Skip to footer

Corvette Stringray: Manual gets best mileage, but automatic comes close

Corvette Stingray with manual transmission gets 29 m.p.g. on the highway, but automatic is rated at 28 m.p.g. Reports of a GM seven-speed dual clutch transmission suggest a future automatic Corvette Stingray could do even better.   

|
Alan Vanderkaay/General Motors/AP/File
The 2014 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray – the first new version of the American sports car icon in nine years – sports a 455 horsepower, 6.2-liter V-8 engine that can take the car from zero to 60 m.p.h. in under four seconds.
  • By Nelson Ireson Guest blogger

The 2014 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray holds the honor of being the only car on the market with more than 455 horsepower and a 29 mpg highway EPA gas mileage rating. But that's only if you opt for the seven-speed manual. Choose the automatic and you'll lose 1 mpg city and highway.

Gas mileage ratings for the 2014 Stingray with the six-speed auto were just released yesterday, scoring 16 mpg city and 28 mpg highway. That's only a touch less efficient than the 17/29 mpg of the manual version, and the combined rating reflects the same difference: 20 mpg for the automatic, 21 mpg for the manual.

Is that a good argument for why manual transmissions are better? Definitely.

But there may be more to this story in the coming months (or years), as reports of a seven-speed dual-clutch transmission patented by GM recently hint at a possible third option for Chevy's already incredible performance-per-dollar Stingray.

While the time frame on the dual-clutch's production is still a mystery, we can think of no other current GM product that better deserves the high-performance mix of manual and automatic characteristics. If it does end up in the Corvette, we'd be hard pressed not to pick it over the manual, for the same reasons Porsche has seen fit to make it the only option in the 911 GT3.

As an extra bonus, the dual clutch is likely to be even more efficient than the manual 'box. Save the manuals, or save the gas mileage? We don't really care so long as it ends up fast, fun, and (relatively) affordable.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to Corvette Stringray: Manual gets best mileage, but automatic comes close
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Business/In-Gear/2013/1006/Corvette-Stringray-Manual-gets-best-mileage-but-automatic-comes-close
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe