2014 Corvette Stingray: 30 MPG Highway In Eco Mode With Seven-Speed Manual
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From a sheer data standpoint, the 2014 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray is quickly shaping to be a legendary machine. When this “base” Corvette hits the market in a few months, not only will it be the most technologically-advanced and powerful base model ever (with 455 standard horsepower), but it will also achieve an official EPA estimated 17 mpg city and 29 mpg highway for a combined 21 mpg — making it the most fuel-efficient V8 sports car on the market.
The 29 mpg highway rating comes from the average of the C7’s driving settings, with the default Touring mode achieving 28 mpg highway, and the Eco mode attaining the coveted 30 miles per gallon mark, all while delivering 455 ponies (460 hp with the performance dual-mode exhaust system). Fuel economy numbers for the 2014 Corvette Stingray equipped with the six-speed automatic transmission are still being finalized.
The 30 mpg rating is achieved with Corvettes equipped with the seven-speed manual transmission, and is made possible with the fifth-generation Small Block LT1 V8 engine’s Active Fuel Management system, which deactivates four of the eight cylinders during light driving conditions. Check out our deep dive feature on the new LT1 to read more on the system’s mechanics.
Let’s not forget, either, that the 2014 Corvette Stingray starts at an unrivaled $51,995 including destination. The performance-to-dollar ratio here is enough to make any Porsche buyer look like a complete fool. Because by comparison, the less efficient, less powerful Porsche 911 Carrera S offers just 400 hp, and 27 mpg highway, and at $98,900, is nearly twice the price. Chew on that, Stuttgart.
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I could just imagine what the FE for auto is……
The C7 is best sportscar bar none terms of performance and price point.I can’t wait to this vehicle go heads up with the 911s.The Stingray with Z51 package and the MRC suspension is a increditable car for 57k.I will take a triple black convertible with the seven manual.
Way to go GM, your new Corvette can almost challenge fuel economy of a forced inducted 4 banger.. Ok I’m dragging it a little bit but my hat’s off to you. I’m glad that they invested the time and energy in this..
Solid numbers for sure considering the 6.2L displacement and 455hp, but Corvettes have been getting good highway fuel econ. for quite a few years now. I had a ’96 LT4 with ZF 6-spd., it was rated 16/27. I did a number of road trips, never got 30 mpg, but 28-28.5 was the norm even “having some fun with it”.
Seriously, exactly when will GM start taking orders on this C7?
This article is full BS. When AFM kicks in, the car does not deliver the claimed horsepower-it cannot because the car runs on FOUR CYLINDERS. The real gas mileage that matters is the stop and go CITY mileage. Since C7 is heavier than C6 and AFM does not work during stop and go, C7 will get worse CITY gas mileage than C6, this is a fact. Nice attempt to skew the reality nevertheless.
Grab the ban-hammer! 😉
“When AFM kicks in, the car does not deliver the claimed horsepower-it cannot because the car runs on FOUR CYLINDERS.”
Why would you expect it to? When it’s running on AFM, of course there would be drop in HP. AFM isn’t there to maintain 455hp, it’s to maintain better fuel economy numbers.
“which deactivates four of the eight cylinders during light driving conditions”….yeah, like conditions in which you wouldn’t be using all 455hp, like at normal highway speeds.
Wait until you learn about HP ratings at peak rpm’s AND at crank. You’ll lose you mind when you find out a 500hp Z06 only has 140hp at idle and at crank, not to mention the mechanical loss along the way to the wheels. I mean if you’re misunderstanding how AFM works, then there is a good chance you’re looking at cars the wrong way.
Your name says it all.
I agree with you Grawdaddy, Nobody does not really understand that with the fuel saving features, it’s about conservation and not just full trottle response.
Excellent Grawdaddy – is nobody going to complain about getting great mileage when common sense tells you that no car gets its rated horsepower all the time at any rpm?
I have the paddle shift C7 on order and already my beautiful daughter (who was pushing for me to get the X1 BMW) wants to borrow it for a week when it gets here.
LOL, if comments disagree with the opinions of the writers in this place, you just ban people? Pathetic, this place must be ran from China.
Dear Boo,
We only delete comments that are 1) spam and 2) obscene.
Since we haven’t deleted any comments from this thread, your assessment is simply inaccurate.
Also, GM Authority is based right here in the U.S. Any references to the contrary are simply poppycock.
