I came across my "Dilemma" thread (http://forums.corvetteforum.com/c6-z...6-dillema.html)

And a few people had requested that I come back and give my opinion on the differences.

I bought my 2LZ LeMans Blue 2007 Z06 in November of 2008 which was the color I wanted. It had 618 miles on it and was in absolutely the most perfect condition a person could ask for.

When I got her:







As you can see the car still had the delivery packaging on it. The previous owner was from NY and had come down to Daytona Beach, FL. and had fallen in love with a viper. He traded in the car to the dealer sight unseen and had it shipped down to them in an enclosed trailer. A buddy of mine worked at the Dodge dealer and contacted me telling me about the car. I was out of the country so I sent my father in. He told me over the phone the car was immaculate. So 57k dollars later I was the proud new owner of the Z06 even though I wouldn't see it for a month. My dad took it to the dealer for me and got an initial oil change for me at the local Chevy dealer in Daytona (Jon Hall Chevrolet). I would like to mention that the SA Gary and the tech Tom took amazing care of me over the years. They were always above and beyond in any situation when dealing with my car and me.

I came back to the US in December and immediately jumped into the car once I got home which was roughly midnight. OMG was it amazing. I think I drove it for a solid hour that night. It blew my mind how amazing the car was and that's after just owning a Yamaha R1 and an E46 M3 that had every single bolt on possible. The pull in any gear was amazing, the seats were very comfortable compared to the stiff german seats, the A/C actually worked in Florida heat, the V8 sound made you feel like you were going fast even when you were going 10mph under the speed limit. All in all the car blew my mind away.

I kept the Z06 stock for about 6 months and then I decided it was time to just improve on the car in small ways. First up was I wanted to amplify the growl of the V8 so I started hunting for exhaust systems. I saw all the typical and popular systems, yet I kept on digging because nothing truly appealed to me. Finally I found the Bassani exhaust system!!! I was very intrigued by the weight savings due to it being a single muffler system and that it was essentially straight through with no baffle walls. Man oh man was it loud. It droned horribly, but it was the perfect rumble to let other know I meant business.


So after dealing with the noise for 6 months I realized it was time to do something about it. I bought the next round of mods. First up was the madvette insulation kit which was pretty easy to install and helped greatly with the heat and noise. Next was the Airaid intake which was also easy to install and made tip in feel much better. The final mod was an ipod hookup which was also easy to install. Now the car felt right as a DD. I dyno'd the car and felt the numbers were great and reflected how well it pulled in mexico against other cars.

A month later I order some ZR1 replicas in Z06 sizes from Bob at House of Wheels. Bob took excellent care of me and shipped the wheels to me very quickly. I wrapped the rears in NT-05s since my stock Goodyear Runflats had run out of life. The NT-05s dead hooked and took anything I threw at them.

6 months went by and I thoroughly enjoyed the car, however I started to get bored with the power. So I started looking into a cam. I started looking around at vendors on the forum and really liked the cam offer from Carlos at Quality Motorsports. So I started calling around local shops to see who would install it for me. No one was willing to install someone else cam or their prices were out of this realm. I finally called Vengeance Racing and they matched Quality Motorsports deal with their own custom cam. Well I went ahead with the install in June of 2011. Vengeance highly recommended headers to make proper power due to the nature of their cam, however I opted not to due to the cost and I like to enjoy each mod on its own before I add something else. The car made 525/466 in 95* weather. After the install was done I showed up with a Uhaul trailer attached to my truck ready to pick the car up. Before I could pay they told me to go out and make sure the car was up to my expectations. I climbed in and expected some grunt. What I go was beyond my expectations. I pushed the clutch in and hit the start button and was instantly blown away. The car shook violently at idle and just screamed anger. I took it out and ran it through the gears. It was comfortably blowing the rear out even when the rears were wrapped in NT-05s which previously dead hooked before the cam. I was beyond amazed to say the least.


I took the car home and enjoyed it on the street for about a week and now it was time for my first track event. I took it to Road Atlanta with the run group Chin Motorsports. I had purchased some 18x12 replicas from a forum member and used my stock fronts and wrapped them all in Hoosier R6s. I know this is a big NO NO for people new to the track. However I had two arguments for this in my defense. One I was already on NT-05s which are essentially a R compound tire. Secondly I had autocrossed for years in my E46 M3 and was very comfortable with pushing a car hard around corners.

