By Mark Reuss, General Motors President
Editor’s note: Originally published by Automotive News, this essay is part of collection of stories written by industry leaders, journalists, and historians to commemorate the publication’s 100th anniversary. The essay collection is being published as a book looking at some of the major events and trends that shaped the auto industry during the past century.
Automotive News’ Page 1 cover story in December 2019 about the debut of the 2020 Chevrolet Corvette focused on the new mid-engine configuration, and how the V-8 was exposed in all its glory. One of our General Motors engineers was quoted as saying, “You can see into our world directly for the first time.”
The first time the world saw directly into Corvette’s window was, famously, in January 1953 at New York’s Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, where the new sports car concept was unveiled as a show car in the 1953 General Motors Motorama. It was a sensation. Within six months, it was rolling off the assembly line, the start of a production run of 72 years, eight generations and counting, during which it has defined and refined what obtainable performance is all about, as America’s Sports Car.
Zora’s vision
The man who set the Corvette down that path had nothing to do with its creation. He saw it for the first time right there at the Waldorf, like any other civilian, and like most, he was captivated, intrigued by what he saw — even more by what he imagined it could be. And by that May, Zora Arkus-Duntov had accepted a job at GM, working for Ed Cole, Chevrolet chief engineer, and by 1956, general manager.
Cole led the Corvette from concept to production, and under his guidance, Zora set out to turn it from a great-looking sports car into one of the fastest production cars in the world. This was accomplished in just a few short years, thanks in part to what may have been Cole’s biggest contribution to GM (and automotive) history: the Chevy small-block V-8, which was unleashed in 1955.
The effects of that initial encounter at the Waldorf are still being felt today, because in Zora’s vision, his blueprint for the Corvette ultimately called for a mid-engine layout, which was finally made into reality by Tadge Juechter and his team with the C8.
How the Corvette got from there to here is a fascinating look into the window of vehicle development, a view that never fails to astonish me. Working on a car such as the Corvette, influencing its performance and design and features and benefits — it’s a pinch-me moment every day, even after all these years.
Gearhead paradise
To put it simply, the Corvette is the reason I work at GM. As a young boy, I spent many car trips hunched in the rear flat area of mid-1960s coupes. Often on Saturdays, my dad took me to work with him at the Chevrolet Engineering Building at the GM Technical Center in Warren, Michigan, where the Corvette came to life. On the way home, he would take me by the Research Building lobby to see the Firebirds and the original silver Stingray.
I, like many of my co-workers, wanted to work for the company that makes the Corvette. I just loved everything about it. Its presence, its performance, its history and heritage … everything it stands for has always raised the hair on the back of my neck.
Back in those days, there used to be a swap meet just down the road in Warren, where they’d sell Chevrolet heads, parts, accessories — everything you could imagine and more. It was gearhead paradise. Once, when I was about 10, I begged my dad to stop at the swap meet so we could check it out, and he did.
When we went inside the huge warehouse-like building, we came across the man himself — Zora! I’d never seen him before, but you could tell right away he was someone special. He was sitting there holding court, signing all kinds of things for all kinds of people, and it all contributed to the aura of the Corvette for me, reinforcing what I already knew I wanted to do with my life. I thought about that moment often as we made Zora’s vision a reality with the C8. It was an honor to work on it, to follow the blueprints and trace the DNA of various development vehicles right back to the roots.
The next level
In many ways, it was inevitable. Once we got to C7, we had pushed the limits of what we could do with that configuration. It was as close to perfection as a front-engine/rear-wheel-drive Corvette was going to get. To take performance and driving dynamics to the next level for our customers, we had to move to midengine.
The groundwork for it had been done decades before. The Chevrolet Engineering Research Vehicle #1, commonly known as the CERV I, debuted in 1962, and demonstrated what happens when you push the boundaries of engineering and design to develop a mid-engine race car. What made the CERV I so unique was how light and powerful it was. The car weighed only 1,600 pounds, and the body accounted for only 80 pounds of that.
Its 283-cubic-inch V-8 produced 350 hp and weighed only 350 pounds, thanks to the novel use of aluminum in the cylinder block and heads, and several other critical parts such as the water pump and flywheel. The team also used magnesium in the clutch housing and fuel injection manifold — it featured mechanical fuel injection. My favorite aspect of the CERV I is the orange flames that flow out of the back as it goes. It’s a sight that absolutely delights the 10-year-old still living in all of us.