Now, this is funny, considering I got banned from this freedom loving place after a single post in this thread… Here is a thought for you, if you do not like a post, either delete it or lock it, instead of creating a one way venue in the aftermath. Respecting other POV’s may add some credibility to your blog, especially when calling people buying Porsches FOOLS-just does not seem very objective (I do not own any P cars).
“Here is a thought for you, if you do not like a post, either delete it or lock it,”
That’s not unlike censorship, something else that’s fashionable in China these days.
What do you mean you got “banned”?
That word isn’t even in our vocabulary, as we have an open commenting system… are you sure you’re in the right place?
As for the original article’s reference of Porsche buyers being “fools”: the statement illustrates the undeniable dollar-to-performance advantage of the C7 over any Porsche. It’s in no way meant to be derogatory or insulting to those folks. Lighten up. It will brighten your day.
LOL, denial is not a river in Africa. If my posts do not appear after I write them, what does that exactly mean? This is actually the second time I have been banned from posting in this place. I suppose it is good I have my own website to comment about it.
Allow me to reiterate: we don’t moderate the comments on GM Authority, unless they’re spam or obscene in nature.
However, there is a possibility that the comments you’re referring to, the ones that reportedly “do not appear after [you] write them”, were caught by our automated spam filters. This doesn’t imply that your comments were in any way “moderated” by the staff here at GM Authority; it also doesn’t mean that you were “banned”.
Instead, a comment usually reaches the auto spam box either due to the name you used in leaving the comment (common spam names like google, noone, poop, etc.), the IP address that you’re commenting from, or various other factors.
I can research this later today to see if any comments associated with your email address were caught by the automated spam filters.
In the meantime, I recommend doing the following:
1. Signing up for a free GM Authority account, which lifts many of the auto-spam flags during commenting, and
2. Contacting GM Authority support in relation to these kinds of issues, as they have nothing to do with the thread at hand. To reach support, simply click on “Support” at the very top of this page.
Color me impressed if it actually does this good
Good numbers highway but I wonder how much longer they can pull these tricks out of the bag without reducing engine size to meet future demands of CAFE.
While modern electronics have delivered us the best HP we have ever have I ponder what will become of these cars when they get older and the electronics begin to fail. Things like digital speedos on some cars now are impossible to replace and I wonder about BCM’s and computers in the future. Will we be able to off having old C7 and C8 cars in the future. Cars like the Spark are just going to be like BIC lighters and when they are used up toss them.
As of now I am amazed but I still worry that there may be a cliff somewhere ahead. I fear it more every time the idiots in DC talk about raising the CAFE again.
So enjoy the present and live free and live fast. I just now have to find a way to get a C7.
They already experimented making the engine smaller, and it got WORSE fuel economy. That’s was discovered while developing a varient of the LT1 with the same displacement t the C6.R ( cylinder deactivation was actually far more efficient on the larger 6.2L)
Just because the engine is smaller does not mean it will automatically get better fuel economy. There are factors such as weight, hp, torque across the rpm band and how often the engine is forced to work outside of its most fuel miserly rpm range due to enviormental and driver demands.
I think you misunderstand what is going on.
The Vette people want to keep a V8 as long as they can but even the lead of the team said at some point they will be forced to possibly move to other forms of power. Yes a smaller push rod V8 Na V8 will get worse MPG but other engine packages can be as powerful and even more efficient. GM is just not ready or willing to move to these packages yet. They will hold on for as long as they can but even Tadge has stated they need alternative plans for the future.
In the Future a Turbo V6 may be offered as could a hybrid drivetrain. As for now they do not want them but at some point the 17 City will not be enough to let slip by for Chevy.
I think at one point the Vette will lose size and weight but also go to a smaller volume engine with less than 8 cylinders. The Hybrid like Porsche could happen if they could do it cheap enough but these system are very expensive.
You can’t change physics as lighter mass and smaller volume always will get better MPG but that does not mean the engineers always want to do it that way as cutting power makes it difficult to sell a sports cars that has offered so much.
I think in the near future they will cut weight in the C7 over the next few years and rumors are that the C8 which is already being looked at will offer more radical changes.
Things can change plans like Cheaper molded Carbon Fiber and other items that can reduce the mass.
In the future even the Vette at its present volume will need to get even better MPG to meet future regs that will only get worse.