I decided to apply some painters tape to the car beforehand to protect the paint. When I sent my two buddies pictures of my work who were coming up for my track event to hang out and lend a hand if needed they jokingly said I should wrap the whole car in painters tape. Weeeeeeeeell 6 rolls later....





The night before we had a few adult beverages and decided to use the leftover painters tape on my truck:















We had the initial drivers meeting and I met my instructor. He was an older gentleman that was very familiar with the track and corvettes. I explained to him my track background and what modifications were done to the car. We climbed into my car and I started it up. Instantly he said I want you to take it very easy, which I take was due to how angry the car sounded and from how young I was. We rolled onto the track and I instantly felt at home. I took it easy and he was guiding me through the lines. After the warm up session it was time for class. I made the mistake of leaving my buddies alone with my car for 30 mins. I walked out to this:









I was dying from laughter because it was epic in person. The greatest part was the other instructors cracking jokes on my instructor when I rolled over to his area of the paddock to pick him up.

 

We worked through the day together and using his input and my input really started to get the car and myself to flow around the track smoothly. At the end of the day he had to do the writeup on me and wanted to speak with me. He told me I did an excellent job which was very amazing for me to hear. He said he wanted to bump me up to blue group immediately, however he wouldn't be allowed to because Chin wouldn't let him and also because he felt he would be doing me an injustice because I needed more input to perfect my skill and wouldn't receive that if I didn't have an instructor in my car.

A few months passed and a buddy told me he was doing Sebring in October of 2011 with a bunch more of car guys that I was acquainted with. I signed up and joined them ready to go with new Hawk DTC70 pads since I burnt through my stockers in one day and with DBA slotted rotors.

I went through the motions of the warm up session and went to my novice class. I came back out and met with my instructor again who was a C6Z owner also. We jumped in the car and got onto the track. The ground was wet and since it had rained overnight the track was still damp so I was taking it very easy to warm the tires and car up while the track was drying up simultaneously. The car was amazing fast and I rolled up on a buddies GT3RS like he was stopped through the back esses and he had to quickly give me the point by on the back straight. Well on the 5th lap I was coming up to turn 3 and in 3rd gear the car shook. I noticed it and noted it mentally, but braked for the turn. I wasn't carrying much speed because I was at 3500 rpms and all the gauges and lights were a go. I went through turn two and started to throttle in. The car felt unresponsive as if I was in 6th gear. A quick glance down and it confirmed I was in 3rd gear. All of the sudden the car died. I told my instructor the car died and I am going to pull it off the track to the right. He gave me the go ahead and I immediately pulled into the grass as much as I could to be out of the way. He asked me what happened and I told him it just died under throttle and that I was pretty sure I just dropped an exhaust valve and that the motor was toast. He told me to try and crank it and I did but it would just turn over, but wouldn't catch. A track worker made his way over to us and asked us if it would start. We told him no and we needed a tow. Well they shut down the track and towed us off. Xplosive motorsports was on site and they offered to check it out for me. They tried turning the motor by hand and it would turn halfway and hit a point and wouldn't go beyond that. We started pulling plugs and sure enough plug #7 was crushed. Game over for me.

Something I learned that day was how amazing the car community is especially at the track. The chief instructor was actually my old Biology 2 teacher in undergraduate and when I caught up to him in the pits he asked if it was my car that died and was floored when I told him what happened especially with only 13k miles on the car. Another buddy with a Lamborghini Murcielago LP-640 offered me to take his car out. I turned it down because I was uncomfortable taking someone else's car out on the track. It even amazed me more when he pulled back in during the middle of his session just so he could offer again for me to take it out.

Later that day in the pouring rain we (awesome friends especially since I didn't have a winch at the time) loaded the car up and I trailered her home with my head hung low. The next day I went to visit the dealer to tell them what happened and see if they would be able to warranty the car or would I be wasting my time. They said bring it in and we will see what we can do.