The CERV I was followed by what I think is the most beautiful of all the CERV vehicles, the CERV II, in 1964. The CERV II had a monocoque chassis and was powered by a 377-cubic-inch V-8 producing 500 hp, enabling the car to accelerate from 0 to 60 mph in under 3 seconds, with a top speed of 210 mph. Importantly, the CERV II was all-wheel drive.
The transmission featured a unique configuration in which the rear wheels were driven by one torque converter and the front wheels through another. GM patented that in 1968. The CERV II also marked the beginning of the velocity stacks, like the McLarens had. Those were developed at General Motors R&D. That car is very special.
Setting records
In 1990, the CERV III made its debut. I was already working at GM so I remember it being built around the time we were working on a true active suspension system. The CERV III had an all-wheel drive, mid-engine configuration, and ran a small block 5.7-liter V-8 producing 650 hp. It weighed only 3,400 pounds thanks to extensive use of carbon fiber. The central structure was a carbon-fiber torque tube that weighed only 38 pounds. The ends of the beam were machined from titanium.
Those three CERV vehicles show that midengine has always been the Corvette’s destiny. And their legacy is on the road today in the C8, in all its iterations — the Z06, E-Ray, ZR1, and ZR1X. The inherent balance of the configuration has led us to great things with C8, including setting Nürburgring lap records, and a top-speed record of 233.5 mph in the ZR1 — still one of the coolest things I’ve experienced in my life, a triumph for the car’s performance and technology and the work done by Tadge and his team.
The DNA of C8 and all the generations that came before it will continue to inspire us as we peer into the window of the Corvette’s future, to C9 and beyond. As we’ve done for seven-plus decades, we will push the boundaries of innovation in propulsion, material usage, and high performance with every Corvette we do. I can feel the hair standing up on the back of my neck just thinking about it.
Mark Reuss has been president of General Motors since January 2019. Reuss is a mechanical engineer who began his GM career as a student intern in 1983.
Questions or comments: news@gm.com
Editor’s note: Originally published by Automotive News, this essay is part of a collection of stories written by industry leaders, journalists, and historians to commemorate the publication’s 100th anniversary. The essay collection is being published as a book looking at some of the major events and trends that shaped the auto industry during the past century.
Automotive News’ Page 1 cover story in December 2019 about the debut of the 2020 Chevrolet Corvette focused on the new mid-engine configuration, and how the V-8 was exposed in all its glory. One of our General Motors engineers was quoted as saying, “You can see into our world directly for the first time.”
The first time the world saw directly into Corvette’s window was, famously, in January 1953 at New York’s Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, where the new sports car concept was unveiled as a show car in the 1953 General Motors Motorama. It was a sensation. Within six months, it was rolling off the assembly line, the start of a production run of 72 years, eight generations and counting, during which it has defined and refined what obtainable performance is all about, as America’s Sports Car.
Zora’s vision
The man who set the Corvette down that path had nothing to do with its creation. He saw it for the first time right there at the Waldorf, like any other civilian, and like most, he was captivated, intrigued by what he saw — even more by what he imagined it could be. And by that May, Zora Arkus-Duntov had accepted a job at GM, working for Ed Cole, Chevrolet chief engineer, and by 1956, general manager.
Cole led the Corvette from concept to production, and under his guidance, Zora set out to turn it from a great-looking sports car into one of the fastest production cars in the world. This was accomplished in just a few short years, thanks in part to what may have been Cole’s biggest contribution to GM (and automotive) history: the Chevy small-block V-8, which was unleashed in 1955.
The effects of that initial encounter at the Waldorf are still being felt today, because in Zora’s vision, his blueprint for the Corvette ultimately called for a mid-engine layout, which was finally made into reality by Tadge Juechter and his team with the C8.
How the Corvette got from there to here is a fascinating look into the window of vehicle development, a view that never fails to astonish me. Working on a car such as the Corvette, influencing its performance and design and features and benefits — it’s a pinch-me moment every day, even after all these years.