A good example is my car weights in at 3200 about the same as a Vette. At 2.0 liters I get 25 in the City and 32 Highway with the aero of a brick with better aero I could see much more. The 2.0 can do 500 HP easy so a smaller engine even in a Turbo V6 can do well MPG wise. It is just one of those deals where it has to be put together as a package and GM is also not ready to lose the V8 yet. They will hold on as long as they can but even they know at some point they have to have other plans.
So if you have a V8 today enjoy them as long as you can.
No I think you missed my point. Getting decent to excellent fuel economy out of a big motor is easy with modern tech. Heck it wasn’t all that hard with older tech (assuming u were willing to trade hp and performance) like many who have owned 6speed 4th gen F-bodys or C4-C6 Vettes knows; 30 mpg v8 is nothing new nor hard to reach with current tech.
I almost shrug with disinterest when the “30mpg” sports car articles and statement are made about the GM V8s. It’s old news.
And yes a smaller engined, lighter car could do better, but the reality is, NO sports car in the Corvettes performance class, price range, or hp and engine displacement come close to those numbers. Not Porcshe, not Ferarri, not Nissan, or anyone else has a 455+hp car that gets 30mpg.
I guess what I’m saying is this is par the course for GM. They are simply maintaining , not breaking new ground. and it’s one area where none of the competition with their smaller (supposedly more efficient ) engines are performing at.
The only thing that will kill the V8 is when people stop buying them. And when u consider THE most produced single engine is the small block V8, you have to give pause and question the conventional wisdom that the V8s days are numbered.
A s I said before, there are many many other variables involved in good mpg ( not necessarily efficiency). A perfect example is the old GM G bodies of the late 80s-90s. 4 speed auto, 3.8L v6, 28-30+mpg. Yet they weighed 3400-3800+lbs. they had no fancy engine management tricks, nor were they visually aerodynamic. (they actually were very slippery, [.028 range] the eye can’t judge for sh#t when it comes to cheating the wind) but they were full size cars getting great steady state gas milage.
Tahoes, full size trucks and so on, get worse milage than cars not because of their V8s per say, but because of the weight, gearing, drive train drag (4×4 anyone?) tires, and so on. read a book on Areodynamics; the shape of the car doesn’t even matter till well over 100mph. BUT air management around that shape; like how much flows in the grill, or gets caught under the car, or flows off the rear – will creat havoc with mpg.
The fact that you have a upper level high performance car with a big displacement V8 (or an style engine for that matter) that makes 455+hp and as much torque while still getting 30 mpg is beyond impressive. And if anything only proves that short of a sudden loss of interest in the market for that engine design; V8s ain’t going anywhere.
Fantastic engineering by GM once again! And GM has nano steel, and carbon molding process, a few investments in lightweight tech that should be bearing fruits soon and I’m sure the carbon molding would debut on the prestigious corvette!
Okay folks forget engine down sizing, because the C-7 gets better mpg numbers than all these cars with smaller engines such as the Hyundai Genesis Coupe 3.8 V-6, BMW 550i 4.4 V-8tt and Benz E550 4.7 V-8tt.
3.8 V-6 18 mpg city, 26 mpg highway
4.4 V-8tt 15 mpg city, 21 mpg highway
4.7 V-8tt 17 mpg city, 25 mpg highway
Nissan GTR 3.8tt 15 mpg city 21 mpg highway
Now do you all really think engine size always means more efficiency?
I had a BMW X5 with the 4.4LTT. Granted, it was a 5300 lb beast, but it could pass everything…except a gas station. Can you say 13 mpg?
I think the only real concern for engine size is engine weight (bigger it is, the more it weights). If Chevrolet can continue to cut weight, even in the engine, and maintain its horsepower and torque, they have a winning combination. None of that is easy, but good mileage is the result. Advances in technology in any other area will spur the Corvette in that direction and we will continue to benefit. After all, it’s their halo car and an innovation leader.
I just found out my C7 order was processed against the dealer’s allocation (pre-order went in a long time ago), HOWEVER, the carbon fiber interior is not available right now, so I had to change the order to omit the interior carbon fiber. Bummer. Does anyone know why? Is this a supplier problem or a quality control problem? Is it possible that I would get the carbon fiber panels installed sometime in the future?
That’s just one more way to reduce your carbon footprint.
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