I trailered the car in and dropped it off at the dealer. I openly informed them I had a cam and tune on it for the past 2k miles. They knew I changed the oil before and after the track and every 3k or 1 year. They called me later that week to tell me GM requested a copy of the computer to analyze the tune. While this was all going on I was already sourcing a motor through Vengeance Racing know in the back of my mind that I was going to have to dish out some serious bucks to get her running again. Well Gary from the dealer called me and told me that GM looked at the tune and agreed it was safe. They also inspected my valve springs and confirmed it was not due to a failure from those aftermarket parts and approved to put a new motor in. I was ecstatic to say the least because they had saved me thousands of dollars. A few weeks passed and the new motor was in and I even got back all my aftermarket parts from the motor (cam, pushrods, springs).

I took the car out and since I had to drive back up to Atlanta for school/work in the next few days I decided to take the car out around town to make sure everything was in perfect working condition. I looped down one long stop and go road and jumped onto the highway to cross town and come back up a stop and go road. A total of about 12 miles. Well on the way back after the highway stretch as I slowed to a light I heard what sounded like an ambulance and started looking around to see where he was. It turned out the noise disappeared suddenly when I pushed the clutch in and instantly I knew what had happened. The transmission fluid had not been refilled properly after the radiator had been replaced. I pulled back into the dealer and instantly was approached by my SA. I told him what was wrong and he was obviously upset. The tech came out and he too couldn't believe his mistake...3 quarts later into my trans it confirmed what had happened. Now I hit my first dilemma. My powertrain warranty expired in 1 month with only 13k miles on the car and a possibly burnt transmission. The tech told me it should be fine and to drive it and if their was a concern even if I was out of warranty they would take care of it, because he did document it in front of me what had happened.

I drove the car to Atlanta and the new motor felt great. She pulled very hard and even slayed a 600cc bike on the highway very comfortably (in mexico). However, I could still hear a very faint whine. So I took it into the local dealer here and they couldn't hear the noise over my exhaust, but I could definitely hear it.

Now my problem was that I was basically back at square one on power. I knew I needed to spend the money for the cam and tune and I needed to access the issue with the heads in my opinion and that would be a few thousand dollars. Then due to the lift coming up on turn 12 at Road Atlanta I knew I had some aero issues to deal with. Also I wanted to start attacking the suspension. All of these little things were starting to add up in cost and that was out going into a BBK or more power from headers and the obvious clutch issues that would have to be dealt with due to the extra power all without having any warranty.

 

I was talking with my dad about all of this and he was suggest I just get rid of the car and not deal with the headaches, but I couldn't because I was in love with the car. He then told me he had been looking at the ZR1 and it really excited him, but he couldn't get it because he didn't want to deal with a manual. The conversation sparked the idea in my mind that it wouldn't be a bad platform for what I needed out of a car and still kept me in a C6 corvette.

So now I had the major dilemma do I spend roughly 25-35k on a car that was now almost 5 years old or get a new platform with warranty and payments. For me the biggie was going to be that I could afford monthly payments, but would have a tough time paying lump sums for mods. Well the hunt began because I was set on a white ZR1. There were 3 in the country and two were 1ZRs and I decided I wanted a 3ZR because I did use the car on the street and the added creature comforts were needed. Well to my surprise the one white 3ZR was actually located in Daytona where my parents live at Jon Hall. Well I called in and struck up a deal that worked for me. So I trailered the car down to them and we did the swap.


Now for the ZR1 story. Initially I decided I was going to keep it as close to stock as possible to maintain warranty. I ripped the Bassani exhaust off of my Z06 and swapped it over after 200 miles.


I read a lot about breaking new motors in and decided to go with the hard break in. I left the dealer with 6 miles on the car sideways. And did quite a few rips on it that night. The first thing I noticed about the ZR1 compared to the Z06 was that it felt heavy especially in the nose. The car felt much more solid interior wise. The transmission felt much better and the torque was amazing. However, the car didn't feel that fast. Well I drove the car for a few weeks and had to leave for 2 months so I was washing it up before I left and was going to leave it at my parents place. Well I washed it and started it up to pull back into the garage at my parents place and all I heard was what sounded like engine knock. I immediately jumped in and drove it over to Jon Hall Chevrolet. It just so happened that my tech and SA were standing there when I pulled in and both just started shaking their heads asking what I broke now lol. I told them I didn't do it this time and they just laughed and asked what was wrong. I started the car up for them and the tech immediately goes I am pretty sure I know what it is and I'll be right back. He went to the back and came back out with a printout for a service bulletin. My supercharger had failed already at roughly 500 miles. Well I left the car their and caught my flight that day. I got a call 2 days later to confirm the supercharger needed to be replaced. They took care of it and my dad went and picked the car up for me and placed it in his garage. She sat their for the following two months till I got back to place some abuse on her.

