid-engine exotics already out there. It breaks no new ground whatsoever. But thank our lucky stars they went for two versions of open car again, a targa roof and a soft top convertible. A fixed head coupe would have been a waste of time and money.

So I predict this is just the beginning for the 2020 Corvette. Various entrepreneurs will offer different body trim that will improve the areas where Chevrolet fell short. After these aftermarket-improved cars appear, there will be precious little separating the 2020 Corvettes from V8-powered mid-engined Ferraris, Lamborghinis and McLarens except the foreign exotics will be three to four times as much, and have a hard time justifying that vast price difference (base price of the Corvette is $60,000).

To compare just one price by the way, Ferrari’s 488 Spider will be replaced when the new F8 Tributo Spider is announced, but for now the 488 Spyder is Ferrari’s V8-powered mid-engined spyder, retailing at $280,900).

One problem though–finding a used stock 2020 Corvette will be rare, as owners vie with each other on who has the latest add-on. In the foreign exotic car world there’s few owners who want to “sully” their car with add-ons, but the Corvette crowd has always done that. Not exactly purists, they.

Let us know what you think in the Comments.

 
 
 
 
THE AUTHOR: Wallace Wyss has owned a mid-engine Ferrari, and authored 18 car books, including three on Ferrari and three on Corvettes. Prints of his paintings of the 2020 Corvette will be available at his Art and Books booth at the Concorso Italiano in August.