Gearhead paradise
To put it simply, the Corvette is the reason I work at GM. As a young boy, I spent many car trips hunched in the rear flat area of mid-1960s coupes. Often on Saturdays, my dad took me to work with him at the Chevrolet Engineering Building at the GM Technical Center in Warren, Michigan, where the Corvette came to life. On the way home, he would take me by the Research Building lobby to see the Firebirds and the original silver Stingray.
I, like many of my co-workers, wanted to work for the company that makes the Corvette. I just loved everything about it. Its presence, its performance, its history and heritage … everything it stands for has always raised the hair on the back of my neck.
Back in those days, there used to be a swap meet just down the road in Warren, where they’d sell Chevrolet heads, parts, accessories — everything you could imagine and more. It was gearhead paradise. Once, when I was about 10, I begged my dad to stop at the swap meet so we could check it out, and he did.
When we went inside the huge warehouse-like building, we came across the man himself — Zora! I’d never seen him before, but you could tell right away he was someone special. He was sitting there holding court, signing all kinds of things for all kinds of people, and it all contributed to the aura of the Corvette for me, reinforcing what I already knew I wanted to do with my life. I thought about that moment often as we made Zora’s vision a reality with the C8. It was an honor to work on it, to follow the blueprints and trace the DNA of various development vehicles right back to the roots.
The next level
In many ways, it was inevitable. Once we got to C7, we had pushed the limits of what we could do with that configuration. It was as close to perfection as a front-engine/rear-wheel-drive Corvette was going to get. To take performance and driving dynamics to the next level for our customers, we had to move to midengine.
The groundwork for it had been done decades before. The Chevrolet Engineering Research Vehicle #1, commonly known as the CERV I, debuted in 1962, and demonstrated what happens when you push the boundaries of engineering and design to develop a mid-engine race car. What made the CERV I so unique was how light and powerful it was. The car weighed only 1,600 pounds, and the body accounted for only 80 pounds of that.
Its 283-cubic-inch V-8 produced 350 hp and weighed only 350 pounds, thanks to the novel use of aluminum in the cylinder block and heads, and several other critical parts such as the water pump and flywheel. The team also used magnesium in the clutch housing and fuel injection manifold — it featured mechanical fuel injection. My favorite aspect of the CERV I is the orange flames that flow out of the back as it goes. It’s a sight that absolutely delights the 10-year-old still living in all of us.
The CERV I was followed by what I think is the most beautiful of all the CERV vehicles, the CERV II, in 1964. The CERV II had a monocoque chassis and was powered by a 377-cubic-inch V-8 producing 500 hp, enabling the car to accelerate from 0 to 60 mph in under 3 seconds, with a top speed of 210 mph. Importantly, the CERV II was all-wheel drive.
The transmission featured a unique configuration in which the rear wheels were driven by one torque converter and the front wheels through another. GM patented that in 1968. The CERV II also marked the beginning of the velocity stacks, like the McLarens had. Those were developed at General Motors R&D. That car is very special.
Setting records
In 1990, the CERV III made its debut. I was already working at GM so I remember it being built around the time we were working on a true active suspension system. The CERV III had an all-wheel drive, mid-engine configuration, and ran a small block 5.7-liter V-8 producing 650 hp. It weighed only 3,400 pounds thanks to extensive use of carbon fiber. The central structure was a carbon-fiber torque tube that weighed only 38 pounds. The ends of the beam were machined from titanium.
Those three CERV vehicles show that midengine has always been the Corvette’s destiny. And their legacy is on the road today in the C8, in all its iterations — the Z06, E-Ray, ZR1, and ZR1X. The inherent balance of the configuration has led us to great things with C8, including setting Nürburgring lap records, and a top-speed record of 233.5 mph in the ZR1 — still one of the coolest things I’ve experienced in my life, a triumph for the car’s performance and technology and the work done by Tadge and his team.
The DNA of C8 and all the generations that came before it will continue to inspire us as we peer into the window of the Corvette’s future, to C9 and beyond. As we’ve done for seven-plus decades, we will push the boundaries of innovation in propulsion, material usage, and high performance with every Corvette we do. I can feel the hair standing up on the back of my neck just thinking about it.
Mark Reuss has been president of General Motors since January 2019. Reuss is a mechanical engineer who began his GM career as a student intern in 1983.
Questions or comments: news@gm.com