I got back and immediately jumped in her with my dad and he had this look on him like he had the itch to drive it so I had to jump out and let him have a go at it while we ran some errands. He was in love. He is anti-modding, but loved my bolt on E46 M3 and till this day says I should have never gotten rid of it. He immediately loved the ZR1 and said it felt like a caddy with the snarl of muscle car. He liked the Z06 with the cam, but didn't feel the lope was comfortable to deal with at every light.

Well it was time to head back to Atlanta so I loaded the ZR1 on the trailer and headed out. I got to Atlanta and Leavinu had contacted me and offered to weigh the car for me on his scales. We threw it on the scales and with the Bassani exhaust it weighed in at exactly 3300lbs with half a tank and me out of the car. This confirmed the weight issues especially when we saw the heavy weight distribution towards the front.



I also ran Leavinu and he dusted me. I was definitely surprised by this. I decided to add some water wetter to the system and figured whatever it would take in the intercooler system and radiator system would be ok for now. Well I started adding to the intercooler system first and it took the whole bottle which really surprised me so I started adding water. A gallon of water later I figured out that the system was empty. So come to figure out when running Leavinu I was on 6lbs of boost and not the usual 10.5lbs. I also had a run in with a buddies full bolt-on gtr that pulled me too when I was on the same boost due to the empty intercooler system.

Anyways I drove the car till about 1k miles and I was definitely bored with the power so it was time to start the modding adventures. I decided to go with a tune and the 2.35 pulley from Lingenfelter. We strapped the car down at Vengeance Racing 2 different times about a month apart and the car baselined 535whp.


It didn't surprise me seeing as how I was coming from a 525whp Z06 that weighed ~150lbs lighter. By the way my best time in the Z06 with just intake, tune (which was a botch job IMO from MTI), and Bassani exhaust was a 11.6@123 on the Nitto NT-05s at 32psi:



This is the ZR1 stock, tune, and then pulley:



At this point I went to the strip which was only about my 5th time going and on street tires and it was in the high 80s ran a 11.2@129

 

Well after that last run which was my best as I was leaving the track I notice the exhaust note changed. I drove to the gas station and noticed that the mufflers had metallic flakes sitting in the tips. Well it turns out I blew out the passenger cat after only 4 days with the new pulley. I took it back to Vengeance to confirm what I thought and this is what we saw:





So we pulled all of the exhaust system down and gutted the drivers side cat.



I came to find out that the 2.35 setup has a lot of belt slip so to solve the issue I ended up notching the pulley a lot. I then decided to add meth to the system for safety. I didn't add timing and only corrected the AFR. I also added in a larger heat exchanger that Vengeance Racing provided that they felt better than what was on the market. Mine now is about 3 times taller than what is offered out there. Its all about surface area when it comes to cooling and not depth.


This was with meth and still belt slip:



I went from making ~14-15lbs of boost to seeing on my data logger to seeing 17lbs consistent and even seeing a random 18.1lbs.

So far the car has run a 1.51 60' 10.6@129 in 92* weather. I let a buddy jump in it 15 mins later and he botched the launch and ran a 11.01@135 due to being able to flat foot shift. A 135 says a lot about the power of the car especially after being heat soaked like no other.

I was thoroughly impressed with the car at this point for only having the 2.35 pulley, meth, gutted cats, K&N filter, and Bassani exhaust and drag radials.

At this point it was time to throw some turns at her. First up was Little Talladega. Its a tight track and very hard on tires. I mounted up my Hoosier R6s on my CCW 18s. The car was fast and there was no doubting that. I had another Z06 owner riding with me and coming down the back straight I was starting to push it and I braked and there was nothing. I pushed harder and still nothing and we were quickly approaching a 90' turn. So I yelled to him saying we don't have brakes and started to pump them. Well they slightly came back and I quickly realized it was because they weren't burnished. Well I took it easy for a few laps and dragged the brakes to build up a lot of heat in them. I let her rest between sessions and the car felt a lot better. I finished the day almost without any issues. I had another C6 vette owner riding with me when alarms and lights started going off everywhere. Temps were out of control and the car was telling me to kill the A/C even though it was already off. I shifted up to 6th and let her cool. The rest of the day I had to be a gear or two higher to keep temps in control. Well now we identified the latest problem and it was time to deal with it before I went to Road Atlanta again.

