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Drove a C5


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I went to West Palm, FL to visit a friend who moved down there about a year ago. He just bought super clean 2002 C5 Convertible to cruise A1A. Unfortunately, he went with an automatic so his wife could use it if she had to. He let me cruise around in it for about an hour one evening. First off, it is my first time ever in a vette. My first impression, with the top down, is that it is a very comfortable car with great visibility all around. It feels very solidly built. I was only able to "get on it" for short bursts at a time because of all the traffic and police around. It jumped nicely forward and stopped even better in response to the brake pedal. Overall, it felt lighter than I thought it would feel and it felt pretty fast but not quite as fast as my Z. I think the power steering and pretty heavy brake assist make it feel agile compared to a Z at low speeds. I really liked the suspension and ride because of its good street comfort vs. good sportiness. It definitely stayed flat in corners but it pitched and dove more than I would like in brake and acceleration. The stock exhaust was WAY too quiet for my taste and the automatic just does NOT suit my driving style. It would make a real nice daily driver though and with a few mods, I could see it really waking up.

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automatic C5 verts are the slowest LS1 cars.. they do about 14.2 or so in the 1/4... its pathetic. my bone stock LS1 camaro did a 13.2...

 

they are very nice driving cars though' date=' [b']and have close to 50/50 weight dist.[/b]

 

 

Yeah I would hope so with as far back as they set the motors in the Fbody and C5 lol.

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First thing your friend should do is swap out the sway bars for the Z06 units, and the shocks as well. That will change the driving characteristics 100% night and day.

 

Beyond that, The Vette is a decent daily driver, gets decent fuel mileage and is a nice car with the host of typical GM bugs. They respond well to header and exhaust mods, typically pulling 30WHP out of a set of LGMs or Kooks headers and Z06 catbacks.

 

Glad I had mine. Glad I modified mine. Glad I sold mine! :2thumbs:

Mike :cool:

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The big difference I noticed in the C6 I drove is that it actually "feels" smaller, which is a HUGE PLUS. The C5 is a boat of a car. It takes up way more space than you think, until you see one inside the lines of a parking space... The C6 feels smaller, and is a little, and feels like it is overall a fair amount stiffer. Otherwise, it's standard C5 fare... Brakes, suspension, sense of power/speed. Biggest downfall is the plastic-ish interior, which GM should have done a better job on... It's only slightly better than the C5, which had WAY to much F-body in it.

 

Mike

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The C5 is a boat of a car. It takes up way more space than you think, until you see one inside the lines of a parking space...

 

Agreed 100%. My best friend had an '03 conv't for a few months and let me drive it one time. I was amazed at how big it felt (thought probably exasparated by the fact that my 240 is my daily driver). And for as big as it was outside, it sure didn't have much interior room. I'm not a big guy, but I am a shade over 6 foot, and sitting in the passenger seat I often found myself staring at the sun visor/upper windshield frame (in contrast, I fit quite comfortably in my 240).

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Well this summer I went to vegas and they have a place where you can test drive new GM products through a road coarse or in the case of trucks, suv's, and hummers, 2 different offroad courses. I got to drive the new Z06 a couple of laps as well as the new caddy cts. It was my first time driving a vette and it was really sweet. I was surprises how comfy the car was guess it is strictly for people with too much money that think they want to drive fast. Best part of the deal though was you could test any two cars for 10.00 bucks. Overall I thought vegas was depressing to see people throwing away their hard earned money (yes I mean the junkie gamblers) glued to the slots. But for ten bucks getting to drive a new vette had to be the best thing about my trip. As for the car it really handled great and I was surprised with the smoothness compared to older vette's I've ridden in. Still flooring it didn't exactly scare anyone.

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