A great basis for a What-If Car - well, it's knd of a Whif now!

[Faust]

If you believe that too much is never enough, then you can probably understand what GM was thinking when they let California Custom Coach create what is perhaps the most excessive Corvette of all time, the four-door Corvette America! The idea was to create a four-door, four-seater Corvette that would, uh, well, I don't know what. It would be long, and expensive, and not really compete with any other sporty car since it was slow. Does that work?

Beacause I love the losers, the odd and forgotten, I clearly have a super-big love of this weirdo. I mean, it's a FOUR-DOOR Corvette!!! How much more forgotten loser does it get than that??? I consider it a miracle that Monogram got suckered into making a kit of this thing, and I consider it an even bigger miracle that I was able to snag one for like, $10 still sealed a couple of years ago.

Of course, I could have just sold it, but I really do like the Corvette America, and that means I had to pop it out of the box and revel in all the late '70s bad ideas I could handle. Lucky for you guys, I also decided to share it! (That makes you lucky, right?)

Check out this completely bonkers Vette at the link below, and remember: it was the '70s. If that's not an excuse, it's at least an explanation!

https://adamrehorn.wordpress.com/monogram-1-24-1980-corvette-america-oob/

[PR19_Kit]

I've never even heard of the real car, let alone a model of it! 

It does look 'off the wall' compared to a standard 'Vette, that's for sure.

[kerick]

First time I ever heard of a four door 'Vette either. It's kind of beautiful and ugly at the same time.
Are you going to build it?

[JayBee]

That box art just does not look right! 

[zenrat]

...Moulded in Orange...

I built one of them back in the day.
I remember being perplexed by the transverse leaf spring IRS.

You did well to pick it up for $10.  I'd love another chance to build one.

[PR19_Kit]

I remember being perplexed by the transverse leaf spring IRS.

Why DID they keep on with that for so long? It was archaic by then. 

[Dizzyfugu]

I remember that kit from a vintage MONOGRAM catalogue from the Eighties!

[rickshaw]

I remember being perplexed by the transverse leaf spring IRS.

Why DID they keep on with that for so long? It was archaic by then. 

I find it a bit incomprehensible.  I suppose they thought it was cheap and it worked.  I remember a friend showing him his Spitfire's rear suspension and it had a single leaf spring, mounted transversely.  It seemed a bit strange to me but I'm not that much of a revhead.   

[NARSES2]

I find it a bit incomprehensible.  I suppose they thought it was cheap and it worked.  I remember a friend showing him his Spitfire's rear suspension and it had a single leaf spring, mounted transversely.  It seemed a bit strange to me but I'm not that much of a revhead.   

Me and Jan had a Spitfire, all of 40 years ago, and anyone squeezed in the back, normally our Doberman, had a fairly uncomfortable ride. OK in the front though.

That box art just does not look right! 

Agreed Jim, but then it's also pushed in a little which doesn't help.

[Rheged]

That box art just does not look right! 

Agreed Jim, but then it's also pushed in a little which doesn't help.

Agreed. The deformed box makes it look even wronger...........if there is such a word.

[PR19_Kit]

I find it a bit incomprehensible.  I suppose they thought it was cheap and it worked.  I remember a friend showing him his Spitfire's rear suspension and it had a single leaf spring, mounted transversely.  It seemed a bit strange to me but I'm not that much of a revhead.   

I'm not quite sure when they stopped using that transverse leaf spring on the Corvette, but at least they didn't combine it with swing axle rear suspension like the Spitfire and the original Corvair. That was a recipe for oversteer disaster! 

[jcf]

I find it a bit incomprehensible.  I suppose they thought it was cheap and it worked.  I remember a friend showing him his Spitfire's rear suspension and it had a single leaf spring, mounted transversely.  It seemed a bit strange to me but I'm not that much of a revhead.   

I'm not quite sure when they stopped using that transverse leaf spring on the Corvette, but at least they didn't combine it with swing axle rear suspension like the Spitfire and the original Corvair. That was a recipe for oversteer disaster! 

The transverse spring was used from the 1963 C2 (rear only), the C4 of 1984 introduced a composite leaf spring
front and rear, they were used until the 2019 C7 ceased production.

https://route66corvetteclub.com/documents/TechKorner/Transverse%20Leaf%20Springs.pdf

The current 2nd generation Volvo XC90 uses a composite one on the rear.

[PR19_Kit]

I'm not at all sure the C4 Corvette was the first use of composite leaf springs in the automotive field

It may have been the first use of them in a production car, but GKN were working on them in the late 70s. MTS, my employers, sold GKN a hefty test rig to test composite leaf springs and I installed it in mid-'79. They also tested and supplied the composite prop shaft for the 4x4 Renault Espace in the same period, and the leaf springs were intended for a British Army vehicle of some sort IIRC.

[Dizzyfugu]

 

[PR19_Kit]

A FOUR DOOR 928! 

Is that a Panamera prototype then?