Well first step was I hated the window in the hood and wanted to make it functional for heat dispersion. I saw the Lou's car from LG Motorsports had a vented hood. Well after some hunting I found out it was an aftermarket fiberglass hood, but they did make the insert separately so you could switch between the clear window and the vents. I contacted ACS Composites and they confirmed the vent insert would fit on the stock hood. So $175 later I had in my hands the insert and had her painted in satin black to match my stock wheels which I had powder coated in satin black and the barrels painted in the blue to match the calipers:













The next adventure was to swap the transmission fluid with Redline ATF, clutch fluid with Castrol SRF, brake fluid with Castrol SRF, intercooler and radiator with water and water wetter, then I wrapped the exhaust manifolds with DEI titanium exhaust wrap, and a 160 T-Stat.

Time for Road Atlanta and 2 days of abuse were due. The car performed great. Ambient temps were 100* and coolant tapped 230* and oil temps only got up to 275*. The only issue I had was some serious blow by. I think it was partly due to no catch can and 5w-30 oil. I have now switch to 10w-40/20w-50 oil to see what it does.





Well at that event the same buddy came up with his GT3RS and he has way more track time than me and we had a little run in. I chased him for a bit and was only using 4th and 5th gears and was all over him and he had to give me the point by.









So now onto the latest details. I am installing a nitrous system for a 150 wet shot. I will finish it up tomorrow. We shall see what it does on the dyno and next Saturday I have a 1/2 mile event that I shall be attending.

Final thoughts.

I think the Z06 is an amazing car and very tossable compared to the ZR1. The magnetic ride feels numb and doesn't give back the feedback the good old shocks and spring setup of the Z06 did. The ZR1 provides the power capabilities that the Z06 couldn't without spending tons of money to achieve. The ZR1 commands attention compared to the Z06, but comparing stock for stock is not worth the money in my opinion. I don't regret my purchase by any means. I enjoy the car thoroughly and for now I think I will be done with power mods on the ZR1. Next will be some sway bars and from there who knows. If I max out the handling which I slightly feel I am near since I have already rubbed the front fender guards I will switch to a coilover setup. I might do the heads for piece of mind seeing as how one guy claims that their was excessive valve guide wear on his 1300 mile ZR1 according to Katech. Also I want to purchase or build a larger tank for the intercooler reservoir system.

 

Good read thanks for sharing. Both your z's were/are nice cars.

 

Super Jealous.

Thanks a ton for sharing. I think I've got a C6Z in my sights for the future if things go according to plan.

 

Thank you very much for sharing, I am now subscribed this is officially my favorite thread.

 

A lot of great information in this thread - many thanks to the OP for taking the time to share all of that.

I wonder what your thoughts would be in a new Z07 Z06 with the performance handling package vs a stock ZR1. The debate never seems to end on CF.

I was very close to picking up a 2012 Centennial ZR1, but just couldn't make a deal with any stealerships in Canada (it's a long story). I'm glad it didn't work out as I ended up with my Mongoose Grand Sport, and the new C7 is being released in January.

BTW, Arctic White is the best color in a ZR1! I still want one to match my AW 1999 Camaro SS one day. Also hoping to get the Grand Sport out for some vintage road racing in the next year or two - have a few mods I would like to accomplish first, and the nearest track is being re-paved over the next two years.

Again, thanks for sharing. I would like to hear your thoughts on the Z07 (Carbon) Z06s, if you ever get a chance to drive one.

 

Awesome write up and quite a journey you have been on. When i was up at vengeance getting my cam installed, yours was there also and got some pics of your car as it looked great with the ccws on it. If your ever in NC ill try to keep my car away from you with the bad luck you have had lol jk man. Good Luck with the car and cant wait to see the results with the 150 shot.

 

I think the Z07 with some basic bolt-ons would be the ideal car for the street and track. I am yet to drive one, but if I do I will definitely post up about it.


Lol thanks. I am about to post up a thread with the results.