The Hybrid AWD Chevy Corvette E-Ray Weighs How Much?!
Chevy engineers promise that the E-Ray’s hybrid-electric all-wheel-drive system is worth its weight penalty.
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Chevy's new 655-hp all-wheel-drive 2024 Corvette E-Ray hybrid is tons of fun, figuratively and literally. We say that because we've already taken a thrilling ride in the passenger seat and because the E-Ray convertible earns the inglorious distinction of being the first 'Vette to crest the two-ton threshold. The drop-top version of the E-Ray will weigh 4,056 pounds, while the coupe will cross the scales at 3,890 pounds, according to Chevy.
Engineers tell us an E-Ray weighs about 260 pounds more than a comparable Corvette Z06, with most of the additional poundage stemming from the hybrid system's 160-hp electric motor, 1.9-kWh lithium-ion battery, and the accompanying power electronics. Compared to a Corvette Stingray, the E-Ray also picks up weight by adopting the Z06's wider body along with wider wheels and tires. The lightest current-generation Corvette that MotorTrend has tested,a Stingray 1LT coupe, weighed 3,552 pounds.
Chevy engineers weren't cavalier about America's sports car putting on pounds. "This car is the heaviest Corvette we've ever done," Corvette executive chief engineer Tadge Juechter said, "but we did everything in our power to make it light." The car comes with carbon-ceramic brakes standard, and a lithium-ion 12-volt battery saves 18 pounds over the lead-acid alternative. The electric front drive unit, which weighs about 80 pounds, uses a magnesium case. Optional carbon-fiber wheels trim another 41 pounds off the curb weight.
And because the hybrid battery is located near the car's center of gravity, in the tall and wide tunnel between the driver and passenger, the weight distribution is barely changed. Every C8 Corvette we've tested to date has carried its weight split between the front and rear axles at either 40/60 or 39/61 percent. Chevy says that the E-Ray will nudge that to 41/59 percent.
That detail was critical to the development of the E-Ray because the engineers weren't just out to build the quickest Corvette ever with a 2.5-second 0-60-mph time. The E-Ray also had to corner and lap a track like a Corvette. As chief engineer Josh Holder put it: "The mass penalty had to earn its way onto the car." In other words, if an idea or component added weight without improving the performance or the driving experience, it didn't make the final cut.
Not Your Average Hybrid
Don't think of the E-Ray's motor and battery as a conventional, fuel-saving hybrid system. Chevy has set a low bar by telling us we can expect the E-Ray to match or just barely beat the mpg numbers of the Corvette Stingray. Instead, the hybrid hardware acts as an unconventional all-wheel-drive system—one that happens to also add 32 percent more power than the Stingray.
Executive chief engineer Tadge Juechter says Corvette buyers have been asking for an all-wheel-drive 'Vette for years, but the front-engine, rear-transaxle layout of earlier generations kept Chevy from even considering it. The move to a mid-engine architecture in 2020 finally made all-wheel drive feasible.
Chevy's approach is innovative if you take the long view of automotive history, but the basic idea is a fairly common approach among hybrid performance cars such asthe Porsche 918 Spyder andthe Acura NSX. The E-Ray leaves the Stingray's 495-hp 6.2-liter V-8 virtually untouched (only the starter has been changed) and installs an electric motor to drive the front wheels. There is no mechanical connection between the mid-mounted V-8 and the front electric motor. "We think it's the lightest way to do [all-wheel drive]," Holder explained.
We'll note here that some of the E-Ray's closest competitors manage to offer all-wheel drive in a lighter package. A Porsche 911 Turbo S coupe is about 260 pounds lighter than the E-Ray, and all-wheel-drive Audi R8 coupes weigh in at less than 3,700 pounds. The E-Ray's closest analogue, the recently departed Acura NSX, suggests that the about 3,900 pounds is simply what it takes to make a mid-engine, aluminum-intensive sports car with an electric front-axle assist.
Could an AWD Corvette Be Built Another Way?
Taking the traditional approach and using a handful of driveshafts and differentials to build an AWD C8 Corvette possibly could have been lighter, but it wouldn't have been easy or cheap. The challenge is that the Corvette's eight-speed dual-clutch is mounted behind the 6.2-liter V-8, and routing torque to the front wheels would require running a driveshaft under, around, or through the engine. It's not an insurmountable problem. The Audi R8 and Lamborghini Huracán do just that, passing the front driveshaft alongside the engine oil sump, but it comes with packaging compromises. The engine is mounted off-center so that the driveshaft can run up the central tunnel.
The other alternative method would have been even more wild and complex than the E-Ray's hybrid system: install transmissions on both sides of the engine. Chevrolet actually did this withthe 1961 CERV II concept, a sort-of spiritual predecessor to today's mid-engine Corvette that used two-speed transmissions on either side of a mid-mounted V-8. Fifty-one years later,the 2012 Ferrari FF riffed on that idea and brought it to production. That Italian shooting brake sandwiched a front-mounted V-12 between a two-speed gearbox that drove the front wheels and a seven-speed dual-clutch transmission turning the rear wheels.
The Proof Is in the Performance
Juechter, Holder, and the rest of the team are confident that any concerns over weight will melt away the moment a prospective buyer slips behind the wheel. The E-Ray is intended to be more of a grand tourer than a road course scalpel like the Z06, but they're promising this heavier hybrid will still deliver the performance we've come to expect from the Corvette.
I fell in love with car magazines during sixth-grade silent reading time and soon realized that the editors were being paid to drive a never-ending parade of new cars and write stories about their experiences. Could any job be better? The answer was obvious to 11-year-old me. By the time I reached high school, becoming an automotive journalist wasn’t just a distant dream, it was a goal. I joined the school newspaper and weaseled my way into media days at the Detroit auto show. With a new driver’s license in my wallet, I cold-called MotorTrend’s Detroit editor, who graciously agreed to an informational interview and then gave me the advice that set me on the path to where I am today. Get an engineering degree and learn to write, he said, and everything else would fall into place. I left nothing to chance and majored in both mechanical engineering and journalism at Michigan State, where a J-school prof warned I’d become a “one-note writer” if I kept turning in stories about cars for every assignment. That sounded just fine by me, so I talked my way into GM’s Lansing Grand River Assembly plant for my next story. My child-like obsession with cars started to pay off soon after. In 2007, I won an essay contest to fly to the Frankfurt auto show and drive the Saturn Astra with some of the same writers I had been reading since sixth grade. Winning that contest launched my career. I wrote for Jalopnik and Edmunds, interned at Automobile, finished school, and turned down an engineering job with Honda for full-time employment with Automobile. In the years since, I’ve written for Car and Driver, The New York Times, and now, coming full circle, MotorTrend. It has been a dream. A big chunk of this job is exactly what it looks like: playing with cars. I’m happiest when the work involves affordable sporty hatchbacks, expensive sports cars, manual transmissions, or any technology that requires I learn something to understand how it works, but I’m not picky. If it moves under its own power, I’ll drive it.
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